Fortunately my life has gotten a little more interesting recently, so I actually have at least a few things to write about. Tuesday was uneventful (they tend to be with class from 10am-9pm), so other than class I don't think there was really anything noteworthy. On Wednesday, after our normal morning errands (paying rent, going to the gym, making lunch, stopping at the grocery store) Lauren and I went to a cafe near UBA to kill time before class. At the cafe, she went to use the bathroom, only to find that there were two unmarked bathrooms. After walking into the first one and seeing a row of urinals, she decided she was in the wrong one, and headed into what was evidently the girls bathroom. All of the lights were off, but when she walked in and turned them on, she discovered that there was a man sitting in one of the stalls, minus his pants, laughing maniacally in the dark with the stall door open. Needless to say, she got out of there as fast as she could, only to discover when he came out of the bathroom that he had another table very close to ours, in the deserted second floor of the restaurant. At that point we ate and got the check as quickly as we could and escaped minus the perverted bathroom laugher.
After that unusual experience, I headed to class for an hour, and ducked out early for our presentation from Habitat for Humanity- Argentina. Pretty much our entire group decided to volunteer, and we're still waiting on our placement, but I think that it'll be a good experience. After the presentation, we had history class as usual and then went out for burritos. I met up with Lauren and the DiTella girls afterwards, and we all went to the movies to see 17 Again, which was entertaining even though it wasn't the greatest movie I've ever seen. Lauren and I went to the gym after we got home, watched some TV and did our homework, and went to bed.
Thursday was a repeat of Tuesday- I should really stop including them in here. Nothing ever happens on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Friday was a productive day, thankfully- gym, grocery shopping, homework, class, party planning, and laundry. That night, about 15 of us went to a restaurant near our house for Ben's 21st birthday dinner. The food was not as good as we had hoped but the birthday boy had a good time at the very least. After dinner, we all came back to my apartment building, where Joe, Lauren, and I had rented the salon (an empty floor in our building designed for parties and such) and started the party. We had cake and ice cream, of course, and a ton of people showed up. Overall the party was a lot of fun and I think everyone there had a great time.
We kicked everyone out at about 3am (the latest you can reserve the room until) and Lauren and I cleaned up the mess that was left since Joe had mysteriously disappeared. We found out when we got back to our apartment that he had left the party in the middle, come upstairs, and passed out on his bed, fully clothed and with all the lights on. It seems to be a habit of his.
On Saturday, Lis and I waited all day to hear from Amanda, who supposedly got into town on Thursday and had yet to call us/respond to our frantic facebook messages asking if she was alive. I spent most of the day doing homework and killing time, until finally Lis called to let me know that she had heard from Amanda and that we were all meeting at Lis's house at 7. After rushing around to get ready (it was almost 6:30 by this point) I made it to Lis's at 7. We sent everyone on ahead to a restaurant for drinks and told them we would catch up with them when Amanda arrived. After an hour and a half of waiting, Amanda finally showed up with all of her friends from Chile, who were really nice. We took them out to a Mexican restaurant nearby (apparently they can't get their hands on Mexican food in Chile) and had dinner, but Joe and I both started feeling sick towards the end and had to duck out early to run home. We told Amanda to call us the next day to hang out as well as next weekend, when her group would be back in town for their return trip to Chile.
On Sunday, I waited around all day to hear from her, and did homework for a while. Stayed in that night with Joe, who had gotten some bad news about one of his cousins and needed the company.
Monday, Joe, Lauren and I were still all feeling sick, so we stayed in for most of the day and watched tv/did homework. Lauren and I made one excursion to go pick up her concert tickets and change my flight home to two weeks earlier- neither of which was successful. That night I worked on my creative project for my class with the awful professor and went to bed.
The only relevant thing that happened on Tuesday was that I skipped out on my last class an hour early. After listening to my professor explain to us what an introductory paragraph, thesis statement, and conclusion were for two hours, I figured my time would be better spent studying for my three exams in the next two days. Spent the remainder of the night studying, which I think ended up being a good call on my part.
