Week begins

2004-06-01 / 12:57 p.m.

Whew. Quite a weekend it has been. Good, bad, ugly�we had it all here, folks. And in typical when-it-rains-it-pours style, I embark on writing what I�m sure will be a long ass entry to cover it all. Also, please note that I am posting two at once. The entry right before this one is also new new new.

Friday after class, I went to my Argentine friend/group partner�s house to work on our project. Her abode is suuuuper nice and in quite a ritzy part of town. Very comfortable place to work on a group project. While I generally hate group work, it�s a godsend here. Mercedes is not only a capable project partner, but very friendly and fun to hang around with�.so I get help with school and a friend out of it. Rock. So we worked for a long time, the better part of the afternoon/evening. About 8:30 ish we met up with Keith and Dan�two American mutual friends who are in a different program�for dinner. Light and fun discussion was had. Important cultural transcendence was enjoyed. Mercedes asked why North American�s make jokes about Canada (she interpreted them as something indicating malice toward Canada, and not just a consequence of Canadians being generally weird), and whether it was common for North American�s to sit down for a giant daily breakfast of fried eggs and such like in the movies. In turn, she satisfied our curiosity about some Porte�o habits�though this digressed into a discussion of the ever popular fem-mullet pretty quickly.

After dinner, Mer went home to meet up with some of her Argentine girlfriends. Keith and Dan invited me to come along with them--were going to meet up with another guy from their program and go listen to a local band playing at a bar not far away. I went along, and was glad I did. The band was great�really excellent lead guitar player, lots of energy, and good harmony singing. I had a really good time listening to it. The downside was that they started really late, per BsAs tendency, and therefore I was out a good bit later than I wanted to be. The other guy from their program who we met up with was annoying�I had actually met him before in one of the classes I tried and ended up dropping. I thought he was kind of a cheeseball playboy then, and Friday did nothing to improve his reputation in my book�.Nor did the fact that he managed to knock Keith�s beer all over my bookbag and pants. The class we met in was way way early, and we ate breakfast together afterwards. He seemed quirky at first, but after we had talked for a little while, I got a distinct impression that he was kind of fake, and I never ended up contacting him again (nor him me). But yeah, the band was great; and as an added bonus, they did a rockin� cover of a Bangles tune (In Your Room) which endeared them forever in my heart.

I got home about quarter �till five, and I was dead fucking tired. Slept until about 10:30 Saturday morning, and awoke feeling surprisingly great. Good enough to go to the gym --and getting up the ganas to the gym on a Saturday morning is practically impossible for me, so that�s saying something. After, did some homework, studied in the caf� down the block, not a whole bunch during the day. There was a boliche that was having a university special for UCA students, and not charging covers before 2:30. Usually, I�m not a boliche kind of girl, but several Argentine acquaintances were going, plus Dan and Keith and some other non-assy Americans, so I figured I�d give it a try. Besides, it was a fairly upscale one, and I thought it would be neat to see (and it kind of was�cool architecture, lighting, dancing girls on platforms�even better, there were dancing boys as well. It�s nice to see some gender stereotypes broken. ha ha). I tried my best to get some sleep during the day, but I didn�t achieve that much. Went to get my hair straightened and did some more homework in addition. I went to sleep at 8:00, and set my alarm for 1:00am to get up and go to this club or whatnot. It didn�t end up being much fun at all. When I got there, my amigos had not yet arrived. Now, I doubt I�ll be going to anymore clubs while in BsAs (because I never really have that great time there), but I DEFINITELY will not show up to any more alone. People who go alone to clubs look like they�re out looking for a partner, which I am not. You could be a leprosy ridden, foul smelling individual of indeterminate gender, but if you go to a club alone, you will be hit on. It is unavoidable. It�s to be expected. In one pass across the dance floor to get from the coat check to the bathroom, I was hindered five, count �em, five times by potential Argentine suitors. I tried to be friendly about saying �no� at first, but by Casanova number 4 I had to pee so badly I was just kind of shoving them off and moving on. The last guy got a full-on Peter* to the face. The lines they give are just priceless too. One guy heard my crazy accent and asked me where I was from. I told him I lived in Northern Canada and going back in two days (and therefore couldn�t give him my number, nor my name, nor my email�). He asked me if that was why I was so cold, and if he couldn�t come visit me in Canada and warm my cold, cold, heart. All of this transpired in Spanish of course. I just don�t think I could ever be the kind of woman who would enjoy meeting men in a crowded club. No one ever just wants to dance, they all want your telephone number as well, or to suck on your tongue, or to bed you, or god knows what. When I got back from the bathroom, I spotted the people from my Politica Exterior class and successfully maintained a close enough distance to male friends to thwart any other dudes out looking for action. It wasn�t too terribly crowded, so I danced a little bit with everyone else. It was fun for awhile, but I was unimpressed with the DJ. For the love of all things sacred, he played a fucking dance mix of U2�s �Bloody Sunday.� What. The. Fuck. Bloody Sunday?! A) Not exactly a dancing song and B) not exactly a great mix of it either. Then it started to get obnoxiously crowded, so we started gathering and making preparations to leave. I should have just gone home, but it seemed like a waste of getting up, getting dressed, and all that garbage just to go home after less than an hour or so.

