i played soccer today! with this women's league in san telmo. and i was so bad but it was soo good. it was on turf outside but underneath a 10 lane highway (they use the spaces under highways really innovatively here. even for fancy restaurants!). i only had a coffee and a piece of bread before going though and so now i feel a little sick and exhausted but! they play every tuesday and saturday and were totally down with us coming and playing with them every week. so this is what my hopefully coming together life looks like right now: 2 long days of stimulating classes a week, soccer twice a week, teaching english classes twice a week, going to concerts every friday, working for killer startups internet review thing 3 days a week, hopefully doing something with this organic garden (called la huerta orgazmica) a few times a week, making stencils and collages with friends on the side, baking and cooking once a week with roommates, seeing free movies at the art museums and hopefully figuring something out with this printshop. shit, that sounds pretty good.

address

this is my address:
KellyAnne Mifflin.
Azcuénaga 1064, 8A.
CP: 1115, Capital Federal de Buenos Aires.
Argentina

last night after a long long day of classes i told all three people i know to come over and i baked a peach apple pie and chocolate banana cake. but at ten thirty no one i had invited had showed up and it was just one of those awkward nights where you sit around talking in english to lots of international students about boring things like why they are in argentina so i decided to leave and go to a concert even though it was technically my party. so i left and went to this really funny really fun surfpunk show with some argentine bands and also this guy called daddy-o of los straightjackets (i know you guys know all about surfpunk and know who he is of course). he wears a mexican wrestling mask and speaks really really fast made up spanish that no one can understand while brazilian surf videos and movies from the 50's play in the background. so it was totally worth it but 10 minutes after i left to go to the concert i got a million texts saying that all of these people kept showing up saying they were my friends and i wasn't there. but 3 hours later i came home and they had all just decided to stay and eat dessert even though i wasn't there so we got to have a party anyway. and then totally coincidentally my friend sean had been invited to a party in the basement of an apartment building on azcuenaga 1064. my building! so at 3:30 am we ventured downstairs and found a door with ricky martin blasting out of it and after ringing the bell for a half hour finally got inside and it turns out it was a bachelor party! not with strippers or anything but i did see the groom making out with some girl in the kitchen. so that part was not so great but then i forgot about it and we just danced all night to bad/great latin music with porteños who didn't even care that some weird kids had just knocked on the door and come joined their party. then at 4:30am some old people came in and said hi to everyone and then went into another room and it turns out that this guy who's house it was lives with his parents. who were in the other room sleeping but no one turned the music off or anything and we all kept dancing until 5:30. so a very argentine night. and i met some vecinos. also i found out about this organic garden in the city that is open to anyone to come work and hang out at! they have concerts and movies and stuff too but mostly it would just be soo great to get to be around plants and people into organic gardens and eating fresh food! i can't wait to go. except it's really a shitty situation and they've been there for 6 years or something but don't actually own the land and now the government wants it for a parking lot or road or something so they have to camp out in tents every night and fight a lot to not have it taken away. but it's still really exciting that it exists. now i'm gonna go do some reading and have dinner with some friends at a vegetarian restaurant in san telmo. i'm really really happy being in buenos aires right now.

i hope you are not offended. its just so we have an excuse to bake a lot and wear thrift shop dresses and because we all miss and love our abuelas so much!

oh and i have another roommate named rocky from canada but i'm not really excited about it so i'm not going to write about him. but here are a few pictures of my other roommates. anne (blonde), sarah, and Jeppe. we made tapas all night and got dressed up and ate them at midnight.

