Katie's Rules for Studying Abroad

Maybe it's just me, but I have a set of unwritten life rules I follow. I'm not sure when/where I came up with them, but I have accumulated them over the years. Some are silly (like never painting my nails black or dying my hair), but others are more serious (like never smoking).

Studying abroad is no different. I have a set of rules I abide by and thought I would share a few:

• Speak the language
• It drives me crazy that people go to another country to experience and learn their culture and language, but end up speaking in their native language. You can do that at home! Not to mention the fact that you are making yourself a target when walking around the city.
• Make friends with the natives
• Branch out and meet new people. Get out of your comfort zone and hang out with students who aren't from your country. I guarantee that your experience will be so much better than you could ever have imagined!

• Refuse to support American chains
• Don't go to McDonald's, Subway, Burger King, Starbucks, Walmart, etc. You traveled over 5500 miles (if you're from the Chicago area) to study abroad and can eat/shop at these places any day you want for the rest of your life.
• Become a native
• Follow their lead -- go to the hole-in-the-wall restaurants, dress like they do (unless they look absolutely ridiculous :-P), drink mate, arrive late to everything, learn the local dialect, master the public transportation system, go to non-tourist places, learn how to cook their national dishes, attend cultural activities.

Mate - like green tea

Learning Truco - Argentine card game

• Join extra-curricular activities
• There are multiple sports teams, volunteer organizations (Rotaract, anyone?), church groups, clubs or whatever else you might be interested in. Think of your study abroad as an extension of your university experience back home. Nobody wants to go straight to class and then home - make the most of the short time you are abroad!!

And Then There Were Two

I've been meaning to give some sort of neighborhood update for awhile now, but alas better late then never.

In the beginning there were four - 2 guys from Mexico, 1 from Ecuador and myself. Two of them have been living in Buenos Aires for a few years (one studying engineering and the other training for tennis) and the other came to study architecture for the semester.

We live with an older couple - Tito and Susy, who are like grandparents ... telling us when to bring a jacket or umbrella and helping us get where we need to go in the city. During the week, Sandra (from Paraguay) also lives in the house. She cleans, helps prepare the food and does laundry for the family. In Buenos Aires this type of job is referred to as mucama because many people want so badly to live in BA that they are willing to work for room and board in residential houses. (For the record, I'm not sure if some get paid in addition to room and board.)

Despite living in Argentina, where dinner is usually around 10, we eat between 8 and 8:30. The food isn't great, but I guess it could be worse. They cook super early (4ish) and then reheat it in the microwave at 8. This kills any flavor or freshness the food may have had and dries up red sauce on pastas. We rarely eat meat and tend to eat the same things every week. We drink orange flavored koolaid with everything and dessert is always a piece of fruit, occasionally fruit salad.

Breakfast options consist of toast with jam, coffee with milk (half coffee, half milk), koolaid orange juice, a type of frosted flakes without sugar and a piece of white cake. I absolutely LOVE coffee, but they brew it the day/night before, add the milk and microwave it in the morning. Quite possibly the worst coffee imaginable. Not to mention super weak :( 

*However there is a great coffee spot a few blocks away that basically has caramel macchiatos!

Since we are all students, we have varying class schedules and some eat dinner later depending on their classes or activities. Breakfast is when you get up, so some at 7 am and others 10 am. I've come to the conclusion that there is nothing worse than getting up first thing and having the person who touches your food blow their nose continually and touch your food without washing their hands. Not cool, especially because a majority of the people here blow their noses without toilet paper! (Think of blocking one side and blowing with all your might into a sink or outside.)

Speaking of sinks, the bathroom we share is supposedly cleaned daily, but it definitely doesn't smell that way and I'm pretty sure the shower curtain has NEVER been cleaned!* Plus, I'm pretty sure if Sandra actually cleaned it daily we would not run out of toilet paper all the time. ...nor would my room be covered in dust.


*Note to self: never live somewhere where shower curtains are necessary.


