An Anniversary and a Bicentennial

Well, another week has passed, and even though it wasn't quite as exciting as the trip to Iguazu Falls, its worth a post.

Just as I was settling back into my house, unpacking, catching up on my blog and pictures, my host mother knocked on my door and whisked me away to our "aunt's" house. Last Sunday, while I was in Iguazu, was "Dia del Nino" (Children's Day). Yes father, they celebrate children's day here too! Since it was in the middle of the long weekend my family decided to celebrate Monday evening with another large family dinner.

I'm not quite sure what "Dia del Nino" normally consists of, other than giving presents to the children in your family and discounts at every pastry shop across the city, but for us it just meant a relaxing evening of dinner and board games. My 10 year old cousin had decorated her house with signs proclaiming it "Dia del Nino" and since she's the youngest she was allowed to pick the games for the night. We started off nice and easy with Jenga -- not going to lie, playing a 10 year old in Jenga is not all that challenging. But then after dinner we moved on to Trivial Pursuit. As if Trivial Pursuit wouldn't be challenging enough in Spanish, it was also the South America edition. At least I provided a lot of amusement for my family as I lost, finishing way behind the 10 year old.

After a nice close to an amazing weekend I was back in school-mode for a short, 3 day week (wouldn't want me to be working too hard).

On Wednesday afternoon a friend and I decided to check out the Cemetery de Chacarita (similar to Recoleta in design, but its filled with all Argentines, not only the rich and famous). It was built following a great flu epidemic to house the victims, but its now famous for housing the tango singer Carlos Gardel.

After finishing up another week of school, I tried to take full opportunity of my 3-day weekend. On Friday I had some administrative things to get done - like spending 2 hours at the migrations office to get my official residency forms! (Turns out before I just had temporary residency, but now I'm official) Then a friend and I headed downtown to check out the events for the 190 year anniversary of our university, Universidad de Buenos Aires.

The events were housed in a state-run high school that served as the original building for the university (if only the current building was as nice!). The building had been converted into essentially a museum of the history and founding of the university, with classrooms housing free lectures open to the public on a variety of topics. I was particularly proud when I was able to have a conversation with two women wandering around the exhibits about the difference between American Universities and UBA - they even complimented my Spanish :).

Then on Saturday I broke out of the Buenos Aires bubble by traveling to a barrio outside of the "capital federal," or the city proper. For my service learning class I'll be working with an organization called "Un Techo Para Mi Pais" which is very similar to Habitat for Humanity. Saturday was my first real introduction to the organization - I traveled with a group of about 15 Argentines to a barrio where they have constructed houses to throw a "Dia del Nino" party for the kids in the barrio. We spent the afternoon dancing to reggae, handing out candies and presents, and playing tag with about 60 kids. It was nice to get outside of the city and spend the day with Argentines. I'll be spending many more Saturdays over the semester going out to these barrios learning about the families and helping assign houses to families.

Sunday closed off another great, although more relaxing, weekend. We started the day off right by making the trek up to Palermo for some real, American brunch! The standard breakfast here is crackers with cheese spread and marmelade, or if you need a big breakfast a croissant glazed with sugar (called a "medialuna," or half-moon). I'm one of the lucky few who's host family buys me Frosted Flakes to eat in the morning, but a real breakfast was still desperately needed. The restaurant mainly serves as a popular bar, but its owner is from Vancouver, so he also does brunch on the weekends. We partaked in dulce de leche filled Belgian Waffles and a "Cali Coast" omelette with home fries - absolutely divine!

Then we headed back down to the main part of the city to do some of the more touristy things on our list of must-see things in the city. First stop was the Casa Rosada (the principal government office where the President works), which is completely open to the public on the weekends - if only the White House were the same. We got a tour of the building, which included going out onto the balcony where Eva Peron delivered her most famous speech.

Directly behind the Casa Rosada is the museum for the bicentennial which was this past year. It is underground and built in what was previously a Spanish fort, so they maintained some of the original brick floor which you can walk over on glass platforms. The museum is a general overview of Argentine history (conveniently sensationalized on television screens for us gringas) and has other historical artifacts like one of Eva Peron's gowns.

And now I'm settled back into a week of classes, but I will update again soon!