Russian Roller Coasters

I made it back to Buenos Aires! A slightly more painful 20 hour bus ride than the last one since no one was sitting next to me, but I had some good thinking time. I had my iPod on shuffle and I had a few nostalgic hours to myself, all of the songs reminding me of different people and different times in my life. It made me feel really ready to go home and give everyone I miss so much the biggest hug they've ever received.

Now I am living with my friend Valeria still in Palermo but in a different part. The top picture is of Valeria and me. It has been great living with her and getting to know her. She's a very sincere person and I can talk to her about almost anything. It's been weird being back in Buenos Aires and not seeing Carolina at the laundry mat I used to go to, not seeing the man with the spikey hair when I go to print something, and not buying alfajores at my regular kiosko from my favorite gray-haired kiosko worker.. but life goes on. Valeria and I have seen a lot of my friend Josh, one of the few students from IFSA that is still in Buenos Aires. He is working on his political activism thesis, so he has his own apartment here for a few weeks. We had delicious pasta at my favorite restaurant near my old house called La Pharmacie, and the night after that we ate tasty Japanese food near my current apartment. There has been a lot of eating out since I stopped living my host mom, which also means a lot of money spending, but such is life.

My friend Marney from junior high and high school just arrived in Buenos Aires recently to study here for the semester, so we met up and had a jolly time catching up and sharing stories. She has already been through a few ordeals and been introduced to the chaos and disorganization that is Argentina. The volcanic ash blowing from Chile is causing everyone with flights problems and hers was cancelled 5 times before she finally arrived. Also, her study abroad program does not provide housing for the students; they have to seek out an apartment or host family themselves. Considering all of the stress I faced upon entering this brand new culture, I am extremely thankful that IFSA provided housing for us, since that was one less thing I had to worry about.

Yesterday Valeria, Josh and I went to El parque de la costa in Tigre, which is an amusement park in the province of Buenos Aires that I recently found out existed. We took "el tren de la costa" to get to the park, which took us along a scenic route that stopped at artisan fairs and cute cafés. I didn't have high expectations for the amusement park since Six Flags is out of this world, but I ended up being pleasantly surprised. While there were plenty of tamer kid rides like the flying whales (of course I went on those!), there were also two extraordinarily intense, loopy and upside down roller coasters, or "montañas rusas". This literally translates to "Russian moutains". I did not know the history of roller coasters and if they really came from Russia, so I looked it up. Wikipedia (yay reliable sources!) says that the first roller coasters were hills constructed of ice located near Saint Petersburg, and after that they became slides with a height of 70-80 feet and a 50 degree drop that were reinforced by wooden supports. I genuinely feared for my life while I was riding each of them. I will never underestimate Argentine roller coasters again.

I was able to see my family friend Sara Navin and her family and have dinner with them after they also got back from Salta. It was lovely to see familiar faces after a long time of not seeing very many. We laughed for hours about Argentina and family memories and had a very tasty vegetarian meal. Today Valeria introduced me to her friends Santiago and Marcelo and we all had lunch. It was nice meeting her friends since we have only hung out alone before and then recently with Josh. Tonight I had dinner with my host mom, Ana Lucía and Suky for the last time and, you guessed it.. I cried. But not too much. They have been absolutely outstanding and have been there for me every step of the way during my time in Argentina. I know that I was lucky to have met and stayed with such loving people and I know that it is because of them that my experience was as incredible as it was. They gave me Argentine CDs of my favorite artist Fito Páez and also Andrés Calamaro, which was very thoughtful of them. The bottom two pictures are of me and my host mom, Adriana, and then me, Ana Lucía, and Suky. They all seemed very sure that we would keep in contact and see each other again, so I felt better about leaving them.

Now I have two nights left and I am really looking forward to being home to see my friends, family, and co-workers at Kama Indian Bistro. I just hope the cenizas (volcanic ashes) don't impede my flight home! Lots of my friends have been having issues with that and the airports keep closing sporadically. All of the IFSA students that are home have been telling me that their study abroad experience feels like a dream. It is already starting to feel like that to me since I am living somewhere else and around different people. But maybe everything's a dream anyway! "That´s what reality is. It's a dream we all have together." -Middlesex.