ok so there are about a million things to write about. 1. i got a job! not so sure how i feel about it but i'm gonna try it for a little while. my friend rosie is basically my boss and its for this company called killer startups that writes reviews of startup internet companies so i have to look at lots of webpages and write whether they seem like they're going to bomb or would be a good idea to invest in. the good part is that they're all kind of interesting websites so it hopefully will be a little fun. and i do it from my computer whenever. and i get $8 an hour which is mad dough for buenos aires. and maybe i will start doing graphic design work for them instead. obviously i am totally unqualified for all of this but apparently that is irrevelant. so we'll see. 2. i went to the class i was super excited about, sociology of art, and it totally totally sucked. so i'm gonna drop that but the religion one surprised me and is really interesting and taught by these two young really excited professors. they walked in wearing a beastie boys t shirt and dirty sneakers and i can't understand a word they say cause they speak so casually and like they have food in their mouths. but judging from the enunciation and hand gestures i think its gonna be really interesting and if i get through it my spanish will be soo good. also already the professors are on strike so classes are cancelled on wednesday. 3. i met this amazing person named sean who is sarah robinson's friend and we went and saw The Evens (you know, ian mackaye's new band) and it was so good. probably the best concert i've been to in latin america. cause it's so rare that big underground bands can come here since it's so far and expensive but it was so fun and good and thought out and it was exciting to see Argentines into a dc band. and afterwards we went out and met these argentine girls who dance tango in the street for tourists in la boca on caminito (remember mom) and its cool to be able to look at those tourist areas from a different perspective. 4. and then yesterday was the 31st anniversary of the military golpe del estado in '76 so there was a really big demonstration at plaza congreso and plaza de mayo which was phenomenal. really different than any protest i've bee to before and really interesting to see especially compared to santiago. for one there were no police! no police interaction at all with the demonstrators. i didn't realize how used to tear gas and riot gear and molotov coctails i had gotten but it was really nice being here. the left is super divided in buenos aires so there were millions of millions of different organizations present and everyone there was part of some group or other, which was sort of intimidating at first but then we talked to a bunch of interesting people and joined up with some students and it was ok. i don't know, it's always really intense to think about the desaparecidos and actually be in the spaces where extreme acts of violence happened and see pictures of people my age who went to class one day and then were gone. but inspiring to see so many people still out and remembering and speaking out against it.

i just got done with my first day of classes which was surprisingly really really good. really long but i´m hopeful too. the ethnicity one in the morning is going to be good (although two thirds of the class are extranjeras from germany) and the argentine art history one, although almost unbearably long is exicting because we get to spend the next three classes in the bellas artes museum instead of the classroom. its a little ridiculous that i´m taking an upper level art history seminar in spanish when i´ve only ever taken one art history class ever and don´t know what any of the terms mean but i guess that´s what makes it fun. and tomorrow i have a job interview!

apartment!...

so i'm all moved in. i stayed up all night on friday and painted my room blue and i love it. you can see the before and after pictures. we're still looking for a 4th roommate. the colombians were back with plans to all there live in the tiny back room but the other girls thought that would be too much so now we're back to looking for someone else. i am a little disappointed because this means i won't be living with spanish speakers and also the apartment is so huge it feels really empty with only 4 people living in it. but maybe it will be less chaotic. ...

Classes start wednesday for me. 9am to 9pm. it's a lot. i'm taking 4 which are: sociology and anthropology of art, argentine art history, theory and practice in anthropology of religion in latin america, and anthropology, politics and economics of ethnicity. probably i'll drop one since each class is either 4 or 6 hours all at once and that is a lot of lecture in spanish. The filosophy and letters "campus" where I am is pretty special. It's a converted tobacco factory and is probably the most disorganized place ever with millions of conversed stringy haired kids running around all day handing out flyers for communist concerts, protests at the us embassy, miming workshops and a lot of other things that make me laugh at how stereotypically it is the facultad de filosofia y letras. by which i mean its fun being there but also impossible to ever know what's going on and today i was trying to check my e-mail in the computer lab and realized that i was actually in the middle of a class and had to get up and run out. and i got lost for 2 hours on the bus trying to get to campus so i have no idea how i will get there on time on wednesday. but i guess that's what being in a new city means. I surprisingly know a whole lot of people here and am finding lots of stuff to do. i went out for a drink with this guy i met at a bookstore and his good friend owns a printmaking workshop and he's going to introduce me and see if i can get a job or just help/hang out there. which would be phenomenal. and its still warm enough to eat breakfast on my balcony every morning and wear dresses and eat icecream. actually i'm here in Freddo's, my favorite icecream place, which is only 2 blocks from my apartment and has free wireless internet even if you don't buy an icecream (which obviously never happens)....ok, its been 2 hours and clearly these pictures are not loading. someday, sorrry.

