Week 1

Hello friends, family, and those that accidentally Googled words that brought them here!

Life in Buenos Aires is already wonderful. My best friend Jesse and I live together in a residence for international students called Master in the part of town called Palermo Soho (much like in New York) and its in the part of the city called Palermo Viejo. Our room is tiny and has no air conditioning, but we absolutely love it. Every day we meet new students from around the globe, and practice our charades skills. I don't speak a lick of Spanish, and that is probing quite difficult. Though portenos (people of the port--that's what they call people from Buenos Aires) are very sweet, and apparently English is the second language here, I fail to communicate with pretty much every porteno I meet. That part is getting quite lonely.

Yesterday we went to a town called Tigre, just an hour or so north of BA. We thought we were going to a lovely beach, and hen we got there we found that both the pool and the river were doo-doo brown. Ahh the benefits of being a functioning port! Tigre was fun though, and I got that tan I've been craving since we left Puerto Vallarta only a few weeks ago.

A few days ago it was very rainy, so we took a bus tour of the city. I learned all about the history of BA and what brought it to its current state. After driving through the shanty-towns in La Boca, they showed us a picture of an area in BA and asked us to guess what year it was taken. Most of us guessed early to mid 1800's because BA now looks so modern, but we found out that it was 1997!! This led us right into a discussion of the corruption in the local government, and how it has affected the development of the city. For example- there is an 8 block long train here, with only one car going in each direction, that cost the government US$ 22 Million. Who do you think got all that money??!!?!? One clue: the extremely wealthy aristocracy in BA also own most of the construction (steel, lumber, etc.) and real estate companies!

Other fun facts:

• Graffiti here is art. By far the coolest graffiti I've ever seen.
• Portenos eat dinner at 11, go out at 2, and go to sleep at 7am. We're really suffering over here!
• Though Buenos Aires is located on the water, the closest (actually nice) beach is 4 hours away!
• There is a specific word for horse shit in Argentinean Spanish
• The meat here is as amazing as they say-- but not nearly as cheap.

I love you all and miss you much!!

Kisses