Veintiuno

My 21st birthday was a mighty success. After a midterm and class from ten until 9, I could hardly wait to relax and begin the festivities. My Austrian housemate Veronica’s birthday is the day after mine, so we decided to plan a little party together. We each invited our friends over to the house, and it ended up being a wonderful international affair, of (North)Americans, Argentines, Austrians, Germans and una francesa.







Natalia put up balloons outside the front door, and all over the living room and we sat chatting and laughing around a delicious spread of food: una picada (meat/cheese/bread/olives etc.) and empanadas. Anna (my French housemate) made caipirinhas, which is a traditional Brazilian drink, and we had a lot of tasty wine as well. Eli, Natalia’s friend/co-worker, made guacamole. I forgot how much I missed Mexican food until I took a bite of this guacamole.



Natalia also made a delicious apple pie for dessert. You can gather how good is was from the pictures :)





For a birthday present, Natalia gave me a shirt that she made herself. It fit perfectly, and I ended up wearing it that night! Veronica and Anna gave me a tango CD for me to practice my new moves with. Then the four of us had a big group hug. I felt, and feel, so incredibly lucky to be living with Natalia, Veronica and Anna. I couldn’t have asked for a greater family to be living with for my time abroad.

Here is me, Anna, Veronica and Natalia:



This is me with Eli and Natalia. Eli, by the way, is hilarious. She is over at the house a lot, because she works with Natalia, and I can always count on having an entertaining conversation with her. Eli speaks ridiculously fast, and every other word is either a lunfardo (Argentine slang) or a swear word, so sometimes a lot is lost in translation. She calles Luz, the cat, Senora de Chorizo (The Sausage Lady, roughly), which I never fail to laugh at. She is also, according to Natalia, very flaky. Natalia will call Eli, who will say she'll be over in a half hour, and then she will go back to sleep and show up at the house three hours later. Once Natalia snapped and got angry at Eli. When Eli showed up later, she slinked into the house bearing Natalia's favorite chocolate.



Later that night my group of friends and I set off to go dancing. I was reluctant to leave, because we were having such a fun time at the house, but I knew the night would not be complete without a little dancing. Per usual, I had a fantastic time at the boliche (club where you can go dancing) with my friends. Unfortunately someone dropped (and broke) my camera right when we got there, so I have no pictures. The night however, will be forever imprinted in my memory.

When I got home early that morning, I found that the girls had hung up the balloons all around my room. I thought to myself, it is good to be 21 and in Buenos Aires.

Exploraciones Culturales

Last week an anthropologist came to my class as a guest speaker. After he spoke for a while about his research, we ended up having a discussion about some cultural differences between Argentina and the United States. Here are a few things that came up in the discussion, as well as some of my own observations:

1) La moda: as a general rule, Argentines are extremely fashionable. There is however, one exception:



These shoes are very stylish here. They kind of remind me of Crocs, except that I'm pretty sure people recognize that Crocs are ridiculous. Argentines on the other hand, consider these shoes to be high fashion.

2) Los Deportes: There are a lot of things that can be said about fútbol, which if we’re being honest is really the only sport in Argentina. One interesting cultural difference is that women do not play fútbol. Every time I tell someone that I play soccer, they almost always think that I am joking. I actually shared this difference myself during the discussion, to which the anthropologist responded, “Para mí, una mujer quien juega el fútbol es como un asado mal cocido.” Translation: for me, a woman who plays soccer is likely a badly cooked barbeque. Yes, from the mouth of the anthropologist.

3) Una Cultura de Café: In Buenos Aires, going to tomar un café, or getting coffee, is as much a part of the daily routine as sleeping or eating. Cafés line the streets, and are teeming with porteños, who will spend hours chatting over a café con leche and media lunas (delicious Argentine version of a croissant.) More than anything, going to tomar un café is an opportunity to spend time with friends and to talk, talk, talk. As the anthropologist said, “La discusión es un deporte nacional,” or discussion is a national sport. To give you a sense of the café culture here, note that there are only three Starbucks in the entire city of Buenos Aires. Three. The reason is because it doesn’t make sense to the porteños. While they have undoubtedly embraced McDonald’s and Burger King, they continue to reject the idea of to-go coffee. Coffee without conversation to go with it is practically unthinkable.

