Travelogue

Or should I say travel-logged? On my way down to Argentina I wrote excitedly on how amazing my traveling experience was. My way back was no less fun, but it seemed frustratingly prolonged.

I got to Ezeiza International Airport at 17:00 (13:00 PDT), hung out with Sus, got her situated and checked into the American terminal, and then began my search for United. They didn’t exist quite yet. I searched over the entirety of the terminal until upon asking a lady at the info desk, I found that their terminal didn’t open until 5:30. I found the United kiosk (one where American had 6) checked in for my flight a good 3 hours early (Sus’s flight was two hours before mine) and paid my airport tax. Yes, you have to pay to leave the country, no matter who you are. This, along with the 21% sales tax on goods and a few other taxes make for a means of supporting the leftist social programs throughout the country at the expense of the middle class. Security was minimal, customs was a joke. (Though the tones to let one know where to go next played the first three notes of the Sesame Street theme, which of course got me whistling the entire rest of the evening.) This led me to the best part of International Airports: Duty Free shopping.

I was walking through all the chocolate, cigarettes, expensive clothes and wine when I got to the Scotch. I’ve had an… unhealthy relationship with whiskey for a while. I love it and hate it at the same time. I’m infatuated with Scotch, but I couldn’t tell you why. I had promised myself some Johnny Walker Blue upon my retirement as HRM with Unitrans, but my partner in crime, the Operations Manager decided to go sober as soon as he gave up the position and I couldn’t justify buying a 750ml bottle of Blue by myself.

I walked past bottles of Red, Black, Green and Gold, and didn’t see a single bottle of Blue. That is, until I picked up a bottle of Gold and behind it was the smallest most adorable thing I’d ever seen: a 250 ml bottle of Blue, priced Duty Free at $55. I scooped it up and strutted over to the check out, settling in behind a gentleman who seemed to be the sole reason for the lack of any Blue in the whole shop. He was walking out with several bottles, more than 10 times in volume what I was planning to purchse. He was debating in Castellano with a friend or acquaintance, equally well dressed and advanced in years, about the merits of single malt vs blended scotch. This acquaintance was wondering why he was throwing all his money away on expensive blended scotch, when he should be drinking single malt. They traded insults and laughs for a while, until I was noticed with my tiny bottle. Apparently nobody drinks scotch in their early twenties because they seemed rather surprised. They laughed at my miniature portion, comparing it to the dragons hoard of scotch already on the conveyor belt, and naming mine el hijo pequeño. I asked the gentleman not standing in line if he had a recommendation for single malt scotch, having spent the last few minutes piecing together what Spanish I knew and concentrating furiously to ask the question. He pointed to my lapel pin and asked me which language I preferred, I answered with Ingles and he led me around giving me a dissertation on the merits of different scotches in perfect English.

I walked out with a bottle of The Glenlivet 18 year for only slightly more than I had planned on spending on my tiny bottle of Blue, though this was much to the disappointment of the other Caballero.

I met up with Sus in the Airport and I fretted on how I was going to find the BART station in SFO, she responded with “ask someone.” I almost fell back in my chair. I had been so used to planning and plotting and thinking ahead because, though I could comprehend about 45% of what everyone said and generally get the gist of what I as being told, I had a much harder time speaking than listening comprehension. I had forgotten that I could talk to people I didn’t know in English once again. Granted, I found that once back in the States I was still responding to waiters or other people with things like “si” or “esta bien.”

My flight to Washington was incredibly interesting. I was seated in the very back row, between the window and a 250 pound marine sergeant. We met as I was idly complaining to myself that airlines should load from the back to the front, as everyone stops and loads their carry-ons in the overhead bins and slows the whole loading process down. He wholeheartedly agreed with me and then we followed each other to the back of the plane serendipitously sitting next to each other. I learned he was the senior staff sergeant of his platoon. (so, senior NCO that rides around with his LT in a nifty Hummer while keeping tabs on the 8 or so squads). He’d been down in Argentina teaching their marines how to swim. I laughed, starting with, “well if any branch needs to know how to swim outside of the…” he cut me off with “don’t say navy.” I was actually going to mention the PJs or SEALs, but I guess any special forces needs to be in the best condition. Anyways, we talked about deployment, active duty, military families, the Argentinean military and its history, and then he was bumped up to business class. He mentioned he knew the flight crew from the way down there, they had chatted and some of them knew he was a serviceman. I’d like to think they bumped him into an empty seat because of that.

