great week for classes! not so hot for the rest....

so UBA (universidad de buenos aires)classes started this week! On monday I went to check out my Violencia Familiar class, had to take two subtes to get there, but it was cool, got to conocer a different barrio. I loved the building, the outside had murals and inside, there were posters everywhere for clubs and organizations and events, it was beautiful. That and the location next to the autopista made it feel just like home! Gah,to think that I would every miss freeways! Not that I miss them, but nothing says home like being near an overpass! jaja so I got there early, walked to nearby plaza and sat and read. It would've been perfect had it not been for the creeper who sat right next to me and who I felt lean over and come closer to watch me read. Scary! So I left my nice tranquil spot in the parque next to the overpass. Gr! Ruin my moment!

But my class was going to start, so whatevs...So they did the usual intros, then they asked a series of questions, why we chose the class, what were our expectations, what did we not want to happen with the class....etc. We did this individually, then shared with the group, then the class. It was nice, sadly, as I expected, all women in the class, because of course, these issues are for women only, they shall be solved by women alone. Yup! I brougth that up as one thing I didn't want for the class, but could obviously not escape.

So we went over our responses for a bit, plus the profesoras did some explaining about what the class would entail. They wanted to emphasize that it would by no means be a purely theoretical class, one of the issues that some women brought up as to what they didnt want from the class. But they also highlighted that it's an intro course and we would by no means be able to magical miracle workers to end domestic violence, which was obviously a great point to bring up.

In the second part of class, we went over the term "violence". They asked us to freely write on our papers the first things that came to mind when we thought of "violencia". I was very embarrassed about this part because my vocab in this part was like that of a fifth grader, but that's besides the point. After we had our free write, we got back in our groups and shared, then they asked us to write down 5-6 of the most common words between all of us in the group, then 3-4 unusual ones. So we had things like "golpe", "miedo", "peligro" as our common words, and then things like "invisibilidad" for our uncommon words. From there, each group wrote their two groups of words on the board. What we noticed across the board was that the common words were all of the initial, situational concepts of the words violence. The physical pain, the immediate emotional reaction, the individual experience. The uncommon words included things like the aftermath, things that described the state of the person afterwards, the subconscious and also the institutional systems that support violence. The uncommon words were the quite profound ones, the ones that really make you think. It was a great exercise.

At the end, they told us that besides doing our reading, for the next class we should write about an incident of violence that we have experienced/witnessed. They said we could have been the antagonist, the victim or a spectator, didn't matter, we just needed to describe that situation that we personally witnessed. At that point was when I was thinking...hm...maybe this class isn't for me, maybe I'm not ready for this just yet. So I headed to the subte stop, linea E headed back to linea D, contemplating the last class I just had and whether or not I wanted to be in it. Despite this, I still had the Talking Heads, "Psycho Killer" playing through my head over and over again, still in my state of euphoria from Saturday night's great playlist at Avant. ah, it was great!

Instead of going home, as it was actually 6pm already, I headed up further north on the linea D because I decided to have a meeting with the "consejera" through FLACSO. So the program pays for it and since it's free, I was thinking, hey why not just go and get some things off my chest and let go a little bit with complete stranger. Her office was pretty far away and my cita was for 8pm, so I had lots of time. Once I got there, to barrio Belgrano, I walke around the main avenida and looked for a bookstore to find La Regenta, the novel I need for my Literature espanola class. Found it, both its two parts, in a nice little bookstore for only 20 pesos, so about a little more than 6 dollars. NICE!!!