4) El Beso: Argentines always greet with a kiss. Until recently, I always considered this to be a more personal greeting than in the US. As a general rule I guess it is, at least between strangers, but the other day I realized that I really miss big, tight, it’s-hard-for-me-to-breathe hugs. Kisses here, while on the surface imply a lot of physical contact, are in reality very delicate. I’ve gone into huge withdrawal, and the other day I think I frightened Natalie when I gave her a huge, fuerte abrazo.

5) Lo Politcamente Corecto: I may have mentioned this earlier, but the term political correctness does not exist in Argentina. After talking about ethnocentrism and race as a social construct, the anthropologist (an anthropologist!) went on to refer to los chinos, pulling his eyelids and bowing down in a stereotypical, and what we would consider a pretty racist way. In Argentina anyone who is Asian is un chino, including Japanese and Koreans. The class was flabbergasted, but the crazy thing is that they don’t see anything wrong with saying these sorts of comments.

6) La Comida: What would you like on your sandwich? Jamón y queso o jamón y queso (jam and cheese)? Apparently turkeys do not exist in Argentina.

7) La Cultura Pop: Argentines are obsessed with the Simpsons. I watched an episode, all of which are dubbed over, and Homer’s voice is one of the funniest things I have ever heard. There were hundreds of Bart dolls at this feria:



They are also really into Spongebob Squarepants, or Bob Esponja. My Brazilian friend asked me once, “Do you like Bobby Sponge? Do you like Bobby Sponge?”. It took about fifteen minutes to figure out what in the world he was talking about.

8) Los Conductores: drivers in Buenos Aires are insane. Fact: Argentina has the highest number of road deaths, at a whopping 8,000 per year. Swerving, honking and shouting characterize a typical taxi ride. The drivers here make LA drivers seem like sweet little old ladies. In response to a comment about the apparent disregard for lane divisions, the anthropologist said jokingly (but not really), “oh, those are there for a reason?”. Here is a picture of my taxi driver the other night, who did a lot of shouting during the drive:



9) El Ojo: It took me weeks to figure this out, but in Buenos Aires there is something called “El Ojo,” or The Eye. What people do is they will say “ojo,” and then grab the skin under their eye and pull it down. I never knew what this meant, and would usually just look at people and smile when they did it, figuring it was some random gesture. I discovered however, that it actually means be careful. Good to know.

The same taxi driver pictured above was so into El Ojo that he actually had El Ojo in his taxi, so that he could simultaneously pull underneath his eye and point to the glass Ojo, for extra emphasis I suppose:

Uruguay: Parte Dos

For Semana Santa (the long four day weekend over Easter) I went to Uruguay with a few of my friends. We waited until the last minute to plan anything, so we decided on the relatively easy and 're lindo' trip to Uruguay. Sara and I took a ferry called the Buquebus over to Colonia on Thursday morning, crossing el Río de la Plata, the widest river in the world. If hadn’t known it was a river it never would even have occurred to me that it wasn’t the ocean. The highlight of the ferry ride may have been the café con leche I had from the ferry cafeteria. It was really amazing, and I might need to go back to Uruguay just so I can have another.

Me and Sara on the Buquebus, pumped to arrive in Colonia:



Once we arrived in Colonia, we walked over to our hostel. We thought that we were lost, because we were supposed to be on the main road, and it appeared that we were walking down a semi-deserted side street. Sure enough, after asking around, we discovered that we were in fact on the main street. Colonia, the oldest town in Uruguay, is very small and very quaint. The walk to our hostel took approximately two minutes. Once we got to our hostel, we discovered that they had lost our reservation. I remained surprisingly calm in a potentially bad situation, and after showing the woman our confirmation thirty times, she finally showed us into our room.



