i´ll be gone

HI EVERYONE..........tomorrow im leaving with my family to mar del plata.......in tents. so i wont be around for awhile....oh and i´ll be doind a major picture update soon, so you can see pictures from guillermos birthday and prom, and pics from marianos birthday, and pics from christmas, and mar del plata. :) Rocio has been in cordoba all weekend, so on sunday i didnt go to centro, which is the norm. sunday afternoons when you wake up after along night of dancing you go to centro with your friends and walk around and sit in the plaza and drink coke and such. but i had no one to go with. so i slept over at my dads house with my little brother........fun fun. we spent the whole day at the pool with the girl from Thailand....shes leaving in two weeks already! im really gonna miss her. i went to centro after and hung out for a bit, my brother is giving me ANOTHER dreadlock right now as we speak.......ay dios. very demanding he is. oh well. have a happy new year everyone. until january..........

feliz navidad

Hola!!! I hope everyone had a wonderful christmas!!! Here in Argentina, I definitely had a new experience at Christmas. My brothers spent the 24th with their dad. I went with my mom to her friend´s house for dinner. Rocio came too, her mom doesnt celebrate christmas. After we ate, at about 1 AM, Rocio and I went back to my house where Guillermo had all of his friends over. We got bored so we walked to my friends house and then we went dancing! On christmas!! So i was like totally weirded out by not being with my family. Oh and on top of it i went with my mom to do ALL of her christmas shopping ON christmas eve!!! The entire city bought all of their gifts on christmas eve.....everything here is at the last minute. Then I went to the farmers market with her and we made a fruit salad. I did have a lot of fun experiencing a new culture, but it was also very different. Yesterday was Maxi´s birthday, so I went to his house to wish him a happy birthday and such. Today he is having a party. On Tuesday our family leaves for the ocean, where we will spend 10 days doing NOTHING. cant wait. gustavo is really excited to show me everything, he wants me to wake up early so we can see the crabs on the beach. today we spent the whole day together at my dads house. we swam in the pool, went to eat ice cream, and we just got back from a trip on the four-wheeler. nice bonding time. anyway, i better go shower. merry christmas and happy new year!

feliz navidad

havent written in a week, i know. my apologies to all you loyal fans. ive been hanging out with rocio a lot.......this saturday for the first time since ive been here i went out with GIRLS ONLY!!! i loved it!! i had so much fun. she even came over to my house and got ready with me before. i always get ready alone and in a hurry because my brothers yell at me if im in the bathroom too long. anyways, im working regularly every morning with my mom in her escribania........dont know the english translation. sorry. i do secretary stuff. i even answer the phone and handle clients!!!!!!!!!! its so fun! i seriously completely totally forgot that wednesday was christmas already. i havent bought anyone any gifts, which it really isnt that common to give gifts here. according to my mom, everyone gets together in someones house to eat like pigs. then after one AM, you start house hopping for toasts....then the young people go out and dance like crazy!! sooo pretty excited for that. however, im going to my moms friends house because my brothers are going with their dad. so im kinda sad im not passing it with my bros....although they do get on my VERY last nerve. then we are going to the ocean for 2 weeks for new years.......in tents. :O
hahahahaha i cant WAIT to tell you guys all about that.....so if you are wondering at all about my love life im totally crushed out on maxi still, and i have about 5 other guys crushing just as much on me..............it makes life very complicated. an argentinean boys heart is easily broken. anyway im so happy i have rocio!! she is super nice and im sorry its just nice to have a GIRL to talk to once in awhile. im also hanging out with the son of my moms friend whos 15. drinking mates...doing nothing,,,,summer life you know??? happy holidays everyone. :)

deep thoughts...

Major cultural differences between the Argentineans and North Americans: Today I was walking to centro to do some major shopping in my alone time. So i´m walking, and I started to think about all of the things I´m missing school, me being such a freak about school and learning and stuff. And I started to totally freak out of course because here school is so much easier and the entire lifestyle is so laid back and less work-driven. So I´m like, oh my god, I´m getting dumber because I didn´t learn anything in school and I don´t do anything during the day and I don´t have any responsabilities at all! But then I started to realize that I am learning so much about life and other people and myself! So then I decided that those things are worth a lot more than what I can read in a textbook and forget after I take the test. For example. In the U.S. I judged people heavily, not gonna lie. When I came here, I didn´t have any friends and couldn´t interperet the difference in character between one person and the next because of the language barrier, and just had to go with my instincts. my brothers tell me that people who listen to cumbia music or do this or do that are bad people and i shouldnt hang out with them. But for me, they seemed like really nice people who I got along with great! Then I realized that I too judged people for things like the music they listened to and not for how they were on the inside!! So I´m really glad I made that realization! THen I also realized that its okay to take some time out of your day for yourself and you dont always have to be stressed out and doing something productive just to feel like youve accomplished something. Sometimes its just nice to sit outside with people you love and talk and laugh and enjoy life. Because this is the only life we have!! And although it seems like you have an eternity to live you dont! You can´t spend your time worrying what other people think about you and what you do with your life, because its yours and no one elses! This has been the biggest thing that the Argentineans have taught me. I just thought I would share it with you all.

osea hello!

hi again! still dying of boredom here in south america........no not really im actually enjoying the freetime i have. i get to bond with my brothers a lot more, actually more Mariano than anyone else because Gustavo and Guillermo are never home. And with my mom! Which I love. People here are getting ready for the holidays, just like everyone else i suppose. However not in the same way as rushing to buy christmas presents and last minute wrapping and planning and baking and "kilombo", craziness. For my mom and I would think the rest of the working people, rush to finish and close up the businesses for the vacation in January. Here, after the holidays, the ENTIRE POPULATION migrates to some other province for a few weeks or a month for a vacation. My family is going to Mar de Plata, a city in close the the capital Buenos Aires and right on the beach. My mom is super excited. In other news, life without my grandma, dont know if i mentioned that she moved out, is really weird. My mom doesnt know what to do for food anymore hahaha.....just joking but really. just without one old lady the whole house is more quiet and calm. its very very different. its funny, although i expected there to be fights and arguments like any other family, i never expected HUGE changes, like my grandma moving out! im FINALLY finding some girlfriends to hang out with which i totally needed...and not ones that talk behind my back and such. the girl who waxes and does my moms nails is superrrrrr nice and today im going to go out with here somewhere. :) chau

Day of the Virgin........was monday.