I finally made my way over to her office, feeling a bit nervous. I had always said I'd see a psychiatrist one day, just to check it out. I went once to Emmons at Oxy and hated it, so I never gave it another shot. So I took the elevator up to floor and found myself right outside her door, and heard her clearly on the phone inside. I rang and waited a bit and she let me in. She gave me the usual porteña greeting of a beso and a little hug and first she wanted to know what specific tings I had wanted to talk about. So I told her about my immense homesickness I was feeling last week, about Eli, about my grandma, about my missing my family and how I had really never been away from them this long and my main goal for this trip was to become more independent and grow from this experience. And then I told her about my tendencies to put the weight of the world on my shoulders and how I tend to keep all that bothers me bottled up inside me because I'm used to helping everyone else and not used to being helped or asking for help. This stuff led to other topics and then finally she sat there really concerned about my wanting to take the domestic violence class, she personally thought that it wouldn{t be good for me, would take me back to home instead of using my time here as an escape and a way to think of solely myself. She thought that I should really use this time here to forget about all the stuff back home, not to forget about all the people I care about and distance myself from home, but to take the time to better myself, to put myself first for once. I kinda sat there confused at the concept for a while, not really wanting to take what she said in. I'm so hard headed that even the suggestion of bettering myself seems like a foreign concept.

Yeah, it was difficult sitting there listening to her suggestions, because they were so simple and straightforward and of course logical, but my mind doesn't work that way, I like to torture myself with it sometimes. yeah and as I sat there telling her things I sometimes keep from even my closest friends, I was really scared of the judgement, that feeling I get, of being scared of seeming like a scary monster in the eyes of others, which in the end keeps me from exposing most of my real emotions to people. But she listened and took it all in and sat there and acted like, no big deal. And that was it. I think I needed that. It made me realize Eli was right, it doesn't matter, shit happens and my life is what it is and my feelings are what they are, it doesn't matter because in the end I am a good person and yeah my life can be complicated and my feelings can be dark, but it doesn't make me a bad, ugly person. It was really actually relieving going to that session. Even though it was painful letting some things out and her phone rang at some point and she had to talk to her daughter in the middle of the session, it really did help. Even though I wanted to punch her as she sat there on the phone, right in the middle of my vulnerable point, it made me realize, we're all people and we all have our things going on. She's a mom, she needs to talk to her daughter, no biggy, calm down crystal.

So I left the session feeling a little shaken but rejuvenated. I was quite content with that. She told me to come back next week for a check in, so yeah I will head back next Wednesday in the evening.

Tuesday, I headed back to UCA and to my literatura española class, very unenthusiastically. So in the course of the class, Karla (one of the other FLACSO students in the class) and I realized that we were not on some class list to receive emails for the class, emails that included our extra side readings for the class. GR!!! that class is so frustrating, and interacting with some of the women in my domestic violence class made me realize that the kids in this class, the literatura española class, really do suck! They know we're foreign students and completely lost to this new system of schooling, but they don't extend any offerings of help at all. But we spoke with the professor and got some things straightened out and cleared up, which was really nice and it was great to talk to a professor. Class ended, and Karla and I sat outside on the grass of UCA, and ran into Natasha on her way to class. It always brightens my day being able to see that gal! I do love her!

After a while, I left and went to the subte and back home. Ran some errands, took a nap, then off to another UBA class which was located near FLACSO, so I decided to walk there. When I finally arrived, I realized that it was a building I had passed before, and this one was even crazier than the other UBA building. It used to be an old hospital, but it's now turned into a classroom building. It's completely run down, but great! There were even more posters all over the walls and more people recruiting for their clubs and their meetings. I was standing by the class lists, double checking that I was at the right place, when some guy asked me if I knew where a certain class was. It always makes me happy to know that I am sometimes mistaken for a local! yay!

I was early for the class and just waited in the room, doing some reading. As the class rolled in, we realized there weren't enough seats, so people dragged more in from another nearby classroom. Once the class actually got started, I realized it was perfect for me. The professor talked about the notion of teenage pregnancy as a "problem", from whose perspective is it a problem? Who is it a problem for? What does this reflect about our society? Also, she talked about the difference between pregnancy and maternity, explaining that a pregnancy can be terminated, but maternity is something one chooses to enter into...but also has certain societal constructions attached to it too. We also introduced ourselves and talked about what kind of experience we've had with the theme of the class. I talked about my experience with WYSE and the girls we have worked with and the themes we discussed, and this short remembrance of my WYSE days really did make me realize I wanted this class instead of the domestic violence class. Also, as we did the intros, I realized that there was another American girl in the class, not from FLACSO, she was actually living here and works with an organization for women. Me and another girl from FLACSO talked with her after class, she was pretty great to talk to and helped us find where to get our fotocopies. It was great, and as she talked more about her work, I further realized I really wanted to be in the class. Plus, the psychiatrists words were still wringing through my ears, and I realized I felt much more comfortable after leaving that class than I did in the domestic violence class. I realized that I would be very uncomfortable and emotional taking the other class, and with this pregnancy class, I felt more ready and willing to attack life and give it my all, plus, after leaving, I had that euphoric feeling of being in love with Buenos Aires. It was great.

