Borderline...feels like I'm going to lose my mind

Left Mendoza at around 10:30am on Tuesday via bus. The scenery during the drive was amazing, leaving the valley of Mendoza and inching up through the Andes Mountains. Breathtaking. After falling asleep briefly, I awoke at the border crossing of Los Libertadores, one of the border entrances between Argentina and Chile. Upon opening my eyes I noticed white outside my window, whiteness and the jagged skyline created by the massive mountaintops we seemed to be resting on.

Everyone on the bus had to get off and go through customs and a security checkpoint. It wasn't until Lauren almost fainted on the walk back from the bathroom that I realized how high in altitude we were. After customs, we all had to wait in another room (which must have been the same temperature as a subzero freezer) and watch as they scanned our luggage. Everyone was shivering, most of us basically in pajamas, while we observed the border patrol guards in full parkas, even half of their faces were protected. We were then sniffed by dogs and went through metal detectors as the dogs then went onto the bus to sniff some more. The guards came back with three plastic bags that were onboard and asked whomever owned them to please step forward. Two of the bags had fruit in them and one had flowers or something. Turns out that bringing fruits and plant matter across borderlines is against the law especially without declaring them....I'm pretty sure it's like this up North too. The three passengers, an old Argentine woman, an Australian and an Israeli guy had to go up and be questioned while the rest of us boarded the bus. A few minutes later the bus started moving again, but only to pull forward and park.

I watched skiers at the nearby resort pass us by on the mountain for a bit before starting to read my book to pass the time. After a couple of chapters, I noticed the words on the page blur and start moving. Getting dizzy, I shut the book and leaned back in my seat. I stared out the window....still not moving. I started to get hot and claustrophobic and hurriedly got off the bus. I sat outside on a rock in the snow, put my head between my legs and felt better with the cold fresh air. A couple of other people started getting off the bus, some for cigarettes and others who were starting to feel sick from the altitude. I also noticed the water bottle I'd been drinking out of, looked like it got the life sucked out of it...the bottle almost flattened like a pancake.

Everyone started getting chatty, trying to figure out what was taking so long and then this guy said that his friend (the Australian) was still in the building being questioned along with the other passengers and the bus couldn't leave them behind. Apparently, they were going to have to pay a fine of somewhere along $1,000 U.S.! I started to think back to early on in ride when the guy was coming down the aisles to give us our customs forms and noticed an apple sticking out of Laurens purse and telling me that she couldn't bring it across the border. I told Lauren to eat it right away, and remembered to eat the banana I had in my purse as well. What would have happened if we forgot? I couldn't even imagine how furious our parents would've been had they gotten a call from us at the border haha!

All in all we were at the border for about two hours...I eventually felt better and our supposed quick 6 hour ride into Santiago, turned into almost 9 hours. We basically lost the whole day. Still, though driving into Chile was pretty amazing. This country is soooo naturally beautiful and they're patriotism was instantly noticeable. From the first shack in the mountains, to every house after that until the apartment buildings in the city, we saw the Chilean flag flying above doors and on balconies : )

So tomorrow turned into two days : )

I know I said I'd write everyday, but I've been really exhausted at the end of each day lately. All this traveling wears you down. I feel like we've been gone for six months already and we only left Buenos Aires a little over a week ago! We're in our fourth city/fourth hostel with 7+hours on a bus in between each, so it takes a toll after a while.

Anyways,

So we arrived in Mendoza Saturday morning after an 11 hour overnight bus ride from Cordoba. It wasn't so bad, I got as much sleep as was possible. We got to our hostel around 9:30 am and all we wanted was to shower and rest for a bit before walking around town. Well, it turned out that check-in was at 2pm and our room wasn't ready yet! They let us put our bags away and eat breakfast but then we still had about four hours to kill so we decided to start our tour of the city early. Mendoza was gorgeous, mountain views, fresh air, tree lined streets, cars stopping for pedestrians, store owners greeting you...a big difference from the big cities. It seemed to be full of tourists so I felt less embarrassed taking my camera out and taking pictures of everything. We walked to the center of town, Plaza Indepencia, which had a huge fountain, trees, live music, and stands selling hand crafted jewelry and art. Surrounding this square are four other Plazas each about two blocks away from the main Plaza. We visited them all, and then walked to a park near all the government buildings where we decided to sit on the grass and take a break. Our break turned into an hour nap in the park, and we woke up just in time to catch lunch before all the restaurants and shops close for the afternoon siesta. Finally after lunch it was time to check in so we headed back to the hostel to get situated. Later we went out for an early dinner, and by early I mean 7pm, we were the only people in the restaurant. We had our first bottle of wine in Mendoza at the restaurant. It's actually cheaper to by a bottle than two glasses. A bottle of Malbec (my favorite kind of wine, made only here in Argentina) costs about $10 US. After dinner, we went to have dessert at another restaurant that was on the top floor of the tallest building in Mendoza (10 stories) with a spectacular view of the city with the Andes mountains in the distance. We walked back to the hostel to find it full of people, foreign and local. Our hostel also had a restaurant/bar attached to it that was apparently a really popular place. We decided to go and hang out there for a bit and play Uno : ) hahaha real party girls!

