Halloween

lost!

lost!

pre-club lost!

angie!


What a crazy week! I know I say this every week, but this week it is actually true.

Last weekend was definitely a blast. On Friday night I went out with Heidi, Angie and Angie's friends to a club and it was quite fun. There are many stories of the night, and Heidi and I ended up being out till close to 6:30 am. It was one of my latest nights in a long time. Saturday we celebrated Po's birthday once again by singing some Karaoke and going to the club Lost afterwards. It was my first time ever karaoke-ing and I can honestly say it was a blast! We sang anywhere from "Like A Virgin" to "Never Going To Give You Up" by Rick Astley. I really enjoyed it, and to me, her birthday was a blast! (And we all looked fabulous!).

Unfortunately, following an amazing weekend, I got sick. Very sick. Much sicker than I've been in a long time. It started out as a sore throat and then turned into a runny nose, fever, nausea, basically the whole deal. And it has been this way for the past four days. Four days of being a house prisoner, since till today I could not get out of bed. Still though, I've had presentations, mid-terms and regular classes this week so I had to go. Luckily, Wednesday was a "feriado" or holiday because of the national census. Like in the U.S., Argentina only does a census every ten years, but unfortunately in order to do it, their system is to shut down the entire country, declare it a national holiday and force everyone to stay home. So basically, for the duration of the day, all hospitals, kiosks, restaurants, malls, parks, grocery stores, and even gas stations were closed. Nothing and no one was moving. It was one of the quietest days I've ever had in my life. At the same time, I was dying for some ibuprofen to relieve my fever, and you can imagine my frustration to not find a single pharmacy open. It was a day from hell. In addition, ex-Argentine president Nestor Kirchner passed away on the same day, so the news took up every single channel on TV, leaving me with nothing to watch but pictures and talks of the manifestations forming at Plaza De Mayo. I hope to never repeat a day like that again.

Today I actually got out of bed (despite the tsunami-like rain), and headed over to my grandparents' to get some money, and after I had an interview at a teaching center. I interviewed to volunteer in teaching underprivileged kids English, every Monday and Wednesday night. Luckily, I got the job! I am very excited to start THIS Monday. Woo!

Tonight, even though it is Halloween weekend, I will be staying in to make sure that I fully recover. Tomorrow though, I plan on taking my costume for a night out on the town with the girls. I can not believe that Halloween is already here, and that it is almost November. I will be arriving home in less than 7 weeks! It sounds so wild to me, time has gone by so fast. My mom is coming to visit on Thanksgiving, and I just can't believe that's right around the corner. I am so excited!

Colonia

I'm sorry to all my readers for taking so long in updating this week, but school work is really piling up on me! (and it doesn't help that I didn't take a minute out of my weekend to do it)

So I'll skip through my last week of classes since nothing major happened and I'll get to the good stuff. Friday I met up with Becca at the heart of the city and we walked along Florida Ave and settled into a McDonald's. After we order our delicious coffees, we sat to discuss some issues we had been having and made up, which was great! After our reconciliation we headed over to Florida Ave again and decided to do some street shopping, since I hadn't been after my robbery. I absolutely love el centro!
That night I invited Becca to sleep over, and the next day we headed to the feria in front of my house, right at Parque Centenario. The fair was good, and we found some amazing stuff! (Becca got a Louis!). I had taken Nano (my scottish terrier) with us, so after the feria we sat down at a cute cafe outside and had lunch. Nano made friends really quickly! Following lunch, I decided to take Becca to the Abasto shopping mall, which I was sure she had never been to. I was right. There is a type of dave & buster's place upstairs and we decided to hit up a few games. We had a blast being kids again! We even went on the ferris wheel! The day was concluded with a dinner at Plaza del Carmen.