I had plenty of room to stretch out until about an hour or so into the flight. An elderly gentleman complained to the stewardess that some punk in front of him was jamming the seat into his legs, and wouldn’t compromise or stop. She seated him next to me and we started empathizing about being tall (he was 6’4). This gentleman was very opinionated and very ready to debate. I was reading a four week old copy of the Economist (it was either that or skymall) and he started talking to me about all sorts of issues. My favorites were music and Islam.

I told him I had been studying music in Argentina, and had just graduated with a music degree. He was curious of the music that I listened to, being a youngster and all that jazz. I told him I was open to al sorts of music, that on my ipod I had everything from classical, to jazz, to punk, classic rock, Funk, techno, broadway music, Irish traditional music, Mexican hip-hop...

He scoffed a bit.

I asked him what he listened to, and he mumbled a bit and then returned with what my favorite bit of music I saw in Argentina was. I told him I couldn’t decide, I saw a few concerts, an avant garde opera, contemporary music accompanying a modern dance show, and of course tons of street musicians and tango everywhere. Oh yeah, and the musical Rent in Spanish, which I had never seen in English.

He responded “I bet you like that one, Rent.” He spat out the name of the play, as if it left a bitter taste in his mouth. I responded that I did and he chuckled, content that he had sized me up correctly. I asked him why he didn’t, he said the musical style was terrible and that it was the beginning of the end for Broadway. I could only respond that my interpretation of music is that its purpose is to evoke emotion, and I’ve never really found an other form that is so successful at this task than Broadway musicals. The combination of a story and the style of music, interweaving lines, layering different songs on top of each other and all the harmony just draws something out of me that other music is unable to do. I asked him if he liked the show Man of La Mancha, my favorite musical, and he responded that he did. I argued that there was little to no difference in style between the music of the two shows, only in the story and instrumentation. He decided he had had enough and left me to my ipod while he dragged out a book; a treatise on Islamic Jihad.

The cover claimed it to be an unbiased study done by an Islamic center, but when the gentleman showed it to me, it seemed rather anti-Islamic to me. I was told that he had read a good ten books on the religion and this was by far the best one. He asked me if I had studied Islam, I told him that outside of a comparative religion class in high school, I hadn’t really devoted too much time to it. He made the claim that I shouldn’t believe anyone who would tell me that Islam is a religion of peace. That Islamist apologists were full of bull. He said that the basis of the religion was absolute faith, fundamentalist devotion. Without devoting yourself completely to Allah you were nothing. He told me that our Jeffersonian principles of debate and reason had made us weak, (apparently American and Christian were synonymous terms in his eyes) and that there was no compromise with the unyielding faith of Islam.

I was taken aback but he proceeded to find passages in his book, to illustrate his point. Each chapter started with a passage from the Koran, and then its interpretation and the implementation of this interpretation by fundamentalist Muslims throughout history. There was a trend that the interpretations of the Prophet's words became less and less tolerant of other religions or people, but it was like taking passages from the old testament and applying them to Christianity today. The last pages of the book looked at the death toll taken by Islam on every continent throughout the ages. I shook my head in disgust, as a study like this taken without context seemed only to be hate propaganda, especially when put in the hands of a christian who was already convinced that Islam was the enemy. After reading things to me about buying the protection of Islam, the right for Muslims to take Jews as slaves and destroy Christian art, he told me that he "could only admire Mohammed, certainly a clever man to be the architect of the greatest sham in history."

That’s where I lost it.

I asked him where I could find a comparable study of Christianity, because now I was thoroughly interested in what that had to say. The death tolls taken by Christians on every continent. How many lives destroyed by slavery by citing that these men were created inferior. How much greed and corruption in his church, buying salvation throughout the dark ages, repression of women, Crusades, Inquisition, Witch Hunts, Bookburnings, Willful ignorance, repression of science, using Latin to keep the lower classes illiterate and away from all forms of learning.

I only stopped when I realized he was watching the in flight movie. I smiled and plugged my headphones in and watched Flawless. He was asleep when the movie was over.

In the morning we discussed coffee, skiing in Patagonia and the humidity of the east coast before he shook my hand and left the airplane.

My flight from Dulles to SFO was uneventful. I gave up my seat so a married couple could sit next to each other and sat again in the last row of the plane, though by myself this time. I watched Definitely Maybe and Be Kind Rewind and napped a bit before stepping off the plane at 11:00 am Pacific time, 22 hours since I set foot in the airport in Buenos Aires. I got my luggage, climbed the escalator to the top to a monorail to BART and got on the Pittsburg / Bay point train.