We hit the sack soon after that, and even with all the partying going on our room was far away and quiet. It was actually the nicest hostel we'd stayed in. We had our own bathroom and our own balcony. There was even a pool in the backyard, not that anyone was gonna use it in this temperature....Lauren shook me awake the next morning to say that it was snowing! I didn't believe her so I groaned and then turned to go back to sleep. She then opened the balcony doors and a gust of wind hit my face, I turned over to see snow falling heavily outside! Our plans for biking to the wineries were immediately canceled. Really anything involving the outdoors was canceled because we brought nothing with us that was snow proof. We went to the restaurant next door for breakfast and sat by the fire along with all the other gringos in flip flops haha. The snow stopped later that day and we decided to call it an early night as we were set on touring the wineries weather it was snowing or not.

Thankfully, Monday morning the sun was gleaming through the windows : ) Our idea was that we would check-out that morning, leave our stuff at the hostel, take the 45 min. bus ride to the wineries, be back in town by 4 or 5 pm and get on the bus to Chile. Obviously, our plan didn't really work. We checked-out, got on the bus and arrived to the town of Maipu by noon. We rented bikes from the company Bikes&Wines, we're given a map and took off. A little shaky at first haha, I don't think I'd been on a bike in years and now here I was on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere and about to start drinking before lunch....

Our guide told us to head to the wine museum first, have a tasting first and then go to the last winery on the map and work our way back, as it was easier. Lauren and me are also bad at conversions so we had no idea what 11km would mean. Soooo 7 miles later, we got to our first winery already complaining about it being a literal pain in the ass. After a mini tour, where we actually learned a lot about how they make the wine, what creates the different aromas/flavors, difference in time, etc... we had more tasting. At this point, we had an equivalent of two glasses and still had about five wineries to go haha and don't forget the 7 mile bike ride back. We stopped for lunch around 4pm at a huge winery and had the best meal we'd had in a looong time. We accompanied it with more wine, obviously, and realized it was getting late and decided we had time for one last winery. By this time we were back on the main road and it was full of traffic. We had semi's and bus's honking at us to get out of the road, until we had an actual police escort follow us all the way to the next winery. It was a little weird at first and Lauren was convinced we were going to get arrested for drinking and biking (being illegal in the US) and I was convinced they were just protecting us. I think it was pretty obvious we were tourists. The next winery was too expensive, so we chose to leave it and head to the next site on the map, a chocolate factory! Instead of heading all the way back to the main road, I decided to take a marked shortcut on the map. This shortcut, it turns out, wasn't paved and wasn't dirt either. It was literally huge rocks on the road, which slowed us down and required more exertion. When we finally got to a dirt side road, we had to stop a couple of times and walk the bikes haha then when we got back on them, Lauren was chased by guard dogs from a nearby property.

We reached the main road only to see the Bikes&Wines sign and figured they lied to us about this supposed chocolate factory we'd been looking forward to and called it a day. The guy at the tour place didn't understand how we missed it, neither did I...even though we took a side route, it was on the map! Oh well.....by the time we got back on the bus for Mendoza it was almost 7. There was no way we were getting to Chile that night, which was kind of a relief as we were almost dead from exhaustion. Thankfully, we were able to get our room back, and got into bed at around 9pm. The next morning, we'd head to Chile!

MEN doh Zaaaa

will write more tomorrow.....just wanted to announce how much we love it here, even with the snow : )

Córdoba aka the Heartland of Argentina

We arrived in the second biggest city of Argentina (after Buenos Aires) on Wednesday evening after a 7 hour bus ride from Rosario. We were staying at the Palenque Hostel, which is on the main street of downtown. I instantly took a liking to Córdoba, as it was alive and bustling with noise and crowds of people on the sidewalk. Our hostel was big and probably had about twenty+ guests all sharing two bathrooms : (
Exhausted, we spent our first night out at dinner and then back to the hostel to watch a movie and head right to bed. The next day, we slept in unfortunately and missed our free breakfast at the hostel. Now that we are out of the capital, we realized that we had to conform to the daily eating customs of the country. Meaning, if we wanted lunch it had to be between the hours of 1-4pm, after 4 there is basically no food/meals available until about 8pm or later. Also, during the hours of 1-4 most businesses are closed, as everyone heads home for their "siesta." Lauren was especially bothered by this haha.
We decided to sightsee the city with a two hour bus tour. It started off at the Plaza San Martin, which was once used for bull fighting and executions. The square was also the sight for the oldest standing Church in the whole country, Iglesia Catedral, which took 200 years to complete after building began in 1574. This area was full of other historical churches, such as the first Jesuit Church in the country, museums and other sights and walkways with cafes and shops. The bus tour continued to other areas that we probably would have never accessed by foot, so we were really glad to have caught the tour. The city is also known for having a large young population, as there are numerous colleges and universities all in close proximities and most of people from the northern provinces all come here to study.
It got pretty hot here on Thursday and Lauren kept asking to get ice cream the whole day, so finally on our walk home from the bus tour we stopped at this one place and she got her two scoop cone. That was until she tripped on the curb crossing the street and fell flat on her face in the middle of the intersection, ice cream smeared all over the crosswalk. Later that evening, still needing to satisfy her need for ice cream, we decided to take another stroll and grab some cones. After finding most of the shops closed, we continued our walk (which I found very safe, as it was the middle of the night yet hoards of people were still out and about, in comparison to Rosario where the streets were dead and kinda scary) to find anything open with ice cream. When we finally found a place, we ordered and then Lauren reached in her pocket only to discover that her money must have fallen out during the walk. Sadly, again, we walked back to the hostel empty handed.
The next day consisted of more walking around on foot and finally sitting down for some ice cream : ) We packed up and left that night for our next stop, Mendoza.