Wednesday was final exam part one for my UBA class, which wasn't too bad. History class was the same as always, except that a few of the BC kids had friends from home visiting. Adrian's friend basically monopolized the entire class discussion, which was a little weird considering that he obviously didn't do the reading or know anything about the topic. Wednesday night was spent doing another project for my dreaded Cuentos class.
Thursday involved turning in a project in my first class, taking the second half of my final in my second class (the speaking portion- normally I bomb the speaking parts, but I got a perfect score!) and taking a midterm in my third class. Basically I was just excited to have survived that day.
Friday, I headed out to UBA for my last class and to get my grades (an A- too bad I don't get credit for it and took it pass/fail). I then walked the 25ish blocks to the post office to pick up the package that my mom mailed me almost two months ago. I'm almost afraid to open it, because there's food in there that definitely would not keep for two months. Once I got there, they told me that my passport number and multiple forms of photo ID were not good enough and that I would have to come back with my actual passport to get my package. Needless to say, I was less than thrilled. Came home and got sushi with Lauren and Joe for dinner, which I hadn't tried in years but really liked. Will definitely be ordering it again. We also rented a movie, and Lauren and I stayed in and watched it while Joe went to a party for a friend of his.
That morning, Joe got home at 645 and proceeded to turn his music up all the way, turn the tv up all the way, slammed every door in the house multiple times, slammed dishes around in the sink, and ignored us when we yelled at him to please be a little quieter. Since it was fairly obvious that he was drunk and angry, we decided to stay in bed and just wait it out instead of confronting him. After 45 minutes of angry slamming and full volume confusion, he finally went to bed and we managed to go back to sleep.
When we got up a few hours later, we discovered that he had left the freezer open all night, and that there was a flood of water all over our kitchen floor and all of our food had defrosted. We cleaned it up and resisted the urge to blast our music and wake him up, and went to the gym instead to remove the temptation. That day, he didn't say a word to us, and we obviously were annoyed enough to not want to speak to him either. Lauren and I went to the grocery store, printed some school stuff out at a locutorio, and basically avoided the issue for a while since we were still so angry and didn't know what we did to provoke him.
I did homework for a while, and that night Lauren and I went over to Memo's to meet up with everyone to watch the Lakers-Nuggets game and hang out. Joe ended up showing up, and made Lauren and I leave the party to discuss what had happened. Timing could have been better, since we missed the majority of the game and the party, but whatever. We all had a screaming match and got everything out in the open, and finally resolved things for the most part, although I'm still annoyed. After we finally got that dramatic mess straightened out, we were able to go back to the party, which was basically ending by that point. We all headed out to a bar to hang out for a while and headed home around three.
Today is designated homework/blogging/Skype dates to figure out travel plans day. Beanie and Elizabeth are each coming to see me, which is really exciting :)
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Monday, May 11, 2009
Attempt number two to post this entry- if it gets deleted again, I'm giving up.
I don't remember anything at all about Tuesday the 28th, other than that I know I went to classes and studied a ton. Wednesday was my first real midterm, in my BC Argentine history course. Basically studied all day for that, took the exam and am pretty sure that I did at least okay. Afterwards, my BC crew all scattered to our respective houses for dinner, and then Lauren, Joe and I met up with the DiTella kids at TGIFridays for drinks/appetizers/deserts. Although we had a few food fiascos (the fruit drinks all tasted like the wrong fruits; Argentines apparently consider barbecue sauce to be the same thing as hot sauce; we still don't know WHAT kind of cheese they put on their potato skins, but we strongly suspect it's CheezeWhiz) we had a good time- it was a good way to de-stress after the exam. I headed home early to watch a movie for my class in the morning, and went to bed afterwards.
