good weekend....feeling content here

So this was a good weekend. I feel so comfortable in this city. I've had those realizations where I wake up and I think, wow yeah this is my life, this crazy, caotic, beautiful city has been my life and will continue to be my life for the next few weeks. I really don't want to think about going back. I was sitting there at my friend's apartment this weekend, a weird mix of americans and one lonely porteño and one of the girls was talking about how weird the keys are here, and yeah I thought that they were super weird and cool when I got here, but now they're just normal. I sat there trying to remember what my car keys looked like back home and what my house keys looked like, I couldn't for the life of me remember, it was ridiculous. I actually til this moment can't really remember what they look like, and I really don't want to remember, it's not important, those stupid mass produced and lack of uniquness keys that make up my life, I don't even want to remember how to drive, I just want to walk and take the bus everywhere for the rest of my life, it feels so great.

Ok, so Friday, I ran errands, went to the American Express travellers cheques place, exchanged my $200 for 740 pesos. Then I was on the subte feeling blah and wanting to just chop off my hair, so I went to Rossana's hair salon she had recommended me. I get there and there are all these really chic cool people there and I sat there and thought, Shit, this is a long way from Freddy's. I already hate hair salons, just like I hate doctors and dentists, I just dont like people all up in my face and too close to me. Add to the fact that it's a super chic place that makes me feel uncomfortable, yeah whatevs. I get this random guy who takes me to an open seat but not before he asks for my sweater so he can put it in the coat check, A COAT CHECK, isn't that ridiculous. It gets better. I start looking around and I see one woman with an empty coffee cup next to her, you can order COFFEE at this salon! Then the guy comes back with a white satin robe for me to put on, then he puts the regular old black one after that. It was just weird. So there I was getting my hair cut and hating the experience and feeling so awkward. My stupid highlights growing out, you can see all the roots, and the unevenness of the bleach because I did it myself. jajaja the unevenness of my HAIR because I normally cut it myself. jajajjaa I'm so out of place at this salon. Then he takes sections and twists them and does a random jagged cut and then I was freaked out, I didnt know what was going on, I've never seen anyone cut hair like that. He didn't talk to me at all, just the usual, De donde sos? jaja

In the end, my trim turned out great and I have less damaged hair. But I ran the hell out of there when I was done, I literally ran a little down Araoz for half a block before I got to Santa Fe. Then I killed time, probably doing nothing, until 4 when I met Karla at Alto Palermo to study for our Contemporary Spanish Lit exam. God I hate that class and I hate La Universidad Catolica de Argentina. jajaa But our study session went well and I felt like I could allow myself to go out. I went home and then put on make up and met Kristina outside the subte stop in front of Alto Palermo, we had agreed to meet and talk about our convo the previous night and clarify some stuff. It was a good convo, much needed and helped us out. We were at a super packed enpanada place when I decided to stand outside to alleviate some of the congestion in that tiny place. I was just standing there and some random guy waiting for his order was sitting there and started talking to me about how it was so packed. I got the usual de donde sos and the surprised look when I said LA and he kept trying to talk to me, it was awk, he pointed at the cute little kids hair salon across the street and told me that he works there if I ever wanted to stop by, his name was Alfredo. So weird.

Whatevs, we pre-gamed at Colby's and then took a cab ride to Casa Brandon, a queer bar Kristina and Colby had wanted to go to for a while. It was so GREAT! It was so chill inside, there were two men dressed as women as well as some girls who looked like Shane on the LWord. It was great. There was no one there and there were sofas and the walls had the words "Amor, respeto, visibilidad" going across all the walls. Plus, they were playing the yeah yeah yeahs then SANTOGOLD! Amazing! We chilled there for a bit then walked over to Sitges for another stupid night of that drinking trap. Seriously, I'm not going there for a while, I always feel so crappy the next day. But I wanted to go this time becuase it was Kat's first time. She was crazy. jajaja oh yeah so I was dancing there with Colby when I noticed that a group of 4 porteño boys were staring at him and eating him up. Of course, Colby was drunk enough for me to just drag him over to this group of boys and I left him there to disfrustar la situación. He hit it off with this one guy Cristian. I kept checking in on him throughout the night, one time I walked over to him to say hi and that guy thought it would be funny to pick me up and spin me. I hate that, idk but people seem to think, idk maybe because I'm little, that it's always fun to just pick me up and spin me around. No I don't appreciate it put me down please. I could've puked all over him and me, he's so lucky I didnt. At the end of the night I put Kat in a cab because she was gone, and I walked home because Colby was still enjoying that boy and Kristina seemed to want some space. All in all a good night, I just woke up feeling meh as usual.

