Bienvenida a Buenos Aires

My first impression of Buenos Aires was WOW! We arrived just before sunrise and during our 40-minute bus ride we saw the sun appear in the sky. We arrived at the Universidad de Belgrano where I got to meet Elizabeth, my Buenos Aires host mom. Elizabeth is a speech therapist and acts/models on the side.
We went to her apartment and it’s pretty sweet. It has two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a living room, kitchen, dining room, and roof. She also has it really well decorated.
We had a breakfast of coffee and toast. At 11 we had a meeting at the ISA office for our Buenos Aires orientation. We were all dead tired, we hadn’t slept in almost 36 hours and we could hardly keep ours eyes open. I made it through the orientation and we ate empanadas afterwards which gave me enough of a second wind to walk back to the apartment awake.
I took a nap and at 6 I went to explore around the area where I live with Emily. (Note about Emily: Emily grew up in Grand Rapids, MI and as it turns out, we have a mutual friend.) We walked around the shopping district and the fashion here is great. Everyone seems to look well dressed. I’m looking forward to stretching my fashion instincts. :D
I slept really well that night (36 hours of little-to-no sleep will do that to you) and Sunday morning we got together for a city tour. We met up with Coqui, ISA student-event coordinator, and took a bus tour. We stopped a lot of different markets that are only open on Sundays.

Here are some pictures from the tour:









I fell in love with Buenos Aires that day. It was amazing, I felt so much more at home. I liked Lima alright, I loved other elements of Peru (like the rain forest or Machu Picchu) but I never really loved the city. It always felt like a hassle to get from one place to another. Buenos Aires is a huge city of 16 million people. It has several different neighborhoods ranging from the richest of the rich to the poorest of the poor.

Monday was my first day of school and it was a bit of a shock. I have a 15-minute walk to school at the University of Belgrano. I’m taking an advanced Spanish conversation class. My professor is a young woman who grew up outside of Buenos Aires and she makes the three-hour class go fast. The down side of the class: homework! I had forgotten what it was like to have daily homework. In Mexico and Peru we had a worksheet here and there and sometimes a reflection page to write, but never homework like our classes in the United States. It was a news flash.
In the afternoon I have an Argentine Literature class. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that class. It will take a while to get used to, but I’ll survive. The first book we’re reading is called Facundo or Civilization and Barbarism. It was probably the bloodiest, gruesome, and most violent book I’ve ever skimmed.
I only have classes Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays from 10-1 and 2-5. It makes for three very long days, but excellent four-day weekends.