......hmm Rosarioooo

Sooo...my opinion, hmmm. Let's just say, I might need to give this town a second chance, like at a different time of the year. First off, not only was it small, but on our first day it was pouring. Not only was it pouring, it was freezing. We woke up early because our guidebook said the best thing to do was to go on this kayak/bike tour that takes you from the city to the near Alta Delta islands across the river. It's a seven hour tour, and ya I know I don't seem like the kayaking, biking, or any physical activity for 7 hours type BUT I'm here to experience new things so I was ready to do it. Well....with freezing cold rain not even my adventurous friend Lauren was interested in it anymore so we decided to just walk around the city and visit the "sights." We walked a block away from the hostel to the Plaza de Mayo, the main city square where all the government buildings were, and a little past it to Monumento Nacional a la Bandera, a monument to the Argentine flag (since this was the first city in the country where it was erected). This was a pretty cool sight except for the fact that it was also the exact moment that it started pouring intensely and so we gave up on sightseeing for the day, hopped in a cab to the nearest mall and saw a movie, hoping to wait out the rain indoors.

We were right, when we got out the rain let out and we decided to keep on with the guidebook suggestions, which left only about three more sights and took all of an hour to get through. One sight that deserves a mention was visiting the house Che Guevara was born in. Well, it's now an office building and we couldn't go inside but we did take some pictures from the outside. It was frustrating though because by this time we were in a dead zone as the whole city basically shuts down between 1-4pm because everyone goes home to nap. We headed back to the hostel, hung out with other travelers, and relaxed till later that night when Lauren and I went to meet a friend of hers that is studying abroad in Rosario.

When we got back Lauren was tired and went straight to bed. I, on the other hand, have been having trouble falling asleep throughout this whole trip and decided to read for a while. By the time I was tired, I got into bed and lay awake listening to the drunks in the bar yelling all night. Now I guess now is the time to mention that, I've discovered....I'm not much of a "backpacker." To begin with, I don't even own a backpack. I don't really like guidebooks telling me the name of every church in town, things "i must do," blah blah blah....I am, though, very into different cultures, languages, customs, etc. I like doing my own exploring, really experiencing what locals do and see on a daily basis, I hate being the "tourist." I'd rather blend in.

Anyways, when looking for hostels I tend to look at the best rated by customers and also by the pictures posted. The one in Rosario had really great pictures and good reviews and was smack in the middle of town, so it was an obvious choice for me. The pictures did it justice, it was really cool, ambient, and decorative. Different colored walls, pop art paintings, a tv room with bean bag chairs and a pull down projector screen, a bar with a hangout room...and a lot of guests, well at least I thought they were staying there. Since our hostel was "so cool," and the town I guess is pretty boring, our hostel hosts liked to invite their friends over to hang out, both nights. Our room, unfortunately, was right next to the bar and the first night I tried to fall asleep to loud conversations, laughter, the smell of cigarette smoke and an ongoing soundtrack of R.E.M. and Pearl Jam....I dealt with it. The second night, though, when I knew I had to get up at 8 am to get on a 7 hour bus ride, I couldn't hang. I tried to be cool and not say anything, even though their was one drunk British girl who slurred all of her spanish and seemed to talk for hours. It literally sounded like they were right there in my room, I could hear EVERYTHING, and to make matters worse Lauren and our roommate were fast asleep. By about 4:30 am, they were even louder and I had to get up and go in there and assertively complain in spanish, basically saying "As much as I've enjoyed your entertaining conversation, I really don't see a reason to be yelling it at 5 in the morning, especially when there are other places in this hostel that are far away from all the bedrooms." I was amazed that it was only three people making all the noise, the graveyard hostel host, his friend and one drunk guest. The host was very embarrassed, apologizing repeatedly, which I ignored as I walked back to my SUPER comfortable bunk bed (not). We left this morning, thankfully, but not before I got charged for the lock and key to my locker that went missing the day before along with Laurens lock to her suitcase. I was frustrated but didn't even care at that point, I just wanted to get out of there. We got on the next bus to Cordoba and I reclined my seat all the way back and fell asleep for the next five hours. The next hostel I chose read, "Quiet and cozy, trying to make you feel at home.." they even have a live in dog! Oh ya, and when we left Rosario, the rain had been long gone and the sun was blazing....just perfect, the first hot day of the week and we get to spend it on the bus.

p.s. i got that picture from the internet....it didn't look as nice with our weather

Rosario

First night in Rosario, Argentina. Lauren and me took a really nice, comfortable bus this afternoon from Buenos Aires to the city of Rosario ( 4 hours North). It was nice to get out of the city and see the vast green landscape, where cows and horses grazed freely for once. We got in around 6:30pm to the Che Pampas Hostel, located downtown. It has a really cool laid back atmosphere, paintings of Bob Marley, Che Guevara and the Rolling Stones line the hallways. One of our new roommates, Andy, a film production assistant from London, joined us on our trek to dinner. We walked about twenty minutes on the boardwalk along the river Prana, which was full of people and live music as today is the official first day of Spring and it is widely celebrated throughout the city. Dinner was eaten at the a restaurant called Flora and we each had the famous Argentine steak and Malbec wine for dinner. After dinner, we walked through the city back to our hostel with a quick stop at the supermarket for more wine and some ice cream : )
At first arrival, I thought of Rosario as another Montevideo, a small town lacking the liveliness of the city. I am very much a city person, so this makes me nervous. But walking at night, I realized it wasn't so boring and probably has more than I thought to offer. Lauren on the other hand was more than excited, as we are opposites and she likes smaller towns with more opportunities to explore nature. I'm not going to write off this city yet, we still have tomorrow haha....anyways, we were all tired from the long drive so we ended the night by staying in and lounging in the really cool tv room to watching Meet the Parents on a massive screen projector, while our hostel host is partying in the Bar area with her local friends. It's a nice change of pace from the fast life in BA though I have to admit.
Tomorrow, we'll explore and I'll get back to you on my thoughts of this city once I have a full day to enjoy it.

