Weekend in Wine Country

So I'm teetering back and forth between weather I should use this blog to catch up on my free time and the fun things I have done in Buenos Aires or write about my weekend in Mendoza while its still fresh in my mind. I guess I'm choosing Mendoza. Since I'm already behind on fun things in BA another week or so cant hurt. So, here it goes.

Last week I started classes at ECELA again. The weekend, Easter weekend is a long one in Argentina. We had classes off on Thursday and Friday so some friends and I decided to go to Mendoza. Mendoza is the area, right at the base of the Andes on the Argentinian side, where most of the wine from Argentina is produced. Its about a 12 hour drive from Buenos Aires and about an eight hour trek from Santiago. One friend, Daniele, who is Italian, and who I met in school, rented a car and the two of us and one of his friends, Jonathan, from Colombia drove up there on Thursday night. Both Daniele and Jonathan speak English, but prefer Spanish so for the entire trip up and back we only spoke Spanish. Good practice, but exhausting for me. After stopping for a sleep in the middle of nowhere, Argentina, we arrived in Mendoza mid-day on Fri. One of my friends from school in BA, Kristian, who is now studying in Chile, took the bus from Stgo and met us there.

The first afternoon we just spent wandering around the city. There is a huge beautiful park, and the city itself is very cute and quiet. It was such a nice contrast to the noise and pollution of Buenos Aires. I needed some time out of the big city in a bad way. The hostel we stayed in the first night was a little bit out of the city (everything was booked up because of the holiday weekend) so we took a cab into the city for dinner that evening. After that we headed out to some bars that we had had recommended to us. We spent the entire evening barhopping and really hit up every big spot in town in one night. We only had a few slight mishaps upon arriving home and having to tiptoe a very narrow path by the pool to get to our room :p

The next morning we got up and decided to visit some vineyards. The first one we went to was a small vineyard, owned by a French couple. We took a tour and tasted some wines and got some nice photos. We then went to a huge vineyard, the Familia Zucchardi vineyard, and took another tour and tasted some more wine. The comparison in the size and the processes of the two vineyards was amazing. And so was the wine! We switched hostels that evening and after preparing some dinner at the hostel we went met up with some other friends from Buenos Aires and went out again that night. Again the night ended with only a few mishaps involving dark hostel rooms and glass bottles left in precarious places.

After far too few hours of sleep we got up early the next morning to enjoy our final day. Jonathan, being an avid photographer, was keen to take a trip up to the mountains to see some sights and take some pictures. We decided to drive a huge loop up into and through the Andes. The roads were steep and winding and gravel for a good portion of the drive but the sights were fantastic. We saw guanacos, and eagles, and lizzards, the leaves were changing to gold and the distant mountains were capped with snow. It definitely satiated the mountain girl in me. And luck was with me; my camera battery lasted until about 5:00 Sunday night. That evening we went back to the city for a couple of hours, dropped Kristian at the train station and started the long journey back home. We stopped again overnight and got home Monday evening.

It was a lovely weekend and taking a break from the hustle and bustle after three months was more satisfying than I can explain. However, I was still excited to return home at the end of the trip and to be back in my city. Tune in next time for some of the fun activities that Buenos Aires has to offer.

Real Life

Hola! My new computer has finally arrived and so I can finally put Leah's mind at ease with another post about how I am not homeless in another country.

So I finished up my classes about four weeks ago now and I have been kinda puttering around trying to establish a life here since. The whole apartment fiasco turned out alright. My roommate from my old apartment left town the weekend that I needed to move out so I moved into his room for about five days which bought me more time to look for my own apartment. I then stayed with another friend who had an extra room for a couple of days and finally found an apartment of my own on Craigslist. I'm living with a 30 year old Argentinian girl in an itty bitty apartment, but its fully furnished and fairly comfortable. Its also very centrally located so its easy to get anywhere.

Other than that I've just been enjoying the city, trying to find a job, and keeping myself busy. And I finally got offered a job yesterday! I met an American girl in Santiago who worked with ECELA (my school) as an international representative. She lived in Santiago but worked with universities in the US to promote ECELA. From her I got the name of the (American) guy who runs ECELA and emailed him my CV and cover letter kind of on a whim. Well he was very helpful and they actually kind of created a position for me with ECELA. They are bringing down a group of premed students for a one month program this summer. I will be working with an Argentinian girl to set up that program and to work with the students and pre-med advisors on the trip. I'll also be talking to other students and advisors who contact ECELA with questions to promote our school. I'm going to take four more weeks of classes and work part time for a while and also do some volunteering at the clinics to kind of test them out before the group of students gets down here. One of the nicest things about the job is that I can do it from anywhere. They want me to stay in BA at least until July when the group comes down but after that I could move to Chile or anywhere else, and they actually want me to keep working from the US once I got back. It will also be partly in English and partly in Spanish so I'll get to practice some more Spanish. So I start the new job next week and I'll start classes again the week after. I'm really looking forward to it.

So now I have a house, and a job, and some friends and life is good. Unfortunately most of the friends I'm making are from the school so they're only here for short periods of time, which means lots of goodbyes. Fortunately some are staying for a pretty long time so thats nice. I'm also still trying to get used to the Argentinian ways of doing things. Buenos Aires is really fun and there is always something to do or see, but trying to live life here, and be productive and efficient is enough to make any American go crazy. Everything, from mailing a letter to paying my rent to trying to get my computer, has been a nightmare. I will definitely appreciate many things about the US when I get back.

I'm also hoping to plan a short trip or two within the next couple of weeks. My friend Julia and I want to go to Iguazu Falls, a huge series of waterfalls at the boarder between Argentina and Brazil. They're supposed to be some of the most spectacular sights in South America. I also want to go to Mendoza (wine country) before it gets too cold. I think it'll be nice to get out of the city for a while. Well I guess thats all for now. Kinda a boring post. Next time I'll tell you about all the fun things I've been able to do here. And also about how I find myself in a near death situation on almost a weekly basis :p Keep checking in!