So I walked to the subte stop with the other girl from FLACSO, talking about how amazing the class was, with that great feeling of contentness set upon me. Then we talked about St. Paty's day and what our plans were. I told her I didn't even realize it was March 17th, how crazy. Said I'd probably stay in, didn't want to go crazy, and we parted at the stop and she wished me a happy st. paty's day...gah, if only it had been that way, it's actually funny now that I look back on it.

So I went home, ate with my homestay family and watched the ridiculousness of the city on the news,people were climbing lamposts and openly defying the already very weak police force. It was great, I sat there laughing at their ridiculousness. Then I txted Natasha and she wanted to meet up for helados, also agreeing that she didn't want to go crazy that night. So we met up at our usual malabia and santa fe corner and enjoyed some great gelato, standing and being ridiculous and silly and drunk looking on the street corner, eating our helados. But when we finished, Natasha asked what we wanted to do next. I sat there confused, thinking all we were going to do was have helados. Oh no, destiny did not have that in store for me. We ran into a FLACSO acquiantance, Colby on the street, who said he was meeting up with Kristina (a girl who had also gone to avant with us the previous weekend, a soon to be close friend after the events of the nite)in Plaza Serrano for a bit of guinness drinking. Colby left and Natasha and I pondered our opciones. Then we said, hell, joining Colby and Kristina wouldn't be too bad, it's close to home and we could leave when we were tired. jajjaja

So we caught up to them and went to the Irish Pub a block away from Plaza Serrano. Most of us at the table hadn't tried guiness so we wanted to give that a go. But they sadly ran out. Oh jajaja it was the funniest thing ever, when we arrived, one of the waitresses greeted us in a irish accent and we had a moment of stupidity and talked back to her in English, forgetting where we were and that she probably just memorized that one phrase in English, but basically she refused to speak spanish to us for the rest of the night, we were the stupid americans. So when we asked for guiness she sadly informed us that they had run out,but that Otro Mundo, Rojo was a good choie (no it wasn't) and we ordered a few of those. So, I didn't know this at the time, but each bottle was a medio litro and red beer is stronger than regular beer. I quickly downed two bottles as we played a game of 21 (one of natasha's, of course) and yes, I was quickly tipsy. Well, at some point I made my way up to the restrooms, located upstairs, as always, and yeah I puked in the baño, it was great. I don't even remember the process of puking, the nastiness coming out, so I guess that was good, but it wasn't great that I got it all over myself and some nice irish girl found me and took me down stairs, yelling at me to drink more AGUA! It was great, but apparently, at that point, Natasha was talking to this guy with dreds who I had been telling her to talk to all night, and Colby and Kristina thought I had gone home with a few other kids. So all were surprised to see me suddenly chilling with this Irish girl. They came over to the table and collected my drunken self, and took me outside, where I proceeded to puke in the street, right next to all the tables on the sidewalk where people were still seated. GREAT!!! yeah right, more puke on myself. Kristina was a doll and took nice care of me though, so we proceeded to walk home towards santa fe. Somewhere along the way, I asked where my purse was, then we realized I didn't have it nor did anyone else. Colby ran back to search for it, unsuccessfully of course.