So Saturday, got up early thinking that my homestay family's son and co. would be there early. They werent. I went to bed at 6 or 7 ish and woke up at like 11. Met Karla again to study, we've been really great about this. We also had some good convo, she's in the same position as Colby, boyfriend back home that she's in love with and been in a relationship with for two years, but realizing for the first time that there's a whole world of opportunities and boys out there to disfrutar. jajaja I feel so bad for really adding to the situation, I help Colby find boys too much, it's especially bad because I met Kenneth, but whatevs, it's his decision. So I went home and met the familia. The little boys were cute. One was scared of me and the other, Facundo, was super cute, he gave me a beso right away and started talking to me.

I took a nap and called up Kristina and she said they were going to complete their queer tour and go to a queer friendly thai restaurant, so I walked in the stupid endless rain to the place and it was AMAZING! There was crazy doctor seuss red spirals on the walls and our waiter was great. He kept coming by and chatting it up with us. The food was AMAZING! Actual sabor! There was sweet and sour and PICANTE sauce, eating this food immediately took me back like nothing else could. I really felt homesick for a second because I remembered what food is supposed to taste like, slash I miss my asian community!

So the waiter brought us two rounds of these warm cider shots that were great. They didnt taste like they had alcohol it was great. Also I ordered Pad Thai and was so blown away by it. I really can't explain how it feels to be separated from everything asian and then suddenly get this dish that rivals pad thai in LA! It was amazing! Oh and our waiter also told us that they have a special 4th of july celebration, Happy Days Happy Hour with cerveza and burgers. I NEED to come to this, I need some kind of semblance of my normal life during my bday so I won't get depressed.

So I left them after dinner because I had made plans with Alida and Kat to go to La Bomba de Tiempo's 3 cumple año! They're this amazing drumming group that is a must see but I haven't made my way to see them. The whole city loves them. I really should've known I'd have ticket trouble when our waiter stopped by our table and showed us his tickets, I walked those blocks in the drizzle to Konex and stood in line for a while just to find out that it was sold out. I called Kat up and we stupidly decided to walk on Corrientes towards each other, which didn't work because the cold was killing me, so I called her said we'd meet at our friend Sara's boyfriend's rented apartment. He was visiting again and had actually brought me a king size reeses package from the US since that stuff is not available here. He's basically a sweetie and Sara had invited us over for a chill party so what the hell, perfect place to stop by. I took a cab over there and met Kat, but not before I was the only unlucky person in the city to step in dog shit. jajaja

So Adam welcomed us, made us this really great Brazilian drink with limones and of course listened to his great music collection. Also, Sara's friend from the US was also there,she's here studying with a different program. But she showed us her awesome tattoos that she's gotten while here. She had a compass on her wrist which was alright, but she had this AMAZING poem written on the both sides of her ribcage that she had just gotten. It was so GREAT! It was even greater because she was telling us how her asian daddy was gonna be super pissed about all her tatoos, but damn she was such a badass, this little asian girl can take lots of pain, she had to many tatoos! I was super jealous becuase she got hers done at Bond Street and Colby just went on Friday to get his nose pierced and Kat got some earrings. My piercing that I've been set on must wait a bit more, I promised Eevee we'd get piercings together when she comes to visit. AH!!!! I can't wait, I've been thinking about this one for so long, and I really can't pass up the opportunity to get it done for the grand total of 30 pesos, less than 10 dollars! WOO!!! So Nina if you're reading this, don't rat me out, it'll be fine too I've checked all these places out, they're completely steril and yeah as you see I know lots of people to get stuff done at Bond Street, so it's all good. I will leave everyone in suspense as to what's getting pierced.

So back to the party last night. Natasha had been texting Juan "Fernett", our friend we made that night-morning I missed the bus to Tandil, you know the one with a bottle of Fernett in his jacket and who asked us if we had some Coke to go with it! jajaa so I don't actually remember meeting this kid, because I was gone, so I was REALLY excited to meet him again because I didnt even have a clue what I said to him, Natasha had to retell the story to me. jajajaja anyways, he came over! and we all chilled there for some time. After a while, Colby and Kristina finished their gay tour and left to some more queer bars. Then Sara's tatood friend left and Kat, Natasha, Juan, and I decided to make our way to a bar to chill. Juan suggested Jobs, a place that has board games and pool tables. We got there, rented our Jenga set, just like in Cha for tea, except we were missing our Boba! So we ordered a jarra of Sangria, which here equals vino tinto, hielo, and fruta. So yummy. We started playing jenga, I was on Juan's team and Natasha and Kat were another team. JAJAJA everyone seemed impressed by my jenga skills, but they don't understand that my old lame life where I couldn't go out and drink consisted of chilling at Cha for Tea and playing Jenga with my girls or with Brian for hours, in the case of Brian we would make up stupid rules where you had to grab the first one you touched. So yeah, needless to say, I'm a jenga pro plus I'm super competetive, so I take my games seriously.

