So I´ve now been in Catamarca for 7 weeks, the first four weeks were a lot of fun, but after the real work began this month I began to struggle more and began to realize that it takes a strong person to become an Exchange student. While I´ve been having a lot of fun hanging out with the Exchange students, my school classmates, and learning tango and guitar at the culture school, it hasn´t been without its challenges.
One of the main challenges has been directions and transportation. I am not a directionally smart person, I´ll be the first to tell you that. There are many family stories where I have been the one to completely screw up the orientation of the group, and frankly it´s been a miracle that I haven´t really been lost for a whole 7 weeks. But I did have one scare, which was incidentally to a rotary Exchange student barbacue. I made my way to the center and then took a cab to an adress that Zatik texted me(the event was at his house) I wound up on the other side of town, luckily my cab driver was nice enough to realice that I was not where I was supposed to be, and once we figured out the real address he began to educate me about directions in Catamarca. To make it even more challenging there were four streets with the same name in Catamarca the city, and then each house has an old number and a new number for directions, where my host family and I live in San Antonio there aren´t any numbers. Luckily we live on a corner but even then if you wanted to deliver a package it could be one of four houses. So I´ve had to learn quickly street names and bus stops, which is good for me. And I would say that so far it’s been pretty successful because I still cant tell anyone street names in Granville. To make it more difficult buses here never come on time, there is a hypothetical schedule but no one knows it, or sticks to it. So the thing is I just assume that a bus will come at about every quarter of an hour, which is true sometimes. But that´s been a point of frustration that it takes so long for me to get where I need to go especially if I want to get there on time because I live about 30 minutes away by bus from the center of the city. So to be on time for guitar lessons and tango takes a long time, and sometimes I don’t get home from tango until midnight depending if the bus is actually on time. It´s also been harder this past month because my host brother has been in cordoba for the past two weeks and I really miss him. When he´s around I feel more engaged and like I do more things and see more things. It´s good that we´re separated for this time I guess because it means my security blanket is gone and I have to really navigate everything without him. But it´s definitely harder without him, especially the transportation part since he drives.
I feel like I´m improving my tango, guitar, and language skills a lot. I feel way more comfortable dancing now than ever before in my life, I can kind of play a argentine folklore song on the guitar now and I feel my Spanish is developing nicely. I feel very lucky that I came to Catamarca because The inbounds here we really are a tight group because there´s a lot of us for such a small city. So I´ve had a lot of fun getting to now all of them and we´ve done a lot of fun things together everything from doing eachother´s hair to going out to the movies. I feel like we are so close even though it really hasn’t been that long since I got to know them. I guess that´s one thing about long term exchange, all the inbounds bond faster because when you think about it we´re naturally drawn to people who are in similar situations, and not many people are teenagers, thousands of miles away from everything they ever knew, and non native speakers of the language. While I´ve enjoyed getting to know everyone from exchange and their siblings, I´ve also had fun getting to know the people from my school. I go to the same school as my host sister (which is rare among inbounds in Catamarca) so I´ve had the advantage of getting to know the younger group from her, but also the older group, my classmates. Our school is very small, I used to think Granville High was small, but by comparison Granville is huge. I´ve really enjoyed my Sociology and Literature classes because we work and analyze things and we think about the big questions when we study a certain subject. My other classes are fine, but most of the time we don´t really do anything, and when we do half the time I don’t understand because there is so much noise in the classroom and its hard to decipher what it is the teacher is trying to explain. I´ve really enjoyed sociology though because we´ve been talking a lot about the way society structures itself and how societies change and now about different cultures and relations to other cultures so I get to talk about cultural differences between the US and Argentina and the teacher is really nice.
Its now officially spring here and it actually rained rained here three times this past month woo hoo! It was nice to see that spring actually exists here because we had a hot streak of 97 degree days, which was interesting because the school has no AC, we have fans. So my classmates and I made fans out of paper and I kept buying water at the little snackbar, that and my host sister and I every day would buy loads of ice cream and eat it during siesta and watch tv in the dark to keep cool. I really like the whole siesta concept. It´s really awesome, the only negative thing about it is that I don’t fall asleep until 2 am and then by 8:30 am I´m really tired and have issues paying attention in school since we don’t change seats all day, it´s the teachers who switch rooms. Siesta is usually from 2 to 6, most shops are closed during this time, then they reopen and maybe stay open until 9 or 10. This is really in Catamarca, I hear that in larger cities like Cordoba and Buenos Aires they cut down the siesta.
Another thing I love about being here is sense that dancing is essential to life. Everywhere I go there is a different style of dancing and guys aren´t shy to ask you to dance. In fact some guys here dance more than the girls, like my classmates in between classes will turn up their music and just start dancing. I like to think I´ve learned a thing or two from them, but in reality I think I need some more practice.
Personal Space is something that is engrained in every culture, and every culture interprets it in a different way. In the United States everyone has their own imaginary "bubble" a fake boundary to ensure the safety and comfort of said person. In Argentina my bubble was popped. Everyone here is warmer, everyone wants to touch everyone. Kiss them on the cheek to say hello or give them a hug or just pinch their cheek occasionally or just joke around, which we do in my class a lot. This was a huge adjustment for me. In Ohio practically no one touched me except close family and friends and to go from that to my first day of school where I said "Hi, I´m an exchange student from the United States" and my entire graduating class sawrmed me to greet me with hugs and kisses was a huge shock. When I told my friends that we don´t greet eachother with kisses in the US, they remembered my first day at school and how I was happy to be there, but that my expression was a mix of happy and shock to be touched by so many people.