hello people.....monday was a day off for everyone because it was day of the virgin, on this day everyone puts up their christmas trees and christmas lights. its very weird not having snow or cold or anything that significates winter around christmas time. anyway, today is mariano´s birthday! he´s 15. hes been sleeping all day, i just made him hot dogs with mayonnaise which is his favorite thing to eat.....his friends are coming over tonight to celebrate. As for me, I kind of have started to walk down the path of broken hearted people.......I am officially ending my crush on Maxi. Not that any of you care about my boy problems, at least I have my mom to talk to about these kinds of things, she is the EXPERT on conquering and having all the men follow her around like sick puppies. But she has eyes for only one man, which would be her on and off baldy boyfriend. hahaha. I am getting really, really close to her. I think its because she has three sons and I am the daughter she never had, which I really like. However, it makes MAriano a little bit jealous sometimes. Oh well. Tomorrow I start working for her! Im nervous but also excited to get out of the house. Yesterday Nat came over because my mom and two brothers went back to Buenos Aires for the Ska-P concert, which got rained out last time, so she made me a special rice dish from Thailand. It had sausage, tuna, carrots, onions, tomatoes, egg, some sort of sauce and sugar. It was delicious. Then, at about 11:30, we went to go rent a movie. She stayed at my house all night and we didn´t sleep because today at 7 she left to go travel with the other Thai exchange students to Southern Argentina, where it is freezing and there are glaciers. Ive heard its beautiful. but cold. no me gusta. Okay back to me :), so there is this man from Africa who sells jewelry and stuff on Belgrano Street, which is like this one street in centro that all the teeny boppers walk up and down day and night when they have nothing to do. so one day i asked him where he was from, and we got to talking, and he knows nat, (of course he knows nat everyone knows her i swear), and he said something really interesting. he said that me, nat, and him are all brothers because we are all foreigners. i kind of made me feel special, and i realized how alone this person felt and how sad he must be living here without anyone who understands him. which then made me realize why I get along with nat so well, because we understand each other and what its like to live somewhere where you dont fit in perfectly. Then i started to think that being an exchange student really messes with your head. like, you have to be in tip top mental shape to be able to understand and interperet all of the things your mind throws at you. its like, one day i think in a certain way, and the next another. then you realize how hard it is to be alone without your real family to help guide you through all of these new experiences your living and then your realize how alone you are and how no one really understands what you are going through and, dont really care. So i am like great. my brain is literally scrambled eggs right now. its like someone shook my head so hard i cant think straight!! on top it sometimes the words come out in english and sometimes in spanish. nat´s host brother is in Austria right now, really he´s in Italy but he goes to school in Austria, so he´s learning german and italian so i feel REALLY bad for him. i cant even handle english.spanish in my head! okay well i am babbling too much i should go take a shower now. :) hopefully you guys understand the confusion that is going on through my head......but dont worry, im laughing about it. im more confused than before i came here and i came here to unwind my head......ohhhhhhhhh dear.

Hi again....i just got back from the pool with my mom, she went to work again. for once in my life i am alone in this house....grandma left to visit a friend!!! shockingly because she is always home. i am expecting maxi to come any time now so we can talk about some things....tuesday was kind of a WWE smackdown between the ex girlfriend, maxi, and me. but id rather not get into it. anyways, wednesday was guillermos prom. everyone was crying and crying, and even i got teary-eyed. it made me miss my real family a lot. sometimes it gets very hard not having your real family here. otherwise vacation has been good and not so good. im super bored, so next week im going to start working with my mom. so that should at least kill some of the boredom. at least i wont be in the house all day. today im going to eat with the son of my moms friend.........tomorrow i get up early to go to rosario for an AFS lunch,,,,,,, then gustavo´s graduation and THEN im going out with the girls!!! monday is a no work day so im also going out on sunday.........:) thats all for now chauu

customs and stuff

holidays: here holidays are pretty much the same as in the US. We don´t celebrate halloween or thanksgiving. every once in while, like once a month or every other week, sunday is dedicated to on thing or another, Cultural day and things like that. One important day is the day of San Martin, who freed argentina from spanish rule. another important day is July 9th, argentina´s independence. Christmas here is celebrated in a very interesting way...for one its in summer, which means no characteristic snow. aLSO, instead of spending the entire day with your family, EVERYONE, meaning the people that dont usually go out, goes out. From what ive heard its what everyone waits for and EVERYTHING is open, no stores close. and all the people drink a lot and go out to clubs, like theres so many people you cant get inside the club and the majority of the people have to stay outside. so thats really different. otherwise, theres not really any major holidays.
marriage: marriage is something i havent heard a lot of people talk about. the divorce rate is insane, about everyone i know is either separated or divorced. i think it has to do a lot with the men here. having a girlfriend really doesnt mean commitment for them, for the girls either. so that is one huge difference i´ve noticed. because its so easy to get alcohol and how late people stay out, anything can happen and people dont really value commitment or anything like that. chovinism definitely exists, and its really sad because the women also are a part of this, not just men. women dont find it unfair that they have to do ALL of the house work and attend to men and girls HATE eachother with a passion over ex boyfriends and things like that. which brings me to my next topic, anorexia. girls are very cautious about what they eat and are always comparing eachother.
after high school kids usually stay with their parents. its actually very common for parents to mantain their kids until they get married.



Well, getting back to my life, i cut my hair! and my brother got dreadlocks. today i finished school for good! i wanted to join a tango class but it doesnt start for a while, so i might get a job at a hotdog stand that my uncle owns. if not, i might help out with my moms best friends clothing store. if i dont do SOMETHING im going to bored allll summer. saturday the concert that my brothers were going to go to got cancelled because of rain, so they changed the date to next tuesday. wednesday is guillermos prom, which i am very excited for. saturday we have an AFS lunch with the exchange students and their families. i have to bring a dessert from my country, which i am having difficulties with because finding something authentic to the US is pretty hard to come around. well, thats all for now. cchau

guachin!!

hello! today was my last day of school! i passed ALL of my tests which means i dont have to go back!! i even got 100% on two of them! :) tomorrow at 5 in the morning guillermo my mom and mariano are going to buenos aires. guillermo and mariano are going to see their favorite band ska-p, which this whole week i´ve gotten the privelage to listen to as they waited in anticipation, and i actually like them. tomorrow i invited my friends over for pizza and stuff, since my brothers are gone and i get peace and quiet finally. bad news, i somehow (living with three boys that dont shower might be the cause) contracted the lice epidemic. i am totally obsessivley picking at my hair now and i had to do everything myself, buy the shampoo, pick all the bugs out with the comb and everything. so i am thouroughly disgusted. and i wanted to cut my hair this weekend so that will have to wait. tonight was supposed to be the goodbye party for the seniors but it got cancelled because its raining. also on saturday mariano is getting dreadlocks so he is like off the wall about that too. although there was a family feud this afternoon when the boys wanted to leave in the afternoon but my mom said no....good thing i was sleeping siesta. anyways, thats about it from here...................sorry these things are so short lately..dont know why im running out of things to say so quickly..chau

bored

hellooooooooo everyone! today is sunday! today i woke up at five in the afternoon!! im about to go to centro with some friends, and then im waiting for my mom to call and then im studying for a chemistry test because this might be my last week of schooL!!!! :) on friday i went to a friends house that they call Pignatta for his birthday. I made a cake. Yesterday I went to a dinner that they had at my school with my mom, of course my brothers didnt plan on attending, an 18th birthday party in a bar and then I went to base. my mom is getting ready for summer, too. shes planning and end of the year party and our summer vacation to mar de plata in january. today is super hot. ive been eating watermelon and drinking terere all day to keep cool. i dont really have much else to say right now. leave me comments if you want me to share something specific about life here that i overlook.

