Buenos tardes!

Despite a few delays and over 24 hours of traveling, I finally arrived in Argentina!  Our host "father" picked us up at the airport in a extremely small taxi called a "remis".  My two other room mates and I managed to fit our 6 suitcases, backpacks and carry ons all on our laps.  I sat in the middle, and one of my room mates actually started crying because she was so scared, which was sad at the time but kind of funny now.  It was a good way to literally get closer with my future room mates, Jenni and Mary.

On Tuesday morning we woke up, had breakfast (Argentinians don't do breakfast like Americans do--here it consists of basically a large crouton covered in jelly and tea) and took a remis to the University Blas Pascal, which is the private university in Cordoba where I am studying.  The difference between a remis and a taxi is that remis' are green and come to your house, whereas taxis are yellow and are only used if flagged down.  My group is 9 students in total from Richmond, and there are 5 girls and 4 boys.  Once we all arrived from our respective casas, we had an information meeting with the coordinator from Blas Pascal.  Afterwards, we met with our "mentors" for lunch.  Our guide, Carlos, walked me to the computer lab, and the right when I walked out the door I tripped on the sidewalk and fell in front of about 20 students.  It was a really cool way to get everyones attention, as if my Amerian-ness enough.  Although breakfast was small, lunch definitely made up for it. We were served empanadas, chicken breast, potatoes and ice cream for dessert.  My mentor is Flor, she is super nice and is majoring in tourism here at the University.  In the afternoon, the Richmond group took a bus to downtown Cordoba, which was about 20 minutes away and we went on a tour of the city.  Cordoba has a rich history, and was the original capital of Argentina, before Buenos Aires.  We had a cute little Argentinian tour guide, who dressed to impress in a blazer, purple button down and matching purple scarf.  He tried to speak to us in english (the first time anyone has spoken to us in english all trip!) which was nice so we could really understand the history.  We visited El Catedral, La Manzana de San Martín (the main square), La Universidad Naciónal de Cordoba (first University in Cordoba, founded in the 17th century), and the cultural center that used to be a prison, located next to San Martín.

Today was our first day of classes.  We took the bus from our house to the University, and although I did not think I would make it there alive, we only ended up being a few minutes late. My first class was Spanish in Business and my other class is Argentine Short Story.  Each class is 2 hours long, and spoken solely in spanish.  I am constantly speaking in spanish, or at least my attempt at Spanish.  When I have no idea what someone is saying, my go to move is to nod, smile and say "sí".  I'd say that works about 70% of the time, the other 30% I end up getting questionable looks from whomever I am speaking with.  The University is pretty small, I am not quite sure how many students go here but it can't be more than 1000.  In Argentina, the government pays for students to attend public universities, but Blas Pascal is private so there are fewer students who study here.

Even though the weather is in the low 60's, everyone's dressed for winter.  It has been cold and cloudy in the mornings, but by the end of the day it has been sunny and warmer.   Something that is very interesting about Argentina is the European influence.  Very few people are "indigenous" Argentinians, instead their ancestors immigrated here from various countries in Europe.  The most popular is probably Italy, so many people do not have the sterotypical "Latin American" look.

Here are a few things I've noticed...
-There are SO many stray dogs. Whenever you're walking around whether its at the house, in the city or outside Blas Pascal, you're guaranteed to see at least 4 dogs.
-All the girls have long hair (kind of second guessing the haircut I got before I left)
-Everyone wears dark clothes (all my clothes are light with colors)
-There are no stop signs or stop lights, just round a bouts. It makes driving in the Chicago look easy.
-They LOVE american music, especially from the 70s, 80s, and 90s...while sitting here writing this in the cafe, they've played Livin' on a Prayer, Take Me Home by Cher, and Girl's Just Wanna HAve Fun
-Me and my entire group could not look more American

That's all for now....

Chau!
Kristin