Buenas Noches!

BACK TO BA

So here we are seven months later and I have returned to Buenos Aires, Argentina. This time I brought two friends with me : ) One only came for a week, seeing as she has an actual job and all, the real work doesn't allow for unplanned adventures. Her (Ashley) and I arrived the same day, an hour apart, and spent an hour looking for each other in the airport. It didn't occur to me to designate a meeting place, not that I could remember what the airport looked like, if you refer back to my post in January about when I arrived you'll know what I'm talking about. Anyways, once we found each other, which was a huge reunion of sorts since we hadn't seen each other in about 3 years, we were well on our way into the city. We arrived thirty minutes later to the hostel I had called home for a month earlier this year. Slept for most of the day then went to my favorite French cafe around the corner for the best eggs benedict I've ever had in my life. Our first couple of days were spent relaxing, eating, and shopping.

It wasn't until my other friend Lauren arrived three days later that we really began to do anything touristy. Also, that weekend we moved into a cute studio apartment we would call home for the rest of the week. Having been here for two months before, I felt like the tour guide and showed to the best of my ability all the "must-see's" of Buenos Aires. Still, our days were short and tiring. We were all trying to adjust to the time and woke up well into the afternoon EVERY day so by the time we were ready to leave the apartment, we would only have a few hours of daylight left since it's still winter over here. Regardless, we still saw all the obvious attractions each day, The Obelisco on Avenue 9 de julio (supposedly the widest avenue in the world, spanning ten lanes), Puerto Madero-the seaport neighborhood with a lot of nice restaurants and new buildings, Calle Florida- similar to Canal street in NYC, the cemetary in Recoleta- a city all on its own with huge masoleums including where Evita is buried, streets of Palermo- chic boho neighborhood, San Telmo's Sunday street fair, Abastos live drum circle-which is every monday night year-round and some of the most amazing percussion music i've ever heard, an intimate Tango show at Bar Sur-where I was serenaded for my birthday...what else hmmm....it was a really busy week. We were also ending our nights pretty late, seeing as the typical time for dinner here is at 10:30pm and the bars don't open until after midnight.

Last Sunday I celebrated my 24th birthday here. Lauren and Ashley cooked a delicious meal for me and four of my friends that live here in Buenos Aires (all ex-pats though). Lots of wine, pasta, and cake...I had a great time : )

Ashley left last Tuesday and since then Lauren and I moved back into the hostel (a better choice economically not comfort-wise though), and spent the rest of the week recovering and relaxing. We had a couple rainy days so we went to the cinema more than once. Tonight is our last night in Buenos Aires until October. Tomorrow, our actual journey begins as we are leaving for our next stop, Rosario. It's apparently a smaller version of Buenos Aires, four hours north and sits right on the river so it should be greener and cleaner : )

From now on, I'll be writing regularly as the sites I'll be seeing will be for the first time and can share it with you guys as I see them. Until tomorrow, CHAU!!! (Argentines borrowed the term from the Italian Ciao)

Punta del Este

I'm playing catchup---don't give me a hard time haha...

So I was in Montevideo, Uruguay for two weeks taking more spanish classes, which I'll talk about later. My friend Matthew his two friends from Chicago, came over the river to check out Uruguay as well. They rented a car and drove to Montevideo to pick me up on the weekend and we drove two hours to Punta del Este.
Punta del Este has been described as the South Beach or Saint Tropez...of South America. It definitely met all glamorous expectations. Its a peninsula on the north east coast of Uruguay on the way to Brazil and it is surrounded by el Rio del Plata on one side and the Atlantic ocean on the other. The white sand beaches are plentiful, as are the fancy cars, high rise condos, tanned bottoms and boob jobs in thong bikinis.
Upon entering the area and while driving through, our faces were plastered to the glass windows of the car...which we rolled down to hang our heads and tongues out of the car like dogs drooling at the gorgeous scenery. Hmm...that def. says something if I relate gorgeous scenery to modernized glass condos and hot people on the beach and not some sort of natural landscape, whatevs I'm a city girl!
We stayed at a hostel in Manantiales which is like ten minutes outside of Punta and on Bikini Beach. Which was a good choice as we were out of the way of boardwalks crammed with tourists with way too much disposable cash. Our hostel, though not as nice as the one in B.A., was quaint, had a pool and a bar and a lot of guests from all over including a bunch of recently laid-off NYC investment bankers taking a loooong vacation.
First thing we did was find the perfect beach...which we didn't. The one we chose ended up being for ages 12 and under. Where were all the hot people?? We decided to stay anyway..tired from driving and tried to nap to the sounds of the ocean and screaming children. Later after a quick change at the hostel we headed to a night on the town. After choosing one of like a hundred restaurants all along the harbor, we came across one with amazing seafood, which I haven't had since I've been in SoAm. Unfortunately, a resort town resembling Saint Tropez also comes with the same price tags, well maybe more like South Beach prices but still...this is South America....everything should be cheap. Oh well, it was just for one weekend.
After eating we tried to go to the number one spot to drink at on the peninsula, Moby Dick, and Irish pub?! Which we didn't get into, because apparently we were in the US and needed to show ID to get in, which none of us had on because again, we are in SOUTH AMERICA and its usually safer not to walk around with your passport, duh....so we settled on the colorful club/bar/restaurant next door, Soho. After three expensive Caipirhinas later we hit the packed dancefloor until around 4 or 5 am when we decided to cut out "early." I forgot to mention, we sat down for dinner at around 1:30 am, when in Rome!

