Adios Chile, hola Argetina!

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Last Wednesday, January 31st was my last day of class meaning that I am done with class for the next month!! Classes don´t start again for me until March 5th, so February is basically going to be the best month of my life 😊

On Wednesday night, the Delaware group and I went out to eat at a typical Chilean restaurant for "la cena despedida," or goodbye dinner. The restaurant was absolutely amazing, such good food and very entertaining. It was a dinner show, meaning that as we were eating they were dancing typical Chilean dances. They pulled people from the audience to go up there and dance with them, and a few people from our group were pulled up. Afterwards, we all went up to dance so that was fun too. From there, we went to Ile Habana, our favorite bar/discoteca in Santiago to finish out the last night in Santiago with a bang. I had a late night that night to say the least...

On Thursday, Matt, Ashley, and I had to say goodbye to everyone from Delaware and take a 5 hour bus ride from Santiago to Mendoza, Argentina. The bus ride was really neat because it took us through the Andes mountains! I also got a new stamp in my passport crossing into a new country too 😊 We got to Mendoza around 9 p.m. so Thurday night was pretty relaxing. We walked around the city center and got Italian food in town. Argentina is so cheap! Our pizza literally cost like 2 to 3 dollars per person!

Friday was spent in Mendoza, walking around the city center then going to this park where we climbed a hill that gave us a view of the city. We were probably walking for 4 hours straight, and it was SO HOT, so we were literally exhausted when we reached the top. Well, we didn´t think we could make it down the mountain then all the way back to the center, so I asked this van driver if she would take us down and back, and she did! Man, I love Argentina 😊 We had chicken and the ABSOLUTE BEST wine of my entire life, called Malbec, for dinner. Malbec is made in Mendoza, so I am for sure bringing back a few bottles to the states. On Friday night we took an overnight bus to Buenos Aires, so my time in Mendoza was limited. I´m not too upset about that though, because Buenos Aires is ten times more exciting!

Saturday: get into Buenos Aires in the morning after a 13 hour bus ride. We checked into our amazing 6 story hostel then went out exploring the city. We went up the Recoleta that afternoon to visit the cemetery there and Evita´s grave. I have never seen a cemetery quite like this one: basically, the only way to describe it is a mini city with compact crypts and streets. Crazy... For lunch we went to an all-you-can-eat buffet and got more Malbec wine with lunch all for less than 10 dollars per person.

Saturday night we went to the biggest discoteca in Buenos Aires: Oprah Bay. The club has 4 dance floors and half of it is outside under the stars overlooking the bay. The actual building itself is shaped like the Oprah house in Sydney, Australia. So cool! We didn´t get there until 2:30 in the morning because that is when everyone goes out here and then, sadly, had to leave around 5:30 a.m. Buenos Aires really is the city that never sleeps. 9:00 a.m. when we got up came way to early!

Sunday we headed to San Telmo for most of the day and saw some really neat tango performances on the street! There were tons of people out which made for a very interesting and entertaining atmosphere. Ashley, Matt, and I sat at a table with coffee for a good hour or two just people watching and talking, and it was probably one of my favorite moments so far. We hung out at a park in the area with some girls we had met from Manchester, England before walking around that afternoon in the city center. As last night was the Superbowl, we wanted to go to Hooters for dinner since they were the only bar in town that was broadcasting the game in English (we were going with some other guys that we met in the hostel who didn´t speak any Spanish...) Walking to Hooters it was absolutely pouring rain, so we were completely soaked by the time we got there. Well, it ended up that they didn´t even have the game on, so we ended up watching the Colts vs. Bears game in nearby TGI Fridays. The game was on in Spanish, meaning that I didn´t get to see any of the good commercials because they were all Spanish ones 😞 Oh well, still had an absolute amazing time there!

Monday: went to Tigre which is a town on the delta about an hour outside of Buenos Aires. It was an interesting place but honestly kind of boring compared to Buenos Aires. We took a river boat up the canals of the delta and got off at various stops. There basically was nothing in Tigre to see except restaurants to eat in and pretty views of the river. It was good to have a day of rest after probably about an average of 4 or 5 hours of sleep the past week!!

Today, Tuesday, was our last day with Mateo before he leaves us for Mexico 😞 Even though I have only known Matt for a little over a month, I am still going to miss him when he leaves... We have gotten to know eachother fairly well being around eachother 24/7 these last few weeks, so it will be hard to say goodbye. Today we went to La Boca, another barrio in Buenos Aires. We got lunch at a restaurant called Desnivel, supposedly one of the best places in Buenos Aires to get parrilla, typical Argentinian meat. The guide book was definitely right when it said it was one of the best in town. The piece of steak I had was absolutley phenomenal! We got a bottle of Malbec to go with it, so lunch was amazing! Afterwards, we went to the city center and walked around the town center for awhile. We also went to a tango show tonight for dinner, so neat! We had to dress up for this show, so we got there and the first part was a reception time when they gave you free champagne and appetizers. After this, we walked to the upstairs part where we were served a delicious plate of parrilla (more steak!) and all the red and white wine that you could drink. They also performed an hour and a half long tango show which was really good! I had a fabulous time!

Tomorrow Ashley and I are planning on visiting a few places around the city that we haven´t seen yet. It is our last day and night in the city, so we have to live it up!

Tell everyone in the states "hola de Buenos Aires" for me!

Laura

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