Going Out?

After a seriously long, but awesome tour yesterday, I went home and managed to get about half an hour of sleep before dinner.  After dinner, I went over to Bry´s to hang for a while, because just sitting around my host families house didn´t seem appealing.  I wasn´t planning on really going out, but once I was at Bry´s, a bunch of people were posting on facebook how they were meeting up to go to some bar.  So at 11:45, Bry´s roommate hailed a cab and told it where to take me.  We were meeting on the corner of two streets, and I was the first one there. It was pretty scary because there was almost no one around, and I had to wait about 5 minutes for the other people to show up. BUT, they did, so I ended up ok.

We basically just starting walking up the road hoping to find a bar we wanted to go into, and some guys that were sitting at a table outside of a bar heard us speaking english and asked if we were looking for something to do.  Not like super creepy Argentine guys, but a couple of guys that originated from California.  They live down here now and work as guides for a pub crawl. We sat and chatted with them for a couple hours and had a drink, then they took us to this club called QuiQue or something like that.  We had another couple drinks and had fun dancing.  Especially when the go-go dancers got on platforms around the room and danced :P.

We ended up not leaving the club until about 4 in the morning, so after walking home, I ended up back at 4:30. This probably wasn´t the best idea considering I had a test at 9:45 this morning, but it worked out.  I actually wasn´t all that tired getting up and taking the test.  It wasn´t until about one this afternoon that I really started getting tired.

This morning we took our Spanish placement test, and I ended up getting stuck in the basics class, which I don´t understand because the girl who doesn´t even know left and right in spanish got put in the intermediate group.  Oh well, I guess it´ll be easy at least.  So then we wandered around to find a restaurant for lunch, which was really good. I got this yummy rice/chicken/veggie bowl that was pretty good. A bit more wandering and now we have our academic orientation coming up. After that I really need to go home and sleep for a long bit. If I don´t get at least 3 more hours sleep before nine o´clock, there is no way I´m going out tonight.  I like my sleep too much.


Plus, I´ve only got the equivalent of like 5 dollars left in pesos. It´s amazing how fast 100 dollars goes!

Day Two

I´ve officially been in Argentina for over 24 hours, and so far, I like it.  My host mom is really nice, and tries her best to communicate with me (cringe) and made wonderful food so far.  Some things are kind of odd, like how the bathroom light doesn´t turn on every time you hit the switch, but you just have to keep clicking it until it turns on, and I use the toilet in one bathroom, but the shower in another.

I´ve officially mastered the subway, or Subte, and managed to get to the ISA office all my myself this morning. Yay Bry for giving me awesome directions (i.e. look at the McDonalds and turn right). Cora gave me a Subte card that apparently only Argentines can get so I could put money on it and use it while I´m here. Apparently foreigners need to go stand in line for hours at some place to get a refillable Subte card instead of buying each ticket individually.

I went to Bry´s apartment last night and got to take pictures of her awesome "river" view and eat strawberries from a little veggie-fruit seller.  We went into the supermarket too and I saw brain packaged right next to the ground beef and steaks.

I came early to the ISA office this morning (we needed to be here by 10AM) just in case I couldn´t find my way, so I have time to post this, then we have our orientation that´s supposed to last 3 hours, lunch, and a city tour.  I´m really glad that the city tour is going to be on a bus because my new rainbows are still getting worn in and they´re making the bottoms of my feet slightly sore.

I Made It!

I'm here! From the last time you heard from me...

My room here at Cora's

I managed to get a super late checkout from my hotel, so I didn't have to leave there until four. Then I took the shuttle over to the airport and used up my last two meal vouchers from the airline.  As I was lining up to board the plane, I noticed a girl with the ISA pin on her backpack, so I went and introduced myself.  Her name was Sara.  Then, on the plane, I met Alexis, who was sitting next to me.  We got served two meals, lots of beverages, and I had to lovely experience of having to pee while trapped in by a sleeping person.  I managed to almost completely climb over her without waking her up, but jostled her at the last moment. Oh well..