Anyway, back to the original story... Tito has eyesight problems and can only see certain spots or angles. Thus Susy and Sandra serve the food, but Susy has been sick recently with some muscle problems and we were all told we had to find new homes (but we could obviously stay until we found something). About a week later, Tito told me I could stay, along with the boy who is training for tennis because we don't have weird schedules. (aka breakfast at 6:30 or night classes)

That was a few weeks ago - yesterday the other two guys left and I learned that the tennis player has tournaments in Mexico starting next week and he won't be back until I leave. Not news I was expecting to hear... I've been actively looking for a new home, but with no luck. I thought well at least there's the guys - not so much. I'm dreading two months of subpar food and awkward dinners with Tito (Susy never eats with us). Not to mention I've heard all of his stories enough times to retell them as my own. :( on the bright side, I won't have to keep putting down the toilet seat nor worry about sharing the bathroom.

Other positive aspects include: having my own room (large in comparison to other students staying with other families), cable tv in my room, a big desk with shelves and lots of closet space. Plus the location is unbeatable - two colectivos stop at the corner of our house, another three pass the avenue three blocks away and i have 15 or so stop eight blocks away. The subway station is 11 blocks away or I can take one of the colectivos on the corner to another subway stop. I love walking, so I'm glad it's within walking distance to the university, volleyball and church. I also live in one of the richer neighborhoods, so it's fairly safe to walk at night from the bus stops. Not to mention that we live a block away from a police station and the neighborhood is filled with security guards every couple blocks.

Here are two of the failed attempts at moving... 


Not even half the size of my current room, broken furniture, inadequate desk and super far walking from my activities.

Another option, but also itty bitty (aka the shower head was on the wall behind where the bathroom door opened), super expensive and the lady didn't know if she had wifi.

Traveling in Argentina

For the most part, traveling in Argentina is pretty affordable (by bus). Plane tickets are super expensive for foreigners - that's right, foreigners pay a different price than Argentines.

Either way, traveling within the country is always an experience. There are twenty or more lines of buses and each have distinct time tables, not to mention that there are different types of seats -- semi cama or cama (semi bed or bed). Typically the buses run on-time, except my bus to Mendoza. We were supposed to leave at 8:10 pm, but the bus didn't show up until 9:40. There were massive crowds considering we had national holidays Thursday and Friday and everyone was traveling. It was an obstacle course trying to reach your bus when it arrived because you couldn't move even if you wanted to.

Of all the buses I've been on you always get served dinner (and sometimes breakfast). Dinner has ranged anywhere from ham and cheese sandwiches to a milenesa sandwich (similar to a tenderloin), in addition to dessert of an alfajor and pepas (a type of sugar cookie with jam in the middle) or hard candy.  Usually they don't provide drinks, but sometimes you get a tiny glass of coke.

On my recent trip, we got zip...before I knew it we were reaching midnight and everyone was sleeping and the colectivero was not handing out food. Thankfully I always bring snacks since 12+ hours in the bus can make you quite hungry...or it's just me that's always hungry :) We did stop for breakfast consisting of coffee with milk and croissants. On my current bus back to Buenos Aires, we got multiple ham and cheese sandwiches, pepas and our own 12oz of coke. It's impossible to know ahead of time what you may or may not get served.

Then there's the fellow passengers... Interesting would be a good word to describe them. Since public transportation is so great, everyone utilizes it. Young parents with their infants or toddlers, older people, students, middle-aged people and foreigners. I've only had one bad experience with the person I had to sit next to...

He was probably in his 40's and creepily staring at me from the seats in front of me. The people who were supposed to sit in those seats came and he sat next to me in what I assumed was his actual seat. He continued to look at me and into my purse when I opened it to get something out. If he was trying to be non-obvious by looking out of the corner of his eye, he failed miserably. Then he cracked open a can of beer... As if things couldn't get any worse. He already made me super uncomfortable and we had just started the trip. We stopped at a gas station and I politely asked the colectiveros if all the seats were full because I wanted to change if at all possible. All the semi-cama seats were filled, but he kindly allowed me to move to the first level of the bus with the cama seats. They are more expensive than semi-cama seats because they have more room and recline further, so my seat swap was on the dl and I could travel in peace.