hola

hello again, im at my dads house right now. i just got out of the pool, just thought i would rub it in. im going to go meet nat in centro to go have a coffee, maybe a coke instead because of the heat. today i presented a project in class about e. coli. every single day next week i have tests!!! because next week could potentially be my last week if i pass all my classes....so im studying hard!! which annoys my mom because she thinks this year should just be full of fun fun fun and nothing else, but for me, "fun" things lose their fun if you dont work hard to appreciate them....anyways, yesterday i went to gaucho with my mom to go out to eat. then just me and her drove around in the car for awhile, until midnight! i really liked it. what else....im slowly forgetting how to speak in english, like literally i dont know how to speak in the english tone anymore!!!! on saturday im going to a birthday party. next friday is the goodbye `party for guillermos class, and two wednesdays from now is the "prom"!!!!! well im going to go check on a tango class, i have to walk and its about amillion blocks. chauu

happy birthday to guillermo...

hello..............so i have a lot of things to write about!! on friday, i slept siesta form 12 to 5 on account of getting in at 3 in morning because i went to rosario on thursday for the cultural festival with AFS. at 6 nat came over and she helped me make alfajores "africanitos" for my brothers birthday. i chose these specifically because me brothers call guillermo "black" as a nickname, and the alfajores are made of two chocolate cookies with dulce de delche mixed with chocolate.........and luckily they were a huge hit! i say luckily because normally i am a pretty good cook/baker but here i cant make anything! it all turns out disgusting.......so i was really proud of myself when everyone said that the alfajores turned out well!! :) saturday was a big hit...my cousins and my uncle arrived from buenos aires saturday at about 1AM......one of my cousin´s is a girl and shes 16 just like me, she is so awesome! we have a lot of things in common. she dances a lot and she loves going out to dance, which was so nice since my brothers absolutely HATE it. anyway, saturday i spent the morning-afternoon picking up the three cakes my mom ordered, and the meat for the asado, and guillermos birthday present, etc etc. at two we began to EAT EAT and EAT some more......asado, tiramisu, lemon pie, dulce de leche cake, and the alfajores i made specifically for the party that night were slowly disappearing during the day...that night i went party hopping. started out at guillermos party, then i made my way to my other friends house. then i went back to guillermos party and THEN i went dancing. my cousin, who is a little shy, didnt go out with me but next time she comes, when there are no birthday parties to go to, we´re doing the normal round.......soñado (bar), hora veinticinco (when soñado closes, everyone goes here to eat something and for one last cheap beer before base) and then base (disco). so that should be fun. this week is the second to last week of school. i have tests every single day this week. its really frustrating because i study and study and then on the test i confuse the answers and get it all wrong. but oh well. im still really proud that im taking tests in a different language! what else.......my mom SAYS shes going on a soup diet for guillermos promocion (prom like party for the seniors). i dont know if i mentioned that i bought my dress already so im very excited about that. sunday i showed my cousin around town, it was nice to finally show someone around instead of someone showing me around. this week im going to check out a tango class so that is something else im very excited about. my grandma went to buenos aires with her son so the house is very quiet, when no one is home...like now. its a nice change because here you cant get one minute to yourself. i must go now, i will put some pictures up for your viewing enjoyment... :)

IN SCHOOL!!!

im writing this in school, because our computer is broken and never available.........so anyways, tonight i am making chocolate alfajores, two cookies with dulce de leche which is like caramel in the middle. they´re called africanitos..im making them because my brothers call guillermo "black" as a nickname. tomorrow my aunts and uncles that i´ve never met before are coming for his birthday! i have two birthdays to go to tomorrow, guillermo´s and agustin´s who is sitting right next to me :) he turned 19 on tuesday but hes in my class. its very common for 18 and 19 year olds to be in classes with 17 years olds, because its very common to repeat two or three years of school as well. yesterday i went to rosario with some AFS kids for a festival of cultures. they have food and sell things from a variety of countries. when i got there, the first stand i saw was one from Iran! i was so excited. me and the girl from thailand ate there and also in paraguay and greece. i got home at 3 in the morning and i had to come to school because today i have a quiz and since its the end of the year im trying to get my grades up so i dont have to come back. on wednesday i spent the whole day after school with nat in centro. she wants a bikini. i bought a dress for guillermo´s "prom", its silvery and sparkley and super cute! i still have to look into tango classes, i need something to do ASAP. well i should go, class is over!! chau

summer is coming!!

hola..sorry for not writing, now our computer´s screen sometimes goes completely black without warning. this weekend i went to a cumpleaños de 15 with 2 of my friends from school. im kind of sort of dating maxi but not positively...yet. anyways, on sunday i went to something called a quinta, its a place that has a pool and sunchairs and umbrellas and its open to the public. it is getting extremely hot here, only two more weeks of school :) then, as my friends tell me, its pure partying everyday. hahaha. this saturday is guillermos birthday, which also means the big party him and his friends are having. other parties coming up are la promocion for the seniors, which is like prom and is going to be held in BASE, the most popular club here. also, my grade is organizing a goodbye party in the school for the seniors. we actually spend our environmental services class planning it instead of learning, but thats nothing new. oh yes also on friday i walked to my moms work to take her secretary out for something to drink. usually my mom goes to but she was in rosario. we go about once a week to my moms favorite bar, el guacho, because its full of old men and she likes to have about 8 boyfriends at a time which all have around 50 to years of age on them so im like, gross, but whatever. anyways, i went with her secretary and we talked and it was really fun. what else....my grandma is still sick, its been about two weeks now of raviolis and empanadas and stuff...although i do love empanadas, getting kind of sick of them right about now. i heard its snowing there, all i can say is haha! its going to be weird imaginaning a christmas without snow, on top of it christmas eve is like the night were EVERYONE, meaning the people that dont normally go out to dance or to a bar, go out! instead of spending the whole night with their family, they go out and party!!! its so weird. on saturday ihad my dance recital!!!! it was a lot of fun and my mom caught the whole thing on camara. she told me that i was the prettiest, even though there are about 6 girls who could seriously pull off model careers-only moms would. :) now im checking to see where i can start tango or folklore dancing. busy busy. well thats all for now, i have to go study for some final tests!!!! chauuu

OBAMA!!