I overheard two women from New York confused over where they needed to go to get to Powell Street; they were worried they were on the wrong line (there’s only one that goes to the Airport). I thought that people from New York would be accustomed to trains and subways and the like, but I just took one over to the map and pointed out Powell Street, at which every line that goes through SF stops. I got off at the Embarcadero station, walked up and out, and down the street for some cool air. It was colder in San Francisco than it had been in Buenos Aires when I left. I then got on the Richmond train, took it to Amtrak, Amtrak to Davis, walked to Campus, caught the G line and walked the final half a block to my house. I traveled thousands of miles and right to my door without using an automobile and without relying on anyone else. It was a good feeling, though it was overpowered eventually by the grody feeling of not having showered in over 40 hours, after lugging about 70lbs around the city of Davis in July. By 16:00 PDT I was home, 27 hours after I left Buenos Aires.

This is our lives on Holiday

Ok, so I titled the post after a Green Day song. Sorry. When I was 12 or 13, my buddy James introduced me to the band with the album Dookie. I traded ipods with my little cousin (she's 8 years younger, my cousin's daughter, so second cousin) over 4th of July a year or two ago, and was surprised her 'top 25 most played' playlist included a whole bunch of Green Day, but I guess that's just what you do when you're 14. She was confused to find the band on my ipod as well, especially cause she didn't know any of the songs from Dookie, Nimrod or even Warning (which was popular when my little brother was 14).

People criticize the band as sell outs and whatnot, but you have to admire them: I couldn't play the same chords for over ten years. Somehow, somewhere in my brain it seemed appropriate to listen to the album American Idiot while going through all the pictures on my computer and soaking up the last of the cold weather by hiding in a cafe drinking café con leche and reminiscing about everything with Sus.

Anyhoo, I'm headed home today, and have to spend the next 4 hours in the airport writing a paper for my independent study portion of the course instead of blogging, but I put up my favorites of the pictures I stole from everyone on the trip.

4 albums worth: The Many Colors of Buenos Aires (one at a time)
Food Friends Fun... and Wine
Food Friends Fun... and Wine (Dos)
La Argentinidad

I have so much to write about, so many stories, inside jokes, specific memories, but they'll all have to wait 'til this damned paper's done. It's funny, the entire month felt like a vacation, even though I attended class 4 days a week. The courses held my interest, I was excited to go to class, and I was never bothered with the workload. Now, the vacation's over and I have a paper hanging over my head, made even harder to write knowing it's the last thing between me and the end of the shortest month of my life.

Something Majestic

I've been pirating internet wherever I can find it recently, and it's worked out quite well. Sus and I found our way into the network at UADE, which we weren't supposed to, and although access is never guaranteed, we've found internet in our hotel's lounge from time to time. Combined with cafes sporting wi-fi connections, it really makes my post about the closed Locutorios slightly disingenuous.

Now that that's out of the way, I spent my weekend at Iguazu Falls. 

We took a bus with seats comparable to Business class on an airplane, fully reclining and plenty of space. This was a good thing as the bus ride was 17 hours each way. Upon our arrival, we were whisked away to a native village for a tour and then spent the evening on a catamaran on the river. Saturday we walked all over the national park, seeing waterfall after waterfall, then taking a boat and riding into them. I don't think I've ever been more wet, even when swimming or bathing. As we approached the spray, it was like being tortured by someone who is tickling you: you can't do anything about it but laugh. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.

Saturday night we went into town for helado and drinking. Several went to a club, but I already stank of cigarette smoke (I thoroughly appreciate California now) and was exhausted from all that walking. Sus, Ryan and Rae and a few others all agreed with me, heading back in a couple of cabs. After a brief bout of snuggling, Ryan and I were kicked out of the girls' room, the twin beds conducive to snuggling but not for sleeping two. Ryan (who had enjoyed some absinthe) went and passed out while I went down to the pool area and stared at the stars.

