Even though I've only been here for a few days, it feels like I've lived here for months. I'm settling into my room and unpacking bit by bit- we haven't had much downtime so far so the process is taking a while.

Day 2 started off with our first meeting with our program coordinator, Silvana, who is amazing. She treated the ten of us (me, Joe, Stephen, Ben, Lauren, Lis, Alessandra, Robin, Ann, and Emily- everyone on the program) to lunch at a local restaurant and then took us around the city to teach us how to use the subte (aka the subway) and the colectivo (bus system). She also taught us how to get to and from each others' apartments and to and from school, which we had unintentionally figured out on the first day. We also went to get local cell phones, which was a maddeningly lengthy process. It took over two hours for seven of us to buy our phones (they didn't have ten in stock), when the process would have taken less than 15 minutes in the states. We've determined that inefficiency is one of the main downsides to living in Buenos Aires, but there are very few others.

After our whole group had wandered the city for a while, the boys and I headed home for our first real meal at our apartment- that is, if you don't count the tiny bowl of cornflakes that we each get for breakfast. Gladis, our maid, made us pizza, and I finally met the other two foreign exchange students who live here. Mariana is from Brazil and is taking classes at another university in Buenos Aires. She's really funny and sweet, and all of us had a lot of fun teaching each other our favorite phrases in different languages. Her favorites in English are "Ewww, that's gross!" and "Sweet!". Tom, who is from England, is thirty and is staying in Argentina to learn the language and learn about the culture, but as far as I can tell he's not enrolled in actual classes. Apparently he took a leave of absence from his job to travel and decided to come here among other places.
After dinner, the boys and I went back out into the city in search of an American bar to watch the Superbowl in. We met up with some other kids from the program and finally found a place that agreed to put the Superbowl on after the Boca vs. River futbol game was over. [For those who don't follow sports, like me, Boca vs. River is one of the most famous and intense rivalries in the sports world. Whenever a game is on, the entire city of Buenos Aires sits down to watch, and people will throw you out of a restaurant for even suggesting that you change the channel.] Fortunately, the game ended just as the fourth quarter was starting, so the bar owners were fine with changing the channel after that. Since no one here supports the Steelers or the Cardinals, we decided to root for the Cardinals rather arbitrarily and had the entire bar cheering for them within a few minutes as we frantically tried to explain the rules with lots of Spanglish and crazy gestures. A few Steelers fans came in towards the end and were heartily booed by everyone in the bar. After the game was over we called it a night and took a cab back home.

Monday, day 3, we all had to hike out to UCA (my university) far too early in the morning to take our placement tests for Spanish. We had a written test and an oral exam in a hot, stuffy room that took several hours, and then went out for lunch again. Afterwards, I went with the boys and explored the city for a few hours after class. We got ice cream and sat in one of the parks for a while analyzing the PDA of couples sitting around us, then went home for dinner. Went back to the apartment with the boys and had dinner (milanesa de pollo- basically breaded chicken) and hung out for a bit, then headed out with the entire crew to try to find a tango bar to watch the dancing. We ended up at a small Mexican restaurant after finding out the tango place we wanted to go to had shut down, hung out there for a while and headed home in the middle of an intense thunderstorm, which I loved.

Tuesday was our first day of class. The boys and I went out to breakfast beforehand and accidentally ordered enough food for ten people. The rule about portion sizes being smaller outside of the US is a myth, at least in Argentina. The class was long and mostly boring, but we met a few other kids from different exchange programs, and during class we went over some common menu items and what they translate to so we'll know what we're ordering when we go out. A bunch of us went exploring a different section of the city and found a really cool movie theater, so after we all went home for dinner, we went back out to see "Doubt", which was pretty good. Walked home with the guys and got some ice cream on the way- no mint chocolate chip, which is very upsetting to me, but in general their ice cream is EXCELLENT and way better than anything we have at home.

Today, we headed over to school early to eat breakfast/lunch and buy our books, then sat through a horribly long, hot, four-hour class where we went over grammar that we learned in our first year of Spanish. After class, Joe and I split off from the rest of the group and walked back to the apartment, checking out different stores and scouting out restaurants along the way. We came back here and met Patricia's daughter (who works as a tour guide in Argentina and offered to get us discount tickets to soccer matches, concerts, and basically anything else we want- she's awesome and really fun) and the newest member of the household, Tobias, who is from Switzerland and is here traveling around South America to improve his Spanish.

Tomorrow, we have a city tour starting at 930am followed by our regular class, which will make for a long (but hopefully more interesting) day.

Random extras thus far:
1. Everyone in Buenos Aires has a dog. I really think the dogs outnumber the people here, I love it. They take them everywhere with them, and you can't walk around the city without seeing at least a few dozen.
2. I named the stray dog outside my building Bandito. He doesn't respond to it yet, but I figure he'll catch on eventually.
3. Mariana told us about a petting zoo that she went to today where you can pet any animal you want- lions, tigers, and bears (oh my), monkeys, elephants, etc. She said you actually get to go into the pens with them to play with them and pet them. Added it to the list of things I must do while I'm here.
4. The malls and the movie theaters here are insane. They are beautiful, like if you converted the Newport Mansions into a food court. The insides look more like museums than malls, if you ignore the sales signs and whatnot.
5. If you order a salad here, there is no lettuce in it. None. It's generally carrots, celery, and onions, but most places don't even offer salads. There's also no side vegetables with dinner, or even lettuce and tomato on a cheeseburger. We can't figure out how Argentines stay so skinny when all they eat are carbs and protein.
6. The buildings that my university is now located in used to be grain warehouses before they were converted.

That's all for now, now that I'm finally caught up. More later, when I have something else to tell.