Vamos a Decirnos Adios, Como Se Debe (Let's Say Goodbye, like We Know We Should)

For those of you that know me, I stress... When I travel it's 10 times worse. I was scheduled to fly out of Buenos Aires Tuesday night, so naturally I had my bags nearly packed by Sunday night. :-) I just needed to figure out how much of my papers I could or wanted to being back and do some last minute shopping - aka get another suitcase and figure out what I could purchase with any remaining pesos. (on a side note, I spent all of my pesos with the exception of a few cents - yay!)

Sunday I finally went to the reserva ecológica (ecological reserve) in Puerto Madero and spent an hour or so walking around enjoying the gorgeous 65 degree 'winter' weather. I ate my last choripan (grilled sausage on a bun) in costanera norte (northern coast) and found a great green space  with tons of families enjoying the afternoon. Too bad I hadn't discovered this say, 6 months ago...

Monday I went to Parque de la Memoria (Memorial Park) in the coatanera sur (southern coast) which is dedicated to los desaparecidos (those who disappeared during the dictatorship.) it was a grey day and really brought a somber feeling to the already touchy subject. (most argentines never talk about the dictatorship nor mention Menon's name.) 

Last time I was in Argentina, I never discussed this subject nor heard anyone mention it. This time around  I got a much better picture of why things are the way they are currently in Argentina, as we heavily discussed the topic in my literature and political classes. 

Monday night I went to La Bomba de Tiempo - a drum show. It was a lot of fun.. and I couldn't believe they played for 2 hours solid! Afterwards we went to someone's apartment for dinner and then attempted to go to Frank's Secret Bar in Palermo.... However the girls who wanted to go there hadn't checked to see if it was open and sure enough it was closed. Epic fail. 

Tuesday I got up and went to the aduana to get information for my senior honors project. (I almost forgot I was supposed to be researching that while in Argentina - oops!) I was able to get a lot of pertinent information, so that was wonderful. For my last meal I went to Desnivel in San Telmo to eat my last asado (grilled meat) and finished off the day by getting ice cream with Bianca. I love ice cream and Argentine ice cream is no exception. Think soft serve with hundreds of flavors and add-ins. Every shop has a few of their own special flavors, so I tried a white chocolate ice cream with orange and  cookies covered in chocolate. It was delicious and tasted like an orange dream-sickle, but better. 

Carmen and Orlando graciously picked me up at 5 to head to the airport and we arrived around 6. There was a short line to check in for Continental, but tons of people for other airlines and more would be coming later. We went to a cafe and I had my first and last (at least this time around) submarino (steamed milk that you put a bar of chocolate in to make hot chocolate) 

I made my way to migrations and the scan of my carry on luggage - there were a TON of people and about thirty 15 year old Argentine girls in front of me traveling to the US in celebration of their quince - 15th birthday. (think sweet 16) An hour+ later I was waiting in my terminal and headed home. :-)

I sat next to a young guy who was born in the US, but his family is from Buenos Aires. During the dictatorship his parents moved to New York where he and his siblings were born. (so he has an American passport) they all studied in the US and he is the only one who stayed to work here. His parents and siblings  now live in Buenos Aires. I had never personally met anyone who moved to escape the dictatorship, so that was neat. It was also nice to talk to someone in Spanish and ease into the whole speaking English deal..

I cleared customs and went to claim my luggage, only to check it in again. I had minutes to spare by the time I reached the scan for the carry on luggage and walked quickly/ran to catch my connecting flight to Chicago. (I wouldn't have run except for the fact that they had 2 last calls for my flight and I was definitely not there. So yes, I was one of those people) 

I seem to have bad luck with traveling - last time the travel agent booked my ticket from Buenos Aires to Corrientes when I was in Corrientes needing to get to Buenos Aires. When I finally arrived, Carmen and Orlando rushed me to the other airport on the other side of town and I arrived 30 minutes prior to take off. (not to mention that there was a paro - protest - that day and one of the streets that cut the city in half was inaccessible.) While Orlando went to park, Carmen took charge and helped me skip the long waiting lines to check my luggage and saw me off to the migrations area. I was definitely the very last person on my flight!

Either way, I made it home!! :-D The next 3.5 weeks will be ridiculously busy as I start work on Monday and the move back to school at the end of the third full week to start training for my CA/RA job. However I still have a lot I want to blog about, so stay tuned if you're interested. If not, thanks for reading up until this point and sharing my journey with me. I hope my posts weren't terribly boring and they shed some light on Argentina, it's people and it's culture. 

A Series of "Lasts"

Well my Argentine adventure is coming to an end, but not without it's last surprising (or not so surprising) moments...

Saturday night I enjoyed a delicious dinner of fish and guiso (similar to a casserole, but not really) for Maria's birthday with the family before heading to Bora Bora with all the cousins for one last night filled with dancing until the wee morning hours. Sunday was spent sleeping and recovering with a traditional locro (soup) and staying warm by the fire. 