And this whole walk home, there was supposedly a porteño named Nicolas walking with us, who I dont remember AT ALL. yeah Colby was hitting on him, but no luck, but still there was another human being with us and I didnt realize it. At this point we were freaking out for me because I didnt have my cell to call my homestay family, nor did I have their numbers, they were on my phone. Nor did I have my keys. I reassured them that I didnt have any identification or credit cards with me or much cash for that matter, remember, I thought I was only going out for helados with Natasha, which really did save me because all I lost was my phone and 30 pesos and well my keys too. At this point, it was 6 am and a cafe just opened, so my amazing friends stayed there with me until 8am when I knew I would run into my homestay dad would be exiting our apartment for work. I took advantage of this cafe by cleaning myself up in the restroom, Natasha gave me a shirt, but I still reaked and had some chunks on my jean shorts. It was GREAT! At some point after we finished our cafe and medialunas, Colby and I fell asleep with our heads on the table for a good few minutes. 8am finally arrived and I walked myself home, waited outside for 2 seconds when I ran into Enri, and told him what had happened, and how I wasnt used to red beer and to take pity on me. I was hoping I didnt reak too bad. But it was all good, he was worried about me, he saw my empty bed and thought the worst, so he was glad to see me. He walked me upstairs and I took off the puke smelling clothes and slept for like 3 hours. When I woke up, I embarrassingly told the story again to Rossanna this time, who gave me another spair set of keys (luckily they had some!) and said that at least I was alright and didnt lose much, which really is the truth.

I hungoveredly tried to read all day, didnt go outside that whole Wednesday. It was pathetic. On Thursday, when I woke up and had to go to FLACSO, I still felt weak, it was the worst feeling ever. I got through one class, ran into Kristina and others in the comp. lab during lunch, they were all happy to see I was doing better. Told my story to a few others, I got two reactions from Katy and Elizabeth, both thought I had been roofied, but we saw them uncap our bottles, so that was inprobable. BLAH! I went to my other class, on Argentine history, and it was wonderful. We have the cutest professor, this older man with curly grey hair whos just a sweetie! He broke out into operatic song to demonstrate what the argentine flag song sounded like, he was amazing! Not to mention, so great at drawing parallels between american and argentina history, he's AMAZING! Finished up my day with my awkward writing class. We went on a field trip to this bookstore, that used to be a playhouse. It was GORGEOUS!!! but the walk to the place was funny. I dont know anyone else in the class, but they all know each other. They walked together and I was stuck with our awkward-geeky looking young professor who looks like he hates having to teach us. Yes, I made awkward convo with him and he weirdly asked where I lived, I wanted to die. gah. Awk, awk, AWK!!! blah! But the bookstore made up for it.

That thursday I took it easy. I wanted to meet up with Kristina and Colby who were at a restaurant in Palermo, next to plaza serrano. I called Kristina from my home phone (since at this point I didnt have a phone) and got the address from her. I also got the address to Emmette's house, this guy from our program, who had invited all of us over to his place to chill. Natasha and Elizabeth were already there. Well, it was a great thing I got all this addresses and numbers because I took off walking to Plaza Serrano, stopped by the pub to embarrassingly inquire if anyone had turned in a black purse (no luck of course) and by the time I arrived at the parrilla that Kristina and Colby were eating at, I realized that it was on fire, the street filled with interested passerby and firemen all around. Basically I was scared. Didnt know what to do or think or know where my friends were, because they weren't around. But I calmed down, realized they probably took off to Emmette's, so I walked passed the sketch train tracks to a big street and flagged a taxi to Emmette's, and found Kristina and Colby outside, the had just arrived too. We hysterically hugged and greeted each other, amazed at our porteño luck to get ourselves in such crazy situations. They were quite impressed at my resourcefulness and ability to stay afoot and get myself to Emettes in one piece. I was impressed myself. jajaja omg and Kristina told me that she redialed my home phone number, thinking it was my new phone and started cussing and shouting about the restaurant being on fire, when she realized it was my homestay mom saying, "I don't speak English". jjajaja so funny.