Buenos Aires has a light dome probably the size of L.A. The light pollution is horrible, even though many of the old lamps point down instead of up. This hotel was in the middle of no where and it showed. Stars filled the sky, each one twinkling in the humid jungle air. Every one of them was unfamiliar though; I'm in a completely different hemisphere. I had planned to study star charts before I left, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I had a conversation with a friend a while back about astronomy. I told her I loved sharing the sky with people, pointing out constellations and enjoying the stars with someone else as company. She told me it was the most humbling thing to walk out to the ocean on a clear night and sit silently in conversation with the stars. I'd never tried it, so I sat on one of those long beach chairs and stared out at the unfamiliar face of the universe.

I'd never felt farther from home, but it was an experience I hope I'll never forget.

On the way home the bus played an "in-flight" movie, The Bucket List subtitled in Spanish. Two things stuck with me from the movie (besides reaffirming my love for movies with Morgan Freeman in them): First was the Egyptian mythology bit about finding joy in your life and bringing joy to others. The second was the idea of witnessing Something Majestic.

The interwebs are closed? Oh Noes!

If someone told me a year ago I'd be writing in a blog, I'd have scoffed at them. I don't enjoy writing, or so I thought. I never kept a journal, never developed a taste for writing poetry, or descriptive or creative writing. In High school I wrote what I was told. In college, I wrote a whole slough of dry, boring research papers, followed by a whole bunch of equally dry and boring analyses of music; reducing wonderful works of art to numbers and symbols.

Now I just write. Persuasive or expository arguments, narratives of my adventures, (they're more fun when you call them that, try it). I've even tried my hand at descriptive writing, once properly motivated. It's interesting how addicting this has become. There's something significant differentiating writing here than just writing into a word document. Something about being plugged in.

If someone reads this, it means they have internet access. Something I've taken for granted since I started college. It's frustrating having my computer with me and not being able to call up video or reference when talking with my friends. I've become so dependent on having so much information at my fingertips, it's frustrating when I can't just open up my macbook and find out what I want to know. 

I'm addicted to the internet. 

Here, the Locutorios hold varying hours and there are times when they just close. That's it. The internet is closed. That's a thought that's just incomprehensible. "So?" you say, "What are you whining about, you're in another ephing country, go out and enjoy it!" I am and I do. The problem is, there's nowhere to go at some times. The whole city freezes at some points, and everything opens much later than I can work around. My afternoons are spent doing homework and trying to connect to life back at home, while waiting for dinner (10:00) or to head out with the gang (try 12:00 or later). I usually open my computer for music while I'm reading or doing homework, in the afternoons when everyone else is asleep (they're planning on being out til 4:00 or even 6:00 am). Grappling with my internet addiction has been a larger ordeal than kicking my caffeine habit. Actually, that hasn't happened either, soda down here is made with sugar instead of corn syrup and the coffee is just plain amazing.

Just think about how much effort you put into maintaing a persona on the internet. Between Facebook (or myspace), instant messaging, email, and, for me, now this blog; it's become something more than just an idle hobby or strictly a means of communication. 

Now imagine what happens if you are severed from this connection, your only connection to everything comfortable and familiar, by a stupid sign that says "Cerrado."

Musicos de la Calle

Warning: This post is even more Media Heavy

[Which means the video will come later when I'm on a hard line and have lots of time to waste]

I’m aware that every major cosmopolitan city has amazing street musicians, but I’m taking a course in which we’re studying the music and culture of Latin America so it’s hard not to go out and look for music to capture. This music however, is relatively easy to find. Because we’re in Buenos Aires, there’s always someone singing tango in the streets where they think they can find tourists. There are entire street Orchestras, rather Orquestras Típicas. The biggest I found was comprised of a (string) cuartetto, 4 bandoneones, double bass and a piano; one they roll down the cobblestone streets and tune on the spot. There’s a huge reggae movement down here, I’ve seen dreadlocks in every color of hair. But as far as music: Sunday walking down Defensa street in San Telmo, we caught a whole bunch of different groups, all playing something different. An amazing Klezmer Trio, a small mestizo group, including a charango, that Tango Orchestra, a jazz combo, and even a drunken Samba Parade bright and early on Sunday morning.