hello everyone!!!! go obama!! right now im watching the elections with my grandma before i go to dance class. everyone is gone, moms at work, the boys went to my dads pool..because its hot as a burning inferno here. i was in school (no air conditioning) until 5 today, i would be going to the pool too but i have dance and we only have two more classes until our show!!! so ive been really busy lately. this weekend i went dancing with my friends...i had a lot of fun, i think the most fun ive had going out since ive been here! i got home at 8 am, the latest so far, now my goal is to stay out for breakfast. hahahahaha. anyways sunday i didnt do much, considering i slept until four, that doesnt leave much time to do anything. hmm what else, right now school is a mad rush of students trying to get their grades up in these last four weeks so they dont have to come back in december. so im pretty much cutting down 3 forests at a time with the amount of paper i use to translate all my notes and study from them. sorry earth. ive also been really busy buying......my moms birthday was on saturday, which was a huge hit. all of her friends came over and i think she had a lot of fun. her secretary made this ENORMOUS cake, and of course, with the three brothers i have, it was finished yesterday. i even invited my friends to come over for mate and cake we had that much, i didnt think it would be gone in such a short amount of time!! next up is guillermos birthday. max, the student from denmark, is becoming friends with my guillermo and his friends. so all of the november birthdays (max, guillermo, guillermos friends) are having a huge party next weekend. then the 28th of november mariano and guillermo leave for buenos aires to go to a concert, so i basically have the house to myself for the first time ever!!!!!!!! my grandma has been sick for about a week now, so we´ve been eating a lot of "fast food" which here means empanadas, pizza, ravioli, etc etc. after the dance show i think im cutting my hair and dying it again! and my mom is BEGGING me to try waxing instead of shaving my legs...

weekenddd

hi everyone, today is my moms birthday!!!! so far i think she is having a great time, i woke up at 2 in the afternoon because last night i went to a 15th birthday party which is like a sweet sixteen in the Unites States, only way more overdone. I didn´t home until about six this morning, but i left my moms present and card for her to open just in case i didnt wake up. Today all of her friends are coming over and she told me and my brothers that we HAVE to go out tonight because she wants the house to herself, so tonight im going to BASE to go dancing with my friends. Yesterday a few adventurous people here decided to dress up because it was Halloween. My brother got really mad and said that these people were ¨sudacas¨ and not ¨yanquis¨ and shouldnt be allowed to do that. but he gets mad all the time over things like that. other than that, halloween isnt really celebrated here. yesterday my youngest brother went over to a friends house and threw eggs to ¨celebrate¨:/ anyways, just wanted to let you know my plans for the weekend, see you all later.

holaa

Hi everyone! Today is Thursday, I just got back from school and now I´m eating lunch before I have to go back. Today is also Max´s (the boy from Denmarl) birthday! Me and Nat (girl from Thailand) are going over to his house today for leche chocolatada and i think cake too. Yesterday we went to centro to buy him a shirt and little necklace. While we were shopping, we found a shirt for 80 pesos, which for me isnt that expensive. I thought it would be perfect for Max, so i kept pushing for us to buy it,but Nat got really nervous and walked out of the store quickly. When I asked her what was wrong, she said that the shirt was really expensive and that we should look somewhere else. Then I realized that for her the shirt would have costed her 800 bahts! Money value isnt something I had thought of as a problem before. Now I know to be more aware of cultural things like money. Anyway, I also bought my mom a nice perfume that smells similar to mine because she loves mine so much. Her birthday is on Saturday. I also bought the finishing touches to my dance costume!! The show is next week. Can´t wait. Hmm what else..oh and i bought a belly button ring that has the face of che guevara on it........dont worry mom, i dont have the hole... :) and the BEST thing i have bought myself so far is the calle 13 cd!!!!!!!! which i listen to every minute that i can!! Life here is pretty much the same as usual. Right now there is a big debate on when school is going to end. first it was the november 21st, then the 28th, and now they´re saying december 12th so that students have time to get their grades up so they dont have to come back in the summer. yesterday my brother had to go to gym, and i asked him if he was going to go, and he told me¨"well yeah, if i get even one tardy i fail all my classes and have to go back in the summer to make up all of them, which isnt that big of a deal, considering im only passing two." here it is very common to be failing a few classes, one because you have amillion opportunities to make them up and two i think that the education system is.......lacking, shall we say. today i spent one hour sitting outside and playing soccer, and then i spent the other hour copying down a photocopy. :/ oh well. right now my class is planning the goodbye party for the seniors.......we´re trying to have it in the most popular bar, el soñado, but we´re not sure if its going to work. everyones all huffy because its an all alcohol party. now this just makes me laugh. actually its kind of sad that kids my age dont know how to have fun without alcohol. well thats not true, but it is what everyone looks forward to on the weekend. well thats enough for now, i think im going for a walk by the fields before school starts. see you later......

my trip to cordoba

Hello everyone......I just got back from my trip to Cordoba this weekend. I got home at 3 in the morning today so I didnt have to go to school in the morning and I only had english class in the afternoon so its starting off to be a pretty good week. The AFS trip was a really good experience. THinking aboout all the people I know from all around the world is really crazy!! Now i¨ve met kids my age from places like turkey, tailand, iceland, latvia, france, italy, germany and more. The cool thing is that although we come from different places and cultures and speak different languages, we really are all the same person with the same thoughts and views of the world. The coolest part is that not everyone can speak English, so we all have to communicate with eachother in Spanish! its so awesome. i definitely learned a lot about myself over this weekend and now i have about a million places to visit!! on top of that cordoba is just and AMAZINGLY beautiful city, with a little bit of everything in it. In the camp we did some little activites to help understand the feelings that we´re going through and what else we can do or what objectives we can make to maximize our study abroad experience. I really liked the activites. In one, we had to create a mask of what we think people see when the look at us on the outside and on the other side of the mask we had to create who we really were on the inside. Through this activity I learned how much I have grown in these past months! Its crazy! Then my group got into a really heavy discussion with the boy from Turkey, who literally came to Argentina out of survival. He has a beautiful tattoo on his arm of all the instruments he plays. He says in Turkey, its forbidden to have tattoos and that when he has to go to the army next year they were going to try to either cut it off or just beat him. I also found out that someone had cut his stomach with a knife because he doesnt believe in God. I didnt even know this was going on in Turkey, and just to stand in front of him and listen to him tell me this made me really sad and angry at the world. I´´m not really sure what I´m going to do to help change things, but I know I will do something. we are all the same animal and killing and hating each other wont solve anything.