So we spent a chill night in Emmette's just talking, he has a nice spread with a single 30 year old who was on a short vacation. Nice to have a homie place to ourselves. Friday, the next day, I did a whole bunch of errands, bought a phone and did my laundry in time to get in contact with Kristina and Colby, Kristina had proposed we take a bus to La Plata, a city an hour outside the city, to this alternative folklore festival that her homestay "dad" (hes 27, with dreds and plays in an awesome band) was going to perform in. That day was such a rush, but I got everything done, even walked to UBA to get my fotocopies for my class and by 4:30 I was meeting Kristina, Colby, and Natasha at the Ortiz subte stop, on the way to the bus station en Retiro. That place was huge and kinda intimidating at first, but we bought our hour and a half bus ticket to La Plata for only 9 pesos!!! 3 dollars! Ridiculous! And the ride was beautiful! It was great being able to see the countryside, you know, grass and trees and not a single high rize or apartment in sight! Plus, Natasha brought a whole bag of medialunas and other postres, it was AMAZING! The only downside was that our friend Sara brought her friend from home with her, and she was grossly obnoxious the whole night. On the bus, she talked loudly, as people who use this bus to do their daily commute to and from work sat there having to endure this gross interruption of their daily routine, having to endure the sound of loud americans on their bus. It was great, quite embarrassing. Plus, the whole night, she refused to speaka a single word of spanish, not even a gracias to the waitress who served us! It was so annoying.

Natasha and I proceeded to whisper to each other in spanish. We did have an early eruption of laughter though, because I realized that there was a penis drawn on the seat in front of me, and we all quickly remembered the wondrousness of superbad and I HAD to take a pic of it, using Kristina's camera (I didnt bring mine because I still didnt trust myself) When we arrived, we walked through the streets through trial and error, the calles were conveniently numbered only, so we just walked in one direction to find if they were rizing or increasing. We found which direction to walk in, as we stood on a street corner confusedly, a couple of old men asked if we needed help with anything. It was quite nice. They were great help! They told us how to get to the festival and pointed us in the direction of a few hotels, in case we wanted to stay over in the city. We quickly found it would be grossly overpriced to spend the night, so we just proceeded to walk to the festival. It was quite adventurous, we didn't know where we were at all, but it was nice to be out of the high rises, as I said earlier. But of course, that one girl looked like she was in a horrible mood, not down for exploring and getting lost and being adventurous, she even said, gah I dont want to get raped tonight! Yup,nice way to joke about rape, and be annoying at that. But we quickly found the parque it was happening at, and went to eat at this place that was deserted, because it was only 8pm. We ordered, had some good intellectually stimulating convos, ranging from Teach for America to gay rights, but our convo was interrupted when that girl said, "OK this convo is too serious, it's not even that deep, just too serious. So um...has anyone seen gossip girl?" No lie she said that, not an exaggeration in any way. I wanted to strangle her, plus I was on the other side of the table from Colby and Natasha, I was stuck with this annoying girl!!! WHY?!?!! It was great...

So we stayed there a while, and as 10:30 approached, the place got packed and the "show" was going to start. So this was a restaurant filled with older people and there was going to be one of those corny solo singers performing. And he did, he started, as we were paying the bill. We waited until he finished his song, and walked out, what else were we supposed to do? Kristina's homestay "dad's" band was going on at 11, we had to leave. We thought we were doing it as politely as possible, but as each one of us passed by this man, he asked, into the mic, "Adonde van? Apenas empezo" jajaja way to call us out and put us on the spot! That was evil, but oh well, we had to leave.

We walked that long walk to the big park and found the stage, it was a great night. We found a little spot on the grass and listened to one band finish up, then Luciano's band came one. They were great! He played the accordian, there were a millilon members to the band, the lead singer playing an ukaleilei (spelling?). It was so amazing to be out of the city, underneath a patch of slightly visible stars, in the open air listening to great music. On the last song, they brought out a group of folk dancers who performed on the grass right in front of us. We stayed around and danced to a few other bands, then we indecisively walked back and forth between the park and the main drag a million times, hoping that Luciano would say, hey lets go to a party that so and so is throwing. But that never happened, and we eventually all made our way back to the bus station. Luciano and his gf and his groupie went to eat and we sat there, 4am dying from the exhaust of weeks of partying and coming home at 6 am. Once we got on the bus, we all knocked out. I sat next to Natasha, who used her scarf to cover her head. That was probably the soundest I've ever slept in BsAs, all I remember was once looking over at Natasha as we locked eyes and giggled hysterically at each other. Silliness. Oh and these buses are AMAZING! They cost 15 pesos round trip, this was a low cost bus, but the seats went all the way back, they were comfortable, easy to sleep in, I can't believe the quality of bus they have here, it's great! Highly recommended. So all of us were passed out when the bus got back to the station, the bus driver had to yell "chicos!" at us several times before we realized what was going on. So we all made our way back to the subte station, departed for our respectful lines at Diagnol Norte.