here are some basic pictures of the apartment. i bought paint today so i'm going to paint my room light blue and i made a desk out of a door for it too and now there's only one bed and obviously it will be different with my stuff in it. but so you have an idea. about a million people responded to our add but none of them are native spanish speakers so we're holding off before making a decision. plus today during dinner the colombians called us to say that they had gotten the money and so now wanted to move back in with us, but we've all changed rooms now so the only one open is this tiny one at the back of the apartment and they want to fit 3 people in it. they say the will sleep on the floor. so that's a little insane and the other girls are worried and think it will be too much to live with 3 boys. but speaking spanish is better than speaking english so i don't know. we have to decide saturday morning.

sike. no colombians. but we decided to keep the apartment anyway, right now its just the danish girl, Anne, and an American girl for 2 months named Sarah and we have to look for roommates. but it's still exciting and a relief. there is a giant living room with a long balcony and a small grill, fairly decent rooms, 3 bathrooms, a big kitchen, horrible mattresses, plants, a bike, really well located, on the 8th floor, and i don't know what else to say about it. But i'm not going to put up pictures until i move in and make it pretty, so maybe next week. signing leases and contracts in spanish is pretty fun. it took four hours to finally get everything worked out but now it's ours. !

I got an apartment!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! with 3 colombian boys and a danish girl (and el misterioso novio) pictures to come, i'm allowed to paint it! and it comes with a bike! (to share between 6) hooray! por fin.

Noticias from Debbie

We’re in our little apartment on Cerrito & Posadas, possibly one of the ritziest neighborhoods in BA, waiting for 2 Columbians and 1 Dane to show up so KA can start looking for an apartment with them together. Should be another exciting day in this bustling metropolis of 12 million. Since Fred has left, we’ve gotten down to tackling the practical daily hurdles like learning how to flush the toilet, avoiding new bathroom floods, lighting the pilot so as not to have to take cold showers and figuring out how to get the bus to stop if we don’t want to go another mile from where we intended to get off!

We love the buses though because they zip through the city (since they don’t bother to stop unless someone is halfway in the middle of the road waving them down) and we get to see everything that we are not going to visit like the huge Puerto Madera.

If you come to BA, all of the streets have names either of another country, so you see a tango show on Estados Unidos, drink coffee on Florida (I guess they think this is a separate country) or Mexico, and have a wonderful Italian meal on Arabe Seria. Otherwise you are on a street named after some famous male whose mausoleum you can visit at Cementario Recoleta. Every single name I had encountered over the past week I discovered again at the cemetery.

Here are a few pictures from our outings – tango show, street fair in San Telmo & La Boca (literally the ‘mouth’) & the “beautiful” Facultad de Filosofia & Letras – another clear indication of the sorry state of the funding for the humanities. Today we visit a colleague I met in Graz in a suburb of BA. We are thinking of you all in el Norte (basically, the rest of the world) and sending besos & abrazos.

BUENOS AIRES--BY FRED

Hello again from Fred, filling in for the real blogger queen. BA is huge. I forced Kellyanne to go to the top of the 23 story Intercontinenatal Hotel with me last night to see the city from above where we were immediately stopped as we tryed to casually walk by and pretend we were guests there. They let us go anyway--so much for security. I hope the pictures convey the scope of how big the city is. The road you see lit up is eighteen lanes wide! Which leeds me to cabdrivers and driving in general.