Going to Cordoba

hello everyone........sorry for the delay, part of the argentinean culture is to wait until the last minute for everything so i dont think the computer will be fixed for awhile. today i am going to Cordoba with all of the AFSers in my area and the the ones that are in the province of Cordoba. We´re going for the whole weekend. I guess I am pretty excited. This week I have been really busy. On tuesday we had paro again so i didnt have to go to school. I went to the plaza with my friends and had mates and so forth. Wednesday I went for a run on the road the leads to all of the farm fields and the cementary. It is a really beautiful area and I enjoyed the exercise. Yesterday I went to my dance class again, we have a show coming up on November 8th, so we are preparing really hard. I only know one dance because i joined late, but i am asking a girl in my class to teach me another one. School is finishing up too, November 28th is the last day. Here it doesnt really matter if you fail a class during the school year because you can go back in december or march to re take a test and get your grade up. i find that kind of crazy! The weather is getting super hot, i still havent been able to try out my dads pool but according to all my friends every day in the summer is used up swimming in pools so im not too worried. Other than these little things, Im starting to be more aware of the culture of the people here. The girls are very nice, but also very jealous-I have learned the hard way not to mess around with a girls crush or even their ex-boyfriend from years ago. I also have noticed that the girls do EVERYTHING around here, and the boys do nothing which is very hard for me to swallow. My mom works all day and comes home to my brothers screaming and yelling and begging and whining. The other day we celebrated Mother´s Day here, and my mom was the one who made the meal and washed the dishes........talk about going against the whole idea of Mothers Day. I bought her flowers and I´m still working on her letter, I still have a little bit of trouble writing in Spanish. In other news I am pursuing a boy.....hahaha. My mom calls him my future boyfriend, because its been awhile since I´ve showed interest in him but we´re still not ¨together¨. His name is Maxi and hes tall and he likes to talk...a lot. which all people here do. He also makes me laugh because he´s such a chamuyero, a boy that likes to sweet talk girls until we´re all left with cavities. :) Something i am really proud of is doing a presentation for school in spanish! i was really scared but i was very proud of my accomplishment. i went shopping the other day, i still cant find me nice pair of jeans but i got some shirts so of course im bringing them all to cordoba. speaking of cordoba, i should get going to gym class now, not that arriving 10 minutes late is out of the ordinary for anyone :) will write soon!

huge update...computer still dysfunctional

okay people just to let you know i had just written a super long blog explaining a whole bunch of stuff and it totally just got erased and im really super mad on top of that im using the stupid computer that the mouse doesnt work so im not really sure if this blog will even work anyways things here are pretty good. on tuesday after school my brothers and i went to the plaza thats right outside the school and picked blackberries off the trees and ate them!! it was so much fun, then i stained my backpack purple and guillermo stained my face, my entire face, purple-he then told me that blackberry juice doesnt come off of people that have yankee blood. now normally i wouldnt retort back to this because i get "yanqui" (thats how they spell yankee, i mean, if your gonna make fun of me at least spell the word right) jokes a lot, but this time i told him that it was a good thing that i had iranian blood then and that shut him up pretty quick. im also a very bruised being because of all the fights and tackles i get caught in the middle of on the kitchen floor, actually everywhere, the kitchen floor, bathrooms, on top of tables, fights break out whenever wherever. so anyways ive been caught in a few of those before, and trust me, it hurts. the weather is getting superrrrrrrrrrr hot and everyone is getting excited for summer, which officially starts november 28th, last day of school! hopefully i dont fail any classes, if i do, i have to go back in december to take a test for another chance to pass, which im like, we dont get that in the US! so i guess its not really that big of a deal if i fail or not. hahaha. hmm what else oh yes my package finally came!!! my grandma was very skeptical that something had been taken by the argentinean mail people, but i think everything was there, i sure hope so, considering i paid about $200 for it to get here. This weekend has been full of rain, we had a thunderstorm last night. me and my brother went dancing in the rain last night while we were waiting for his friends to arrive, then i went walking about 10 blocks at 3 in the morning with josue (very cute, very single) to buy a coke and sandwiches at an open kiosk. dont be alarmed, this is a very normal thing to do here!! i guess you could say im used to the nightlife here now. im so sorry for the very late response, i promise to write more as soon as i can!!

sorry.....my computer broke

sorry i haven´t been able to write, my computer caught a "virus" (it was really probably one of my brothers who doesnt want to take the blame) and now the mouse doesnt work, so i have to go to my dads house if i want to use the computer until the other one gets fixed, which probably wont be for awhile. anyways, this week i´ve had an extremely inflammed throat for four days, i didnt have to go to school tuesday or wednesday though! now i feel better, just in time for the weekend!!! which this week went flying by!!! yesterday "me di una vuelta" with guillermo´s friend. i should explain to you all what dar una vuelta is. WHen i first came here, i realized that if my mom needed to go buy something, my brother always wanted to go with. one time i went with to buy cell phone cards and i realized that my mom purposely missed the turn to our house and kept going. then i realized mariano always asks my mom if we can dar una vuelta.......then i realized what it means! if you have a purpose for going out, you dont just go and come back, you take your leisurely time driving or walking around....at first i was like, what the heck is the point of this? but now i kind of like it. so yesterday i walked around my town with coco for about half an hour. it was really nice. Everything here is much more laid back and relaxed, which i´m starting to really appreciate!! Well thats all i have for now, until next time.

Did you know today is the day of ñoquis?? yum...

hi everyone, hope you had a good weekend! mine was very full. On friday i went shopping with the girl from tailand (not sure if you remember her name is natnapin, aka nat). i bought a skirt and cute shirt and i also bought my costume for my dance class. later we were going to go to a bar, but we just stayed in the house with mariano and his friends. The house was very empty without guillermo, and gustavo is always at his dads house so it was just me and mariano the whole weekend. on saturday i went out with mariano and his friends again, we went to a party with nat and kids from her school and then we went to little bar. i had a lot of fun. mostly because the kids in my class (the girls) dont really talk to me, or if they do they dont have nice things to say, and all the boys try to kiss me! its nice having brothers who have good friends. sunday i spent recovering sleep and studying, for me sundays and tuesdays are the worst days of the week: sunday is like a traditional argentinean lets-not-do-anything day, i mean you literally do NOTHING. tuesday is another terrible day, worse than monday, because i go to school from 7:45 to 12 and then 1:30 to 5! its horrendous. right after that i have my dance class, so tuesday is always a full day. and of course tuesday is always the day that guilllermo´s friends come over and have mate, which i love to be a part of mate rounds (its so much fun), but im literally in my house for 15 minutes and then i have to go. ahhh and on saturday i spent the whole morning with my mom at the hair salon!! i got blonde highlights and different shade of brown. it was really fun, although i must say the salons here a little bit more carefree when it comes to scrubbing the shampoo out of your head or plastering on the hair dye. mariano undid the other dreadlock he gave me and now is insisting on giving me number three. the problem is i, unlike 3 members of my family, shower everyday, and that just doesnt work with dreadlocks you know? tomorrow im expecting my package, finally! i cant wait. i think culture shock is starting to hit me as well, which isnt very pleasant. oh dear, its time for the boys to go to gym, WWE smackdown. i will talk to you all later................

forgot about my blog...

sorry for the delayed response..totally forgot to update...well right now my life is full of tests, which arent that difficult, but its a lot of work for me because i have to translate all of the notes into english and then make sample questions for me to get a good grade. anyways, saturday my mom had an asado at our house to celebrate spring, i didnt go out because i was tired, and truthfully a little afraid of the drunks. haha. this week has been a lot of fighting between my brothers and my mom because guillermo has around 50 faltas from school (absences), your only allowed 15 a year-mariano has 25. guillermo is determined to continue miss gym and his contraturno (classes in the afternoon). yesterday he went to gym, the first time he has gone since i´ve been here. he wasnt very happy. what else....im going to the hair salon with my mom soon, i also might go back to rosario and stay with my counselor for the weekend. its really pretty there. well, i added a picture of my house so that everyone can see!!! its really cute. yesterday i made persian food for my family and ithink they really liked it! well, i dont have much more to say, until next time.

spring has arrived and is in full bloom...