Got home at around 6am like always.. Enri and Rosanna were sleeping. They were going to leave for Rosario, where their son and his family live 3 hours away, at around 9am. I was going to have the whole house to myself and Rosanna gave me permission to have a friend stay the night. I passed out yet still didnt get a full night sleep, woke up in the 1 oclock hour. I got in touch with Elizabeth and Natasha to see if they wanted to drink mate and have some sweets in el jardin botanico. I met Elizabeth and we bought some breadstick things that are weirdly plain and popular type of snack here. In my bag I had my mate, the yerba, a termos full of hot water, and my imitation yet still amazing nutella chocolate that would acompany the plain biscuits. We found a nice little bench and sat there all cool, sipping on my mate, enjoying those biscuits with chocolate, which reminded us of the asian yan yan snack that you can find at any store in china town. mmmmm...

Then we decided to take advantage of my kitchen and cook an amazing dinner. We went to carrefour, the french named market, and picked us ingredients to make a stir fry veggie mix, cheese and tortillas for quesadillas, and some wine. We got back and set up my room. Rosanna had showed me how to access the bottom cushion of my bed and we proceeded to make my room into the ultimate sleep over room. We took a whole bunch of silly pictures that looked horribly like American Apparel ads and contemplated watching Natasha's DVD, boondock saints, a movie about some irish mobsters who get into trouble on st. paty's day, quite suiting for the holiday that had of recent made me sick. We decided to make dinner instead. I started off by making some amazing salsa, if I do say so myself. We consumed that happily with some Lays, since tortilla chips are nonexistant here, sadly, are all other maiz based goods. We proceeded onto our stir fry mix and Natasha got to work on the quesadillas. She had the brilliant idea to add this other hot sauce to the veggies. The result, an amazingly tasty vegetarian meal (just for my Natasha, but to my own happiness too, I miss veggies). It was AMAZING having quesadillas, really, indescribable! Added some of our wine to the mix and started watching boondock saints and we called up kristina and colby. We met them outside after a short wait (Colby surprisingly lives two blocks down from me, which I didn't know). Showed them around my house, they revelled at my balcony, we had a bit more wine out there. We proceeded with more ridiculous american apparel pics. We had been planning to go to a reggae show downtown, but my friend Cecilia, the porteña, ended up texting me saying she wasn't going after all, and that Zelmar was going to Avant again. Gr! Wasn't the highlight of my night. Well, we were all way to lazy to make our way to microcentro, so we walked over to a different bar in Palermo! Could you believe that, we didnt go to Tazz in plaza serrano! Crazy huh!?! It was a queer friendly bar, and Colby was happy to check out the other chicos there, but was a little disappointed because he thought that there were more straight people there than gay. That and the guy he had been eying didn't respond much after we had urged him to go talk to him. Too bad. Natasha went home early, Elizabeth never went with us. Then we quickly got tired dancing, so we all went home. The next day...I don't remember what happened, nothing too eventful I believe. I don't think that was the sunday me and natasha went to san telmo and got dragged into a drum circle.

Well, actually, this is as much of an update I can do right now, I still need all of last week, which included a frustrated me saying a stupid childish retort to Natasha, due to misplaced frustration at a failed night. Gr! Yeah, and last weekend, which I think was uneventful, found a new mexican restaurant and underestimated the argentines in their ability to make spicy food.

Anyways, tonight, Wednesday April 1st, we are getting on a bus at 10pm to go to Cordoba, a city 9 hours northwest of BsAs, great for outdoors activities, with nearby mountains and rivers. Activities include: hiking, biking, horsebackriding, and paragliding, which I have been told costs about 120 pesos, amazing price for a chance to fly through the air, so hopefully I come back with some great stories!

Besos!