Chaska in South America

Yesterday marked 6 weeks in Buenos Aires for Matt and I. Time has gone by really quickly, but at the same time it feels like we’ve been here forever. Like I said last time, I truly feel like I’m living here now and have gotten into somewhat of a routine with work and life in general. At first the Argentinian Spanish was really difficult for me to understand, but I’m really feeling like I’m starting to understand it a lot better and am even starting to speak more like an Argentine. They honestly don’t understand me if I don’t pronounce my y’s like j’s, so I’ve had to conform!
Aside from yesterday being our 6 week mark here, it also happened to be my 26th birthday. As my friend Leeza pointed out to me, this is the third birthday I’ve spent out of the U.S.(I turned both 22 and 24 in Spain.) I had a really nice birthday yesterday. Although it was definitely one of the most random birthday celebrations I’ve had, it was a lot of fun and a great day. Just by chance, all my classes were cancelled yesterday, so I ended up having the whole day free. As I’ve told some of you, the shopping here in Argentina is awesome…the cutest clothes and shoes and at really great prices because of the exchange rate. Kristy or Nanette, if you read this, tell Maria Nodarse she was right about the shoes! Since I’ve been here I haven’t allowed myself to buy any clothes at all because I really need to save every penny for my future travelling and because I don’t have room to bring anything back anyway. Yesterday I let myself buy a few things, and it was great. Afterwards I went to dinner with a really random group of people…several of whom I met for the first time last night! It’s a long story, but there were 8 of us total and we had a really great time at an Italian restaraunt called El Arte del Mafia, which has an Italian Mafia theme. There were more Argentines than Americans, so we spoke Spanish the whole night…I’m so glad to finally be making Argentinian friends!
Aside from the friends from last night, Matt and I, very randomly again, met two really cool s last week–one American (from Burbank, CA) and one Canadian. We met up with them for the first time last Sunday and went out for a drink in San Telmo and then invited them over for dinner the next night. Matt made his “famous fajitas” (Madrid posse, I’m sure you remember these!) in our less than professional kitchen and we had a great time having our first dinner guests over. The s have both been travelling for the last couple months and left for Rio and Peru the day after our dinner party. The American, Maiko, will be back in Buenos Aires in a couple weeks and will stay through December. She’s really cool and we’re looking forward to meeting up with her when she returns.

Here are some photos. I hope you enjoy them!

Here’s the birthday dinner at El Arte del Mafia. The on my right is my friend Carina who is Argentian and teaches English for one of the schools I teach for. The guy across from me is Roy, one of my students. The across from Matt is an Argentinian English teacher who works with Matt (one of the people I just met last night!) The guy on the left side of the table at the end is Joseph. Joseph is from Kansas and teaches for the same school as Carina and I…the thing is, I didn’t meet him through the school. We met randomly met in the street last week! The next to him is his Argentinian fiance, and the guy across from him is one of his students (both new friends as of last night!)

This was an early birthday present on Wednesday. Matt surprised me with this delicious treat we learned about from the American and Canadian s we met last week. You all HAVE to try this. You cut up a strawberry and put it in between an oreo cookie. They’re called strawboreos and they’re amazing!!!

Here we are enjoying Matt’s famous fajitas. Maiko is the American and she’s the one in black. Kirsten is the Canadian and is sitting next to me.

Here’s Matt working his magic in our HUGE kitchen. The whole kitchen fits in a space that is smaller than my closet at home!

Tags: Travel

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