Finally, spring has come, and it seems like the whole world has come out of hibernation to celebrate. Today I was the spring festival at school, and although i did have to parade around like a dancing monkey in heels, i actually had a lot of fun, except for the fact that i was taller than the king but oh well. I also played a game called the orange game, its where two people have to hold an orange on a certain part of their body and then they have to dance together without making the orange fall. For example, we had to put the orange on each others foreheads while we danced. it was really embarrassing but fun. then i got ready for the king and queen thingy. i didnt win Reina de la primavera or princess, but i did get miss simpatia, which i think is just a sympathy prize because im an extranjera-haha. after i went to the plaza with my friends and looked at the sea of people that gathered in the plaza for all the fun festivities. everyone dresses up in bright colors and it was really fun. i just got back from my friends house, we drank mate and ate pastries and such. at seven my dance class is going to perform at the shopping center, i wont be in it because i recently joined and i didnt have time to learn the dance, but i will be performing on New Years! Anyway, this whole weekend should be one HUGE joda (party). People are going to get crazy.....hopefully not too crazy....

hellooooo

hi everyone...i just received the news that although no one leaves me comments (hint hint) a lot of people are "following" me through my blogs. :) so i decided to write one today since i haven´t written in a week and im sure everyone is just ANXIOUSLY awaiting another update on life in the unkown....well friday is the big dia de la primavera, hip hooray. The king is insisting that he is not going to school that day for the party, which means I won´t have to be queen, not quite sure how i feel about that, on one hand im relieved that i dont have to embarrass myself and on the other i kind of want the experience! Today I went to the WalMart of Argentina with Mariano, my grandma, and my mother. It was really fun, especially because I didnt have to go to school in the afternoon. My mom made a big purchase, a table and chairs with a huge green umbrella for the patio! we just finished constructing it. Did I mention we have an orange tree in our backyard? its in full bloom and it smells wonderful. Now that its getting nicer out i spend a lot of time on the roof looking at the stars and drinking terere, which is mate (look it up if you dont know what it is) but instead of hot water you put juice. Its delicious. My brother gave me another dreadlock yesterday.....on saturday im going to the hair salon with my mother to see if i can get extensions.....very excited! Other than these small things there is talk in the house of me possibly enlogating my stay....mommy???? :) Guillermo wants me to write in English right now so i am doing it. he always wants to learn new words and sometimes when i cant find the word he says that the "yankees have a very poor dictionary" which im starting to believe is true myself. do you KNOW how many swear words you can conjure up in this language?!?! its never ending....everyone always asks me to translate and there is no english translation!! hahaha...more of an enrichment to my already colorful spanish vocabulary. well, other than that nothing has been going on.....school is school. never want to go, not like we do anything anyways. today my teacher didnt come for one class sooo yeah. i think guillermo just got mad that i put that we dont do anything but its true. okay well i should go now...

more pictures...

pictures..

just some pictures to show you all......nothing has been happening...just school, school, more school, i went to science fair with the school yesterday, actually we drank mate in the plaza right outside....just busy with SCHOOl and my dance class...and learning how to play the guitar..thanks to my brother guillo :) anyway the pictures are from rosario, from the roof of my house, and óther random things...and now i have a million pictures of my friends from school because the stole my camera at the science fair and took about 80 pictures of themselves...i must say the argentinean pose for girls is quite amusing...see what you think about it..i cant stop laughing.......

lots of little things to tell...

WELL to start this off I would like to tell a story....I am sitting in class quietly doing an activity, not really paying attention to anyone around me. My friend Dai is at the chalkboard yelling and writing something and all of a sudden I hear my name. So I turn around to see whats going on only for her to tell me that I´ve been elected by my classmates as "Reina de la Primavera" which means Queen of Spring. So I´m like, what the heck is that? If you remember the spring festival i was talking about before, each grade elects a queen and a king and basically the girls get all prettty in dresses and stuff and parade around in front of the whole school (which is only about 300 people but still) and then they make you DANCE; cumbia, cuarteto, reggeton, the whole nine yards. THen they elect one king and one queen to be the real royalty of Primavera. So this should be just swell. The king is someone we call Perrito (Mariano). he has a huge crush on me. :/ anyways, what more should i tell. Today I am going to Rosario with my family. Tomorrow is the AFS meeting. Yesterday Mariano(bro) and Guillermo got really excited about shooting "targets" meaning me, with the air gun. It was just wonderful. OHH yes and I started a dance class!! I went last night, I had so much fun! and it felt really good to exercise, since i havent done any since i arrived here! I met a lot of nice girls at the dance class who are completely OBSESSED with the United States. They asked me to say United States in english about 8 thousand times. oh and they dreadlock has unraveled but that chunk of hair is all burnt and crispy now so i really dont know what im going to do about that. Oh and mom, my package is on major delay. Yesterday I had to go to the post office to sign something so that they could ship it over to Venado Tuerto....another 15 to 20 days they said. Welll thats all for now.......chauuu

Brothers drive you up the WALL

Hello. Once again, nothing interesting has been happening. There is no more "paro" so this week was a full one. Only my second full week since I´ve been here. From what I´ve heard people back in Minnesota are also starting school this week. So now we´re all in the same boat, except for they dont have to wear a uniform and they are probably doing more productive things than copying from a book in every class. Anyways, the weather here is getting really nice..spring is coming! Everyone at school is getting really excited for the first day of spring festival that we have at school (i swear for every little tiny thing we dont have class), and my classmates and I are making t shirts to represent 4th year natural sciences. Woohoo. This coming saturday I´m going to Rosario, kind of like the Buenos Aires of my province, for an AFS reunion. Yipee. Last SAturday I went to Soñado, which is like bar, and then also to Base again with the girl from Thailand and her friends. I had a ton of fun. Got home at 7 in the morning, but still had fun. On Monday Guillermo´s friend Coco came over and he took some really amazing pictures from the roof of my house. Just thought you might want a taste of what Venado Tuerto looks like from up above. YOu can also see (and hear) the amusement park from the roof. That picture was taken by Gustavo. Enjoy. Actually, I can´t find the pictures right now so I´ll upload them later. Going to my dad´s house with Gustavo and Guillermo.

I now have a dreadlock in my hair...