*Peter, verb. Originated by Brian and popularized by Hillary. The action of (often somewhat forcefully) mushing up someone�s facial features with your hand. Adopted from a scene in the film Hook.

So we ended up going to a bar in Palermo which ended up being expensive and disappointing. My drink was way stronger than I wanted, and I ended up getting more intoxicated than I wanted to pretty quickly. By that point, I was just exhausted and cranky and wanted to go home. I split a cab with Dan and Keith�s friend Oz, who was a respectable fellow. However, after Oz left the cab, things took a very sinister turn. I opened up my purse to get out money to pay the cab driver and, much to my horror, my wallet was gone. At some point in the crowded boliche, someone swiped it. Fuck fuck mother fuck. The blessing was that I wasn�t carrying much of anything with me. It was almost like I saw this coming, as I took out everything important before I left�credit card, most of my cash, and my Harry potter ticket (phew!). I also had the foresight to stash money on other parts of my person, so I was cool with the cabbie�.though it meant that I had to dig a 20 out of my pantyhose in the back of a cab while drunk. Yay. That wasn�t weird or embarrassing at all. So I guess as far as being pick pocketed, it couldn�t have gone much better than it did.

Sunday I got together for coffee with my amigo David, who I met through Tania (this entry makes me seem like a social fucking butterfly, no?). We�re planning to go conjuntos to Iguazu�or rather, I�m going to meet up with him there, because he won�t be leaving from Buenos Aires, but from a visit to Peru (and I am so jealous). I�m kind of disappointed that I won�t have anyone to travel with, because I�m definitely not willing to pony up the cash to take a plane, and will therefore be going on bus. I�m sure I�ll like the bus just fine�I�ve heard they�re very comfortable, more so than coach class on an airplane�but it doesn�t change the fact that it�s a loooong trip. I�m promising myself now that I�m finally going to read a novel by a latin American writer in Spanish�either an Isabel Allende, Marquez, or Cortazar. Apparently, some friend of his from the states and one of Tania�s room mates is coming along as well. Whatever, I just want to see a little more of this incredible country before I have to fly my ass (kicking and screaming all the way) to the United States. It looks like I�ll be traveling from the 7th or 8th until the 11th or thereabouts. It will be a nice vacation hopefully; as I�m sure my brain will be absolutely fried by then.

In between today and the 8th, I have about MCXMCLMII scholastic things to conquer. I�ve got to write a short paper for my Spanish class, accompanied by what will certainly be a nightmarish oral presentation. Worse still, it�s group work. Crap. That�s the least of my worries�.For my Latin American Politics class, we have a final, which is over an ASS LOAD of reading, most of which I have barely touched. When one is working with texts in a different language, reading everything is kind of hard, so I�ve been picking and choosing what seems most important at the time�and what has been important in the short term has mostly been stuff for other classes, as this class has no evaluation prior to the final. This will result in much marathon reading, and probably pleading with Argentine students for some help. Still, I�m not super worried about this final though�.It�s only for the foreign students, so if we all do relatively crapilly on it, I think they�ll take that into account. Not being judged in comparison to native students is a relief. For politica exterior, our group project (which has been started, but not finished) is due Friday. If Mercedes and I get above a 7 on it, we get to take an easier version of the final. I think there�s also another parcial in the class, which doesn�t seem to make much sense, so maybe I�m just getting it confused with the final exam. This all pales in comparison to the granddaddy motherfucking monograf�a I have to write for revolutionary processes. My goal is to start outlining/researching for it this weekend. Here�s the thing about that though: the assignment is really long, something like 25 pages, but the regular UBA students seem to have about two years, or else their graduation date (whichever comes first) to finish papers for this type of class. Surely the prof won�t expect the same profundity and length from a student who has a few months vs. student that has a few years. Plus, this professor is really easygoing and understanding. I guess what it all boils down to is that I�m not really worried at this point, just not looking forward to what will undoubtedly be a whooooooole lotta work. But whatever, that was a big digression.

