Heart of the Matter

I´ll just jump right into a few things that have been ¨core¨ or the ¨heart of the matter¨ (as India Arie and Toya Glen would call it) of my time in Buenos Aires.

WEDNESDAY NIGHT DINNER:
Every Wednesday night, it´s ¨family¨dinner!! Around 10 o´clock people start coming over. I haven´t quite figured out everyone´s relation yet... but here is the core group of people:

-Silvia, my host mom
-Gustavo, my host dad
-Natalie, host sister #1
-Colleen, host sister #2
-Soledad, my host mom´s daughter, 27 years old, kindergarten teacher
-Romario, Soledad´s boyfriend, 30 something years old, don´t know what he does
-Augustin, my host mom´s son, 30 something years old, works at Freak Model Agency
-Ro, Augustin´s girlfriend, 30 something years old, works at a clothes shop in Palermo, Buenos Aires
-Little Gustavo (fondly known as Gustavito), my host dad´s (Gustavo) son, 30 something years old, also hosts students from study abroad programs, not sure what he does
-Girl #1, most likely Gustavito´s girlfriend, don´t know anything about her
-Tomas, small child of maybe 10 years-- my host mom´s grandson but not the son of Soledad or Augustin...?
-Raquel, my host mom´s mother, in her 70s, used to be an education professor and now does commercials and advertising!
-Aunt #1, my host mom´s aunt and Raquel´s sister, also in her 70s, teaches Spanish sign language to the deaf, likes wine a LOT and always steals the bread from the kitchen when she leaves
-Graciela, my host mom´s best friend since grade school, she is a professional tango dancer, and psychologist!!

Everyone is quirky. The first night I sat next to Raquel. She told me the same joke over and over. When I finally understood it, around the 6th time she told me, it was actually pretty funny. The aunt, on the other hand, does not use words much when she speaks. She will do sign language with her hands. The first night she sat on the other side of me. She lifted up a bottle of wine and looked at me with an expression that I read as, ¨Would you like some wine?¨ So, I nodded. As soon as I had finished the glass, she had already refilled it. I asked her how to sign, ¨NO MORE PLEASE¨ and she just laughed at me and kept refilling my glass. The following Wednesday I made sure that I didn´t sit next to the aunt, but she still managed to refill my glass with wine every time I set in on the table. I´ve had some interesting conversations with Graciela-- she tells me all about the multiple plastic surgeries she has had. She also invited me to the club where she dances-- so I´m going to go! I love Wednesday night dinners-- best food of the week and great company!

SOUL- SEARCHING
Lent:
A season for inward reflection: a time of stripping down to essentials and a time of sacrifice as people focus on their relationship with God. Also, for me, it is a time that connects one to the rest of humanity, to Mother Earth and to oneself. Whether one fasts for days alongside of his cancer-striken brother-in-law who is half-way across the country to show love and solidarity or one abstains from sweets to challenge their self-control-- I believe there is power in this time of inward reflection.

For me, I have committed to not using the most alien-looking, fuel-guzzling, black fume-farting machine I´ve ever seen: el colectivo (the public bus). There´s something about the noseless fleets of colectivos that terrifies me. Maybe its because they zoom in and out of traffic at ridiculously high speeds and screech to a stop just long enough for you to have to jump off before el colectivo takes off again, leaving behind a nasty cloud of diselous (not sure if that´s a word) vapor for inhalation and contamination of thy lungs. Yeah, that could be part of it. Also, it costs $1,20 pesos per trip. And I´m cheap.

So, I walk. A lot. I enjoy walking. It allows me to really get to know the streets, pop my head into different restaurants and ice-cream shops and it´s a sure-fire way to get a good nights sleep. (Women of Pod 169-- instant cure for our insomnia epidemic!) :)

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance:
Some people call this book ¨thought candy.¨ I would have to agree. I´ve been known to have no attention span and therefore a very short-term relationship with reading in general. But I literally can not put this book down. I bring it to class with me and sneak a few words when the teacher is writing on the board; I read it during lunch, before bed and whenever else I have spare time. You know if you´re Italian and you think something is really good, you would put your fingers to your lips, kiss your fingers and then release your fingers. Well, that gesture would be appropriate here.