The next day, went to bikini beach, i think?, and took in the much needed rays and blackened my skin as much as possible while taking a quick break to brave the crazy waves breaking right on the beach. Of course, it was funny to sit back and watch all the other people get pummeled by the waves but once I stepped in and was knocked off my feet and ass dragged on the sharp shell covered ocean floor, it wasn't so funny....it was pretty funny though when we decided to get out before drowning, and tried to find a way to avoid exposing my bikini bottom that was filled with two pounds of sand, making me look like i pooped myself....hmmm...

*sorry I've run out of time, I'm late to be somewhere that I'll write about another time, as for this story....to be continued....

Buquebus

11:19 pm 13/2/09

So this is my return trip back to BA from Montevideo, UY. I'm aboard the Ana Silvia liner of Buquebus. I just found this out...I kept seeing the name Ana Silvia on my ticket and other papers and figured it was the name of the lady who helped me on the first day at the counter in BA, I thought it was strange that they kept such good tabs on customer service....it wasn't until I was walking onto the ferry an hour ago that I noticed her name in huge white block letters painted along the side of the boat...wow they really love this lady, I thought...just kidding...thats when it clicked.

The ferry ride is three hours from Montevideo to Buenos Aires, its the fast one. The cheaper ride is 300 hundred pesos less but also three hours longer...no thanks. I wasn't sure what to expect about taking a boat to another country. I've never done it before. The longest I've been on a ferry ride was when I was 11 and went on a class trip to Vancouver Island to the city of Victoria....I think that was two hours. I remember it being the funnest thing ever, they had food, arcades, you could basically run around inside and out, there were different levels...way cooler than a plane ride.

This ferry ride is not much different except for the running around part, I mean its possible, there are kids doing it, but I would look strange, plus I have no friends. Well, at first I thought that's what all the kids did, run around, but not quite. I noticed the last time and now the amount of kids on this thing was outrageous! I didn't think I would survive. As soon as I ate and found a row of three empty seats to occupy, I started reading my book and fell asleep. It wasn't long before I heard the faint laughter of children...I could hear but it sounded muffled...awakened and staring at the ceiling, it seemed like the sounds were coming from the vent above me... I looked around and noticed all the empty seats and other adults fast asleep. Hmm, weird, I wonder where they put them all...and then I discovered at the front of the plane they have a mini kindergarten, with clowns and everything! smart....also they have two Wii stations downstairs in the center of the boat. also smart. so now its relatively peaceful.

These boats are huge....two levels and a car deck below. There is a two-level duty free shop with Prada sunglasses, clothes, alcohol, American chocolate and a whole level for perfume and makeup. Its all in US dollars and people are spending like crazy. I have to say, when I first was told to take the ferry over I had my reservations. A boat? with hundreds of people? I was skeptical about the conditions....but it turns out this is the preferred method of travel for most wealthy Argentines. Riding the ferry there and back were the only times I ever saw Louis and Chanel bags, gorgeous tans, iPhones, blackberry, iPods, Macbooks....even the children were beautiful. Of course, when I got off in Montevideo I never saw these people again, until I went to Punta del Este and I discovered their hiding spot, but thats a different story.

All in all, this is definitely way more relaxing than flying, even if the flight would have been only forty-five minutes...with two plane crashes in a month the odds are really high and water seems like a way better alternative than a twenty person baby plane....I'm leaving the nice blue water of the Atlantic behind and heading into the brown, murky, familiar waters of el Rio de Plata... Ciao!

Tourists Beware

Thankfully -knock on wood- I haven't been robbed...
Personally I hate tourists, even though I am one I try to blend in, which is easy because I'm Latina

BUT for those who aren't so lucky here are ways you may get robbed (as explained by my teachers, and friends that were robbed on more than one occasion, more than once a week)

1. People who you would normally assume to be suspicious probably won't wrong you- Watch out for small children, the disabled, the old, and the pregnant----they will most likely rob you, obviously not all but if they fall into the above category AND look slightly sketchy then YES

2. Don't be stupid and carry your camera in your front backpack pocket, or anything important in your backpack for that matter...while you're gazing at the beautiful tall buildings someone is unzipping your bag and taking your shit

3. If you see a $100 bill on the ground, it isn't your lucky day. While you're bending over to pick it up, someone is coming up from behind to snatch your purse/wallet and knocking you over....oh and taking the hundo...

4. If a parrot, pigeon, or any strange winged creature happens to land on your shoulder, you are not the bird whisperer. Right when you swing your arms up to shoo it away, you'll feel your purse pulled off your shoulder and by the time the feathers have cleared...you've been robbed

5. You're in a taxi, its a hundred degrees, got the windows down, smoking a cigarette, enjoying the only breeze of the day. Cab comes to a stop at a red light, guy drives by on a motorcycle reaches in the window and jacks your new suede handbag....sweet.

6. Aaah the subway...you get on, find a seat (for once), put your ipod on and just as the doors are about to close, some little fucker jumps on, grabs your shit and runs off just as the doors close and the subway takes off into the tunnel. WTF!?

As shitty as it may ruin your day, or your life, for the most part it's never violent. They take your shit and it some how ends up your own fault. Stupid gringo.

