First day of school - completed

Ok, the first day of school ended up not being that bad. The kids went off to their classes and I went to mine, expecting to find that I was the only student in the class (most of the kids placed in level 1 or 2, and I was in 6). I was the first one in the room while a group of Chinese students who were not at the orientation stood outside the room (I was hoping I'd have Chinese students in my Spanish class). The first student to come in greeted me in Spanish. His name was Mike and he teaches High School Spanish in Chicago. He was a very nice guy. Then a woman walked in, somewhat resembling a concheta without the fur coat, and she sat down next to me. Her name is Anna and she teaches French in Atlanta. The final student in the class is a guy from England named Jonathan, who is teaching English in Buenos Aires. I was relieved to see that the students were older - Mike and Jonathan are probably in their 30's and Anna is older than me.

The level of the class is a little high. The teacher commented that I was "timido" (shy) - in fact I am, but I was also a little overwhelmed. I understand almost everything, but can only utter a few words, while the other students string together several sentences at a time. But I was relieved to find that I often understood things that they didn't - so what I lack in ability to speak, I have in comprehension. I decided to stay in the class because I want to be pushed, and feel like I need to work to keep up with the others (unlike my Italian class this past semester where I felt I didn't need to study because the other students were so low).

Afterwards I met Larry and his former Spanish teacher, Juliana. First I had my first taxi adventure.

I called Larry on my new cell phone that I got today at school, and he gave me the address of Daniela Wasser School, where he was waiting for his teacher to finish class. The address he gave me was 4832 Cordoba. I asked for the cross street, which was Julian Alvarez (I'm used to being in countries where addresses are useless). I got into the cab and decided to just go ahead and give him the address, but I did it the way we say addresses in the U.S. - cuarenta-ocho trenta y dos Cordoba (48-32 Cordoba). The taxi driver sped towards the Plaza de Mayo. I didn't think anything of it -I actually thought I could walk to where Larry was, because he said he was not far from where I was.

As we got closer to "el centro" traffic became more congested. The driver went down a small street to go over to Cordoba, and traffic was at a standstill - felt like I was in Manhatten. I asked him if I could walk, and he objected (I thought it would be faster). Finally we reached Cordoba and he rolled up to 832. I said, no 4832! At which point he said something I didn't understand and we sped off in the opposite direction (he was probably cursing me out).

Cordoba is a wide street of about 8 lanes that was totally congested. Buses spewed out black smoke and cars cut each other off. My driver honked his horn at everyone (as if it would help). We passed Junin, where I started out and continued on. And continued on. And continued on. The fare when we got to 832 Cordoba was about 5 pesos (a little over 1 dollar), but the time we got to 4832 Cordoba, it was over 15 pesos (I guess we had traveled 40 blocks from the original wrong location). The only problem was there was no 4832. There was 4830 and 4834, but no 32.

The driver seemed a bit upset at this point. I told him the cross street and he told me it was 5 streets back in the other direction. I told him it was ok, I could walk, and that I would call and confirm the address. He kept insisting that I had to say there was no 32. I kind of figured that out. I called Larry. Turned out that Daniela Wasser was at 4382. Somehow the numbers got crossed in the translation from the person Larry spoke to, to Larry, to me.

It was an adventure and I learned some important things.

As I walked to meet Larry, who was now on his way to meet me halfway, I felt in my front pocket for my wallet (which is not where I normally keep it, but have been told to do here). It wasn't there. I felt the other front pocket - no wallet. My back pockets - not there. My jacket - no sign of it. I felt flush and panicked, thinking I had left it in the cab (or that the driver had somehow robbed me). I opened my bag and for some reason, I had put my wallet in my bag. Careless of me and a sign that all of this talk about being careful was making me paranoid.

I met up with Larry and his wonderfully sweet teacher and we walked to Palermo Viejo and went to a bookstore with a cafe in the back. Larry told me this was his favorite bookstore. If I had a peso for every time Larry told me "this is a really good bookstore" or "this is a really good CD shop" - I could retire here. But it was a nice bookstore with a very interesting interior, and I could see why it was Larry's favorite.

We sat down and a sort of punky looking (or was it just "fashionable") waitress came over and laid some menus on the table (only 2 menus for the three of us). Larry and Juliana were chatting and I was waiting for a menu. Finally I slipped one of them in my direction. We decided what we wanted, and sat and continued to talk. Juliana was lovely, and it was really easy to speak Spanish with her (her Spanish was clear and she was very patient with us). Off to the side of where we were sitting was the smoking area, which was simply a section of the bookstore that was set off with windows and a set of french doors that opened to where we were. The smoke blew out from the smoking area in huge clouds and passed by our table. I didn't really get the point of the smoking section, but it seemed it was meant to concentrate the smoke so that it would blow out in clouds to where we were sitting (reminded me of the fog blowing in in San Francisco).

Our waitress was seated in the smoking section talking to her friends, while another guy stood behind the counter where the register was and another guy was behind another counter in charge of the music. The three of us sat for the longest time for someone to come and take our order. Juliana seemed unphased. Larry and I both commented to each other about how hungry we were, and noted that our waitress was having a smoke.

Juliana got up, spoke to the CD guy and eventually bought a CD. We waited for our waitress, and waited, and waited. Finally she came over and took our order.

We ordered a cheese tray and a small pizza with fresh mozzarella, basil and fresh tomato. A huge tray came out that the three of us could not finish. It had cheeses, salami, ham and olives, and we had a basket of bread and olive oil. As we sat eating that and I looked around at the other customers with blond and light brown hair, one redhead, everyone looking very trendy, two people working on their laptops near us, others in the smoking room, smoking and working on their laptops, and one guy above us on the balcony working on his laptop, I said to Larry, "if I didn't know any better I would swear we were not in Argentina'. If I had taken a picture and showed it to you, you would have thought it was just a nice cafe in any city in the US - New York, Seattle, Chicago or San Francisco. The only thing that gave it away was when people spoke, and gestured, or the slow service of our waitress (well, that might also be possible in a trendy cafe in any city in the US).

We finished the evening by taking a cab back to a point equal distance from my and Larry's apartments. We walked a bit, ate (again) and Larry and I split ways and we walked home.

Larry, by the way, now has his own blog - you must check it out. His sense of humor comes through better in his blog than I can relay through my own writing. It is a riot!

Debra requested more information about the food. It is wonderful! So far we've eaten lots of steaks, and wonderful salads (salads usually just have lettuce, tomato and onions and oil and vinegar, but they are good). Empanadas are a more typical food, which are meat pies, kind of shaped like a ravioli and baked (sometimes fried). Today at school, I had a vegetable tort with pumpkin on top - it was ok, not the best thing I've eaten here, but for a cafeteria, not bad. Today in class we had a whole discussion on yerba mate, which I will blog about later, after I experience it.

Generally, the food here is very European. Lots of pasta, meat, potatoes (the potatoes are so flavorful, they're amazing), quiche, etc. Prosciutto is cheap, cheeses are plentiful and good (as is the wine), and you can buy fresh pasta at stores all over town to take home and cook yourself. We are in Latin America, and sometimes it feels that way, but the food is very European.

My observation for today:
This isn't really an observation, but I forgot to mention that the floors in my apartment are heated. Now what a good idea is that?!! I can walk around in my socks and my feet are not cold. Warm air rises, so I don't have all of the heat rising to the ceiling right away (where I am not sitting). Now, I'd prefer not to have heat, but if I have to have it, I say, heated floors are the way to go.