On Thursday, I woke up early and headed out to my 10am class as usual (which, keep in mind, involves a 5-10 minute walk to the subte, a 30-45 minute subte ride, and a 15-20 minute walk to school). When I got there, my class discovered that my teacher failed to show up AGAIN and couldn't be bothered to send us and email to let us know AGAIN. Mind you, this is the crazy psychotic one who takes five points off our final grade every time we're late, ten points off for every unexcused abscence, and emails us almost every day to yell at us for one thing or another. (Side note: we thought it was a half a point per tardy and one point per absence- unfortunately, she meant on a ten-point scale). Since I then had four hours until my next class (too much time to hang out and do nothing, but not enough time to go home and back) I went to the computer lab and caught up on emails/tax forms/homework downloads for several hours. I hate how dependent my life is on an internet connection.
After classes were over, my entire BC crew went to a birthday party for one of John and Mickey's roommates. It was a lot of fun- the party was on the roof/balcony of this house in the middle of the city and it was packed with about a million people. There were quite a few people who were way too drunk for their own good, but it was really entertaining and we all made it home without any serious injuries. Some slight drama towards the end, as there tends to be with our group, but nothing too bad.
Friday was a feriado (Argentina's equivalent of Labor Day, as far as I can tell) so my class was canceled and I got to sleep late. I spent most of the day working on homework/procrastinating, and then went out to dinner that night with Joe and Lauren. We went to a restaurant called Il Gatto, which had amazing pictures of their food on their website but didn't live up to them in actuality. Overall the food was good but not amazing like we had hoped. After dinner we went to the movies and met up with the DiTella kids to go see "Tierra" (aka "Earth") which was really cool. I spent most of the movie wondering how they managed to film it, and hoping that the small animals they showed on screen wouldn't be eaten on camera.
Saturday was spent writing my midterm paper for my Premios Nobel class (which is the most boring out of all my classes, but surprisingly not my least favorite). I stayed in instead of going out with everyone and got to talk to Joshua for a few hours and catch up on all my TV shows, which was really nice. Sunday was laundry, homework, groceries, and studying, and Monday was just studying until my head felt like it was going to explode. Lauren and I broke our diet rule and went to Modena for ice cream, which was probably the best decision I made all weekend. It helped me hang on to my sanity for a few more hours, at any rate.
Tuesday was supposed to be my appointment for my student visa, which I had to move to Wednesday after my professor told my that she would fail me if I failed to show up for my midterm, even though the appointments are randomly assigned by the government and are not supposed to be changed under any circumstances. Her reply to my email was rude and completely unprofessional...I wonder if I could get her in trouble for that? At any rate, after battling with UCA and the visa department for days, I was able to get it switched, thanks to the awesome study abroad advisor Francisco.
That meant that I got to go take my final on Tuesday, which meant I woke up arounf 530 to study beforehand. Luckily the final didn't end up being as hard as I thought it would be, but was wayyy too long for the amount of time she gave us. You could feel the hate in the room after she handed out the tests- I kept looking up during class and seeing people glaring murderously at her, which was very amusing. I went to the rest of my classes and then went home, bringing Robin and Ben G with me to Joe's Cinco de Mayo party at our house. Joe made Mexican food for himself, Robin, Ben G, Steve, and Lis, and after they ate the DiTella girls came over for prebol and everyone (except me, and Ben G and Lis, who went home) went out to a boliche to celebrate. By the time everyone left to go out, it was after 230 in the morning, which was not the happiest realization, since I still had to shower, go to bed, and be awake by 5. Needless to say, I got no sleep, especially because I woke up to talk to Lauren when she got home around 4. Ooops.
Wednesday was visa day, so Joe and I got up superearly (correction: I got up superearly, and dragged Joe's butt out of bed five minutes before we had to leave) and went to the visa place for 730. Luckily, we were done with everything by nine, which was awesome because most of the other kids had to stay for seven or eight hours. We went home and I got to take a quick nap before having lunch and heading out to class. Unfortunately, we had a bus tour instead of our 4pm history class, which was unbelievably boring and went an hour over class time. We all also were trying to nap on the bus had it not been for the incessant chattering of a certain person.