Colonia is famous for its historic district, and once we had settled in at our hostel, Sara and I headed out to explore. We met up with three other friends and wandered around the town for the next few hours. First we looked for somewhere to have lunch, and I found myself once again surrounded by chovizno, the monstrosity of a dish which I destroyed on my previous trip to Uruguay. (You can reference the photo of this mountainous pile of meat, eggs and mayonaise in my Punta del Este entry.) It was one of those dishes you only need to eat once in your life, so I opted for pizza. After lunch we went to the top of a lighthouse where we had an incredible view of the town and of Río de la Plata.

This is us on the top of the lighthouse:







My friend Elsa had her fortune read the day before, and the woman told her that she would find the love of her life in Montevideo, and gave her the street name and time. Naturally we went excitedly searching for el amante de su vida that afternoon. Much to our disappointment, the man standing on the on the street was not a sexy Latin lover, but rather a hefty, fifty-something year-old man who looked like he hadn’t showered in quite a while. We decided that we must have gotten the time wrong.

That night, the other girls set off for Montevideo, and Sara and I headed back to our hostel. It was my first experience staying in a communal hostel room, and a very good one. We met two really nice girls from Uruguay and decided to cook dinner together. We bought food and the supermarket and cooked a delicious meal of pasta with vegetables and salad. One funny interaction was at the supermarket, when Sara told the girls that she is a vegetarian. They proceeded to ask, "So do you eat ham?", and then, "then you eat chicken, right?". Argentines have the highest consumption of red meat in the world, and I'm pretty sure than Uruguay is in close second. I guess it really isn't a surprise then, that for many Argentines and Uruguyans, vegetarianism in nearly incomprehensible. In addition to worshiping red meat, Uruguayans, like their Argentine neighbors, appear not to be big vegetable fans, and Sara and I ate pretty much the entire salad. We spent the rest of the night chatting with other travelers, mainly from Argentina and Uruguay.

Colonia is lovely, but it is regarded as a one day destination, so we forged ahead to Montevideo the next morning. Montevideo, the capital, is often described as a smaller version of Buenos Aires. When we arrived however, we encountered far from a bustling city. Arriving in Montevideo sort of felt like stepping into one of those end of the world movies. Because it was a holiday, everyone from Montevideo had left: the streets were eerily empty and many of the shops and restaurants were closed.

Semi-deserted street in Montevideo:



Later that day Elsa, Sara and I went to Teatro Solís, a very old, beautiful theatre located on the waterfront of the city. We did a tour of the theatre, which included a clown performance. It was very strange, but we enjoyed ourselves nevertheless. And I learned the word for clown: payaso.

Me jumping on Elsa in front of el Teatro Solís:



Inside the theatre:



We finished our tour and stepped outside to see one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. The three of us ran down the street to the water (it was so incredible we just felt like running), and soaked up the explosion of colors filling the sky and bleeding out across the horizon.



Okay, so this is where the trip takes a crazy turn. We were walking back up to our hostel, giddy after witnessing such an incredible sunset, when a hooligan runs by and grabs Elsa’s purse, including her phone, credit card, keys, and….her passport. We call the police, and when they show up a few minutes later, ask us to all get into the back of the car. We then proceed to drive around Montevideo for the next 45 minutes searching for the thief. To no one’s surprise, we did not find him. We got back to our hostel later that night, and had accepted that Elsa would have to extend her trip an extra day to go to the embassy and get her passport. THEN, my friend Claire received a text from Elsa’s (stolen) phone. The ladrón said “hola.” We begged via text for him to return the passport, to which he responded: “we should call the police because he had left her things at la escuela de chile. Hope you are having a nice stay in Uruguay.” We got a hold of the police shortly after, and sure enough, about a half an hour later the police shows up with the passport in one hand, and maté in the other. (I thought that Argentines were obsessed with mate until I went to Uruguay. The love it so much that they where backpacks designed to transport thermoses of water for their maté, and they drink it while walking along the street.) Anyways, it was an extremely bizarre experience, and I’m still not quite sure what exactly occurred. We had no interest in leaving the hostel that night, and luckily they were having a concert and empanada party right in our hostel.