After coffee con David, I went to a movie with Brian. I was surprised that he called me, but he seems to want to repair the bad blood between us, and far be it from me to refuse a genuine attempt to do so. I don�t think that we�ll ever be really close, but it�s nice to know that there�s one more person in the world who would care if you were hit by a bus. Anyway, we went to see �El d�a despu�s de ma�ana��I guess it�s �The Day After Tomorrow� in English, though sometimes the titles aren�t exact literal translations for one reason or another. I was ambivalent about seeing it, but Brian really really wanted to. Meh, he paid for the tickets, so I didn�t protest much. Ung, though he bought tickets to the theater that sells assigned seats, and he bought them fairly late�therefore, we were sitting entirely too close to the screen, and off to one side. I was already not feeling terrific from drinking too much and sleeping too little, so it took a few minutes to adjust to seeing a flashy disaster movie about two meters from my face, but it ended up being alright. It would have sucked if I had to read subtitles though. This entry has gotten insanely long already, so I�m going to add my comments of the movie in a separate entry (see below).

So that�s about it. This week promises lots of study, but also HARRY POTTER on THURSDAY.

Yeah, as if I haven�t gloated about that enough already.

Feeling a good for no real tangible reason today. Not sure why. Mondays aren�t generally super felicitous. Today was a day when I just disfruited daily life here.

Poorly constructed movie review

2004-06-01 / 12:56 p.m.

hummm, I think this is going to end up having some spoilers. If you�re concerned with this (and I doubt there are many who are), you should read my other entries�.Or the newspaper, you ignorant spaz.

Since my expectations for the film were frankly pretty low, I wasn�t disappointed. It was exactly what I thought it would be: Typical disaster movie with fairly cool effects, terrible dialogue, and an attempt at a warm fuzzy message that just comes across as�.err�.tepid and hairy? heh. All said and done, it was fun to watch. It certainly wasn�t bad by any stretch. I enjoyed watching it for sure. It wasn�t very original though, nor were the effects that great. It had a fair amount of environmentalist preachiness, which I didn�t mind at all, because I think that we could all use some consciousness raising in this capacity. It also had the (almost obligatory) you-don�t-realize-what-you-have-until-it�s-gone vibe�which also wasn�t too bad. Where it really got miserably cheesy was with the appreciation of loved ones theme. It just didn�t fly, nor did I expect it to. The worst was the mother, who was a doctor of some kind, and her relationship with a little boy with cancer. I understand why they put it in, but it just didn�t work well, the viewer never gets pulled into their relationship enough for the sentimentality to kick in. Therefore, it just seemed like a random addition meant to arbitrarily pull on heartstrings. �awwwww�.Look how sad�..He has cancer. And his parents can�t be there with him�..And the climate is changing�.and�.uh�.he still has cancer�.ohhh, and look, the mom risked her life to stay there with him�..he�s all sick and skinny and bald�.::weep::�

My two favorite parts of the movie:

1. Protagonist, being all brave and crap, almost drowns in really really cold water. Girl-who-he-likes-but-is-too-shy-to-admit-his-feelings-to helps him out of his wet clothes and warms him with her body heat. A moment so clich� and so predictable that I don�t think I was the only one in the theater who giggled.

2. As zillions of North Americans flee south, Mexico closes its borders to immigrants. Our neighbor to the south only agrees to admit the American refugees after the president negotiates a treaty to pardon all Latin American debt. Ha ha ha ha ha. I genuinely did enjoy that little gem.

