UBA has no toilet paper...

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Today I had class at Flacso from 1:15-3. Afterwards, I went to an awesome restaurant/butchershop and got a Morzipan (2.5 pesos) and a glass of wine (1.5 pesos) while I read La Critica (2.5 pesos). Morzipan is a blood sausage in a sandwich and La Critica is a new independent daily newspaper that mostly examines what the government has been up to and what they did wrong. It is amazing how much content it has since there is a new edition every day. I got home at about 5 and had to leave at 6 to make it to my 7 oclock class at UBA. I thought I had more time, but traveling around the city takes a ridiculous amount of time. I took a new bus to UBA, 128, which may or may not be the best way for me to get there. This class is the 150-person seminar on design theory...it's worth noting that I thought Seminar on Graphic Design was going to be more hands-on.

I arrived and immediately found the bathroom. I should have guessed that UBA wouldn't have any toilet paper...the trash can was full of notebook paper that other, more daring students had used on themselves. I decided I would just hold it until I got home...

I found a seat in the first few rows and introduced myself to the people around me. Assuming I was also Argentine, the guy next to me cracked a joke that I didn't understand. The professor was up in front setting up the microphone which I could already tell was going to make this class very difficult. He started to talk and the sound had so much echo and was so unclear, that I asked the guy next to me (Emanuel/Nacho), if he could understand anything. He said yes. Throughout the seminar, I paid 150% attention and understood about 35% of what Professor Savransky was saying. I was pretty glad I got that much out of it, considering he was talking about the difference between Artists and Designers relating to their thought processes. According to Savransky, Artists use learned behaviors from practice along with their personal creativity to create their works, while Designers use the two separately (or something like that...). at about 8:30, Savransky allowed a few students to come in and make an announcement to the class, attempting to gather the students for a rally march through the Center of Buenos Aires. When I introduced myself to the professor after class, he told me I would have a very hard time. He noted that my spanish wasn't that good, but he would be willing to help me with whatever I needed. I will also use the tutoring service offered by Flacso.

I emerged from the Subte just before 10 PM and it was raining lightly and delightfully. As I walked, the delightful sprinkle became a not-so-delightful downpour and I started running. It was about 10 blocks to my house and I finally arrived, drenched. There may have been some flooding, but I think it needs to rain a bit longer for the real flooding to happen here. When I got back, Steve and Peter invited me out to dinner with them and a few of their friends who were visiting. I was starving, so I took a shower and we went to Al Carbon...

After dinner, we went to one of their friends' apartments and drank a little bit. We had planned on going to Asia de Cuba later, but a few people were not interested at all, and I suggested Niceto Club which is supposed to have an incredible group of DJs every wednesday called Zizek Urban Beats. We hopped in taxis to Niceto and got there at about 1 AM. The front of the club was deserted and I was relieved to see that the whole back room was packed with people. It seemed odd, though, that barely anyone was dancing. This changed as the night went on...

I could end here with the words '5 peso tequila shots', but I'll elaborate a bit. I bought a Whiskey-Coke that tasted like it was about 90% coke, and Peter bought 14 shots of tequila. The bar only had 4 shot glasses, so they came out in groups of four. I had two of them and when we went inside to the other room, Peter continued buying tequila shots...I lost track...

I danced for a while and at about 3 am, Peter, Steve and their crew headed off to Crobar - another club. I stayed, really enjoying the music and company. This is the first time I really got drunk in Argentina and it had me sleeping the whole next day until 7 PM (don't worry, parents - I'm safe and all in one piece!). It took until about 9 for me to feel 100% again...

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Comments

[Andy B! Sucka!]

take it easy there tiger!
easy on the booze hefe! i woulda been upset if i had your level of spanish and the professor had told me it wasnt very good. lookin forward to the next post...if you have the time. still workin' on finding a headset to skype with you. hasta rasta.

[J WEX]

you went to zizek! that rules!