Sometimes though,

7. You go to the ATM, take out money, and then decide to wait outside of the bank 'cause its too damn hot inside, while your friend is taking money out. From nowhere a group of drunk teenagers approach you and say that they're gonna kill you if you don't give them all your money...just as you stagger back, your friend aka now you're new Argentine boyfriend/knight in shining armor runs out of the bank and saves the day...scaring the little shits off
-well let's just hope you're with an Argentine lover, this was obviously only one true story

or you may laugh about it later....or not

8. You're walking down the street, minding your business, when all of a sudden someone chucks dog shit at your face. You freak the fuck out, start screaming not knowing if you should wipe it off 'cause you don't want to touch it, so you're just blinding wandering, flailing, horrified....could it get any worse....YES...whoever just threw the shit at you, is now robbing you. HA!!!


SO what did we learn? Basically never bring your wallet, have a photocopy of your ID/passport, only bring as much cash as you need that day/hour whatever, and get a 'decoy' purse: a shitty purse you bought on the street so when/ if you do get robbed it's no big deal 'cause its a shitty purse with nothing in it.

BA Orientation

So Monday morning we have our first day of school...
The new kids are put into classes and each class has about 2-6 people in it. My group had 3 all together, which was nice 'cause we got more attention. One guy was retired, from Quebec, Canada, and has been travelling for a while, then the other girl just graduated from UCSB with a masters and is from NorCal...way up there though, near Humboldt. Her boyfriend, who was in the class next door, and her dropped everything in the States and are travelling all South America for six months and planned on making BA a permanent home after they travel.
Classes are four hours, where we ONLY speak spanish, talk about ourselves/lives, do grammar out of the textbooks, and watch a cheesy Mexican soap opera and discuss everything they say. We get a break after two hours, and they rotate teachers everyday so that we don't get used to one persons accent or method of teaching.
After the first class we went to orientation, which I assumed would be about the school, the language, and meeting everyone.
It turned out to be an orientation on surviving BA....
First order of business: You will get robbed
Second: You will get ripped off
Third: You cannot wash your own clothes at the laundromat and they will mix them with other peoples
Fourth: Don't plan on eating dinner till 10pm or after and don't plan on going out till 1 am or after
Fifth: No one curbs there dogs so watch your step
Sixth: Pedestrians DO NOT have the right of way

YAY BA!

Dead on Arrival - ??

domingo 11 de enero 2009
21:06 GST

Still muggy from the Ambien...I didn't sleep long enough for it wear off completely....I made it swiftly through customs. Upon exiting I tried to soberly recall what my Buenos Aires guidebook instructed me to do...and did the opposite (damn ambien). Instead of going to the Bank right outside of the exit I went to a currency exchange booth inside where they ripped me off and gave me got a lousy rate (I found out later they exchanged my money at $2.9 to the dollar when in actuality its $3.4!!) Secondly, my guide says to take a taxi oficiale as they are safe and cheap...but I head to a booth that says "taxi" on it, and of course it turns out to be a towncar which I also overpaid. argh.


My apartment is in a barrio aka neighborhood called Once (own-say..the # 11 in spanish), which is pretty close to downtown. Cool building, marble hallways, antique elevator..Settled in my room and was given a nice glass of ice tea and honey then passed out.
Around 5 pm the women I was staying with, Mirka, and I walked around the neighborhood, hopped on the B train and headed to the last stop N.Alem where I'll be getting off for school the next morning. Walked up Av.Eduardo Madero along the Port and ended up at my school's building. On our walk back we went along Av.Cordoba to the Galerias Mall and then all along Calle Florida (which is way too crazy, like Canal street in NY...a bunch of tourists trying to score cheap shit that is way overpriced and then getting their thousand dollar cameras stolen out of their backpacks)...we walked until the lady got too tired and jumped on the train back to Once, I decided to keep walking around, jumped into a shop and bought flip flops for like 8 bucks cause the shoes I was wearing had already ripped my skin off making every step insanely unbearable.

Kept walking until I reached this triangle of streets where they were filming some sort of movie and using leaf blowers to send a million little paper hearts in the air...Walked up to the famous Obelisco, jumped on the train there, headed home, got lost when I got out of the subway, found home...ate yummy pasta....passed out early.

Journey to BA -the Missing Pen

I guess I didn't realize that this blogging thing would take much discipline, I have bad blogging manners. Today is a chill day, it's finally cooled down to 27 degrees celsius ummm 81 farenheit...which is pretty amazing so I'm taking advantage of writing in the outdoor terrace of my hostel. Okay, let's begin:

Saturday Jan. 10th

Woke up at 9 am (!!!) and checked on my flight, secretly hoping it was canceled and wouldn't have to start getting ready right away, I couldn't handle the fact that I was leaving. Procrastinated getting ready, wrote Thank you and miss you notes then went upstairs to have the most delicious homemade crepes with Alex and Jules courtesy of Farida (Jules' mama aka best cook in the world). After Tony P. mistakened Peters briefs for my underwear (seeing as they were relatively tiny, could've happened to anyone) and listening to the extremely playful bickering amongst the fam I started to already get a little homesick for the Warren house. I start to wish (no offense mom) that twenty-three years ago I could have been born half-Egyptian half-Polish so I'd be no-doubtably part of this family.
I am driven to the airport by Tony, accompanied by Jules and Evan...gave goodbye hugs...got into my seat on the plane and immediately passed out...an hour later I was in DC. Seeing as I had a layover for almost 8 hours, I had arranged to meet my cousin Alfonso downtown for dinner. After taking a shuttle to the main airport, a shuttle to the subway station, took the Orange line to the Red line to Chinatown (jeez!) & we met up for food at Chop't...after catching up on the holidays/our lives (we hadn't seen each other in a year), I took the long ride back to the airport and got to my gate just as we were boarding. I luckily had "economy plus," and two empty seats next to me!! Part of the eleven hour flight was recorded deliriously around 4 in the morning on my computer which I will now transfer to here ---can you swear in blogs?? ----