Yeah it was pretty nice being on Juan's team, got nice little back pats-rubs when I did well. jaja but he was such a sweetie! After a while we all just got bored and just started talking about some of our fav English and Castellano frases. It was great, we made fools of ourselves and talked about all kinds of sexual slang and Juan innocently just told us some useful slang, like how to say I'm gonna kick ur ass (I already forgot what it was, something like darte la virada). Then we started talking about hip hop and stupid crap and of course me and Natasha, the west coast girls, brought up hyphy and of course we got hyphy and did the thizz face and I basically thoroughly embarrassed myself just to show Juan what kids in the bay do. jajaja whatevs, it was fun, plus, I love doing the thizz face. ajjaja we ordered another jarra of cerveza and poor kid he was already so gone and us crazy norteamericanas were still going strong and he probably didnt expect to gastar tanto dinero that night, but he chose the wrong girls to hang out with. We continued with our silliness until 5:30 when they kicked us out.

Then, we still werent done because of course Natasha and I wanted cafe con leche y medialunas, so we dragged him with us to a little cafe. He looked so done, todo acabado, jajaja and we were sitting there at our peak, seriously add a little coffee to me at 6 am and I am ridiculous. We were giggling up a storm. We were talking about facebook and tagging people in pics and we didnt know how to say that in spanish, and he was like, of yeah of course, Etiquetiar...jajja and Natasha and Kat couldn't say it and I kept spitting it out and saying it and giggling, but at least I was saying it right. jajaja

So we said goodbye to our new porteño friend after that, he promised we'd go out with him and his amigotes soon, yay! still awaiting his friend request on facebook, but oh it will come, unless we did scare him away, but I think it's all good, he seemed to have fun. jajaja good times.

Bad times was waking up today, Sunday at 10:30 am, when I went to bed at a little after 6 am. jajaja FML it's all good, I don't really need much sleep here, just some te con leche in the morning and I'm good, plus I went the whole day today with no nap, watched Harry Potter 5 with the familia, and studied with Karla for five hours. Damn I'm good, this is the life, I have fun, I study, I still get good grades, its so great! I just dont sleep! jajaja I'll sleep when I get home, or rather as Memi says, Me duermo cuando me muero....so true...

ah I love it here...

our nation and our war

So this was in the Sunday morning newspaper today:

http://www.clarin.com/diario/2009/05/31/elmundo/i-01929755.htm

for all my Spanish reading blog followers, please read. It's disgusting and horrific and another reason to hate this war that we started and to really look at what we're doing in the world.

I'm basically disgusted right now and can't really say much, but take a look. Be informed.

Everything happens for a reason!

So, I continued my emoness today. Not the whole day. I took my grammar parcial and felt good, then after that I had that immense weight lifted off my shoulders! GREat! So I edited my paper, had an awkward meeting with leandro, ate lunch with Lauren and found a new friend, went to my cuestiones class and of course fell more in love with my professor, he loves tim burton, so cool!

After class, went with Anna and had a beer and then went through the hell that is writing class. Finished, went home, ate a great dinner then texted Colby who said he was at Tandoor having wine.

I walked over to find that he was seated with Molly, who I can't stand. I endure some time there, then Kristina arrives and Molly converses with her. In the mean time, I turn to Colby and start talking about beauty standards here in Argentina and how're they're probably more fucked up than in the US becuase here I feel like on a daily basis I'm an obese grossness. Anyways, Kristina and Molly interject, we have a debate I get angry and want to cry because Krisitna's sitting there telling me I'm wrong for having a hateful self perception when really I can't help the way I feel. I throw some money on the table and storm off. I didn't know where I was going but I knew I wanted to vent with Katy. I texted her and she said I could come over.

