I really honestly have no idea where to start when writing this. Coming to Argentina and Rosario has been the most whirlwind experience of my life. For the past day or so I have been going through ups and downs and ups and downs of being super happy to be here and then being like...what the hell have I gotten myself into...
I guess I have to start from the beginning. Since I last wrote I got on the plane to Atlanta Georgia and met up with one of the other guys in the program who has just about as much spanish as I do...maybe a little more. We got to Atlanta and had a pint of beer for 8 American dollars which was rediculous because it was only a blue moon I believe which should never ever cost more than 4 but I guess since its the airport and tax in atlanta...it was worth 8. After that beer we went to the gate 15 minutes early and the flight attendents were freaking out because the plane was boarded and they almost gave up our seats. The second I got on the plane I knew I was in a different world. I hadnt even left the US yet but being on the plane the atmosphere changed, everyone was speaking spanish and you could tell people were dressed differently and not from estidos unidos (the united states) When I got to my seat I sat next to a very pretty older woman who was maybe 35 if I had to guess. After not talking for the first half hour when our meal was delivered we started to converse in broken languages. She spoke broken broken english and I was terrible at spanish due to the fact that A) I dont know much spanish and B) I wasnt quite comfortable yet in trying to speak the language. Anyways, through her speaking english and me speaking spanish I found out that she was a doctor in the southern part of Argentina and she was doing an exchange in Aspen Colorado for 12 days and just getting done. We talked much about the Argentinian geography and the US geography as well as how before she went to the US she thought that Americans were not friendly but after Aspen she felt otherwise. I told her not all Americans are friendly and that she was lucky to find the good ones. Haha by the way I forgot the best part....the flight was chalk full or mormons....yeah mormons. Im not talking bad about the mormons it was just kinda akward seeing a group of light skinned americans walking around in suits and ties wearing nametags that said "elder thomas" or "elder whatnot" I could overhear them trying to convert people on the flight and thats about as deep as I will go into that subject.
When I got into Buenos Aires which I will start calling BA out of lazyness it was in the high 70's and the jackets were coming off. I waved goodbye to the doctor lady and continued on my way with Jensen my travel buddy. We were waiting just through customs for some of the other people from the trip and talking to the bus people who were flustered and fairly short with us but what we understood is the last bus that we could catch for the day was in 10 min. so we had to take it. There ended up being 6 of us on the bus from the program and it was a 3 hour ride to Rosario which seemed to take forever. Traffic was crazy because there seems to be no real rules on the road and every sign you see is just a suggestion rather than a law. Lane changes, stop signs, right turns, left turns....do whatever the hell you want. Anyways the closer we got to Rosario the slower we had to go because protestors were blocking the roads which I will talk about in a little bit.
Anyways....the bus dropped us off right in front of our hotel and rather than shower the sticky sweat off due to the heat we decided to go out and grab an early bite to eat before the orientation began. We walked a couple blocks down almost getting hit numerous times because we didnt realize that cars NEVER stop for pedestrians. In the states when a car makes a right hand or left hand turn onto another street they yeild to pedestrians....haha not here, it will cost you a broken limb or possibly your life at they way the drivers haul around. We pick a small panadaria (Bakery) for lunch and attempt to order in spanish. Some people in the group have more skills than others and some have less. One guy ordered and had no idea what he got until they put it in front of him. I went with the solid choice of a hamburger with cheese and ham...down here in Argentina they are ALL ABOUT THE HAM. everyone says the love the beef here but being around town there is billboards everywhere for ham ham ham, makes me laugh. So the hamburger that came was probably the best hamburger that I have ever tasted. The meat was done to perfection and everything was perfect. It rivaled the hamburger that I had last time I was in Las Vegas at that hamburger place I went to with my parents. During the meal we ordered a couple letres of beer named Quilmes which is the national beer of Argentina....everywhere you go you see Quilmes signs and chairs and shirts and hats and umbrellas....its crazy.... Its a pretty good beer. Cant say what it tastes like but its cheap here. One litre is like 2 american bucks or so which is nothing compared to how much beer you get. After putting a couple of those back we walked down cordoba street and saw all the shops wandering into a few and laughing at others. Rosario is huge very very pretty by the way.
Got back in just enough time to get to the orientation where I finally met everyone from the program and got to have as much wine and drinks as we wanted while socializing. After that we all went out to a bar called tomate. When we were out in the streets we slowly started hearing people up in the apartment buildings banging on pots and pans and cars honking there horn. Luckily we had a few argentines with us and they started asking around as to what was going on. Apparently there is a huge argument going on in Argentina because the president is super taxing the farmers and agriculture people of the country which is a major part of the economy here and the people have had enough of her raising the taxes that they are paying. Between tarrifs and taxes farmers are having to give up about 60 percent of the profits they are making to the government and refuse to pay any more. When we were sitting in the bar floods of people kept going by marching around beating on pans and yelling. Cars full of people were driving around screaming and even flying the national flag with a black X through it. Because the farmers are so important here the people of the cities are gettting behind the farmers and protesting too because they are fed up with this female president. Apparently when she was elected she was saying she was going to help the poor people much like eva peron did but when she got into office she started taxing the farmers which is opposite of what she said she was going to do. Im not political by any means its just interesting to see what is going on here. The Argentines also told us that we caught one of the last busses to make it from BA to Rosario because the road blocks were protestors not letting any busses or goods though so we got lucky to get to rosario. To my parents if they are reading this Im totally safe in the city right now and things are perfectly peaceful here.
This morning we got up at 8 or so and went downstairs of the hotel to take a placement test. I placed into second year so dad if you are reading this....stop worrying Im chill. After that we went and saw where we were going to be going to school during the day as well as where we can use the gym and internet. That part of this trip will be good because everything looks pretty nice. Ill probably write to Alicia and my parents more once I get setteled in and classes begin so sorry for not being more in touch. This is where things got crazy. After lunch we went back to the hotel and met our host families. Finally got to meet my host mom and as for the rumors of her having NO ENGLISH AT ALL....Im sorry to say that they are true. She picked me up in her car and another guy in the program and his host sister went with us since they live down the street. she spoke perfect English which I was super jealous of the fact that it seems everyone but me has at least one person in the house who understands some english. Host mom Teresah drove us around the city and showed us all the cool stuff in the city out the car window. It was nice having that other guys host sister with us because tried to have her tell my host mom everything I could think of on the way to the house to make life a little easier....didnt help. Language barriers officially SUCK. I dont understand anything she is saying and I feel like Im in another universe here. every 10 minutes when im by myself I keep thinking to myself what did I get myself into or....why did I think this was a good idea. When I was super down and out and was depressed about being here my host mom said it was time for us to go out.
Argentina's Flag
Map of Argentina