Then, getting off the plane we met up with 3 other girls, went through customs, etc... Then had to sit around for a few hours while our ISA representative waited for a few other flights to get in.  Overall, a sweaty long day, and I was extremely ready for a shower.  Once we had everyone we loaded onto a bus and drove to the university, where our host families picked us up.

I have the lovely fortune to be staying with Ms. Cora Halpern.  It's a wonderful apartment in Palermo, where she has one cat, a son, a daughter, and I'm assuming another student named Olivia (haven't met her yet) living here.  I connected to the internet, called home, unpacked, and go to take that blessed shower and brush my teeth. Now it's to be lunch, Bry's coming to visit, then we head over to the ISA office for orientation at four.

Almost there!

Well folks, this is going to be my last post from the good old U.S. of A. It's been a long night and and even longer day, but it's only about 20 minutes until I board that plane that'll take me on a 10 hr and 20 min flight all the way down to Buenos Aires. By the time I get there, I'll have been traveling for a grand total of 45 hours, approximately. I still need to use my last meal voucher that the airline gave me for screwing up my schedule, so I'm off to get myself a snack for this insanely long flight. See you in Argentina!

Flight Status: DELAYED

Well, here I am sitting in the Boise airport. My flight got delayed, so instead of leaving Boise at 10:05, we're now leaving until 11:15 (Update: looks like we're not leaving until noon, so I won't be making my flight). Which means I don't get to Portland until 11:45, which isn't very good for me because my flight from Portland to Dallas boards at 11:30 and leaves at 12:15.  The lady at the desk thinks that I'll be able to make my connection, but we'll see.  Then, if I miss that flight in Portland, there's no way I'm going to make it to Dallas to make the flight to Buenos Aires, so I'd be spending the night in Portland and making my way to Buenos Aires a day later.  This would actually work out well for me because I booked my flights for a day early on accident anyways.

However, I'm just starting to get excited for my trip. Buying the awesome new purple luggage didn't do it, packing didn't do it, but apparently sitting in the airport hoping I make my flights will get me all excited.  I keep getting this feeling that I left something at home that I'm going to need, but I think I've thought of everything.  I've got cookies for a snack, and water bottle for filling, two different cameras in addition to the one on my phone, chargers for everything.  I should be set. I really hope I didn't actually leave anything behind.


UPDATE: I definitely missed my flight from Portland to Dallas, so after over half an hour talking to the people at the Alaska desk, I'm not booked on the 3:10 out of Portland to Dallas, I'll stay the night there, and take the 7:30 to Buenos Aires, which is perfect for me!

T- 2.5 weeks

I'M GOING TO ARGENTINA FOR FOUR WEEKS!!!!!!!

 Ok, now that I've got that out of my system, I can explain fully.
Approximately a few months ago, my father decided that I should study abroad this summer and learn Spanish.  He wanted me to go to Spain, but realistically, I thought that South American Spanish would be more useful to me. I found this awesome program in Chile that would allow me to learn Spanish and ski in the Andes, and it was super cheap.  This seemed too good to be true, so I met with one of the advisers in my school's study abroad office and found out that A) the program might not be legitimate and B) it wasn't an accredited university anyways, so I wouldn't be able to get credit for my time there.

So...I was back to page one, looking for a study abroad program in South America to learn Spanish for the summer, preferably in Chile.  Well, after much research, I found out that the programs in Chile were a combination of studying Spanish and Anthropology. I'm not really all that interested in Anthropology, so I didn't want to spend time studying it when I could be exploring Chile and skiing. AND, the programs in Chile were slightly expensive

Then, I remembered that HEY! Bryanna is in Argentina right now, maybe I could study there, and besides, Argentina isn't that far from Chile, plus the Argentina programs tended to be a bit cheaper than Chile. After (realistically not that much) research I found this lovely little program that is going to allow me to study in Buenos Aires for four whole weeks and get 8 credits of Spanish for it.

After a lot of paperwork, money spent, and a very expensive flight bought, I am planned to depart Boise, ID on May 24, and arrive in the Buenos Aires EZE International Airport at 7:55 AM on May 25.

With only two and a half weeks until my departure date, I am frantically saving money, researching fun places to go, and trying to survive through the last week and a half of my regularly scheduled semester.