Tango y Rock Chabón

I’ve seen three live performances in actual venues in the last two weeks. The first was a band called ¡Los Fabulosos Cadillacs! A Latin rock group that does whatever it wants and doesn’t really fit into a single genre. They had horns, Latin percussion, electric guitars… you know, the same old stuff. The concert was free, in the giant park in Palermo. It was a teaser for a “comeback tour” that would return to Buenos Aires in December. The second group I saw was called the Babasonicos, a group which was further out there than I could appreciate. They had the standard garage band set-up lead, rhythm, bass, keys, drums, and a singer who pranced around and didn’t do his job all that well. What was more exciting was the venue, Luna Park. It was an indoor stadium with “Prohibido Fumar” written all over the walls, but the smoke was so thick inside you’d think we were at a Tom Petty concert. Pablo, who got his doctorate at Columbia and spent a good chunk of his life in New York, told us it was the equivalent to Madison Square Garden but I couldn’t make the comparison. I didn’t bother recording the Babsonicos, but here’s a bit of Los Cadillacs. You can’t see it but their tenor player has the most amazing crazy hair ever. I thought it’d be important to mention that.

The best show I’ve seen yet was this last Friday; a sextet of Tango musicians playing in a discreet club, hiding deep in San Telmo. The place looked like it just ignored the rest of the world since the forties. From the outside it looked like another brick building, but inside the doors were two sets of purple velvet curtains, between which sat a ticket booth. Yeah, a ticket booth. We were worried because we were told that without reservations they couldn’t seat 11 of us, but it turned out they couldn’t turn down 550 pesos. We got dropped at the bar in the back, looking around aimlessly until someone marched us upstairs to our own private balcony. The place wasn’t a restaurant with a show, it was a club with a kitchen. Art decorated the grey blue walls, each painting with its own lighting that dimmed just enough when the house lights went down. Each table had candles and all faced the stage. The club was about the size of your standard elementary school cafeteria cut in half lengthwise, or I guess in this context it would be safe to return to your memories of fourth grade and say “hot dog style.” We were seated at a long table with high-backed armchairs and had an unobstructed view of the show. Granted, a few of us were shorted chairs and had to sit on the floor. When Ryan ordered some food though, the waiter placed a candle right next to him so he could eat his meal seated on the concrete in style. The table was meant for the performers to sit at before the show, we figured this out because we were separated from the “green room” by only a curtain.

I can’t describe the music and do it justice, but I have plenty of it stored on my computer when I get back (a few of us bought Cds). Until I do, here’s something to hold you over:

Good Grief

I don’t know how many people read Peanuts anymore, seeing as the strip is just reprinted weekly from ages long past, but that right there is a testament to the strip and Charles Schultz. I hold a certain empathy for Charlie Brown - growing up it was really easy to identify with the character. No uncoordinated adolescent can deny ties to a character who can never for the life of him kick the damn football (though maybe to no fault of his own). More importantly I’ve found that the two of us share something more significant than athletic skill, that being taste in women. One of the prevalent story arcs in Peanuts is Charlie Brown’s inability to cope with his adoration of the Little Red Haired Girl. She’s never shown in the strip, and only worshiped from afar - reminding me of Quixote’s Dulcinea. The problem is, there are certain girls that I’ve found, and fallen for, that completely strip me of my ability to cope and flirt, around them I almost feel stripped of myself. If I catch ones eye across the room I can’t even smile to dissolve the tension, only bashfully look at my feet, caught red handed doing something I know I shouldn’t have done. What’s worse? They’ve all been amazing, fun, intelligent and gorgeous red-heads.

Two things started this post – first I found a document on my computer dated from October of 2004, it was a depository of quotes. Between quotes from H.L. Mencken, Benjamin Disraeli and Douglas Adams, I found a scene from a Peanuts movie or strip, I forget which:

It's stupid to just sit here and admire that little red haired girl from a
distance. It's stupid not to get up and go over and talk to her.
[stands up]
It's really stupid! It's just plain stupid; so why I don't I go over and
talk to her?!
[sits down]
Because I'm stupid.
~Charlie Brown

This ailment plagued me my freshman year and my sophomore year, with two different women, and thus the quote made it into my depository. I thought I had kicked the habit when I moved on to brunettes and the like, but I was wrong: she’s studying here in Buenos Aires with me, regretfully strawberry blonde. Yup, that’s reason number two.

I’m being good. I have to be mindful of how much attention I pay to her, purposefully ignoring her so as not to fawn. The fact that when I talk to her I feel witless and slow helps. Sometimes my thought process just freezes around her, sometimes this is a little less helpful... but something happened that threw me for a loop. Something frustratingly meaningless, but it sent me flying nonetheless.

Last night a group of us went to go see Rent in Spanish. The show was amazing, and the music was the same and as awesome as ever. Whoever translated did an amazing job keeping the lyrics in line, and relevant. For me it was an exercise in figuring out what was going on, but it was much like watching an italian opera (la Bohéme) with a loose idea of the plot and just going aloing for the ride. The fun part was watching them try and fit 525,600 minutos into the same space of time. Regardless, the girls I went with decided it’d be nice to dress up and I threw on a tie.