Tuesday night the electricity went out for a few hours in Santa Rosa and all the surrounding towns. Not to worry, you can still drink mate with the help of a friend's dual purpose cell phone (comes with a built in flashlight) and of course any planned party still takes place. :-) 

I couldn't leave without taking my last cumbi (like a 15 passenger van) to Corrientes at 4:30am the next morning to re-live all of my previous trips between Santa Rosa and Corrientes from my other exchange year. 

While in Corrientes, I was able to visit my old host family where one of my host sisters now has a 6 month old baby. I also had my last helping of homemade  gnocchis (noodles made out of potato) at a friend's old host family. It was fun to catch up with everyone and talk about the good ol' days ;-)

The rest of the days were spent in all of my favorite spots: Cabana for a ham & cheese panini with a peach smoothie, walking the centro (open air shopping area) eating chipacitos (bite-sized cheese bread) from La Reina and enjoying ladies night at Cristobal with a delicious pizza with hearts palm and salsa golf - mm!

In addition, I had some new experiences which included going to the police station (no worries - I wasn't arrested or harmed in any way), watching Argentina play in La Copa America, getting a hair cut (more on that later) and eating at *gasp* McDonalds. In all fairness, I only broke my rules  because I was told it has a distinct taste since they use Argentine beef ... However I don't frequent McD's enough in the States to really know.

My final trip to Santa Rosa/Corrientes ended with a customary stop at the Lezcano's house to say goodbyes and snap a few pictures with the adorable Pilar. I flagged down my last Apipe remis (taxi)  and I was off to the (bus) terminal. 

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this, but I really hate goodbyes and leaving the familiarity of a place that I feel so much a part of... But who knows, someday I will probably be back and will be able to go to all my favorite spots once again :-)

Coffee

For anyone that's a fan of coffee, one may be disappointed when ordering coffee in a cafe in Argentina. For those of us who are addicted to americanos, forget about it...unless you break the rules and go to Starbucks. Which by the way has super ugly international travel mugs this year -sad!

Most cafes serve the following: café, jarrito, café con leche, lagrima, and café cortado. Let me translate that in terms you can identify with...

Café - essential a shot of espresso

Jarrito - double shot of espresso

Café con leche - coffee with hot milk 

Lagrima - mostly hot milk and a little bit of coffee

Café cortado - coffee with a little bit of hot milk

Or in a series of bad translations that I recently stumbled upon...

Café chico - coffee guy (small coffee)

Café grande - great coffee (large coffee)

Lagrima - tear coffee

Depending on the coffee shop, coffee may mean regular coffee or espresso. American sized coffees do not exist and you don't see people getting their coffee to go. (extremely rare and most places don't even have this option) However, coffees generally come with a shot glass of water for when you finish, and accompanied by a mini alfajor or cookie complementary. At certain coffee chains, you can get something similar to a flavored latte, but this is rare and usually seasonal.

Traveling for Le$$

Who doesn´t love traveling and who doesn´t love saving money? I´m always surprised by the number of young people don´t know of some simple ways save money and still do what you wanted to do, so I thought I would share some of my tips and tricks..

If you´re a student in Argentina, you can actually use that pesky student visa we had to apply for. (Shocking, I know!) As you will quickly find out...museums, theaters, tours and other tourist attractions have different prices for residents and foreigners. However, with your student visa and residence paper you are in fact an Argentine resident :-) for example, you can visit Iguazu waterfalls for $10 instead of $25

If you aren´t a student, you can still get a discount by going on the free or discounted day of the museums. Most have a day every week that they don´t charge admission to anyone, but some only have this for students. In other cases, they have a 50% off discount on certain days of the week. Try combining this discount with the resident discount and viola - double the discount! If you tour Teatro Colon on a Monday it's half price, so only $8 or if you're a resident, $2.50

Be sure to check out the free cultural events put on by the government. (http://www.buenosaires.gov.ar/areas/cultura/) There is always something exciting to see instead of taking an afternoon siesta. 

Want to travel around the country? No problem - public transportation is great AND you can save money by using it. The colectivos that go to other parts of the country are housed in Retiro, but you can check their schedules online at Plataforma 10 or Omni Lineas

Students get a 20% discount when traveling by colectivo by showing a letter from the university saying you are a student there (certificado de regularidad), your passport & university ID card (and bringing a photocopy of both)

If you prefer flying (not advised with this volcanic ash), reserve your tickets online and go to an Aerolineas Argentinas office with your passport and visa. If you have a student visa (thus you have residency), you pay the same price as an Argentine. 

If you're planning on staying awhile, you will probably purchase a cell phone. Since 90% of cell phones here are pay as you go, you will spend a significant amount on communication. Texts to someone with the same service provider are around 50 cents and more expensive if someone has a different service provider. Calls are $1+ depending on the person's service provider, area code and if you are calling a land line - which I would NOT advice unless you have tons of prepaid credit on your phone. For calls to land lines, go to a telecabaña, as they are significantly cheaper.

However, you can sends texts for free via the company's website. For example, if Susy has a phone with personal, go to www.personal.com.ar to text her. If Bobby has claro, go to http://www.claro.com.ar/portal/car/  Most service providers also have favorite numbers (números amigos). So if you put on a certain amount of credit each month, you can call one number for free and text another for free.