So we do our usual venting thing and act like dorks and she makes me feel a million times better! I love her to death! Then Ceci eventually comes home, first I've seen her since her arrival from her trip to London, Paris, and Spain. She showed us pics and little video clips and just her smile alone makes me feel happy. She's so warm and welcoming.I realized I want to live her life, I want to live life to the fullest and be caring and carefree and warm and inviting and beautiful. She kept asking me to stay the night, that it was too cold for me outside and such. She's a sweetie, she grabbed my hand and wanted to make sure that I was feeling better. Seriously, Kat and Ceci make me feel so at home! I love them.

So I leave and cross the street thinking, fuck it, I'm going to live life and be happy, accept the heartaches and embrace the pain because it makes the rest of the time that much sweeter. I arrive to my bus stop and two guys are there, one looks very talkative and says hola to me. They seem to be good friends. The talkative one starts to include me in the convo, he seems silly and philosophical and pensive, talking about how we're just three organismos in the universe, all standing less than a meter apart from each other. He talks about the stars and about life and it's all beautiful and all very true. Then the other guy leaves and I realize that the talkative one didn't know this guy before. We get to talking and he asks me where I'm from and raises his eyebrows and repeats "Norte America" and starts to mockingly speak english, it was cute. I learn that his name is Santiago, he's a pianista and that he loves tango music. When I say that my name is Cristal, he starts to sing some kind of folklore song with my name and amor in it, it was beautiful. The bus arrives and he sits by me, asks me how old I am and said that I was very young when I responded that I'm turning 21. He's 28. He was very cute, being all shivery and wiggling around. He turns and looks at my glasses and says he likes them because of the estrellas and luna....gah, kinda like fate no? He was talking about the stars when I first walked up to the bus stop.

So we're approaching my stop and I ask him if he has a contact number, he didn't but he gave me his card. Said to email him and that he would remember my name. While he was showing me his card and explaining his company to me, he would point at it and stroke my finger holding the card, it was very sweet. We got to my stop and I gave him a beso on the cheek and said mucho gusto and such and ran down my street completely extatic!

I'm glad I didn't stay at Ceci's, I really wanted to too, I feel so at home there, but hey if I would have I wouldn't have met Santiago...

I have no earrings in my ears?

So I had a nice emo conversation with Sara Loving today. We were supposed to be studying for our gramatica parcial that is tomorrow, but I had been indoors reading all day up until that point and I wanted some fresh air and Colby recommended we go to the Facultad de Medicina Plaza next to FLACSO to study and get fresh air. We studied a bit, but mostly just talked. I was good to vent and just take a breather from all my studying I've been doing these past few days. But she gave me a great idea, I need to continue writing in here, even if it's just to do a quick update.

So today, the bad: studying, freaking out, stressing out, feeling like I'm messing up in school, feeling fat (stupid skinny girls in this country), feeling unbeautiful (stupid skinny girls, stupid eurocentric beauty, stupid lack of appreciation for glasses!) and feeling generally blah. Bad turn no?

the good: Sara Loving hearing me out and making me feel better, eating Middle eastern food for lunch at our usual spot on Wed (the guys at the restaurant are so sweet to us now!), fresh air, and probably chatting online with Kat, that's always good.

So I just looked at Rachel Johnson's graduation pics and I wanted to start bawling. I won't see any of those faces when I get back. Brandon is going to Japan for two years, and I will be in the same shoes as those kids in a year. SO SCARY. gah!!!!

Blah, also, skype had a bad connection today, and sometimes I have no patience, and I have no patience for skype when it's messing up, so my convo with mom and dad was short because I was already stressed by my lack of paper (due tmr) and then the sound and mom asking me if I was letting stuff at home get to me. Yes they are. But whatevs.

fjdsflajkdslfkjdf whatevs...stupid CA, stupid deficit, stupid school cuts, and stupid gay marriage ban. Too many bad things. Whatevs

But last night was nice, got to talk to Eevee on skype, we're going to get piercings together when she comes to visit. Also got to talk to Michelle, about life, about living abroad, about changing.

It was good to talk to them. I think I'll have a hard time adjusting back to life at home... oh well

Hola querida blog!

jajaja so it's been too long since I updated this.

Life is really great right now, I got over my homesick slump that I was in for a while and am feeling really great about being here right now, I'm realizing how much I've grown and how independent I am now, it might be very difficult to adjust back to life at home.