Thursday was another miserably long day of class, and a sad day for me because Lauren left for Peru for four days. Clearly not okay. On Friday, I had to wake up early to go to a mandatory make-up class for the class that my professor didn't show up for. Why WE had to make up a class that SHE missed, I'll never know. I'll add it to the list of reasons why I hate her. That night, Joe, Lis, Robin, Anne, and I went over to Joanna's apartment, and she made AWESOME Mexcian enchiladas for us and Adrian and Mickey. We all hung out there for a while, which was fun, and then I headed out early to meet up with my UBA friends at Sugar, a bar near my house. We were there until 3 or 4 in the morning, and had an awesome time. This was our first time hanging out outside of class, and we decided to definitely do it more often. One of the perks of hanging out with them is that it forces me to use my Spanish. Since we're all from different countries, Spanish is really the only common language we all have, which is kind of cool. Apparently mine has improved more than I thought, because I had a number of people tell me that I spoke really well. I made friends with a drunk guy from Indiana, who picks up a British accent when he drinks, and I met a couple girls from England, a few from the States, and a couple of German guys. Altogether a good experience- plus, my friend Jordana introduced me to the owners of the bar, and if they remember me next time I won't have to pay the entrance fee.
On Saturday, I did some homework and finally joined the gym. I went with the girls and Joe for a little bit, and then met up with Lis and Robin later that day to go to the Museo de Bellas Artes. It was smaller than I expected, but they had some really cool pieces. They also had some that made me question their taste in art (a piece of brown canvas with a slash in it? Really?) but it was cool to wander around and see everything. We went out to Hard Rock Cafe after the museum and then went back to their place to watch movies and have a much needed (for me, anyways) girls night.
Sunday and Monday (today!!) are dedicated to homework and organizing the disaster area that is my room right now. I also got to talk to Beanie yesterday and get some dates nailed down for when she comes to visit me, which was exciting. Supposedly I also have a skype date with the Vaillancourts tonight, which makes me really happy- I can't wait to talk them and hear all their crazy stories.
Also, another round of postcards went out a few days ago, so if you've requested one and haven't gotten it yet, keep an eye out!
On Thursday, I woke up early and headed out to my 10am class as usual (which, keep in mind, involves a 5-10 minute walk to the subte, a 30-45 minute subte ride, and a 15-20 minute walk to school). When I got there, my class discovered that my teacher failed to show up AGAIN and couldn't be bothered to send us and email to let us know AGAIN. Mind you, this is the crazy psychotic one who takes five points off our final grade every time we're late, ten points off for every unexcused abscence, and emails us almost every day to yell at us for one thing or another. (Side note: we thought it was a half a point per tardy and one point per absence- unfortunately, she meant on a ten-point scale). Since I then had four hours until my next class (too much time to hang out and do nothing, but not enough time to go home and back) I went to the computer lab and caught up on emails/tax forms/homework downloads for several hours. I hate how dependent my life is on an internet connection.
After classes were over, my entire BC crew went to a birthday party for one of John and Mickey's roommates. It was a lot of fun- the party was on the roof/balcony of this house in the middle of the city and it was packed with about a million people. There were quite a few people who were way too drunk for their own good, but it was really entertaining and we all made it home without any serious injuries. Some slight drama towards the end, as there tends to be with our group, but nothing too bad.
Friday was a feriado (Argentina's equivalent of Labor Day, as far as I can tell) so my class was canceled and I got to sleep late. I spent most of the day working on homework/procrastinating, and then went out to dinner that night with Joe and Lauren. We went to a restaurant called Il Gatto, which had amazing pictures of their food on their website but didn't live up to them in actuality. Overall the food was good but not amazing like we had hoped. After dinner we went to the movies and met up with the DiTella kids to go see "Tierra" (aka "Earth") which was really cool. I spent most of the movie wondering how they managed to film it, and hoping that the small animals they showed on screen wouldn't be eaten on camera.
Saturday was spent writing my midterm paper for my Premios Nobel class (which is the most boring out of all my classes, but surprisingly not my least favorite). I stayed in instead of going out with everyone and got to talk to Joshua for a few hours and catch up on all my TV shows, which was really nice. Sunday was laundry, homework, groceries, and studying, and Monday was just studying until my head felt like it was going to explode. Lauren and I broke our diet rule and went to Modena for ice cream, which was probably the best decision I made all weekend. It helped me hang on to my sanity for a few more hours, at any rate.