After the show we were trying to flag down a cab and walking to a bigger intersection for better results. Standing on the corner, she began to yawn and I hit her with my program in admonishment, telling her she couldn’t be tired as she had a long night of clubbing ahead of her. Our conversation fell into inanity and slowly died away as the others tried to grab a cab. This one has a bit of ADD and she absent-mindedly grabbed my tie to better inspect it for the better part of 15 seconds (Jerry Garcia = shiny). When she looked up at me she saw a dopey smile behind which raged a battle between elation and sheer terror. I don’t know if she realized it, but she certainly realized how close she had drawn herself towards me and had to awkwardly take a step back.

This sort of vignette is reserved for some romantic comedy and I’ve had to distance myself from it and come back to reality. I don’t need to be keeping a checklist to determine whether my life is comedy or tragedy as I’m not living in a narrative. My problem however, is that my brain is still buzzing about it behind my conscious thoughts, especially when it comes across other quotes from that repository. Specifically this one from Joseph Heller’s Catch 22 (and aptly so, considering how trapped I feel in this situation):

"His response to women was one of worship and idolatry. They were lovely, satisfying, maddening manifestations of the miraculous... too powerful to be measured, too keen to be endured, and too exquisite for employment by base, unworthy man. He could interpret their presence in his hands only as a cosmic oversight destined to be rectified speedily."

Subways and Wine

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I can get anywhere in the city through Buenos Aire’s extensive subway system for the cost of 90 centavos, equivalent to 30 cents. We played around after class today navigating the system and it’s wonderfully simple. A bunch of us went up to see a free concert in Palermo, a neighborhood Pablo compared to Manhattan, with its own version of Central Park, what the locals call “the forest of Palermo.” The concert was a teaser concert for a band called Los Fabulosos Cadillacs who are acting like any other older rock band and getting back together. Their tour starts in December but they held a free concert last night to get everyone excited and publicize their return. Pablo left early to pick up his daughters and he left us with the direction back to the subway being “follow everyone else.” When we got down to the platform the place was packed with people, and when the first train came, these Argentines put the students of Davis to shame. That car was packed so full of people I don’t think there was room for many to even breathe. We wisely waited for the next train, but watched as two men fought with the doors trying to push their way into the mass of people, they were barely successful.

I also discovered the awesome wine available here. Sus and I split a bottle of a white wine, I forget the vineyard, but the grape was Torrontes I think. It was really light and barely sweet and probably the best wine I’ve tasted outside of the few glasses poured for me in my cousins’ cabin (one of whom is a master sommelier, the director of wine of the Bellagio in Las Vegas, and our family’s hook-up for amazing wines). The best part is after splitting a 3/4 liter bottle (four glasses), a glass of this amazing stuff costs the same a bottle of soda.

I ran into a post that a buddy of mine made a while ago in response to mine, figures he´d wait til I was out of the country, starving for high-speed internet. Shane raises some good questions about religion and I think it´s worth thinking about them.

Stranger in a Strange Land

So, I’ve been in Buenos Aires for four days and haven’t written anything about the city yet. This is mostly because I’ve been too busy/exhausted to do so. This city is absolutely amazing. I don’t know where to start besides that it feels like I’m in Europe, but looks like I’m in the 1920s. The architecture of the buildings surrounding my hotel and in most of the Centro is old and seems artisan in some ways. My hotel is a fine example, the ground floor is only the front desk and a stairwell which spirals up around an elevator. The staircase is marble and beautiful. The rooms are small and the furniture is as antique as the buildings - but worn and used to the point where I’m sure it’s not part of a gimmick but actually has been here longer than I’ve been alive.

The café culture is amazing here too. In a country where the middle class seems to have been decimated in an economic crisis, the city’s center and upscale districts still feel otherworldly in their food service. The dress and actions of waiters here is reminiscent of that which I’ve only seen in black and white movies.