I was talking to Colby (as always) the other night at a restuarant and I was telling him how I didn't get my license until I was in college and my mom basically drove me around everywhere I needed to go up until that point (he got his license when he was 16 and started working before that). And he was telling me how he can't even imagine me being a person to be driven anywhere, said I appeared very independent...which is true, I'm so independent now, I can't really believe I'm here and that I've made it this far and I'm having fun. I thought I would be miserable with my familia and don't get me wrong I get so homesick sometimes and with some situations I wish I could just magically apparate(harry potter reference) home to be there for certain things. But I can do it, I can be on my own and things don't fall apart when I'm not there. The other day my mom told me that Robert and Andrew took care of the kids while the mujeres went out for a chicana play, and I was like, THAT'S GREAT! See, things run smoothly with out me needing to be there, others can do the same thing that auntie crystal does and it's fine! jajaa I'm so silly

So update....this weekend let's see. Thursday I took it easy. I called my bro's apt to talk to his gf really quick and ended up talking with her mom for like 30 minutes and found out that my bro and his gf broke up and that he's moved back home. Pretty big deal, for those who don't know, they've been together for 5 years and she's like familia to me too. So yeah I was pretty sad about that, but Thursday night I met my friend Elizabeth for helado and she kindly listened to me and was very great about checking in on me and how I'm feeling. It was great that she knew that you know, despite the fact that I love to have a tough exterior, she told me, "you really don't have to be as tough as you appear to be". I'm glad she told me that...I need to let things out sometime and not freak about about things on my own and internalize things.

So after that, she needed to go back home and write a paper, and I met a few great friends at a hookah bar and just chilled there. Had some vino and went home relatively early (2 de la mañana) and when I got home Rossana was still awake. jaja ooo yeah, thursday afternoon I got my parcial back and got two 10's a perfecto! woo!

Friday,I ran errands, took my laundry, got some fotocopias at la UBA, did some readings at a biblioteca, it was rather a productive day. My lavadera girl was nice too me too, commented on my necklace. So I met Colby that night at my street corner (he lives a block away) and we headed to Godoy Cruz for our weekend ritual in seek of a good mexican restaurant. jaja not too great this week, we met Katy and Sara Loving there and we realized it was barely 10 and too early to head to our gay bar that Colby loves. So we went to another restaurant and chilled, then headed to the bar at midnight paid our entrada of just 25 pesos for open bar. Killer. That's all I have to say, I missed a bus to our weekend trip because of this bar. jajaa

Saturday, yesterday...too much I was super hungover all day...jajaja Colby and I hung out at cafes trying to study, didn't really work...we later ate armenian food with some good folk and then headed to Avantt, possibly my fav place here! I hadn't been there since march, it was killing me, but Colby was realy wanting to check it out so I was grateful. It also helped that I knew Zelmar was going to be there..jaja thanks Facebook! We got in line and we were at the door when I saw him walk up to the line with some of his friends ah I almost died. I spent the early part of the night trying to not be seen by him because I'm too shy, but around 2:30 they finally opened the downstairs part and me and my friends planted ourselves right in front of him. He came over and said hi and was really surprised to see me. Asked me how I decided to go on that night, and it was totally a coincidence that we chose that night, Colby decided early he wanted to try Avantt this weekend. Yeah, he was also telling me that he saw my facebook and that it was great that I was getting to know other parts of Argentina. He offered me some of his beer and was just super sweet! ah! too cute

omg and then there were two cross dressers, they were hot, these guys pulled off these outfits amazingly! It was great! and one of my friends Doug went up to them and started talking to them. We thought he was drunk and didn't know they were guys, so we sat back and just laughed off to the side for a long time. Eventually he came back, said he knew from the beginning but just wanted to chat and dance. jajajaj it was great. I LOVE this place! I love Avantt, its magical, all the amazing music I love, MGMT, FRranz, The Strokes, The White Stripes, plus all kinds of 80's punk mixed in there...its beautiful.

So at the end of the night Colby and I didn't have any money or monedas to take the colectivo, so we walked from the centro all the way back home. Some more than 30 blocks. jaja but it was great, we got to see the obelisco at night and all the stands they set up for the festivities today. It's 25 de Mayo, in 1810 the Revolución started and the process of liberation from Spain had begun. It's gonna be an exciting day, we'll head back to the obelisco and enjoy some of the festivities, plus there'll probably be tons of Che flags everywhere! GAH!!! I LOVE this place!

Seriously, I couldn't have picked a better city to study in...I'm attached to this place, it's great. Plus, I've made some great friends. Colby and I are like an old married couple, we've seen each other at our best and our worst, I dont want to imagine living more than a block away from him...which is going to be the sad truth in a few months.

But alas, that's far away. Now, to disfrutar the tiempo I have left!