United Flight 847

AHHHHH
We still have 5 hours and twenty minutes.....okay...after three hours I was like, I can do this, its easy! I have all this room, all these movies...I ate dinner...and now, after my second movie...ummm...the whole plane is happily in dreamland and we haven't even reached the top of Brazil!! This is intense, and I lost my fucking pen somewhere between here (Venezuela) and the Dominican Republic and I really wanted to write and I just went on a mission under the seats and under the feet of the people fast asleep in front and behind of me trying to see where it went!! I even considered stealing one from one of the passengers dormido...Its disappeared, plus its not even mine, I borrowed it from the flight attendant when I first got on and she handed it to me with this stern look on her face, "I better get this back..." And She just walked up and down the aisle with a flashlight to check on our "seatbelts" or maybe trying to find me to get the pen back, but I quickly assumed the position of throwing my head back against the window and playing dead, or asleep....but on the plus side I just found the Ambien in my bag after looking for the mysterious pen.....but on the down side, the lady who walked by my seat while I was in the middle of the movie probably every ten minutes with a pitcher of water asking if I was thirsty and consistently waved away, hasn't shown up during this whole investigation and I'm guessing shes not coming back anytime soon cause the pilot just told everyone to put their seatbelts on and so she has to sit in the back, and I don't want to walk back there and find the other flight attendant (owner of the short black pen now rolling down the aisle somewhere)...but I can't go to the middle cabin to those flight attendants because they attend a "different class," and we have been asked not to cross the curtain.....ahhh....still in Venezuela, still 5 hours and nine minutes!!!!!!!!
And I can't even swallow this pill alone because the air is fucking dry on the plane that my mouth is now a massive cotton ball.
I might be going delirious, I just did a little dance in my seat during the chorus of the Regina Spektor song "that time," would be embarrassing but everyone else is alseep....I could probably stand up and dance along the aisles and no one would notice, not even the flight attendants cause they're hidden in the back...only I would be caught once the minor turbulence gets worse and knocks me over.....I'm hungry,,,,I might eat my magazine....I've seen people do that before, eat paper...can't be bad..right? damn this computer light is starting to give me a headache, its the brightest star ever in this dark plane haha what??....Distance traveled: 2626 miles........Apres Moi le deluge....but I have to sleep or I'll ruin my sleep pattern for the week basically..........aaahhh WHERE IS WATER LADY!!? What are the chances of me pressing the attendant light and pen lady coming back here?? I wish there was like a phone, and i could page WATER LADY PLEASE COME TO 24K....damn i wish i brought that salad on the plane from earlier....mmmm apples, goat cheese, raisins, turkey, and spinach greens.....mmmmmmm..i hope this Mirka lady eats goat cheese...but she is a vegetarian and I'm guessing they love goats....i actually don't even care for the cheese, only on my salads....this is ridiculous...WATER I'm dying here!!! Fuck everyone and fuck their eyemasks......AHHH YES!!! They turned the seatbelt sign off....now i just have to wait, its like timed or something, she should be coming with that water annnnnyyy minute now......okay I have a clear view of pen lady....shes hanging out, i'm making a run for it....be back

okay...got a massive cup of water, I hope I don't pass out and end up pissing my pants....that would just be the worst thing...I think I've been caught, as I walked away with my water I could've sworn I overheard Water Lady whisper to Pen Lady, "you should just ask for it back.." well too bad cause I just took my Ambien and will hopefully be unavailable for the remainder of the flight.....

Andrea signing off...somewhere at the northern tip of Brazil.


Okay so 5173 miles have been traveled and we are now fifteen minutes to our destination....I'm bleary.....freezing...poofy,,,,but i slept the whole way after a brief hallucination* earlier, but we can talk about that another time....talk to you on the ground!!


*I'm kind of pissed because I have no recollection of that hallucination and am dying to know what it was!!!

From the Beginning

Before I had this blog thing set up I was keeping a handwritten account of my trip from day 1. So just to get everything covered from the start I'm going to transcribe a summary of what was written starting from:

Friday January 2nd 2009
Somewhere over the midwest 4:14PST 7:14 PST
SFO-JFK United Flight #870

As the hours accelerate in my slow descent to NYC, I am starting the new year off with a nice little adventure. I couldn't have asked for anything better than to spend my first week of 2009 in NY with some of my darling friends : )
I'm completely blind to what is in store for me over these next few weeks/months/years. Unlike some, nothing excites me more than change and running into the unexpected. Do I have any plans for this week in Manhattan?? Nope, not one. Well, actually one: get to Julians apartment from the airport. Usually, I stress myself with lists of people I need to see and places I have to stop by...but I only have one week and it's not like won't be back soon. I just hope for good food, nice weather, and a dancefloor.
~exit

TriBeCa
80 Warren Street (chez Potulicki) 10:30pm EST

Setting up my temporary living quarters with Tony on the second floor. Andre just dropped me off from the airport and I'm already getting incessant texts from Julian to run across the street to Niccolo's apartment. I'm meeting up with them and Carly for drinks...

...1st-->Bubble Lounge: same as the one in SF but I feel like its waaay pricier here.
..2nd-->1 Oak: club/lounge on the west side. Amazing artwork inside, superb ambient lighting haha. Danced for three hours straight minus one potty break...the music was too good to be true. Definitely the best night out I'd had in months...stopped at the delicious Morgans Deli at around 4am then bedtime...