Technology
Technology here in Argentina is actually very expensive, but of course every member of my generation is wired to it. While they have different websites and programs that are popular I like swapping knowledge over the technical side of things. This makes me miss my laptop from the US, because I really want to show them how something works or a specific song or file that I don´t have here which is very frustrating. I did bring an external hardrive here with all of my files from my laptop but for some reason it crashed and only opens the new files from Argentina. So this means that I have no way to update my ipod for a whole year! I completely understand my districts rule and I respect that but I am an exchange student who loves music and the exchange of music so naturally I want to download all the songs I´ve already fallen in love with here, but I can´t. All of the public high schools here by law of the minister of education must provide each student with a netbook, I think it´s nice because it really gives each student an equal oppurtunity to do their homework. Another thing is practically no one here has an ipod, the main thing they use here is to have a cell phone with an mp3 in it, the most popular being a blackberry. People here love Facebook, I thought I was on Facebook alot in the US, but the truth is here my classmates are on Facebook more than I think I´ve ever been on. Whenever we´re in the computer lab everyone goes straight to Facebook, to our facebook group of this graduating class, and then chats. It´s ridiculous, and I told them so, I think it´s actually very funny, but to them it´s kind of normal.
There are many different styles of music in Argentina. There is everything from Folklore, which is with Spanish acoustic guitar and more native to the northwest (Catamarca), to Rock Nacional (Rock). Now Rock may sound very generic, but it´s legitamate that Argentina really loves rock and has certain guitar patterns throughout this genre that were unfamiliar to me with Rock from the US. Then of course there is all the dancing music like Tango, Cumbia, and Cuarteto (from Cordoba). Cumbia is hard to describe, it´s like a mix between electronic sounds and rapping/singing, its mainly for dancing. If you´re curious about it youtube "tirate un paso" by "los wachiturros" its the cumbia anthem right now. Cuarteto is very upbeat and fast paced, and I really like the dancing style to it, it involves lots of spinning and twirling. It´s really cool, and most of the singers who sing cuarteto aren´t very good according to my host brother. He says that their voices really don´t matter since it´s really all about the beat. Tango, of course is beautiful and dramatic and more of a Porteño thing (Buenos Aires). People here don´t really tango. In Catamarca most people have a large passion for Cumbia. I like them all, so I have no problem dancing or listening to whatever, but there are some people here who say "oh I don´t like Cuarteto" or "I really don´t like Folklore". You could say the same in the US with country music I guess but to me they´re all beautiful parts of the complex Argentine culture.
Drinking Soda with a straw
Eating Customs south of the border are very different, some of them are the exact opposite of everything you´ve ever been taught for example the communal cup. The first day I came here I had one glass of coke for three people which is ok, but if there´s a big group of if someone buys a coke in the classroom people want you to share. They see everything as communal, which makes sense and I don’t want to be seen as a hog so I´m always happy to share, I just give people fair warning “I´m sick” when I was sick this past month with a cold. Another thing is that everywhere where you can buy soda there are straws. They drink all types of the small soda bottles with a straw, which was interesting the first time I saw it. I was like “Why did the lady hand me a straw?” Another thing is there are all kinds of sodas here, some that are from the coca cola company that we don´t even have in the united states. But mainly there are lots of different types of fruit sodas, which are really delicious. Another typical little snack you can find at any of the kioskos (which are everywhere) is these mini cakes or little cookies that are filled with dulce de leche and then covered in chocolate. Yum. I´m planning on learning how to make Dulce de leche soon so then I can make my life complete when I return and my host mom makes it homemade! Which it’s a very specific process I´ve heard so I´ll be experimenting with that soon. While at the same time the eating customs here are very different, I feel that my love of food has made my transition here easier. Many of the foods here are similar to ones I love in the US, and everyone always asks me about what food is like in the US. Plus one of my best friends here also has parents in the restaurant business so We´ve cooked together once and we´want to learn more about argentine cooking so we´re going to try to organize a recipe exchange activiy between US, Holland, and Argentina. Since food is universal I think it´s made our bond stronger, and since Argentina shares a brotherhood with Italy and many foods take from that root I feel comfortable because all my life my father has cooked Italian food for me.
There is one week until the South Trip! I have never been so excited for something in my life. It´s times like this when I am so glad I decided to do long term to Argentina. We´re going to all the provinces in Patagonia and going to many different national parks but we´re going the farthest south you can possibly go Ushuaia. I cant wait to plaster my blog with pictures of Patagonia, there are things there that I am sure I will see no where else on the planet. We´ll be gone for 17 days and we´re travelling with another district. I can´t wait to have this incredible experience and to bond with more exchange students! While this month has been more regular with schedules and filled with more challenges like directions and coordinating transportation I still feel the need to stay here. I really love it here and I´m so glad I´ve had the chance to meet all of these incredible people, from inbounds, to host families, to my classmates. I´ve learned so much already about all kinds of subjects, I can´t wait to learn more. Even though it´s weird to think once I´m back from the south trip I only have two and a half weeks of school left and then it´s summer! I guess we´ll see what that entails since everything here is pretty spontaneous, but now I´m off to prepare to go south!