Sunday was a beautiful day, made by the fact that I traveled to Uruguay! About 3 days before, I decided to go to Colonia, Uruguay but I didn't want to do it alone, so I asked my friend McKenzie who I had only seen a couple of times in BA to come with me. We ended up leaving around 8am to go to the port and our boat left at 9. The ride was pleasant and calming, and once we arrived in Colonia, we saw how beautiful it really is! Pictures do not do it justice. The whole historical district of colonia is very narrow and stretched, but to get through it all walking is about an hour. It's very tiny but so beautiful! The water stretches on for miles and it is very colonial and calm. It was a perfect day. I came home exhausted.

Monday was miss PoLin's BIRTHDAY!! We celebrated by going to an awesome thai restaurant in palermo and it was so great to see all the girls after so long! Katie, Heidi, Amelia, Po and I had a lovely dinner and even lovelier drinks! I love girl nights! Her birthday will be followed by some karaoke and boliche this weekend!
Before PoLin's birthday dinner, I met up with Kait! Kait is a girl I met at goucher (back in the day), and she studied abroad in the spring of last year. When I arrived in July, she was still here and we attempted to see each other but it was a bit difficult. She came back now for a week and invited me out for some coffee in the old opera house turned book store! It was absolutely gorgeous and seeing Kait was amazing! She has such an amazing connection to Argentina, and I'm so glad she can see all its beauty. She also has a fabulous argentine man, so who could blame her for wanting to come back?

The past week in school has been awful, since midterms have taken over and will take over next week as well. This week I had Relaciones Internacionales and Sociedad y Cultura. Next week: Relaciones Publicas y Historia de Civilizacion y Cultura. Que bueno no? So, mis amores, this is what I blame for not being able to update. Until the end of next week will also be very hectic, so I'm sorry if I can not update for a while, once again. I promise as soon as all this crazyness is over, I will come back!
Until then, mucho amor <3

Lemon Pie!

Another week has come and gone, and we're winding down to the last two months of my trip. Crazy!
Before I continue, I just want to once again make a shot out to mi novio Mickey =) He has stood and stuck by me throughout my entire trip and so he is amazing for that!

I won't share much about my week sitting in classes, so I'll just skip over to Thursday. Thursday like any other day, I went to classes and later joined Heidi for a shopping trip in once in preparation for her up-coming Cordona Oktoberfest vacation! I finally learned the craziness that is that area, and how much shopping can be done there! After we were done, we were surprised by Katie and PoLin! It was wonderful to FINALLY be able to catch up, and I told PoLin about the amazing shopping and so we decided to take a trip during the weekend.

Friday I met up with my uncle Gabriel, and we had lunch at the very cute restaurant Anamora, two blocks away from Tribunales. It was nice to just sit and talk, and make plans for next weekend since my girls are leaving me for a trip to Puerto Madryn. After that I headed over to Belgrano to visit my grandparents and pick up some much needed money for the weekend. I walked around Cabildo Ave and headed off to meet PoLin for dinner to discuss our girly weekend since Heidi and Katie would be gone.

Saturday, I met PoLin at Once once again and we shopped till we dropped. Literally. Once has some of the cheapest clothes in the entire world, and it was really nice to be able to get some Argentine style clothing. While everything is very unorganized and kind of sketchy, it's definitely an adventure. I very much enjoyed it and I know Po found some good stuff! That night, we had an AMAZING parillada where we had an all-you-can-eat meat dinner. Yum. Nothing is better than Argentine asado. The following day was another girly day at the salon, and later at Sugar bar where we met up with Amelia (yay!). Amelia also goes to GW, like Po, and is from California. She will be staying in Buenos Aires for a year, and she is absolutely the nicest girl. I am so glad I got to hangout with her this weekend!

Today, since it was a national holiday, we did not have classes, and instead Po, Amelia and I met up at the Belgrano Train Station and headed over to San Isidro outside of the city, for some clean air and a picnic! It was a beautiful 70ish degrees outside and we enjoyed it at a local park. And we didn't get up once. We headed back on the train around 6pm, and headed straight home. We were exhausted.