Oh yeah, one small problem: I don’t speak Spanish! Even the “survival Spanish” class offered with my program is taught completely in Spanish, and the instructor only speaks Spanish and Portuguese. (The music and culture course is taught by Pablo and in English). Susanna and I are the only ones in the program who have never taken Spanish before. We’re treading water when it comes to the class but out on the streets we’re having a blast. Though I am slowly learning the language - very slowly - the majority of interaction I have with the portenos is me recognizing the prices they quote and doling out cash. There’s plenty of non-verbal communication too, and it seems they’re used to American idiots like myself expecting them to deal with me without speaking their language. I sometimes feel really stupid, and apologetic, but most of the time it’s exciting at the least.

One of the native Spanish speakers in the program had a pen pal in Buenos Aires growing up and she looked him up about six months ago. Esteban has been showing us around the city like a mother hen followed by 12 little chicks. This guy is awesome. I got to sit across from him at dinner and had a conversation that was all Spanish on his end and all English on mine, and it worked out just fine, we both ended up understanding each other (once we slowed our speech patterns down a bit). The places he’s taken us to were in the Recoleta, (our hotel is in the Centro) and the subway was closed last night (on strike). The distances I’ve been walking around the city remind me of the “Walking distances” cited in John Green’s Gatorade and Gasoline essay.

The strikes have something to do with the government trying to tax soy products coming out of the hinterlands. Apparently la presidente is trying to redistribute wealth amongst the country by means of an export tax on soy products and there’s a huge permanent demonstration on the plaza de Congresso between a pro and con camp (they had a futbol match a while a go and it drew quite a crowd. Our walk downtown last night ran parallel to a huge march in demonstration from the plaza de Mayo to the Congresso.

We’re studying at UADE, el Universidad Argentina de la Empressa, a private university smack dab in the middle of town. It’s on Avenida Neuve de Julio, about nine blocks from the hotel. The place is pretty nifty, it’s a vertical campus. They have 5 or six buildings all that go deep into the ground (3 floors or so) and about 9 floors up. It’s a bit of a contrast to Davis where everything is so spread out.

Hey, I’ve got nothing to do today but smile.

People in Airports don’t smile. Everyone seemed to be in a state of extra stress, and granted traveling with family can be exacerbate the experience of traveling, I found my trip went by without anything to gripe about. Maybe it’s because my trip started well and that carried over throughout the rest of my travels.

SFO is a nice place. I got there three hours before my flight left, and without any reason to hurry. I made it a point to enjoy myself even while standing in line for security. Once through, I got to eat breakfast at a franchise of the Buena Vista Café (no Irish Coffee though) and then wait for another hour and a half sitting in a food court reading and listening to a combo of trombone, bass and keys. Apparently SFO employs live musicians on Fridays. I watched a young fellow scan the packed court in distress as he couldn’t find a table until I waved him over to sit at mine. I haven’t shared a table with a stranger since I was in Germany, but it was a rather fun experience, the first of about 15 new people I made friends with in almost as many hours.

My flight from SFO to Dulles in DC was better than expected as well. I got seated in an exit row, and next to a fellow who slept the entire time. I was worried by the end of the flight because I had gone through all of my reading material pretty thoroughly and didn’t have time to find more. My plane arrived 25 minutes late, at 9:15. Boarding for my next flight started at nine, and of course the gate was placed according to those laws buried deep in nature that state that the gate you come from and the gate you’re headed to in an airport are on absolute opposite ends. I was triumphant and made it to my flight, just behind another fellow traveling from the same gate. What’s more, we were seated right next to each other.

This guy’s name was Dan. He was an Australian. I had no need to worry about entertaining myself with reading material as we had more to talk about than any two strangers should. He was an amateur musician and worked for EA games. He was once a programmer and designer but he was placed as head of a project that involves him outsourcing labor to Argentina. We ended up talking more about politics (Australian and American), globalization and economics more than music and video games. He told me to look up a documentary titled “The Century of the Self” when I found the internet again.

I found that much of my anxiety towards not speaking Spanish here was unfounded. I managed to get on a bus and take a taxi that dropped me off at my hotel instead of a remise straight from the airport, paying something like 47 pesos rather than 120, the exchange is almost 3 to $1. I can read menus and order in Spanish ( who knew) and am learning phrases like “I’m sorry, the ATM only gives $100s” and “My Spanish is terrible”

The group of students I’ve found at the hotel are awesome. The hotel is amazing too. It rises off of a storefront and looks like it’s straight out of the 1930s. The street I’m on is in the exact center of town, Avenida de Mayo. I’d link you there but Google Maps doesn’t do Argentina.
Anyways, time for a nap. I’ll be updating this rather regularly because the internet is right down the street from me… literally.