I have a bucket-list of places I still want to visit, so I'm sure I'll have more interesting travel stories in the near future.

You know your colectivero* is crazy when...

*the colectivero is the guy who drives the colectivo (bus)

Every time he needs to slow down or stop, everyone is violently thrown forward... Despite how tightly they are holding on to their seats or the handles.

When the colectivero stops next to another bus, he opens the door or his window and has a lovely chat with the other colectivero until one of them realizes the light is green.

...this is most likely when you need to ask him a question about a street and where you need to get off. If you're lucky, he might respond 15 streets AFTER the one you actually wanted to stop at.

He refuses to stop when passengers press the stop button, and yells at passengers who repeatedly press it as a result of his laziness.

The colectivero rarely stops when people at the bus stops are signaling that they want to get on the bus, but no need to worry... It was probably for the best.

However, when he's looking for free entertainment he continually stops to let more people on, even though the bus is packed like a semi full of cows. The worst part? People keep climbing on because they don't have any other option and you will get off feeling gross, no matter how clean you were when you originally got on.

He runs more red lights than the motorcyclists (who rarely stop for any reason)

If the colectivero has to make a tight turn, it will almost always be a close call, but he's not too worried. (After all, it's not his fault the car was parked in the street.) I'd suggest you close your eyes.

Argentines and their obsession with ID's

Some of you may be wondering what happened to Katie, considering I haven't blogged in the past month. I could probably fill books with the ridiculous that is my life and all of the interesting things that happen, but I'll spare you the details (at least for now). Long story short, my computer stopped working and is now "fixed" except not... It is super frustrating! I've spent the majority of tonight trying to figure out why it won't read my sd card and with no luck. Thus, no pictures to upload and no idea how to save the pictures on my computer so I can take new pictures. :-(  The temporary soluation? Peanut butter mnm's, a nice hot shower and sleep.

But that's not the point of this entry...this entry stems from another frustration - Argentines and their obsession with ID's. Obsession you say ... isn't that a little harsh? No, they ask for your ID all the time -- for everything!! Not just any old ID either, your passport. Sure, in some instances you obviously need to bring your passport (if you were to fly somewhere or get money at a bank, etc.) but in order to get a free plastic card, which you can put money on to ride the subway or bus. Really!?? A bit ridiculous don't you think?

My favorite is when you purchase anything with a credit card they want your passport or sometimes they will just let you write down your passport number. (Who knows why my internationally-recognized ID card can't serve as my form of ID.) Maybe it's just me, but before traveling everyone tells you not to walk around with your passport. More so because pickpocketing is a full-time job here in the city. It's only logical -- think of all the pain and suffering you'd have to go through to get another one while in a different country, especially a country where running errands is guaranteed to take you at least 3 times as long as you originally had planned. This kills my efficiency and time management. :-(

Then there's the case of volleyball... we practice in a middle school gym not far from my house. It has a guard that buzzes you into the building and you sign in on a piece of paper. They want you to bring your school ID card (even though some people aren't students) or write down your passport number. I for one do not have my passport number memorized, nor would I randomly give it out in the case that I did have it memorized. This likely stems from our culture of not sharing personal information, especially given the amount of identity theft nowadays.

I just don't understand... I feel like asking for your passport number is as commonplace as saying, 'Hey, how are you?' while walking and not really looking for a response from the other person. (Try this - next time someone you know passes you and asks how you are, respond with something completely ridiculous like 'my liver really itches' and take note of how 95% of the people won't skip a beat!) Nobody here ever verifies, or has any way of verifying, if the passport number you are giving them is correct. Quite pointless if you ask me. :-)