No, I am not dead!

Well, everyone, it has been an extremely long time since I've last updated this thing, but I do have a good excuse...now...3 days ago I was diagnosed w/ pneumonia! I told you I couldn't keep up w/ the Argentinian lifestyle! I just let my cold go for too long, and now it has developed into pneumonia, but I feel pretty much fine now, I just cough occasionally, and I'm on antibiotics for 10 days. I'm now getting the full South American experience, because I had to explain to the doctor in spanglish what was ailing me..."I feel pain...here...and...umh..." But it all worked out, they gave me a couple chest x-rays, so now I have some more souvenirs to take back home w/ me! :-) And fortunately I got myself into the doctor the last day that I had insurance w/ my school program, so the visit was free and I had a discounted prescription cost...about $23 dollars US, $69 Argentinian pesos!

Oh, and as far as school goes, I guess I am now officially graduated, because last Thur. was my last day of class and that was my last requirement for graduation! So I should have a degree waiting for me

when I get back home! It's about time, and I feel very proud of myself right now.  Everyone applauded for me on our last class, and at dinner they toasted me. I felt very special. :-)

OK, so now about Argentina...I have moved into my new location in Buenos Aires which I LOVE!!! It's in a barrio called San Telmo, which is one of the oldest sections of the city, so there's TONS of great little antique stores and restaurants and coffee shops (or confiterias), and my balcony overlooks the most famous Sun. fair in the city! I feel very Evita-like when I look down from my balcony at the tango dancers and colorful booths of shiny silver and gold antiques every Sun. There's nothing like waking up to tango music underneath your window! And my room is SO beautiful, w/ high Victorian-style ceilings, and my own private bath that you walk up 5 stairs in my bedroom to get to...Ok, enough of my bragging for now...I just can't believe my good fortune to have found this place! I guess all my research before Argentina has paid off! Today I just booked the room for an extra wk. for my brother

and I when he comes. Fortunately it was available, because it's already booked 2 days after we leave Argentina!

OK, OK, so I STILL haven't really told you about my travels or anything THAT exciting. Well, here it goes...3 weekends ago, I went to Iguazu Falls on the border of Argentina and Brazil, and since I have my Brazilian visa, I was able to visit both sides. To describe Iguazu Falls as a natural wonder of the World is an understatement...I have never seen anything so beautiful. It was honestly so perfect that I felt like I was in a theme park! There were swinging bridges overtop of numerous waterfalls, and the current was so great that in places I was soaked just from the wind carrying the mist over the bridges! I took TONS of photos, but would get so discouraged, because how do you capture something so beautiful in a photo? So I have officially been to Brazil now, and it was very rainforest-like, and I saw the most beautiful butterflies ever, and little crazy mammals called coatis, and weird birds, and a rabbit-dog-looking animal that the Argentines make most of their leather goods out of. I took

a picture of one at the Buenos Aires zoo so I can show my dad what his future boots and vest are made out of. :-/

Anyways, I had my first hostel experience in Iguazu, and it was so cool that the weekend after when I went to Bariloche in Patagonia in the Andes, I stayed at a hostel by the same company. Oh, and by the way, in Iguazu, we took an "Extreme Adventure" boat ride by the falls, and need I say that I was totally soaked! It was fabulous, and afterwards we went zooming around in the boat making our own rapids, and then took a return jeep ride through the forest back to the park. When we returned to the park, there were some folkdancers from Bolivia (I think?) that hammed it up for our photos and talked to us for a while. All in all, it was an awesome experience that I will never forget. Should we say future honeymoon location for me? :-)

So then 2 weekends ago I went to Bariloche which is in the Southwest of Buenos Aires (Iguazu and Bariloche took a 2 hr. plane ride each to reach), so I

am now an international snowboarder! Again, to try to describe the magnitude of the views of Bariloche would be somewhat pointless, because there's no way I can describe how extremely beautiful it was...but I'll try! First of all, at the top of Cerro Catedral which is the name of the slope, you are ABOVE the clouds, and completely surrounded by pristine snow-capped jagged peaks of the Andes. You can even see a somewhat nearby peak of Chile, that's how close I was to the border. The view was breathtaking, and I would LOVE to live about 3 months in the town some future winter (or our summer). The conditions were really nice and warm and slushy the first day we were there, which I love because I can catch an edge better snowboarding (because I'm really not that good), but the last 2 days it was really icy and cold, but again, the views made up for everything. And the people were so nice, I've never made such fast friends in my life! My first day in Bariloche I took a snowboarding lesson since the Andes are, uh, somewhat larger than my little Pennsylvania slopes of the Pocconos! And since I didn't want to kill myself, I took a lesson, and the instructor who was around my age was sooo nice, and would get so excited about the progress I made, that he would keep yelling "Muy bien, muy bien!!!" All in all it was a very cool day.

Then at night I would go out w/ all my class friends, and I randomly was in Bariloche the same weekend as my New Zealand friend Russ whom I met through this travel blog sight, so it was cool to finally meet him! He was the reason I joined this sight in the first place! So after talking via e-mail for the past few months, it was cool to finally get to know him. Cool kid. (Yeah, that's right, Russ, if you're reading this!) :-) I'm not sure if we'll meet up in the near future w/ our travels because he's traveling throughout Chile and whatnot while I'm going to be traveling all about Timbuktu basically, but if we don't meet up in South America again, then I'll just have to go visit him in Canada when he's working there for 6 months. Western Canada isn't THAT far by car from

PA, is it?! Hmmm...

So that basically brings me up-to-date till now on the exciting things I've been doing, and this is what you have to look forward to in upcoming blogs: I'm thinking about going north to Rio de Janeiro, west to Macchu Pichu in Peru, southwest to Mendoza and snowboard another couple days, see Mt. Aconcagua which is the largest mtn. in the Western Hemisphere, and probably buy some wine since Mendoza is the wine capital of Argentina, then south to Las Glacieres and see the largest glacier in the Western Hemisphere, southeast to Ushuaia which is the southern-most town in the world, north to Peninsula Valdes which is a famous wildlife reserve w/ whales, penguins, sea lions and more, then back home to Buenos Aires. But all of this of course depends on time and that little thing called money (I keep telling myself to divide by 3 or dollar to their peso, but I think I'm doing that too frequently and well...). So stay tuned, and I'll try to be more diligent on my blog, though I don't think much will change. I'm having too much fun! Chao for now.

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