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Published: January 18th 2008
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Mexico City Fast Food
this guy is working the counter while having a cigarette. Hola all. Thanks for stopping by my little blog thingy. This will be quite an experience for you, really.
If you haven't heard, I am traveling through South America in search of college credits for the next three months. All I have to do is go to class for 80 hours a month, pay $600 dollars, and viola! I have 13 tranferable foreign language credits for an Economics degree!
All kidding aside, this probably the best two weeks that I have had in a while. My arrival flights are another story though.
To save money I was told to fly to Miami and then depart for Argentina. It did save me about $300 but I would have gladly paid that if I knew that I would be living in Mexico City for full 18 hours. I left DFW airport at 6am, arrived in Miami for a 8 hour layover (not a bad airport), flew to Cancun for a 1 hour layover, and then to Mexico City. I knew Mexico was iffy but come on. The Airport wouldn't let me into the terminal until 5 hours prior to the departure flight. I had 7 hours to kill in the
Electricity?
$40 for this piece of humming crap. unsecured portion of the airport. I slept with my backpack on. After an hour or so a cute, tan blonde came up next to me and pulled a sleeping bag out of her pack. She was much smarter than me. I was thinking how nice it must be to actually be able to sleep. After awhile we started to talk about her book or something. I cant remeber. I thought she was American but after a sentence or two I realized she was Australian. Hell Yeah. Aussies are the best. Absolutely nuts. She didnt let me down at all. We talked about all sorts of crap. I guess she had traveled from the West Coast of Mexico all the way to Mexico Ciudad and was making the long flight home. I had a beer with her at 6am. I need to email her. What was her name again.....
So my plane finally arrived after being in the terminal (yes, they let the gringo in) for about 4 hours. I had been without sleep for about 24 hours and I was afraid that I would nod off and miss my flight so I set my cellphone alarm clock in half
The ShoeBox
My room in Hawaii was bigger than this. Well, maybe. hour intervals. The place was sitting at the gate when the fligh attendants starting making announcements in Spanish. Yo Hablo Pequito Espanol so I didnt hear that the flight was delayed for 4 hours. I asked and said "fuck" pretty loudly. One of those unintended curses but I think the guy knew it was coming form the sleep deprived American. I went to a quiet gate and tried to get some comfortable sleep but was unsucessful. I just listened to some Floyd for a bit and then read a book for awhile. The flight finally boarded and I got comfy on the 767. Oh Yeah! I forgot to tell you guys. For some reason I had Ejectivo Class the whole trip. 1st class. It is the shit. The give you warm towels as you get seated. I felt pretty bad sitting up front so I would wait until the entire plane was seated before I got on. I don't want to feel like a aristocratic prick sitting there as everyone walks pass, green with envy. No one had to know that I am living in luxury, eating preheated chunks of colored beef, downing sparkling white wine, and recling my chair past the standard 12 degrees. I dont need that kind of mental baggage. Anyways, I got a few hours down on the flight. I watched some movie with the "Rock" in it. He danced ballet. It was all in spanish but I got the jist. Before I knew it, I had arrived in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Now remember, my flight was 4 hours late. It left at roughly 4pm, there is a 3 hour difference, and the flight is 10 hours. I was supposed to show up at 1030pm and it is now 230am. After a 30min wait at customs (strangley easy to get through) I went to collect my baggage. I have been wearing the same close for around 2 days and I feel, how you say, stanky. It didnt take me too long to figure out that my Kelty Pack wasnt going to materialize through the conveyor belt mystery doors so I queued up in the unlucky bastards line. That was a longer wait than customs. they told me they knew where my bad was and it would be here tomorrow. Thanks Mexicana Airlines! Thanks for knowing it is in the wrong place! It must have been because I am American. Yeah, thats it. Whatever.They actually delivered it the next day after I had to make first impressions while smelling like an ox. Up until this point I was unsure if I had made the right choice on this trip. Not much had gone right except for the cute Australian chick. I went into the airport main lobby to catch my ride. The program was supposed to have set up a ride to where I was staying. I went to the kiosk and sure enough, there was my name. From this point on nothing, I mean nothing, has gone wrong (knock on wood). The taxi company got a cab in about five minutes and we were off.
The driver didn't speak much english at all but we comunicated well enough. I was still happy that they had expected me so I tried to say something funny to make him open up. He had the radio off and I told him to crank that shit up. He knew that and laughed. Avril Lavigne. WTF. Oh well, almost there Eric. On the highway in Argentina no one turns their headlights on or uses lanes. They all just go to the their destinations in the shortest, fastest manner possible. I like it. I cant wait to rent a bike out here because there are no laws. Sorry Mom. We got to the apartment and the place had a god damn doorman. I have never seen thate before. He told me piso quatro. 4th floor. I rode this tiny little elevator with the manual doors to the right level. It was dark and I had no clue what lied ahead of me. Did she speak English? Does she have a family? Is she hot? Yes, No, and No. For a random stranger showing up at 3am she was very hospitable. She showed me this closet sized room that I was to sleep in but I didnt give a damn. After we were through with the pleasentrys I passed the fuck out. I had to be at the school by 8 so it was back to the cellphone alarm. It was like my Navy days where we would only get a few hours but it would only seem like 5 min. When you ahve something to look forward too it really inst that hard to wake up though. The lady told me to take some bus to the school but I just ended up taking a cab. The american dollar is worth 3 pesos and it really is three times cheaper here. Things looked a bit different in the daylight. I felt awkward because I am so pale but I really dont look much different from most Argentininans. Mostly from European descent, they have brown hair and fair skin. There are ofcourse the ultra tan ones but I am not that pale unless I wear my daisy duke running shorts.
My next entry will start with me arriving at the school and meeting all the international students. I guess we are all international here.
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Mike Flowers
non-member comment
Hawaii Room
I think your room was probably about the same size or smaller. But, fuck you that's what you get for being on leave when we got the house........sucka!!