Tuesday was supposed to be my appointment for my student visa, which I had to move to Wednesday after my professor told my that she would fail me if I failed to show up for my midterm, even though the appointments are randomly assigned by the government and are not supposed to be changed under any circumstances. Her reply to my email was rude and completely unprofessional...I wonder if I could get her in trouble for that? At any rate, after battling with UCA and the visa department for days, I was able to get it switched, thanks to the awesome study abroad advisor Francisco.
That meant that I got to go take my final on Tuesday, which meant I woke up arounf 530 to study beforehand. Luckily the final didn't end up being as hard as I thought it would be, but was wayyy too long for the amount of time she gave us. You could feel the hate in the room after she handed out the tests- I kept looking up during class and seeing people glaring murderously at her, which was very amusing. I went to the rest of my classes and then went home, bringing Robin and Ben G with me to Joe's Cinco de Mayo party at our house. Joe made Mexican food for himself, Robin, Ben G, Steve, and Lis, and after they ate the DiTella girls came over for prebol and everyone (except me, and Ben G and Lis, who went home) went out to a boliche to celebrate. By the time everyone left to go out, it was after 230 in the morning, which was not the happiest realization, since I still had to shower, go to bed, and be awake by 5. Needless to say, I got no sleep, especially because I woke up to talk to Lauren when she got home around 4. Ooops.
Wednesday was visa day, so Joe and I got up superearly (correction: I got up superearly, and dragged Joe's butt out of bed five minutes before we had to leave) and went to the visa place for 730. Luckily, we were done with everything by nine, which was awesome because most of the other kids had to stay for seven or eight hours. We went home and I got to take a quick nap before having lunch and heading out to class. Unfortunately, we had a bus tour instead of our 4pm history class, which was unbelievably boring and went an hour over class time. We all also were trying to nap on the bus had it not been for the incessant chattering of a certain person.
Thursday was another miserably long day of class, and a sad day for me because Lauren left for Peru for four days. Clearly not okay. On Friday, I had to wake up early to go to a mandatory make-up class for the class that my professor didn't show up for. Why WE had to make up a class that SHE missed, I'll never know. I'll add it to the list of reasons why I hate her. That night, Joe, Lis, Robin, Anne, and I went over to Joanna's apartment, and she made AWESOME Mexcian enchiladas for us and Adrian and Mickey. We all hung out there for a while, which was fun, and then I headed out early to meet up with my UBA friends at Sugar, a bar near my house. We were there until 3 or 4 in the morning, and had an awesome time. This was our first time hanging out outside of class, and we decided to definitely do it more often. One of the perks of hanging out with them is that it forces me to use my Spanish. Since we're all from different countries, Spanish is really the only common language we all have, which is kind of cool. Apparently mine has improved more than I thought, because I had a number of people tell me that I spoke really well. I made friends with a drunk guy from Indiana, who picks up a British accent when he drinks, and I met a couple girls from England, a few from the States, and a couple of German guys. Altogether a good experience- plus, my friend Jordana introduced me to the owners of the bar, and if they remember me next time I won't have to pay the entrance fee.
On Saturday, I did some homework and finally joined the gym. I went with the girls and Joe for a little bit, and then met up with Lis and Robin later that day to go to the Museo de Bellas Artes. It was smaller than I expected, but they had some really cool pieces. They also had some that made me question their taste in art (a piece of brown canvas with a slash in it? Really?) but it was cool to wander around and see everything. We went out to Hard Rock Cafe after the museum and then went back to their place to watch movies and have a much needed (for me, anyways) girls night.
Sunday and Monday (today!!) are dedicated to homework and organizing the disaster area that is my room right now. I also got to talk to Beanie yesterday and get some dates nailed down for when she comes to visit me, which was exciting. Supposedly I also have a skype date with the Vaillancourts tonight, which makes me really happy- I can't wait to talk them and hear all their crazy stories.
Also, another round of postcards went out a few days ago, so if you've requested one and haven't gotten it yet, keep an eye out!
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