I haven´t written in awhile because nothing has been happening. This week I only went to school on Monday. I was supposed to go to today but AFS had this promotional thing that me, Max, and a girl from Thailand who has been here for 6 months had to do. We went around to different schools to explain what AFS is and why we should do it....basically a lot of teenagers staring at you with their eyes bulging out of their heads and holding on to every word you say. I also am going to be in the newspaper (again), on TV, and I was on live radio!!! It was a very long day, from 8 in the morning until 6 at night. I have become friends with the girl from Thailand. She came here not knowing one word in Spanish and now she speaks very well! Anyways, after I got home from this I went to the skate park with my brother and his friends. It is very weird to see my brother outside of the house with his friends, since I only know him as he is in the house with his family. Then me and my other brother got cold so we went home, but our grandma was out buying food for dinner so Mariano decides to give me a dreadlock. Not joking. He even took a lighter and burnt it and everything. So now I have this lovely dreadlock in my hair. Its small, its even kind of cute. But still it was by force. oh and also yesterday I had a bonding time with my grandma. We went to centro to buy a skirt for school and buy other small necessities. We also went to a gym which is close to my house to see what kind of dance classes they offer. So now I´m going to dance hip hop every tuesday and thursday. They also offer brasilero and reggeton and all that. I asked Thailand girl to come with me so I´m not alone. And just a sidenote I am very sorry for my broken english but my mind half thinks in English and half thinks in Spanish and once I say one word in spanish i have to say the rest of the sentence in spanish. It takes me a long time to write these blogs because i have to think about what im saying!!!!!! its very crazy. and now that my head is spinning with palabras in english and spanish i will leave you all to decipher this text.

If this were my normal life this never would have happened...

Okay so I just wanted to quickly tell to all of you the FUNNIEST thing that happened to me that only happens in movies and would never happen to me because I don´t have brothers. So on Saturday I was invited to go to this disco called BASE at 3:30 in the morning. So my mom told me I should take a nap and then started getting ready at 2:30. So I fell asleep around midnight, got up at 2:30, and Mariano and Guillermo aren´t home and everyone else is asleep. So I´m tip toeing around getting ready. When 3:30 finally came around, my friend Nico calls to say that he´s outside waiting. So I go for the door and I´m trying to find the keyhole because they always leave the key in the door and i cant find it! ONly to realize that at nighttime they lock the door and put they key in a secret hiding place! So i´m looking around for the key for about 10 minutes when i finally tell nico to just go without me because i´m literally locked inside my own house. But he keeps insiting that he will wait. So my next option is to go out a window, but i cant because there are bars over every window in my house! so i open the window that is close to the door and im talking to nico about what i should do (this was 20 minutes later) and i look down and there is the key!!!!! so i leave and i dance and have fun and i dont get back until seven in the morning! and it wasnt even over!!!!!! so as im going to open the door to my house im trying not to make a sound as to not wake anyone up. i even take off my heels so it doesnt make that tack tack sound. so i open the door just a pinch, and i see this black thread wound around the electricity box and im thinking, "hahaha mariano good one, but it didnt work!" because i´ve tried to make those traps a million times and they NEVER work, its just how it goes. So then i walk about two steps farther into the entryway (which was dark) and my stomach pushes against this thin piece of thread and all of a sudden the most horrible high pitched noise in the world goes off!!!! it was like a death switch to my eardrums!!!! and on top of that my brother guillermo was asleep on the couch!!! hahahhaaaa i didnt know what to do so when guillermo woke up from the noise i told him to turn it off, but he was so tired that he just mumbled to me to ¨hit the switch thats over there¨and fell asleep. so i finally found the stupid thing and i was so mad i almost went into his room to wake him up but i just went to bed. then at about nine that morning my grandma got up to go somewhere, and she fell for it too!!! so theres this like buzzing in my ear for the rest of the day. in the end i let it go and i didnt bite his head off like i thought i would, and now everytime i think of it i start cracking up!!!! just thought i should let you know....

Potatoes and Mayo

Hi again.

Today is Saturday. I just accidentally hit a button and now I´m typing in underline and I can´t get rid of it. OH well. Yesterday I had to go to school. I had Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday off this week and next week I have tuesday, wednesday, and thursday off. Loving it. But i have to take a Physics test next friday and i dont know any of the material because I hadnt arrived in argentina yet. So that should be just wonderful. Yesterday after school i decided not to go to gym class at three and i made a cake with my brother. it was really good. Then i went with him to buy beer and we watched the olympic soccer game, which started at one in the morning, and which argentina won!!!!!!!! yay. I´m sure all of my guy friends are going to be off the wall today. Tonight I am supposed to go to a disco called Base1. People here are OBSESSED with Cumbia music...if you dont know what it is, I suggest you give it a listen. Here they are especially obsessed with Grupo Play, a local pair who do cover songs to a cumbia beat. It is a traditional type of music that originated from Colombia. Now its been computerized and modernized to make the newest sensation sweeping latin america. Everyday at school when we have a break, all the kids turn on their cell phones and turn the volume up really loud and walk around outside with this sh sh-sh-sh sound. I love to dance cumbia, but here they dance it differently. Anyway, today i just got back from lunch with my AFS counselor and the boy from Denmark, who doesnt speak any spanish. It was going fine and dandy, except for I couldnt understand a word my counselor was saying to me in english because of this weird, frenchish accent she had. Then I realized she was speaking Dutch with Max! So the whole time thý´re chatting away in Dutch and I´´m wishing i could take a siesta.

Now I am going to do a segment on the "lovely" fashion here. On wednesday I asked my friend Dai if she would take me shopping, which was just a lovely mistake. I went into the store and I asked for some pants, and she asks me what size. I say I dont know because the sizes are different in the US. She says, I think you´re a 36, and pulls out THE TINIEST pair of pants i have ever seen in my life. My pinky finger couldnt even fit inside I am not even joking. What is fashion here are too-tight tops and butt squeezing pants. ANd i´m like, no thank you. There are some stores with more familiar clothing that I think I will check out instead. FOr now, I think i´m good if I stay away from plaid stretchy pants and lime green leggings.

HEre in the picture was the barbecue at Mariano´s. These are literally all the boys in my class right there.

End of weekend update

This week is going to be very interesting! Yesterday, Monday, I didn´t have to go to school because it was Día del San Martín, a day where all of Argentina celebrates their independence of the Spanish Colonies, however they don´t celebrate it as their Independence Day. Their actual independence day is July 9th, and on that day they were freed by the Spainards from the French, however they were still under Spanish rule. Anyways, tomorrow and Thursday I don´t have school either for something called "paro." I don´t really understand what goes on these days we dont have school but hey it works for me. Let me finish talking about my long weekend. On sunday I felt a lot better and I didn´t have a fever anymore, so I went to the Parque de Diversion with my younger brother and my friends. They set up State Fair style rides in a park close to my house. I´ve been there three times already with Gustavo. He loves it. He´s been back and forth between the park and the house (getting more money to go on the rides) all weekend. He keeps begging me to go again, but I think I ´ve had my share of dangerous, rusty, put-together-in-a-hurry rides. After the park on Sunday, I went to a girl´s birthday party, which I didn´t get there until 1 AM! It is so strange to go out here. There is an EXTREME overabundance of alcohol. Every five seconds someone was going outside to open another bottle of something or the other. The funny thing is the parents don´t mind, in fact, sometimes they are sitting right at the table and drinking with their kids! But I have also met parents who are very against their children drinking. I myself find beer and wine disgusting with dinner, dessert, potatoes, asado, whatever. But they seem to love it. Anyway, now I can say I have survived my first Argentinean weekend!!....................alth0ugh I spent all Monday recovering sleep. :)