The book includes some reflection on time-- and the following are some notes I wrote while reading-- dedicated to Miss. Leslie Mack.
-Never be in too much of a hurry to be courteous.
-Never be in too much of a hurry to talk--- to break the endless day-to-day shallowness, the monotony that leaves a person wondering weeks later where all the time went
-Does change produced by technology and modernity always mean improvement? While technology may move life faster and make life broader, does it provide the same depth? -Don´t ask the question, ¨What´s new?¨ It begs for a trivial and fashionable response about life in general. Ask instead, ¨What´s best?¨ It cuts deeper and demands thought and personal opinion.

I´m definitely learning about myself and what makes me happy. Right now I´d like to live an old- fashioned lifestyle in a town of 100 people and 200 horses in the middle-of-nowhere. :)

La Estancia:
Last week, all the students in the IES program went on an ¨excursion¨ to this ranch type of place in ¨the country,¨which is about 2 hours from Buenos Aires. This place was surreal. We got off the bus and got on a horse carriage that took us to the ¨main lodge.¨ The lawn was filled with tables and chairs and a buffet full of food. There were servers holding trays of empanadas (Argentine meat filled pies) -- we could eat as much as we wanted for FREE! There were 2 pools, fields for playing sports, bikes and trails for walking. I was in a very happy place. After I had my fill of the outside buffet, the masses of students started entering this building. Turned out that the inside of the building was another HUGE BUFFET!! There was a ginormus salad bar (with more than just lettuce), and tons of different appetizers. I got a plate that was overflowing with food and sat down at a table. Then, a waiter came to the table with a basket of hot bread rolls and a huge skewer with like a whole fried pig on it! He cut the slices right there are gave one to each person at the table. Then, a waiter with a ginormous skewer of beef came, then the chicken came. It continued like this: the dessert bar opened next. Who in their right mind refuses dessert even if you feel like you´re already bursting at the seams? Not I. It was a glorious day. It felt so good to lay by the pool, while in a severe food coma, and breathe in the clean and fresh country air. Ahhh... life was good!

FUNNY FOREIGNER
Confusions happen naturally, right? I always tell the story of my dear friend Janne, who is from Norway and went to St. Olaf. We were roommates one night while in Guatemala together last year. Someone knocked on our door and asked us if we had any TUMS (unfortunately, a common necessity for the entire time in Guatemala). Janne looked at me with a very confused expression and then looked back at the girl at the door. She said, ¨Well, sure! I´ve got two tums right here,¨as she held up her two thumbs! As I poke fun at that experience, I´ve acquired a few mix-up stories of my own due to language and cultural differences. Here are a few:

1. This happened the first day I arrived in Buenos Aires, and was the first communication I had with anyone at the Residencia where I stayed. The manager told me that I needed to give her a money deposit for the keys to my room. The word for keys is ¨llaves.¨ In Argentina, the double L is pronounced as a CH. So, I thought she was saying ¨Chaves.¨So, I started talking about Cesar Chavez. I´d say it was a pretty positive start to my Spanish acquisition...

2. It´s typical to have a piece of fruit for dessert at my homestay. Last Wednesday night, Ro, the girlfriend of my host mom´s son, asked me if I would like my ¨fruta con cascara.¨Well, in Argentina, they don´t pronounce the S too often. So, I heard, ¨fruta con caca.¨ And, you know from my story with the CACA-- that caca and fruta would be an unpleasant combination. I said, ¨Heck no, that´s gross,¨and Ro peeled the whole apple before she served it to me. We realized afterwards that confusion had mounted.

3. Maradona is a good name to be familiar with in Argentina. He is the coach of the National Futbol team. Not to be confused with Madonna, who has nothing to do with Futbol and little to do with Argentina.

4. Every morning, I look out from my balcony to see what the weather looks like. Every morning, the sidewalks are wet, so I assume that it rained during the night. I went on believing this for awhile, until I collided (literally) with the real reason why the sidewalks are wet every morning. The shop keepers on every street sweep and hose off the sidewalk in front of the store every morning. One morning I was up running pretty early and ran past a man throwing a bucket of water onto the sidewalk. Unfortunately, I was in-between the man and the sidewalk. He was very sorry and I was very wet. At least I know that it doesn´t rain every night. :)

Well, that´s all for now! Satisfaction with life is up to a 17.92 because I had a great weekend filled with jazz clubs and soccer games-- I´ll have to write about these next time!

Love to you all,
Mica