The next day was very chill: we took the bus to the beach and walked around there most of the day, and spent the evening cooking dinner and playing cards with a group of rowdy Australians. We came home on Easter Sunday and shared an enormous chocolate egg on the Buquebus. Not exactly the trip I had expected, but definitely one I will never forget.

Día de la Memoria

March 24 is a national holiday in Argentina, el Día de la Memoria por la Verdad y la Justicia, or the Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice. El Día de la Memoria is the anniversary of the coup d’etat in 1976 that brought the military dictatorship into power, and recognizes the victims of el Proceso, or the National Reorganization Process. El Proceso was a political project which sought to eradicate subversives: the military junta essentially waged a massive extermination campaign, murdering those who expressed, or who were suspected of having, leftist political views. 50 % of the victims were union leaders, and 25 % were university students. The victims are called ‘los desaparecidos,’ the 30,000 Argentines who ‘disappeared’ between 76’ and 79’. The majority of los desaparecidos were abducted from their homes during the night, tortured, and murdered. Many were tranquilized and thrown out of planes into the ocean.

It is hard for me to believe that horrific chapter of Argentine history occurred little more than 30 years ago. Going to the parade really emphasized that el Proceso is not just something of history, but rather continues to be very much alive and present in the Argentine consciousness. The fear and the chaos and the loss which defined the years of the military junta persist through the memories of those who loved and remember los desaparecidos. Epitomizing this effort to remember are las Madres de Plaza de Mayo, a group of woman whose children 'disapeered' during the dictatoriship. Every single Thursday las Madres gather in Plaza de Mayo and walk for a half an hour to commemerate their missing children. This is a picture of las Madres' emblem in Plaza de Mayo. Each madre wears a white head scarf embroidered with the name of her child.



On the 24th, I headed to Plaza de Mayo. Plaza de Mayo is the main plaza in front of la Casa Rosada (Argentine equivalent of the White House), and the center of all political action in Buenos Aires. I got off the subway to the booming sound of cannons, and when I walked up onto the street I was blown away by thousands of people marching in the street. It was unlike anything I have ever seen. Argentines of all ages, men and women, families, students, businessmen: it seemed like all of Buenos Aires had come out to recognize los desaparecidos. I found out later that day that there were 90,000 people in attendance. It was so loud I could hardly hear my friend standing right next to me.



First there was a parade, with every kind of performance you could think of (dancing, drums, singing) and then the people just flooded the street and began marching and chanting. The streets were packed, and I could hardly move up the sidewalk. One group in the parade carried a seemingly endless banner (four blocks long!) with the photos and names of los desaparecidos. It was a powerful image, and gave me chills to look at the stream of missing faces fading into the distance. Both a serious event and a celebration, el Día de la Memoria is a day of reflection and mourning, as well as a holiday to rejoice in Argentina’s new, brighter future. I am beginning to understand how fundamental the memory of el Proceso is to the Argentine identity: the passion with which they express their views and opinions (in politics, sports, and everything for that matter), as well as the value they place on living well and cherishing time with friends and family are a cultural reaction, or negation of a time when free speech and self-expression were impossible.

Yo Soy la Asesina

A few nights ago, Ariel, Natalia, Anna and Natalia’s friend and I were sharing pet stories during dinner. I felt like it was my turn to share, and not really thinking about it, decided to disclose a dark moment from my past: I told them the duck story. I had repressed the memory for a long time, but it all came back so clearly, and I told them about being at my friend’s house, and accidentally stepping on, and killing one of the family’s pet ducklings. It was one of the most traumatic moments of my life. Everyone else however, found the story extremely entertaining, and once the shock of the story passed, they all started hysterically laughing. Ariel found it especially amusing, and proceeded to dub me “la asesina.” Great. They are really big on apodos (nicknames) in Argentina, and mine is ‘the assassin.’ Now, whenever Luz, the cat, comes near me, Ariel shouts, “Luz, watch out, la asesina is coming hahahaha!”. Or sometimes, he will arbitrarily insert into our conversations, “pero pisaste un patito hahaha” (but you stepped on a baby duck). All I can really do is shake my head and laugh. After all, 'la asesina' is kind of a cool nick name :)