Lanes do not exist here. even though they are all nicely laid out for you to stay in your proper place, every driver and particularly the cabbies are constantly creating two lanes in one. The eighteen lanes mentioned above are really about 53 lanes. I really don't know how they survive-but they do. Also, there is no such thing as a pedestrian (or pedestrian right of way). Kellyanne tells me if you get hit---you pay for the damage to the car (in colombia) . Walker beware. Bikerider be even more aware. Not to many laws regarding mufflers either--it can be very loud. There seem to be alot of Ford Falcons and Ford/chevy pickup trucks, more of a vintage cariety. The subway system is good here and costs about 25 cents to go anywhere and any distance. They have beautiful tile work and murals in the tunnels.

more mundane stuff while I am on the subject: They haven't gotten anywhere near as far as we have regarding ADA laws for the disabled. the last bano (bathroom) I was in was barely big enough for me to get into--let alone a wheelchair. There is alot of beautiful ornamental ironwork on the buildings, particularly the balconies, lots of huge, 12' wooden doors with "big knockers" (brass). Beautiful tile work and murals in the subways:



Prices: (I spent an hour in a supermarket comparing prices while Kellyanne tried to register for classes)
a dozen eggs is about 60cents, a six pack of Bud is $3, a roast chiken $4, ground meat $1.5/pound, bananas 30 cents/lb, wine ranged from $1/bottle to $10 for the good stuff. we ate at a fancy restaurant today called La Brigade, which was recommended to me by travellers from Wyoming. A steak, a big salad, two cokes and two sprites plus a breadbasket cost about $23. By the way, grilled steak is supposed to be Argentina's specialty, but I have had it twice now and i still like US barbecued ribs better. let it be known that if i said that on the street here I would be hung in the public square.




University: We travelled out to where Kellyanne will be going to school. Note: the univerity is in many places all over the city. It depends what you are studying as to where you will be located. Her school is about a forty minute ride from where we are staying (which for those of you who have forgotten, is the posh section of town just a gold coin toss away from the Four Seasons hotel). The building which houses her university is nothing to write home about---but it does have writing all over it. Students are very political here and one method of communicating their message is with graffitti. Anyway, Kellyanne is working out the details, one of which is that university education here, even for foreigners is FREE. So I told her she can spend an extra $25/month on her apartment.

Recoleta Cemetary: they say there is something very similar in Paris. the pictures speak for themselves. The most famous person buried here is of course, Evita Duarte Peron. She is buried in the Duarte family site. throngs of people gather around her grave and she is the only one with fresh flowers every day. The closest thing I have seen to this is the famous cemetary in New Orleans--which is above ground due to the water table (that's if the cemetary still exists there). Anyway--this was an entire city of grave sites honoring the wealthy, the influential, and/or the famous with lavish structures, statues, and yes...streets.








We saw a commotion the first night i got here and went to check it out. the police were there and we thought it was a student protest. Then we realized that it was mostly girls and they all seemed to be in their teens and all were emmitting that high pitched shrill that only adolescent females can muster when they are infatuated with a rock star. Guess who it was? Ricky Martin! Kellyanne and I happenned to be in position to acually seem him (as opposed to the shrieking throngs) ...you can imagine how excited we were :)

I've learned not to refer to Kellyanne as "mi hermosa" (my sister)--that got a little embarrassing back in Costa Rica. She is now correctly labeled "mi hiha". She should be called "mi hiha La Traductora"...my daughter the translator. In conversations with our Doorman, ( who quite generously talks about soccer with me not fulling recognizing that I only understand one tenth of what he is saying) I successfully told him that the Boca Juniors loss the other night 3-0 was not "embarazado" but "verguenza", The first word would have implied his team's loss was pregnant, the second means the loss was embarrassing. So, my spanish has been elevated from that of an infant to possibly pre-school.

To end--let me say that Kellyanne and I got a free ride on the subway the other night. they waved us through. We asked why at the other end realizing that every station appeared to be free and the guard said "they had run out of change".

Note: Debbie got here safely, bright and early this morning. We visited the botanical gardens, the zoo--which was a riot but fodder for another blog, and a whole new section of town I had not been to.

fred's blog:

Hi--this is fred filling in for kellyanne.

I sent an email with pictures to everyone but I don't think it made it---so more pictures included here. I met KellyAnne on wednesday in santiago. It was beautiful flying down the backbone of the Andes and then seeing Santiago tucked into the middle. The pictures above and below are from Pablo Neruda's house--which was quite beautiful. KellyAnne had been to all three of his houses and knew almost as much as the tour guide (he is chilean but had spent ten years in new york and was quite a character. Pablo Neruda had a penchant for women, drink (3 bars and two bedrooms in the house) and things nautical, even though he wouldn't get near the water. He built a boat and kept it in his front yard where he presided as captain over the libations.