I was worried that it would be scary to me, as end-of-the-world movies sometimes are to me. It was to a point, but not so bad. Fortunately, I�ve either grown out of this, or the movie wasn�t realistic enough to make me very anxious. I�m pretty sure this stems from a trip to the planetarium I took when I was 7 or so�.My mom talked up the planetarium for a long time, and how cool it was, so I was totally psyched when we finally went. The first part of it was one of those programs where they show you the night sky where you live, and point out stuff and whatnot. That was incredibly cool; I still remember being super impressed with it. The second part of the program was about what would happen to the earth in the event that the sun exploded in a supernova. Less cool. Definitely less cool. It scared the living fuck out of me, as the film reviewed step by step what would happen to the sun, and therefore our climate, and therefore our civilization. I had nightmares for a week and consulted with at least one science teacher as to the likelihood of a supernova of the sun in my lifetime.

Moral: between a choice of going to see �D�a Despu�s de Ma�ana� and a program about the sun exploding, go for the former. If you�re in the mood for really passive entertainment, and seeing decent effects of a tidal wave sweeping over Manhattan and killing a bunch of people, right on, man! You�re set! As far as disaster movies go, I liked it quite a bit�more than Dante�s Peak (Dante�s Peak ranks only slightly above being kicked in the teeth, so that isn�t saying much), but less than Twister (though I haven�t seen Twister since I was like 13, so I might have to amend this later).

Hazlo, Hansel

2004-05-31 / 9:21 p.m.

Still haven�t finished my weekend update, but its coming.

Thought I`d post a little quasi-update just to say hi though...."hi".

Things are going well. Busy, but well. I heart being here. I`ve gotten to the point where sometimes Buenos Aires almost seems like "home." This is weird to me. Study abroad is a cruel experience in this reguard. Leaving home is difficult, as you are forced to abandon just about all that is familiar and comfortable for various months. Then you get to your new country, and have to re-adjust, and fast. This is difficult (though often fun). When you finally get to the point where you`re getting comfortable, the rug is pulled out from under you again: leaving behind things you`ve grown to love and going home and start up your old life again. I don`t yet know what this is going to be like, but I anticipate it will take some adjustment as well...not as much, obviously, but some.

I think my ankle is completely better, and I have just about weaned myself totally off the stupid stationary bike and gone back to running. This morning I managed to get about 25 minutes of actual jogging and 10 minutes of walking. Not bad for almost a 4 month hiatus, no? Hopefully, I can defeat the weight I`ve put on the last couple of weeks...Not only do I want to come home with great stories, great pictures, improved spanish, and having had all kinds of fantastic experiences, I also would like to return looking like a complete hottie. With a million dollars. And a good graduate school throwing money and acceptance letters at me. And a hot latin manservant to bring me girly frozen cocktails while I sunbathe...Is that asking so much?!

There�s a mix of "Brimful of Asha" playing in the locutorio. Makes me think of riding in Will�s car.

Unnggg. That is all. I`m going home to do homework, and hopefully finish the account of my weekend to upload tomorrow. Though my journal never had a big audience, now my readership is really really down. I need to update more often. Hummm, or maybe I just need to write more sensational, tabloid-esque stories.

Worst. update. ever.

I watch cops with no pants on

2004-05-31 / 11:14 a.m.

Okay, I am totally halfway done with a really really long entry...I swear. I�ll update really soon, really. Don�t forget about me!!!

dulce vida

2004-05-27 / 5:15 p.m.

Safely tucked away in my wallet is a ticket to the Thursday matinee of Harry Potter. The chick at the boleter�a assured me that it was in ENGLISH. Hopefully, at 12:30 in the afternoon, there will be few children there, as all the ones old enough to read subtitles should be in school. Its in a theater I like too--Abasto. Good sound, and they dont assign seats.

�Dulce!

2004-05-24 / 1:01 p.m.

Ohhhh dude. First of all, Im pretty sure now that Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is getting here with subtitles, and not dubbing. Second piece of good news: it appears to be in with the trend of being released in most of the world at once. Third piece of good news: New movies come out here on Thursday and not Friday.

....

So what does this amount to? It means that, should things go as planned, I will be seeing Harry Potter before all you Northern Hemisphere folk! SchiggityStrawberry.