un poco enferma

Hello everyone, sorry I haven´t written in awhile. My brother Mariano is always on the computer and he gets very angry when you try to get him off. Today is Sunday, and I have just spent my first weekend going out with my new friends. On Friday, I went to Mariano´s house for a barbecue. There were 14 of us. Each one `pitches in a little money for the food and drinks, and then the boys cook the meat. It was a lot of fun and a great way to get to know everyone. The time for going out here is very different. The kids usually leave there houses at midnight and don´t come back until 3 or 4! It is very hard to get used to, I had to take a nap before I left! Yesterday I got invited to a 15th birthday party, which is like a sweet sixteen in the United States. However, I didn´t feel well and ended up falling asleep before my friends came to pick me up, which was at 3 in the morning! I ended up having a fever and I still dont feel very well, but my mom and grandma are taking very good care of me. And my brothers still like to mess around and make me mad. For example, Mariano yelled in my ear while I was taking a nap, and today Gustavo got me out of bed to show me his new bed. The good thing is Guillermo always is looking out for me and tells them to leave me alone. Besides that, school is going better now that I am getting to know everyone. I took my first test and I got a really good score on it! Even though it was just a spelling test I was still really proud of myself. I have to read a whole book in Spanish! School is very hard work and I have to study very hard! Well, thats all I have to say for now. Talk to you later

Acostumbrandome....Getting used to it!

These last two days have been very full. Yesterday was my first day of school. We study very odd subjects and from what I can understand they seem completely pointless and awkward. For example, we took notes on rodents nutrition, where they can be found, how to get rid of them and things like that. And that is what the whole class is about. Its really weird. I decided to stay in Natural Sciences so I have a lot of physics and biology and chemistry classes. Our schedule varies from day to day, but I always go to school from 8 until 12 or 1 and then I usually have to come back at 3 for another class. This whole week has been a huge adjustment period for me. Yesterday I also had a computation class, which is basically a teacher reading an article or something from a book and a handful of students typing what the teacher is saying, which I dont get that either but oh well. Today my mom let my brothers and I skip school to watch the inaugural ceremony of the olympics, haha. It was spectacular. After I went with Gustavo to his dad´s house where I helped him make a drawing for his school. Gustavo and I go everywhere together. He takes me around the town and I already know how to walk home from school by myself! I had to go to school at three for gym. I learned how to play handball, which is very interesting. In Argentina boys and girls have separate gym classes. Girls play handball or volleyball and only have gym once a week. Boys play soccer (obviously) and have gym twice a week. As far as friends go, I feel more comfortable understanding and speaking around my peers. Today they invited me to meet al ¨centro,¨ which is basically the main part of town, on sunday. I am very excited. Besides my friends, teachers and basically anyone I meet asks me A LOT of questions. None really seem to understand the idea of Foreign Exchange Student and they all say, ¨Oh, poor you, no one you know can speak english¨ and then proceed to talk to me in english. What a pain. They also dont seem to understand what I´m doing here even when I try to explain to them. Oh well. Everyone is very very nice and understanding and extremely friendly here. It is a very beautiful country with many beautiful people.



IN THE PICTURES you will find me with my good friend I met in Miami Patrick..he is studying in Santiago del Estero in a university. There is also a picture of the tomb where Eva Peron is buried in Buenos Aires, along with other famous people. Then the Pink House, which is the Argentinean equivalent of the White House. The colorful building is in La Boca District, which is a neighborhood in Argentina. All of the houses and buildings are painted bright colors for a certain reason, which is when the immigrants got off the ships and came to Buenos Aires, they found the paint below the deck and decided to paint their houses, and it has lasted all these years. There is also a picture of a gigantic McDonalds which is in Buenos Aires. Check the other blog for more pictures.

Update!!!

Wow, I haven´t written for only a short while and I already have so much to tell! On Sunday (the third) I arrived in Venado Tuerto by bus. It was a 7 and a half ride, and I was so nervous that we would miss the stop that I only slept for one hour. I had to ask someone which stop Venado Tuerto was, and it took me about an hour to get the courage to do it! When I finally met my family, I was overwhelmed with relief. My mom is EXTREMELY nice and touchy. My two younger brothers, Mariano (15) and Gustavo (12) are non-stop chatterboxes and crack jokes every other second. They are always laughing, and it was a great way to break the ice. I also met my grandma, who is seventy might I add, but she left the house at about midnight to take the bus back to Buenos Aires to visit her family!!!! She´s not back yet. My older brother is like a skater boy and has a lot of piercings, and he is also very nice. He plays the guitar really well. When I got home, they had a party for me with empanadas y chorizo and a lot of family and friends. I was very grateful, but also very tired. On Monday I woke to find Mariano not at school, so I talked to him until the others got home. I had a lunch of milanesa (breaded beef) and mashed potatoes. It was delicious. Meal times are very different here. Breakfast is pretty non-existant, just coffee or hot chocolate. When everyone gets home from school and work at 12 or 1, we have a large lunch. Then its siesta. My brothers and I usually watch a movie while our mom sleeps. At around three, mom leaves again for work and doesnt come back until 9 or 10!! Then we have a small dinner and get ready for bed. Yesterday was my first day of school. I t was very hard and probably one of my low points. For one, everyone stared at me which is very awkward. And I know I can speak pretty sufficient spanish, but I didnt understand anything was telling me. It´s very hard being labeled as "stupid" or "foreign" or being referred to as the Yankee. Everyone watches every move you make. Hopefully it will get better. Also, the school system and the school are very different. The rooms have limited heating capabilities, and are very small. Also, once your a junior, you have to choose one of the two career paths you want to take: Art Design and Communications or Natural Sciences. THe bulk of your subjects are fovused in this general category. They decided to have me sit in a natural science class for one day and the art design class for another and then choose. Today i was supposed to go to the art class, but I had to buy school supplies and a uniform instead. I am getting really close to my younger brother Gustavo. Hes very funny and is not afraid to correct any mistakes i make. Overall, i feel very comfortable here. Language barriers are hard, but im trying. I cant wait until I feel more part of the family and less like a foreigner.

****In the pictures you will see me with my youngest brother Gustavo in my room, my mother making a face, and my oldest brother Guillermo and Gustavo.

Trying this out

Hi everyone! I just made this blog and I'm trying it out to see if it works. I leave for Argentina in just 6 days! Time went by really fast; I'm very excited to leave but also nervous and sad! My goodbye BBQ is coming up, I hope everyone can be there. My mom is reading over my shoulder and this is getting awkward, so I'll stop for now.

Nos vemos!