The best part of santiago was, of course, seeing KellyAnne and the family and friends she was staying with. The city was fine, generally clean, but I don't think you could really spend that much time there if you were't visiting someone. I think most people go to chile on vacation for the wine tours, to see Pategonia, to go mountain climbing, and for the beach.

The night before we left, Jorge and Marisol had a barbecue (asado) for the whole house, plus we invited Luke and Cory (friends of KellyAnne's from silver spring. The onwers prepared the barbeque and cooked up alot of vegetable shishkabobs for KellyAnne and others. The grilled meat was great...and should be even better in Argentina. KellyAnne (and Alaina--from Montana and pictured below, baked three peach/plumb cobblers. All were devoured. At one point I counted one Colombian, 4 Germans, 5 Chileans, 2 French, and 6 Americans (4 of which were the Silver Spring contingent). The night ended, as evidently every asado evening, with a ping pong tournament. I didn't do too bad but the chileans who owned the table were far superior. The last picture is KellyAnne with the owners on the day we left. They were very kind to KellyAnne and i think she left her mark on them as well. Our joke was that in ten years all Chileans will be having vegetarian asados due to her influence.






We took off on Friday morning heading to Mendoza, Argentina with only one thing in our way----the Andes. I only included one picture here because they seemed kind of repetitve. Most of the snow had melted by this time. It was a very long climb up on the chilean side but for some reason was much easier funnelling out on the argentine side. I have never seen anything as incomprehsibly ineffecient as going through customs directly in the middle of the andes. The whole bus ride was supposed to take six hours to Mendoza but it took 8 hours because we spent 3.5 hours sitting in this absurd setting: something like a giant bus terminal at about 13,000 feet. it was pretty, but pretty insufferable at the same time. KellyAnne slept and I manage to scorch my bald pate taking a nap out on one of the big boulders.

We finally got through and made it to what turned out to be a fun and festive mendoza--the wine capital of Argentina.



Mendoza was mobbed with mostly local people there for the festival. Luckily, KellAanne was able to secure us the last room in what turned out to be a great bed and breakfast with wonderful hosts. We got there at last, dropped our bags and had dinner and a bottle of wine. The pictures are from the festival. Lot's of regional beauty queens vying for top honors as queen of the entire festival. Our B&B host's daughter was one of the queens and is pictured below. Then we had to catch an all night bust to Buenos Aires that night (last night) so we never saw the winner. I was sick with coughing spells the whole 13 hour ride so it was pretty miserable for me----but buses here are very comfortable and entertaining (for instance, the ride began with everyone playing bingo!) They also showed movies and very poor music videos.

I sat next to a woman from South Africa who had just climbed Acacongua (sp) the highest peak outside the Himalaya chain and one of the mountains that people refer to when they talk about climbing the "seven summits". She is the only woman from South Africa to have ever climbed it!

We crossed miles and miles of pampas (the Argentine plains--plenty of beef out there) in the pouring rain. We made it to our rental agent's office and had to wait over an hour for them to get there (along with a guy from wisconsin who comes twice a year fro tango lessons). We are now firmly entrenched in a very nice apartment which we have for two weeks in one of the wealthiest districts in BA. Buenos Aires is many blogs unto itself. let me just say it is massive in scope and somewhat overwhelming right now.

For those interested (Brooklyn/Patrick and others), we could not get tickets to see Boca Juniors, who played today. We watched the game on tv and they got trounced 3-0, as did river plate. Poor showing for the BA futbol teams today.

Fred

my dad is here! and we're leaving for Buenos Aires tomorrow morning. we had a last big asado bbq at the house with marisol and jorge and everyone who is living here now (coincidentally a girl from the farm is staying in the house too) and we baked peach plum nectarine crisp and grilled lots of vegetables and now are having a ping pong championship and its really fun for my dad to get to see everything.