Tomorrow, I also don't have school and I plan on studying my culo off for my very-soon-i'm-freaking-out midterms. They start next week and go until Oct. 28th. Classes end Nov. 10th. Finals start Dec. 1st. Everything is piling up and I need to get it done!
Next weekend since the girls will be gone (including Amelia), I plan on not only catching up on work, but also seeing my family who I have not seen in a while. Monday is Po's birthday so I have to be ready to celebrate! (Wait till you see her in the dress we picked up from Once). Will definitely be updating next weekend after the 18th.
Muchisimos besos!

When I Fall in Love...

What a week! I can't believe it's already October! Only two-ish months to go on my Argentinean adventure. So crazy!

Since I haven't really talked about the things I do not enjoy so much about Buenos Aires, I wanted to do a bit of rant here (skip over it if you don't feel like reading my whining).

The colectivos aka bus system here is amazing. Absolutely amazing. There is about 150 colectivos in this city and with that many you'd think that they'd be completely reliable and available every 10-15 minutes right? Nope. As much as I love my trusty friend colectivo 92, sometimes it takes my dear friend almost 40 minutes to come by. Yup. So, if by any chance I have anything to do and I'm running late (which unfortunately happens too often), I sometimes don't even cut it close. Then, ironically enough, once it comes THREE more follow behind it, and I've figured out why. You see the Argentine population is very chatty, friendly, and always looking to socialize. That becomes a bit of a problem when it comes to colectivo drivers, since they like to drive side by side so that at EVERY red light they can chat with each other and discuss sports, family and how much they hate their jobs. They have no shame in anything they say, and all the passengers get to hear their entire conversations. As a result, you get four to five colectivos at once, and there's nothing to be done about it.

That can be my one rant for this week. Now I can share about my week.

Mon-Thur were uneventful until Thursday night. Katie, Po, Heidi and I headed over to plaza del sol for some drink(s) and it was a night I was not expecting. Right after I arrived, a much older man started staring at Heidi and I, and shortly approached the table. He heard us speaking English and therefore decided that it was his chance to serenade us by singing When I Fall In Love by Rick Astley. Yup, he Rick Rolled us. In the middle of the bar. He later asked if he could take a seat, which Heidi accepted. Let's just say the rest of the night was mixed with Heidi talking to Daveed (David), and it became quickly uncomfortable. So much for girls' night out!

That night Po slept over and we watched one of my favorite movies as a child: Hocus Pocus! For those of you that don't know, Po, Heidi, KT and I were planning on being the three witches (and cat) of the movie for Halloween! While the plans have changed, that movie is probably still on my top ten list.

Friday, Po and I paroozed around Belgrano and later met up with Heidi and KT at mi casa and made the amazing postre which Po's host sister taught us to make! In case I didn't already mention it, it consists of angel food cake, dulce de leche, whipped cream, and strawberries. Layered up. Also, KT and Heidi attempted to make American chocolate cookies, which turned out kind of similar. So close.

That night Po and I had round two of sleepover fest.

Saturday was to be a relaxing day, but instead I did laundry and tidied up my room from the storm of sleepovers. I went grocery shopping and re-stocked my fridge and later got a surprise visit from my aunt Vivian, my uncle Sergio and my cousin Gus. We walked around parque centenario and made plans for an asado the next day!

Saturday night was a Kika night! As always, the girls and I started the night at the bar next door and later headed over to a night of dancing. The place was pumping, crowded and as always, impossible to breathe in. We had a great time dancing, and as true Argentines, our night did not end until close to 6:00am. The next day Heidi and I had to get up for asado at my family's at 12:30pm.

We took the bus 166 from Juan B. Justo y Santa Fe Av. and it was about a 40 min ride. It's nice to be able to know how to get outside the city from just one bus! The barbecue was amazing, and Gus even invited all his friends over to meet us. After dinner about 12 of us headed over to the local pool joint and sat and chatted while others played pool. It was really nice to hang with Argentines for once and to be able to learn some stuff from then. We've already made plans for birthdays, outings, etc!

Today I did not have Spanish again, so I caught up on my sleep from the weekend and caught up on tons of homework. This week coming up I have an intense meeting and session with my volunteering site and I will definitely have to update about next weekend. It will be exciting!

Till next time mis amorsitos! <3