1/3/09
After waking up around 3pm, Carly and I jumped on the 2 train bound for BK to meet her good friend Ben for Champagne and bread (our breakfast)...
Stopped by Gretchen's new apartment in SoHo before leaving for dinner with her bf and two friends at Gemma's Italian restaurant in Bowery Hotel on the East Side...after, walked across the street to Antique for drinks where we were met by Jenna (yay!), Carly, Jules, Peter, Alex, Andre, Niccolo...etc...Home by 5am.

1/4/09
Brunch with Gretchen (reminder: try Shorty's for brunch between 11-3pm), met Matt in Union Square, jumped on the train heading to BK- Prospect Heights, making yesterday and today the most amount of times I'd ever been in Brooklyn...including when I was living here last year.....later went back to the island and met my cousin Alex for Italian food up by 33rd and 3rd. On the train over there Matt and me came across a lost white pigeon who was chillin under the seat in front of us and probably since we didn't get cell service underground, assumed that he/she didn't get navigation abilities underground either and was lost (right?)....went to my new favorite hideaway Smith & Mills for desert and drinks with Matt, followed by a messy night at Sway with Jules and Eric (Matt got us free drinks for the night-he works there). In bed early by 3!!

1/5/ 09

Introduced Jenna to Smith & Mills, accompanied by Jules and Eric...all + Nicc headed to BK -Clinton Hill to chill at Erics and see his new artwork (amazing)..

1/6/09
Nice day with the fam...breakfast with Tony and Jules at Gee Whiz, and then dinner at the house with everyone i.e. the lost boys, and Farida and Tony. Had tea and a two hour chat with Allison in the West Village where we kept getting distracted by the guy next to us who refused his extra chair to everyone 'cause he was "waiting for someone," while he danced in his chair completely decked out in a red Adidas jumpsuit...met up with Matt at Corner Bistro (cheap drinks, yummy greasy food) before heading to Rose Bar at the Gramercy Park Hotel...more free drinks and tons of oogling at original pieces by Andy Warhol, Basquiat, and Keith Harring all over the walls. Later to Happy Endings in the LES. Home by 6am...

1/7/09
Hung out at Gretchens place, who was sick and working from home, lucky for me 'cause I got to watch her work on the designs for the MDLR accessories line. I especially loved the "Gretchen" and the "Sabrina," bags...she introduced me to Mad Men...later met my roommate, in town from SF, for drinks with Jules and Eric...drove in an actual car (VW cabriolet to be exact) with the top down in the rain...then a boring night at Sway...home early.

1/8/09
BFast at Le Pain Quotidien on Jules' corner..totally overrated (Yogurt and oatmeal $10??? WTF) Walked around Lower Manhattan ALL day...ended up at One Little West 12th street, super nice lounge, good music, danced with Jenna, Jules and Eric....free drinks and one too many dirty martinis later ended up in the LES at a bar where I vaguely remember an arguement between Jules, Eric, and me about the color of my infamous "blue suede shoes," I thought they were Cerulean, Eric thought, they were___(I can't remember) and Jules said Cobalt. Iphone to the rescue!! With the help of google images and a color match: Cobalt..point for Jules.

1/9/09
First headache of the week!! TGIF I only have one more day of exuberance. Prepared for my big trip, took care of a bunch of errands...ran around the city to the places I least like to visit i.e. Canal street and Times Square to try and exchange my money to pesos...Apparently no one carries pesos cause its worth nothing..JK...but really...frustrated and in a sea of a million tourists from the midwest, Gretchen was just getting off work a couple of blocks away at the de La Renta offices (thats Oscar DLR btw) and took off to her place...met Jenna for a pedicure in SoHo...found out my flight to BA was canceled the next day aahh!!!! drama ensues back on the west coast at casa de Rosales-Wyman, where my parents repeatedly called me from assuming I wouldn't "take care of it," but I did! I switched my flight to the day after, what's one more day in NY?? BUT of course a storm was coming and if I didn't leave earlier, I wasn't gonna get out at all....soo changed it to an earlier time, but in no way did it deter me from going out. Allison and I met G at 1 Oak, which was dead save for some underwear clad bottle servers who were the attention of the only two guys in there and were most likely from Jersey. After about an hour the place is packed and we are on top of the booth dancing...Allison slept over and went to bed...4ish..

BYE NY

The Basics

So I finished the last semester of my Undergrad studies in December of 2008 and the What Next? part of my life is currently "under construction." I only have the month ahead of me planned and I'm taking it in strides. Expect to hear me say "I don't know," to almost any question pertaining to my future as it is my new favorite sentence. Since I'm on a roll with the usage of quotation marks today let's throw in a "Please be patient," as Caltrans would say to most Marinites who expected Hwy.101 to be done a month ago (btw apparently you guys are gonna be waiting until April).

Anyways, I started 2009 running off to one of my favorite cities: NYC. After a week of relentless debauchery on my part (I mean c'mon...not since I was in diapers have I been able to run around with no intention of doing anything but keep myself entertained), I flew my butt to the southern hemisphere on this side of the ocean and landed in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Being slightly lethargic thanks to this oppressive humidity, sitting and writing more than two emails a day was a little more than I could handle. SOOO with this blog I can bring everybody whom I hold close (or close enough) to my dear heart together for story time.

Well, I hope this isn't boring, possibly funny at times, and keeps somewhat of your interest...

Hasta Manana!