Una entrada...por fin!

Apologies... I have not been very good at keeping up with this blog for the last month or so. I think I've just been caught up in trying to be present here for my last month in Buenos Aires, and now I am down to 4 days left in this wonderful city! I can't believe it! The time has really flown- BUT it's not over yet! I'm leaving Friday to take a 3 week backpacking trip from Salta (Northern Argentina) all the way down south to El Calafate. Now, I'm really starting to get excited. I have heard that the rest of the country, outside BA, is absolutely spectacular. I will be sure to post pictures, but most likely not until after I come home. Sometime this week, however, I will make sure I post the pictures from my final weeks here in BA - so stay tuned!

My last month here has been really great. I decided to stay in BA an extra week because I wanted to take another week of Spanish class and also spend another week in the factory. I think it really has made a difference. Now I feel so much more comfortable in the factory and actually able to talk to people and understand. I will be doing interviews this week to finish everything up. It has really been a great experience. And like all good learning experiences, it has left me with more questions than answers and opened up more possibilities in the future for me to explore. One thing that it has really made me sure of is that I want to be fluent in Spanish. Speaking Spanish and English will be such an asset to me in the future, especially in terms of activism and organizing. I think I will be back to South America and maybe even back to Argentina sometime in the near future, to get more answers and even more questions. We'll see...

Since I didn't write for so long I can't do much justice to how I spent my last month here, so a brief summary will have to do. We'll start with the sad news...Carolina (Evi's Cat) died this past week while I was home alone with her and they were on vacation. It was a debacle to say the least, but definitely needed to happen sooner rather than later. The cat is 20 years old and has been dying since I arrived here. Since Evi and Roberto left for vacation, the cat didn't eat for 3 days, so Evi asked me to call the vet, and he was supposed to come over at midnight that night but Caro couldn't wait, and she died in my arms at 10pm...pobrecita... I was slightly traumatized by the event and the fact that I had to talk to Evi, the Vet and her son-in-law over the pohone in Spanish and tell them all this. But Evi was concerned for me and there was no blame to be had. Betsy came over and she came with me and Evi's son-in-law to bring the body to the vet's office. And that was that. SO the house is certainly a little more empty now and a little more somber.

In lighter news, I went to my first futbol game here this past weekend. It was really incredible to see how passionate people are about the sport. The colors, flags, songs, cheers, and taunts were much more overwhelming than in any Red Sox vs Yankees game. They literally don't let opposing sides sit on the same side of the stadium, the are separated by a wall with barbed wire and a line of police. And the field is sectioned off by a moat and barbed wire as well. Luckily, the game wasn't as rowdy as it could have been because the game ended in a tie 0 - 0. So needless to say, it was much more interesting watching the fans than it was watching the futbol game.

Per usual, I've been hanging out with friends on the weekends getting in my last nights of going to dinner and staying out at boliches (clubs) until the sun comes up. Liz will be leaving to go back to Australia this week as well, so there's definitely a theme of goodbyes. And I've been going to the ferias in San Telmo and yesterday to the Gaucho feria in Mataderos to buy Christmas gifts. I went to Konex with Betsy last Monday and will be going again tonight. Konex is a big drum circle show that they have every week from 8 - 10pm at this cultural center called. It's essentially filled with the same kind of hippy kids you could find at Earthfoods or hanging out in Central that come and watch and dance for two hours. You also have your occasional hippy-at-heart-in-a-business-suit who comes there right after work. It's a really cool mix of people and the drumming is amazing. It's definitely an experience.

This week I will pack up my room and pack my backpack with as little as possible. Thursday night I hope to spend my last night at a Luis Salinas concert, he's a really famous Argentinian musician and then off to Salta the next day. Hopefully we'll get the tickets.

I'll put pictures up before I leave on Friday! Chau for now!

Jill

Fotos por fin!

Hi all

These, pictures take an insanely long time to load, thus I couldn´t get them all up, but next time I have 2 hours to kill, I´ll put up some more...


Peninsula Valdes Part 1: