Aventuras en Uruguay

Pennies and Pesos

2011-05-05T00:19:00.001-04:00

So, I definitely brought back pieces of Uruguay with me... intentionally and non-intentionally.

1. I have still not exchanged my pesos (argentinian and uruguayan) for dollars. I, also, keep rediscovering two half pesos that live in my wallet and pretend to be nickels. It makes me smile every time I see them though. Edit: I, also, discovered ten brazilian reals in my shorts the other day. When I add up all this money, I'm sure I'll be surprised in how much mulah I have in foreign currency. If I wait long enough, I can add some won to it.

2. Buenos Aires Safety Measurement: I feel like I am invincible just about anywhere in the States now because I survived Buenos Aires. I have a really bad sense of invincibility now. Really bad. For example, I stood under a lone streetlight waiting for the bus at 11pm on a sketchy street corner a week ago and thought nothing of it. Before I would have just stayed at my friends house and had her take me home the next day. Yeaaaah.

3. Preserving my uruguayan accent is so hard without other people speaking it back to me. In fact, I'm in a Spanish Linguistics class and people actually laugh when we go over the voseo and the sheismo that are widely used in Uruguay. So, it becomes an issue of self-consciousness and just naturally losing the accent since I'm no longer exposed to it. Its frustrating and now has me wanting to retire in Argentina instead of Mexico. Sorry, Mexico.

4. A guy briefly presented Uruguay (specifically Montevideo) a few weeks ago at the Spanish club where I work. It had been a few years since he'd been there. So, I schooled him :P. Nah, I just helped him out a little. It made me realize that while I don't think of Uruguay on a daily basis anymore, I still remember it very well.

5. Food items that I became familiar with in Uruguay and later found here in the States: Knorr soups, Cadbury chocolate bars, and Bimbo brand bread. To the best of my knowledge none of these brands are uruguayan although Knorr might be. And, I saw a brand of yerba (for maté) that was sold in Uruguay, but I can't remember the brand for the life of me. I don't know why this food thing matters to me, but I think its cool to find stuff in a foreign place that is sold at home too and vice versa. I think its partially why I loved m&ms, Hershey's Cookie and Cream bar, and snickers so much while I was in Uruguay although in the US I don't really eat them outside of Halloween.

6. This is off topic, but I'm 90% sure I'm going to South Korea when I graduate. I'll probably start a blog about it during the summer and I'll put a link in this blog in case anyone wants to hear more of my ramblings, but about a different part of the world. I don't know Korean at all except that I can say "hi", "kimchi", "thank you", "tiger" and "ski". At least the first three will actually be useful. Also, I'll be going for work *gasp* and not school so it will be very different from my study abroad experience. I'm excited.

On to the Next One

2011-02-21T08:58:00.000-05:00

I finally feel like I've almost fully left Uruguay behind. Two months ago yesterday (Feb. 21) is when I left Uruguayan soil for home and already I'm losing my accent and re-adjusted my diet to fast food burgers. However, I can't stop saying "Well, in Uruguay..." or "When I was in Uruguay..." at least 5 times a day. I annoy myself sometimes, but then again it was my life the past year, so its hard to just pretend it didn't happen.

Thankfully, I gave my presentation on Uruguay last Wednesday which both made me feel closer to Uruguay and farther away at the same time. For 45 mins I got to tell a room full of people all about my experiences and what my life was like in another freakin' country. It was nerve-wrecking, but it was so great to blabber on and on about all the things that I, personally, thought were awesome about Uruguay and remember all the things I left behind.

I'm glad I did it not only because it was an opportunity to force people listen to me talk about Uruguay this and Uruguay that, but it also worked as a great way to say goodbye to Uruguay. I know I left the country two months ago, but it has still been with me everywhere I go. And, I miss it terribly of course, but I need to move on to the other adventures life has to offer.

As for this blog, I don't want to say this is the last post because I'm sure I'll discover other Uruguay related things to write about, but as for my experience there and reading about how Uruguay has touched my life this is probably the last one. I'll still check it every now and then for new comments and such and maybe post every know and then, but I'm moving on to a new blog to post about my more recent experiences. I'm not sure if I'm willing to share it with you guys since I'm still working on it, but I will consider it.

Alright, I'm one more paragraph from getting misty-eyed so chau!

Christmas Cheer in Punta Carretas

2011-02-13T21:09:00.002-05:00

This is delayed, but the same day I left a group surprised the Christmas shoppers in Punta Carretas Shopping with a song. Its pretty sweet.

Blackness in a White Nation

2011-02-11T23:02:00.004-05:00

I had someone comment that they wanted to know what I felt like being black in Uruguay so I thought I would address it. I haven't spoken about it before because this didn't seem to be the right audience for it, but now that someone has asked I have no problem doing it. I already talked a little bit about it in my post titled Afro-Uruguayans, but I'll expound a little.

Uruguay is one of the most homogenous populations in South America, if not the most homogeneous, where the population is majority caucasian. Naturally I stuck out like a sore thumb and my afro wasn't helping matters either. To be honest though, I live in Nowhere, North Carolina where there isn't a well represented population of African Americans either so its not like it shocked me. Although, I would say that in comparison Uruguay has less blacks than here in Nowhere, NC.

Fortunately, I was never hassled or talked down to or anything because of my skin color, which is always great, but I did notice that people treated me a little different sometimes. I feel like people would look at me longer and in a way that made sure I wasn't trying something sometimes. I even had a few kids point me out to their parents which I just thought was cute. Some subtle things happened, of course, where people would jerk their kids away from me or like the example I gave in the other post a guy in McDonalds saw me and pushed his wife to his other side away from me, put his arm around her, and would keep looking at me every few seconds. It was pretty rude, but, hey, what could I do?

Just like in the US there is still some ignorance from people who have never come into contact with people of color, but you just have to learn to take it in stride, especially when you're in other countries. In situations like that I would just try to not give them any reason to think of me as a sketchy character by taking my hands out of my pockets, not looking at them, and just being polite. I would say that 98% of the time though I was treated just like any other person/ foreigner and even like a regular Latin American from the times people thought I was from Brazil or somewhere else.

I would definitely say to not let your skin color keep you from going though. I never met a mean Uruguayan (do they even exist?) and they treat you like a regular person. Just be prepared to stick out a little.

By the way, I plan to research this topic of Afro-Uruguayans because it has really drawn my interest since I can't seem to find more information on it through Google search. I was looking up an Afro-Latin American textbook for a class I'm taking with a similar name and found a book titled Blackness in a White Nation: A History of Afro-Uruguay by George Reid Andrews that I plan on starting with. You know, in case you're interested as well.

America!

2011-02-09T00:04:00.003-05:00

Whew, that was the longest plane ride ever... Haha not. So, let's finish this thing up shall we?

I was actually so ready to get back home to AMERICA that last day, ya'll. (Yes, my southern accent is back). That was the longest line ever when I was in line for American Airlines to check in. I swear. The ride in was pretty smooth. In Miami the Homeland Security officer even said "Welcome back" to me. I felt special. Also, I went through numerous security check points and didn't have to go through the new TSA scanner once. Awesome! Though I did notice it took longer to get through security than before in Miami-- and we got there at 5am.

I remember talking to my dad for the first time in months on my American cell phone on the tram in the airport. I was smiling like an idiot and despite it being 5am my dad was wide awake to talk to me. Aww. And, my family was awesome and on time for my arrival. My brother ran up to me and almost knocked me over in the airport and they gave me welcome back balloons. I, also, went home and had welcome back party things all over my room. Its almost 2 months later and they are still up there. What can I say, they make me happy.

I did go through a stage of reverse culture shock where I kept constantly comparing things to how they were in Uruguay and just being confused about the time and where I was as in orientating myself that home is now a tangible and not just a place in the general America direction. I'm still adjusting slightly. That whole thing where they say you come back a different person and not everyone wants to hear about your awesome adventures abroad was totally true. Its kind of frustrating realizing I am no longer friends with a lot of people anymore (I guess we weren't such great friends anyways) and have a whole year of my life where I wasn't here to see things happen and change. But then I start talking to someone about my year in Uruguay and it puts things back into perspective.

I do horribly miss speaking Spanish though. I'm talking real Spanish and only in Spanish. People are just so scared to speak Spanish and its really hard to get people to speak to me in only Spanish and not Spanglish. I've noticed that only the people who studied abroad even feel comfortable enough to do so. Its weird. So, I'm definitely trying to speak Spanish as much as I can by volunteering and working in environments where its necessary to do so.

But I'm actually doing a presentation on my experience in Uruguay next week (Feb. 16th) where I will be speaking in Spanish so I'm uber excited about that.

I don't know I'm just so greatly to be back. Being abroad was awesome, but I'm glad to be back. God bless America :D

Home Stretch

2010-12-19T23:13:00.003-05:00

With hours remaining in my study abroad experience I would like to recount my last few days in Uruguay which went a little like this:

Exams were done for me on Friday morning and, man, it felt great. I mostly spent the weekend packing and hanging out with as many people as I could and especially my host family. I had my farewell dinner on Saturday which was fun and Sunday night I made barbecue meatballs with rice as a thank you to Analia and Mary for dealing with me and my intermediate Spanish for 10 months. And, being the nostalgic person I am, I made sure to eat at all my favorite places and see my favorite sites before now.

I even managed to finally work up the nerve to go see the ashes of Artigas in Plaza de Independencia and that was unexpectedly scary. I happened to be the only person in that dark, spacious room along with two statues, or rather Uruguayan soliders. Apparently, they can't move, talk or anything as they guard the ashes and it was pretty scary since I knew nothing of this and with their spiffy uniforms they looked like very well constructed soliders like the nutcracker statues. It scared the crap out of me when I realized they were watching me taking pictures and that they had rifles on them. The light on the stairs that kept flashing on and off didn't make the situation any better either.

Also, I took out money before going to the Tristan Narvanja outdoor market and just went crazy buying things I've always been eyeing and doing my souvenir/ Christmas shopping. It was cool because the venders were actually being chatty with me so I got to talk to some of them and observe my further progress with Spanish as they hardly gave me any confused looks as I used English syntax for a Spanish sentence. I seriously love those moments where you can see what kind of progress you're making with Spanish.

I am super tired and this post is all crazy. I'll edit later. I just wanted to get it out because obviously tomorrow I'll be feeling much different.

Christmas isn't Suppose to be Hot

2010-12-16T15:44:00.006-05:00

I feel like I'm in an alternate universe with it being so HOT around Christmas time. Not to be gross, but my hands are actually sweating as I type this. That is not suppose to happen. I'm suppose to be walking around in a jacket and all times and stealing my mom's heating blanket. In fact, I'm usually home from school right now. Its. so. weird. But nice. Apparently its snowing up there in NC already which is usually doesn't do until late winter which means it has to be freezing up there. Nothing makes you appreciate the heat like knowing you will be going home in a few days where its in the 40s.

Another bizarre thing about the holiday season here, for me, is the lack of Christmas spirit and decoration. Its definitely there, but I'm used to being bombarded by Christmas commercials galore and gaudy decorations all over the place. Its a lot more chill. Tres Cruces knows how to get Christmas poppin' though. Unfortunately, I wasn't paying attention to the music to see if they were playing Christmas songs, but there were definitely a lot of discounts going on and whole lot of people there for a Thursday.

Even though I'm more than ready to go home and celebrate with my family a small part of me kind of wants to stay here and see how they get their Christmas on. Its much different in that on Nochebuena (Christmas Eve) they go out and party. Then they wake up late on Christmas day and open presents and just spend time with family. I think they also shoot off fireworks as I saw someone today selling them on the street, but then again those could be for New Year's. And, since families usually live pretty close together airports aren't packed (said the American Airlines lady) in Latin America. I found that interesting.

Here's our Christmas tree. I think it makes it seem like we live in the desert, haha. Its made of twigs and has colored rocks in the glass vase.

For those feeling a bit miffed after I failed to do 31 posts in October I hope to make it up in the next few days with a bunch of blogs I've been meaning to write. If anyone has any suggestions or something else they want to know about life in Uruguay let me know asap.

Speaking of heat, here's a link to my Beach Week photo album. Click around and you can find my other albums as well.

Being an Introverted Language Learner

2010-12-15T20:23:00.002-05:00

'I speak Spanish, I'm just introverted.' This label should be sharpied on to my forehead. I've met so many people who assume I don't speak a lick of Spanish despite being here for ten months and its just not true. A prime example is when a friend of mine, Rodrigo, took me to a music studio to take a class with him. The instructor sensed I wasn't talking very much and interpreted that as me not being able to under him began unnecessarily whipping out every English word he had ever learned while he tried to explain how to create a song on the computer. Every time he asked if I was understanding I would nod my head enthusiastically and insist that I did, but he still had Rodrigo translate just about everything for me until I finally told him that I can understand Spanish perfectly fine.

My thing is I'm not a fan of small talk and I get to the point when I speak. These are not great qualities in a language learner and I'm sure its the reason why my speaking skills still aren't amazing albeit they are SO much better than they used to be. I can't be too bothered by it though as I plan to speak Spanish for the rest of my life which means I'll get plenty of opportunities to keep improving and keep using it. It just kind of sucks though because so many people people probably think I don't like them when in all honesty I just don't know what to say.

I do have to say , however, that what I lack for in speaking skills is made up in my writing skills. Oh, yeah. So, just email me instead.... hah.

So, that was a little bit about me there. If you happen to be an introverted language learner I'd love to hear about it. I think I'm the only one ever I've met and I know there are more people like me out there.

Beach Week: Part 2

2010-12-15T16:48:00.006-05:00

Gah, I don't want to write this post but a part one needs a part two, so here we go....

Unfortunately the failed hitchhiking and hand written, probably really old bus schedule that had us all confused, meant I spent the better part of my day waiting for a bus we finally made it to Cabo Polonio. I was only there for three hours as I was running out of time in my trip and frankly didn't think I would have fun is the middle of nowhere but, boy, was I wrong. Cabo Polonio is a.w.e.s.o.m.e. You have to take a 30 minute caravan ride through the countryside and the beach just to get to it, the electricity turns off at 7pm, and they live in something like shacks. If I had the time I so would have stayed there for a few days. The vibe there is so chill and even though I'm a city girl I think I could enjoy that extreme. For a little while at least.

And, after Cabo came Punta del Diablo! I lovelovelove that place. It was a perfect mix of La Pedrera and Cabo Polonia in that it was still a chill place, but there was a little bit more going on in. I can tell its a huge hit for 20-somethings in the summer time. This is even where I got to try out surfing. I was so excited to do so and it was so fun. Its work too. I woke up the next day and definitely felt that workout in my shoulder muscles and my upper abs. I completely know understand why surfers are so ripped. Its completely worth it though. This is also where I met a really cool girl named Michelle from Scotland! We got along really well and she even invited me to stay with her in Scotland if I even made it up there which I hope to live there one day so we'll see.

----

And the moment you've all been waiting for... my stalker who really didn't stalk me (although it sounds better) so we'll call him a creeper. UGH. He grossed me out. OK, so I was in Rocha on my way to La Pedrera from Punta del Este when he walks by me with his friend and casually says 'hola' without breaking his stride. My guard was down after the dinner I just finished so I non-committedly uttered it back and turned my head when out of the corner of my eye I see dude stop and turn around. Oh my gosh. Before I know it he is sitting next to me telling me how beautiful I am and that he is going to go to sleep dreaming about me and how there aren't girls in Rocha that look like me and have my beauty. Puh-lease. I just did my best to fake like I didn't know Spanish very well, especially when he was talking about kissing me and coming to Cabo Polonia with me. Thank GOD my bus was arriving soon so I could get out of there.

Oh, you thought that was it?! Here is the best part. He kept on staring at me as I waited for my bus then as I chose my seat on the SAME SIDE as the park. Mistake. He ran up to the bus asking for a Uruguayan kiss-- heck no! Right as it was about to pull off he ran up to the door again still asking for a kiss. The bus driver assistant gave me the weirdest look ever and I just said adelante with a hand gesture that together meant don't-ask-just-freaking-go. And even better I had to go to Rocha TWICE after this incident as a lot of buses go through there and was thanking my lucky stars that I didn't see him again. No one in that park tried to help me out either. Thanks a lot, guys. END

Late Night List

2010-12-13T23:25:00.002-05:00

Its almost 3am the night before an exam and am tired of studying. So, that means my mind likes to move on to more creative things and in about 16 mins I managed to come up with a great list for how to avoid taking an oral exam. Its relevant because I'm here for school anyway and some of these definitely couldn't happen if i wasn't here. Yeah. I'm tired. Here we go...

47 Ways to show up to an exam and still avoid taking it:

1) i could just walk in and say hi then leave
2) i'll get drunk and then ill go
3) or i'll get high
4) ill get lost in the streets
5) i'll show up at the wrong time
6) or the wrong classroom
7) or the next day
8) ill pretend i already left the country
9) ill write him a note, ball it up, and chuck it into the room as i run past
10) ill walk in point to the person leaving the room and say ditto and then leave
11) ill learn how to juggle and just do that until he tells me to go
12) ill sit down then abruptly start to cry
13) i'lll call my mom when i walk into the room and tell her to tell him i dont feel well
14) ill tell him i'm pregnant and too emotionally distressed
15) ill tell him id rather be at the beach
16) i will scream my answers hoping he wont hear them
17) ill just stand in the doorway and wave
18) ill pretend to lose my voice
19) i'll poor ketchup on my arm and act surprised when he points it out and act like i've been shot
20) i will suddenly forget how to speak spanish
21) ill tell him in my bad spanish how i was abducted by aliens and they use an anal probe
22) ill sing everything to him
23) ill suddenly get a bad case of diarrhea
24) ill tell him i have to go blow my nose and never come back
25) i'll perform a ritual in the room and explain that it will give me good luck
26) i'll heave like im going to throw up
27) wet my pants and pretend like i did it as i walked into the room
28) start break dancing
29) just stare at him as he talks to me and waits for my answer
30) develop a case of tourettes!
31) start using sign language
32) demand an interpreter be present
33) tell him its that time of the month
34) be so hyper that i can't pay attention
35) space out and never space back in
36) says its my birthday and i expect full marks
37) tell him obama is my uncle and will start a nuclear war if i get anything below an 8
38) take a sip of water and accidently spray it in his face when he starts to ask a question
39) talk about nonsense
40) explain that i cant think without wearing earrings and go back to get them
41) tell him my dog died and i'm really upset about it
42) just hug him and dont let go
43) mimic him
44) break my leg on the way to the exam
45) pretend to be on to be a millionaire and spend way too much time on the sound effects
46) put my head down when i sit down and fall asleep
47) hold up the number 10 throughout the whole thing

leavemealonenight.

Beach Week: Part 1

2010-12-12T20:45:00.003-05:00

What with classes having ended and a week and a half until exams, I decided it was the best time to finally visit the eastern coast of Uruguay for real. (The other trip to Punta del Este definitely didn't count). And this is where I would like to say that beach week was still with me two days later.... in the form of heat rash. They are these tiny, itchy, little bumps that you can hardly see but that I can definitely feel on my arms and neck. I really should've read my own post about wearing sunscreen. Maaaan. Anyways my trip went a little like this:

Punta del Este was my first stop and frankly I wasn't too impressed. Maybe its because of the serious budget I'm on and the fact that the high season doesn't kick in until January but I didn't see anything too appealing about it besides that its surrounded by beaches. However, I did find a great restaurant that sold the best medialunas I've ever had. Delish! A definite highlight and lowpoint was going to the Isla Gorriti which is just a 10 minute boat ride off the coast of Punta. We got nice views of the city and it was cool to be on a more secluded beach. Unfortunately with it being low season the boat didn't come every hour like the hostel told us and we were in the sun with little shade for a whole extra hour waiting for it. Sunburn number one.

The next stop was La Pedrera which I can just never say right. This hostel was fun because I arrived at about 9pm to this rural city and was walking along dirt roads trying to find it despite none of the streets having actual names except for the main street. Yeah, it was that rural. It was the most scared I've been since I've got here. But I got through it thanks to a guy who came out of his at just the right time to kind of help me out and at least assure me that someone would at least know what I looked like if a wolf jumped out of the woods and dragged me away. At least thats what my overactive imagination at the time was thinking. It was a quaint town though with two main beaches. And I might have rented a surfboard with a swedish guy and almost tried to surf but quit after getting a nasty bruise on my wrist as the choppy waves kept throwing the board about. This is always where I tried hitchhiking with an English guy and gave up after a few hours. This stop was just full of fail. And let's not even talk about the $(*^%&* mosquitoes. I'm sorry La Pedrera, but we just shouldn't even be friends.

Well, that's the end to the first half of my week at the beach. As you can see it wasn't really all that fabulous, but the second half definitely made up for it. Also, stay tuned to hear about my stalker in Rocha. *shudders*

Fire in the Hole!

2010-12-10T15:03:00.002-05:00

About two nights go a popcorn machine exploded in the movie center in Punta Carretas Shopping and the mall was shut down for at least a full day while three cleaning crews worked to clean it up. None of the two thousand shoppers at the time were seriously hurt except for a few small injuries and some people who were effected emotionally by the scare. So, I won't be going to the movies on Saturday. Bummer.

But I mention this mostly because through this incident I found out that all the malls in the area (Punta Carretas, Montevideo, and Portones) have a night of discounts that is reminiscent of our black Friday. Its one night only and the earlier you come the bigger the discount. In fact, they are doing it tonight which is why its so good they managed to clean up and re-open that mall today as its the most pricey of them all.

For the news story and a short little video go here. The English and other language buttons are located on the top right of the page.

Thanksgiving

2010-12-05T17:57:00.004-05:00

El Día de Acción de Gracias was my first big holiday away from home.

First off, it was a little strange for me to have two night classes that very day when I usually only have half a week off of school just because just to celebrate this particular holiday. And since we were eating so late and I didn't get out of class until 9:10 I had to get all the recipes together and let Marie and her friend Rafael make it happen. Its unfortunate that we didn't have enough space in the oven to cook more than one big dish and one small dish at a time but always what with me having late classes and Marie and everyone having to work till 5:00 it just all couldn't be done the way I wanted it. So, the meal ended up being different-- and definitely way more healthier-- than anticipated but dang it was still good.

Everyone invited friends over and we scourged up chairs from all over our tiny apartment to accomodate all the people. They insisted that I say the prayer... in English... and very slowly. Somewhere in there I might have gotten nervous and said Happy Thanksgiving to Canada as well... haha. It was nerve-wrecking. And for dessert Flo, my guest, and me attempted funnel cakes which was halfway successful meaning that we burned half of them. But, hey, the ones that did make it out unburned tasted pretty good. And, I know funnel cake is not typically eaten after Thanksgiving dinner, but pies and things need to be made from scratch for the most part here as crusts and things aren't pre-made and we just wouldn't have had the time nor patience to make them. I had secretly been wanting to make funnel cake for a while though so that worked out perfectly for me.

Then right before we started eating I actually got my parents on Skype to check out how I was spending my Thanksgiving. I was video chatting with them and they were able to meet my Uruguayan family who used what English they knew to speak to my family and showed them all the food and the other friends we had invited over. So, I did manage to involve my family a little in the festivities. But that was my Thanksgiving.

P.S. The US lost the bid for the 2022 FIFA World Cup but now that just means we all get to travel all the way to Qatar to see it. And I'm googling Qatar right about now....

USA Bid

2010-11-28T22:09:00.002-05:00

I write this post for two reasons. The first one being that I totally saw Uruguayans being represented in the USA Bid video for the FIFA 2022 World Cup at 0:55 in the video. Whaaaat?!?!?! And the other reason being that I think you should sign the petition and bring the World Cup to the US in 2022. You down?

**BIDDING CLOSES DEC. 2ND AT 10AM ET**

P.S. Watching that video made me really homesick.

Did you know...?

2010-11-22T09:58:00.004-05:00

With summer fast approaching as we reach the high 70s... Did you know that Uruguay is reasonably close to the hole in the ozone? This is because there is less ozone not only in the "hole" of the ozone but around it as well. So, this makes the sun more dangerous in that one's skin is taking up much more UV rays which can be very harmful in the short and long haul. But, Casey, isn't that hole over Antartica (and never near me)? Why, yes it is. And Uruguay is not too far from Antartica really. Check out this picture. In the top right you can barely make out Uruguay.

So, wear your sunscreen! I just provided you scientific proof for why you should.

(Yeah, I'm not going to wear any either).

Restaurant Etiquette and Whatnot

2010-11-20T22:57:00.009-05:00

I hardly eat out anymore, but when I do it reminds that dining in Montevideo keeps you on your toes and definitely offers a different experience than what you're used to. By the way I wrote this one on the fly with no editing so if you think of something else I missed, let me know, eh?

1) Less embarrassing walk outs. Just about every restaurant has their menu located by the door on the window or on a stand. This is useful because instead of walking into a restaurant then walking out while your covering your face because you're not satisfied with their meal choices doesn't have to be such a big ordeal. You stand outside for a few minutes (or seconds) flipping through the menu then you decide in peace whether to walk in or walk away.

2) Remember your waiter's face.. Or waitress. As a rule of thumb, I assume the waiter/
waitress isn't going give me the time of day unless I wave him or her down and possibly spit out what I need as he/she rushes by and probably tries to pretend they don't hear me. I'm not saying 100% of waiters do this but maybe a good 70%. Then again I also try to eat at the cheapest restaurants possible so maybe that's my bad. Anyways, they don't come up to your table every 15 minutes to see how things are going which is actually kind of cool since you don't usually have to speak through a mouthful of chivito and say that everything's just great. You do, however, need to remember their face in case you need to ask for the menu, get drinks, place your food, ask for condiments and napkins, refills, and the check.

3) Abysmal napkins. Something this experience has taught me is how to make do with less. Like napkins. The ones here seem to be made from the smallest amount of material possible making them both thin and tiny. I remember the looks on our faces when Kelsey, Hayley and me first discovered them. "These are napkins?" we thought. Yes, sirree bob, they are. It takes some getting used to but now I know to hold down the container with one hand and just take a handful and lick your fingers when you inevitably run out of napkins two bits into your meal.

4) Drinks. The thing about drinks is that they usually come in a liter or 500cc. Look at the menu and make sure before you order so you're getting what you want. Also, if you want water specify if you want it with or without carbonation (con gas or sin gas). Also, a lot of people order beer all day long whether its Pilsen, Patria or that one in a green bottle that starts with a 'z'. So, no problem if you want a beer or even wine. Gotta bring your own maté though but I've seen it being sold just for tourists to try. And no free refills.

5) Asado. And you thought asado was only an outdoor activity while being surrounded by friends. A lot of places have nice big grills for asado and can fix you up a nice plate of various meats like a mini asado. Depending on the restaurant it might be doing to for just one person if you come hungry but a lot of people, a.k.a. foreigners who can't handle it, end up splitting it with at least one other person.

6) Cubiertos. You gotta watch out for these little suckers. In Colonia the signs outside the restaurants typically let you know about these cover charges that are fees to just eat in their restaurants, but in MVD I've never seen such signs. I also never get charged them unless I go into a fancy enough restaurant like in el Mercado del Puerto (Port Market) in Ciudad Vieja. I usually don't notice until the bill comes and by then its way too late. They aren't too bad though. I went to the Gold Club (yeah, I got friends like that) and the charge was about $28 pesos uruguayos which is about $1.50 if I'm not mistaken.

7) Propina. Typically people give 10% for tip and this is a good percentage for just about any service. I usually tip a little over though out of consciousness that 10% isn't really much and I almost feel like I'm taken advantage of them. Plus the waiters/ waitresses usually do a great job.

8) Rectangular Pizza. Yup, pizza comes in a rectangle here. I've gotten it as a circle ONCE and it was tiny. I think it was called a pizzetta. Whichever one is smaller. A uruguayan once told me she'd only see circle pizzas on American t.v. shows. Haha! It was like we were the ones with funny shaped pizzas.

Well, now you know how to dine in Uruguay. Also, keep in mind that the more touristy the place the more expensive it is like with anywhere else. Splurging on the Port Market is worth it though. And if you want to get away from the high prices try further down 18 de Julio and especially on its side streets. But be careful of course.

P.S. By the way in exactly 30 days i will land I will be sleeping in my very own bed. I'm so excited!

Rock + Candombe

2010-11-09T22:12:00.002-05:00

I finally got to witness the alternative sub-culture in Uruguay. And it was wonderful.

A friend, Sonja, and I were walking back from dinner in Ciudad Vieja via 18 de Julio this past weekend and we happened upon a free mini rock concert in the park where "dieciocho" and Tristan Narvanja connect.. We sat ourselves down near the front and watched as the drunk, high, energy-filled crowd grew crazier and crazier with each song. By the last two numbers I had been stepped on twice and Sonja got wine spilled on her. Can't have a rock show without some casualties. Unfortunately, there was no screaming (my favorite), but seeing a mosh pit more than made up for it. (I must learn this word in Spanish.) By the time we left all kinds of beer and wine bottles were smashed on the ground and I had my fix of head-banging. Must experience more of this.

And Sunday I went with Analía and Andrea to watch candombe, a type of music born in Uruguay that involves lots of drums. It wasn't really what I was expecting, but what I got wasn't a let down either. The group turned out to be uniquely all women and they walked? Shuffled is the more appropriate term. But while they were playing they actually moved down three blocks. I was not expecting that. Uruguay is just shocking me lately. First with Halloween, then I discovered dulce de leche in banana split ice cream is da bomb, and now I find out that the groups of candombe move about in the neighborhood in which they originate? Blow my mind, Uruguay.

Last but not least I drank two mates while waiting for the drumming to start. Faces were made as I drank them, but I tried. I wish so badly that I liked the stuff so I could be just a tad bit more uruguayan, but my taste buds aren't having it. It needs sugar! But I won't say that to the uruguayans anymore who exclaim to me, "¡Pero es una bebida amarga! (But its suppose to be a bitter drink!). Bleh, I say.

I just tried downloading a video of the candombe, but it didn't work. Probably for the best as it wasn't great quality in the first place. So, here as some pictures from that night and unfortunately no pictures of the concert.

The flag

The drums

Casey drinking mate?!

Halloween

2010-11-07T22:51:00.004-05:00

Halloween as the uruguayans say it (emphasizes on the 'hall' and not the 'ween') actually happened here in Uruguay. I was shocked that they celebrated this holiday especially since I did a presentation about holidays that are more American than anything focusing on Independence Day, Halloween, and Thanksgiving where not one person told me that Halloween was actually celebrated here. So, imagine my shock when I walk into Ta Ta (I'm really trying to stop shopping there) and see a whole aisle dedicated to Halloween costumes and decorations.

It made me really excited though because if Halloween is celebrated then that means I didn't get to miss out on dressing up. Win! So, on Saturday I went to Tres Cruces (aka Ta Ta) to find a costume, walked the entire length of 18 de Julio, then took a bus back to Tres Cruces. I didn't need to go to Ta Ta the last time because I walked into at least two Ta Ta's on 18 de Julio... I really am trying. Never said I was succeeding though.

So, I managed to get my costume together, one could only guess my costume by the red witch's hat, and later that night I headed to a party hosted by P¡nk in some abandoned building along Artigas. I don't know. I keep trying to explain it and it just sounds like a bunch of kids met up in an abandoned building and did shady things. I promise it was an organized event with a real life flyer and everything. Still not sure exactly where it was though.

We danced to electronic music, took pictures in a photo booth, and stood around and talked when the music and light set-up blew the power out. It was fun and definitely way more than I thought I would have been doing for Halloween this year. Thanks, Carolina, for inviting me last minute. :D

But, yes, Halloween is celebrated here and it gets bigger and bigger each year apparently. The kids go treat-or-treating to a few houses and the grown-ups have a previa and go out partying. It depends on the party if you have to dress up or not. Now you know.

p.s. As of Nov. 7th, Uruguay is now 3 hours ahead of the east coast of the US. I say this because every single clock on my laptop has the wrong time and I know I'm not the only one. Even my email is affected so I never know if someone just sent me an email or sent it to me an hour ago. I'm working on a logarithm to figure this one out....

The End is Near!!! (Review)

2010-10-31T21:50:00.001-04:00

In two months today, I will be boarding an overnight flight back to my real home and wishing my family spoke Spanish. I can't believe it. I remember thinking "oh my gosh, I'm going to be here foreverrrrr". I'm pretty sure I even titled another review almost that exact title. I just can't believe it.

I'm mostly going to be spending my last 50 days doing things I haven't done before and if exams and time allow I'll hopefully still make it to Santiago, Chile. Who knows! I'm going to try to go up the Telecommunications tower, check out the visual arts museum in Parque Rodó as well as the Torres-García Museum in Ciudad Vieja, try a milanesa (yes, I've avoided them this long), go to a couchsurfing gathering, visit Malvin, visit Punta del Este for real, and other things I found of the list of activities from Día de Patrimonio. Also, I want to eat something completely different every time I go out to eat until I leave. No more hamburgers, pizza, or chivitos. Time to step out of the comfort zone.

My Spanish has reached a plateau-- and I'm cool with that. The days where I seemed to be learning at least a whole textbook chapter worth of Spanish are long gone. I know how to interact with people in all the daily things and if I don't, I have gotten pretty good at charades. I still makes tons of mistakes, but I am working on them as well as using the voseo. Say what? I've purposely been not using it because I didn't want to go through the trouble of un-learning it later, but I really like it now. In fact, I am in love with how Uruguayans speak Spanish though they should really slow it down sometimes. But my two latest "Oh, wow, look how much my Spanish improved moments" actually occurred pretty close together. One was in Brazil as I was surrounded by about 19 other people speaking Spain Spanish and Mexican Spanish and speaking to me. I was able to handle it very well even if I still have to ask people to repeat things more than I should. The second one occurred during a group project meeting. There is this girl who speaks so fast in my Anthropology class that I just couldn't really be friends with her because I am constantly asking her to repeat things or just simply nodding like I understand, but in that group project I felt like someone turned the slow-mo dial down a few notches. I could finally understand her without staring her down. Progress!

(And by staring her down what I mean to say is that when I find it hard to understand what someone is saying I have to read their lips and their face to help me out. I'm sure to them I look super intense, but it helps me out.)

*Sigh* I still have another 50 days and I'm using every single one to improve my language skills and explore what is still left. I'm excited to get back home to family and friends and to graduate too, but, man, I am going to miss this place.

Iguazu Pictures

2010-10-31T21:31:00.002-04:00

Iguazu

*Captions Coming Soon*

P.S. I added Day 3 of the Iguazu trip to the post "Cataratas".

Desayuno

2010-10-28T09:07:00.004-04:00

I got lucky and had my morning class cancelled today which meant I had time to spare for breakfast at McDonalds. I was disappointed in the lack of choices and the lack of pancakes. Or even a McMuffin. The menu only consisted of small ham and cheese sandwiches, medialunas (think croissants with a sugar glaze), donuts, and coffee.

I only chose a donut and a medialuna as I have had way too many ham and cheese sandwiches whilst here and the cashier gave me the weirdest look for not wanting only that. I think she asked if I wanted coffee about three times. Gotta love those moments that remind me I'm a foreigner with weird eating habits. And, by the way, I am not a fan whatsoever of Uruguayan coffee. Admittedly I don't like coffee in the first place, but no matter how much sugar I put into it I just can't seem to enjoy it.

On the good side though that donut and medialuna tasted awesome. The donut even reminded me of Dunkin Donuts. I will definitely be having bfast at Mcdonalds again and I'll even try it with coffee to complete the experience. Maybe.

Cataratas

2010-10-27T13:06:00.004-04:00

Day 2:
We visited the smaller Brazilian side of the waterfalls (cataratas) which offered a great view. We took a bus to a drop off point where we walked a trail and caught glimpses of the falling water as we walked. By the time we reached the end of the path we were at the U-shaped juncture of several waterfalls. There was a platform you could go out on to be super close to what you've been photographing for at least an hour before and, of course, get soaked if you didn't have to bring or buy a poncho before you headed out there.

Since it only took a few hours to knock down this side of the waterfalls people kind of did their own thing afterwards. I visited the mall since its one of the things I like doing in new countries. Nothing really spectacular about it until I hit the third floor food court. There was a variety of food! I was so surprised and happy. I went to every single restaurant minus the Subway and looked at all the menus. You just don't get choices like this in Uruguay where you'll find a lot of the same dishes in different restaurants all over the country.

The language barrier did pop up on this visit though as realized that I seriously knew virtually no Portuguese except Obrigada, or thank you. I just had to point to what I had a question about and the guys behind the counter had to put their heads together to come up with a response in English or Spanish. It was a lot of effort to order a hamburger with pineapple. What? I didn't realize that rice and beans was traditional Brazilian food until after. Oops?

Day 3:
We visited the Argentinian side through a reservation with the hostel which meant we got a ride there and back, help with customs both ways (we handed the guy all our passports, he disappeared inside with them, came back, and voila), and a tour guide in the park. I took advantage of the tour guide and was really glad for it because he managed to show us the highlights of the park in just the few hours that we had to spend at the park. We walked a trail where we kept catching glimpses of waterfalls until we started heading for the boat tours where we got a great few of the falls. I was against the boat ride at first and was not even dressed for it (jeans), but it was hot and I didn't to pass up that photo op. Everyone started screaming when we met the blast of the falls, but it was more because it was freezing! Completely worth it though. We then kept hiking in our wet clothes except for the fortunate few who brought swimsuits or extra clothes and arrived to the top of the U-shaped falls. It was great looking down and remembering I was down there yesterday and now I'm up here and in a different country.

Then before crossing back over to Brazil to change clothes and head to the airport we made one more stop. The "Three Frontiers" is a point where you can stand and see the intersection of river where Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay come together. Each has a cone shaped thing (sorry, my English is failing me at the moment) painted in the colors of their flag that you can see from standing on the coast of whichever country at that point. Of course, I saw the lack of coast guard and security in general watching out for the borders and wondered if this was a great smuggling place at night when the tourists went back to their hotels, but that's just me.

We then almost uneventfully board our plane back to MVD and arrived home around two in the morning. Talk about a long day.

So, which day/ side was better? I think to get the complete picture you should visit both sides. BUT if I had to choose one... Argentina. You get to walk around in the forest AND see falls up close and personal. And, that side spoke Spanish. Big plus.

Three Countries in Three days

2010-10-26T23:49:00.004-04:00

So, I went to Brazil, Argentina, and kinda Paraguay this past weekend. Frankly, the area didn't have as much to do as I thought it would. Despite there being twenty people in our group, the city of Foz do Iguacu, Brazil doesn't have much else outside of the waterfalls. So, we spent our days catching glimpses of waterfalls through the trees and our nights hanging out at the hostel though we did luck out one night when one of the workers at the hostel invited us out.

Day 1:
Unfortunately, it rained enough the first day to probably ruin the views of the waterfalls. But we had three full days to spend in we took this rainy day to visit ITAIPU which is a power plant and a dam at the same time. This is where I learned that Brazil tourism operates in three languages: , English and Spanish. Our poor tour guide had to translate everything she said three times in all three languages and it was obvious she was exasperated at the idea. She even tried to get on me for wanting to speak English, but I had to get on the defensive and tell her that I definitely did not raise my hand for that one, but the seasoned gentleman at the back of the bus did. I can understand Spanish just fine thank you very much.

During the visit to the dam/ power center we even entered Paraguay... for about two minutes. Maybe less. That's because ITAIPU is a joint venture run by both the Paraguayan and Brazilian governments. So, when we crossed the halfway point of the dam we changed countries. Didn't even need our passports.

And allow me to say that Brazilian public buses are hell when you have twenty people with luggage who have never boarded a bus in Brazil. First off, don't even think about handing them a bill worth 50 reales that you received in an exchange booth the day before. You will get a fierce shake of the head and a wave of the hand telling you back away until you figure out how to make that bill into something much smaller like a 2 real bill. Also, there is a pesky gate you have to wesel through after you've paid your fair. I am not a big person by any means, but I had trouble getting through it and my luggage was a added problem. Not to mention there were less seats and way more standing room. That got pretty uncomfortable after spending hours walking in the wilderness snapping pictures of waterfalls.

The first day was alright all in all. It also helped so much that Portuguese speakers can understand Spanish more or less and vice versa so the language barrier was hardly a problem.

P.S. If you count Uruguay, it was four countries in three days.

Montevideo, Minnesota

2010-10-26T00:02:00.002-04:00

Anyone who has ever put in 'montevideo' on google knows that there is also a Montevideo, Minnesota. Whoop dee doo, right? Wrong! Can you believe that they are sister cities? The city in Minnesota (MN) was purposely named after it's Uruguayan namesake though the reasons are unclear from my viewpoint. There is a statue there resurrected for Jose Artigas, Uruguay's national hero given to the community by Uruguayan citizens. Then to top it all off every year Montevideo, MN celebrates Fiesta Days in honor of it's sister city down here in Uruguay.

How awesome!

Inferiority Complex

2010-10-21T02:01:00.003-04:00

It is late as all get out, but I ran across an article that explains the attitude of Uruguayans toward their own country which I liked. I so wish I could have been there for when Uruguay played Costa Rica in a home game last year to qualify for the World Cup. It sounded insane.

Uruguay's Inferiority Complex

Yeah...

2010-10-20T00:40:00.003-04:00

I completely forgot about another Uruguay reference I heard about. I was watching True Blood online and he was talking about places he lived and mentioned Uruguay. Get this. He even said it right. This is probably because he was hispanic but nevertheless!

This blog has no real meaning but to make up for one of the posts I missed. Hey look a youtube video of comedian Gabriel Iglesias that has Spanish at the end!

The Classroom

2010-10-19T14:14:00.001-04:00

I figured since I'm "studying" in the library anyways that I'd finish up this post while I'm here. I know I've already generally talked about my uruguayan university, but I thought I'd highlight some of the differences.

1) For people like me who are consistently five to ten minutes late to class, Uruguayan classrooms are forgiving and even welcoming. A lot of my classes start five minutes later than what the schedule says and teaches often greet me by name as I stroll into the lesson a few minutes late. However, I do say disculpa, excuse me, as a courtesy when the class has already started as will everyone coming in behind me .

2) Say "hello" again to individual desks. I might have had desks in three classes classes throughout my college career not including the fold out insta-desk in auditorium classrooms, but here it's every class. It kinda makes me miss the extra space and freedom you get from tables, but then again now there is a built-in foot rest on the bottom of your chair.

3) The policy for cell phones isn't as strictly adhered to. It's a given that students are going to text and that their phones will go off in the middle of class, but the teachers hardly get irritated about it. In the states, the cell phone policy is often written in the syllabus and discussed on the first day of class and some lucky classrooms even get points taken away if it's seen or heard. After seeing the student scramble to muffle the device with a mumbled disculpa the teacher usually nods or smiles slightly and let's it go. What!? That is no fun.

4) There are always random English words being said. They typically involve technology terms like "web" or companies and people, but they also use select English terms/ phrases such as "play date" and some of which I know are random English my teachers and classmates remember and just want to say since I'm in the room. These ones just make me smile. But it surprised me a little to hear them using my native language in the classroom albeit selectively. I know English is the universal language these days, but it's different to experience your own language that way.

4) No laptops in class. There isn't even a policy for it. They are never use plus there's the added advantage that it's dangerous to carry it on your person in the streets. Just leave it at home loading movies while you're in class and use the computer labs between classes to check what's going on in cyberspace. That's what I do.

5) There is a lot less work... in a way. For the most part all my classes have midterms, second midterms, then finals. That's it. Your grade is those three tests. Good luck, sucker! (Channeling Mitch Hedberg for that joke). Hah, but just kidding. Sometimes you write a paper. And, that's it. It's definitely a less forgiving system with no chance of extra credit which makes it harder and also you have a whole lot more material to study for just one test. Of course, if you're an international student, you have the chance to talk to your professor about doing extra work, or maybe less work if you happen to sign up for a course where you write multiple and/or extensive papers, and have more focused tests.

6) You get to save money on textbooks because their are none. Yay! You still having plenty of reading material though. Instead they use every but a textbook like the library, book stores, and the sometimes faithful fotocopiadora (Photocopy Center). It definitely saves money (as long as you don't have a literature class), but it also makes it harder to find the reading material compared to simply finding a chapter out of your textbook. Serious pros and cons to this one.

6) And, obviously the general format and unspoken rules of the classroom are different. Things that often go unsaid for them that needs to be said for you like holidays and strikes which mean days off. Then if you're in two different faculties like I am some procedures/days off/ exams times are different as well. I have learned to just ask when I'm not sure why we are suddenly watching a movie in class, can't find a book, or don't know if we have class or not that day. Plus it opens up another opportunity to talk some Spanish. Oh, yeah.

Other useful things:
- A carilla is one side of the page; a pagina is both sides.
-This doesn't apply to international students who usually only stay one semester, but you actually have three chances to take your final for the course on scheduled dates throughout the next year.
-Sneaking drinking mate is hard to do, but I've seen it done.
- Papers are single spaced instead of double.

Literature

2010-10-18T17:52:00.001-04:00

I don't know why I'm so worried about not being to find any books about Uruguay or by Uruguayan authors when I return to the states, but I am for some reason. So, let me mention some Uruguayan writers I've read whilst in the UM:

Horacio Quiroga: I would name him my favorite mostly because he has written children stories and I love uncomplicated story lines that speak volumes. He had a really sad that affected him deeply and it shows in his work. For example, I read one of his short stories for kids where a turtle had his head almost severed off and was barely hanging on to his body. I wrote a short paper on his collections of stories titled Cuentas de la Selva.

Idea Vilariño: She wrote wonderful poetry about love and heartbreak about Juan Onetti who was her lover, but refused to leave his wife for her. How sad!

Juan Carlos Onetti: He was once admitted into a mental institution which can explain why he chose to write psychological stories. As an accomplished novelist and author of short stories, he also managed to win the National Prize in Uruguay for literature and was a distinguished writer in Latin America.

Love these authors and want more? Uruguay experienced a boom in literature from 1945 to 1950. There is a list of about 15 other writers.

If it's Uruguayan history books you're after, Benjamín Nahum and José Pedro Barrán have got your back. Both wrote a series of books about the history of Uruguay titled Manual de Historia del Uruguay and Historia Uruguaya, respectively, with the last compilation being the more descriptive of the two.

*Picture is of the book section of the Tristan Narvaja outdoor market that takes place every Sunday. If you don't wake up in time on Sunday, there's also a lot of book stores along the same street that are open Monday through Saturday.

Party Hardy

2010-10-18T00:42:00.004-04:00

I regret I wasn't able to get a picture, but the other night I managed to see some bachelorette party-goers just starting out their night around three in the morning. I love how here you can point out the group with no effort whatsoever. They usually have a theme going so everyone is dressed up accordingly. The girls from last night all wore the same funky head bands in varying colors of pink, were holding pink balloons and I think they all had on pink shirts. The soon to be bride was easily identifiable as she wore a pink wig with a veil. If all that didn't grab your attention, just about every car that passed them was honking away as the girls went "Whoooo!". I wonder if it was a Black Out Korea kind of night.

Speaking of parties full of girls, Analia celebrated her birthday last Thursday. She's actually not big into partying up her birthday because she thinks she's getting old at 27 so I doubt I witnessed a real uruguayan birthday celebration, but she did invite a bunch of friends over and we stayed in and had pizza. My favorite! Then she grabbed a bunch of bite sized desserts from a confitería, or a bakery, and we chowed down on those. And, Analia fussing at her mom and repeatedly telling her "Máma, es MI cumpleaños-- Cállate!" (Mom, it's MY birthday-- shut up!) was awesome too. :P

P.S. Seriously check out that Black Out Korea website. Do Koreans know how to party hardy or what?

Total Uruguay Expat Meeting

2010-10-11T17:12:00.002-04:00

On Sunday (yesterday) I went to my first expat meeting sponsored by the Total Uruguay website. It was nice to meet fellow foreigners in Montevideo who weren't actually studying abroad, but retiring here or simply just setting up house for a while. It was a nice change of pace. They meet ever Sunday as they have for almost 5 years now at an Italian restaurant in Pocitos. It was kind of weird going as I'm not living here long-term yet not exactly passing through either. They accepted me either way and even joked about what exactly is an "expat"? They really are a nice group of people and a great reason to wake up a little early on Sundays. I'd definitely recommend it and hopefully I'll be able to go again before I leave.

Día de Patrimonio

2010-10-10T20:50:00.001-04:00

I know this post is a few weeks late, but August 25th and 26th were Día(s) de Patrimonio here in Uruguay which translates into Heritage Day. Basically, museums, some embassies, naval ships, and the like were open for free all weekend to tourists and locals alike to celebrate the local culture. I didn't enjoy as many of the sites as I would like due to my waking up after noon and having to stand in long lines by the time I did make it out of the apartment. However, I was able to upload the program for the weekend and have a nice, new long list of things to see and do in MVD. Did I mention most of it is free any other day as well?

The website I managed to snag the list of events is still up here (only available in Spanish) and if you click around like I did you can eventually find the file with the list which you can upload to your computer.

Some things I was able to do over this weekend were tour the Peñarol museum, a church, see inside the Mexican embassy, and visit the Carnaval museum which I had been dying to see since I first heard about it and some other things as well of course. Marie and me even got to watch a full sunset from the pier alongside the port after everything closed down.

For pictures check out this.

Parque de Diversiones

2010-10-09T19:50:00.005-04:00

Ah, Spring. It's still on the chilly side, but at least it looked beautiful today. So much so that I went for a walk with a fellow North Carolinian around MVD after lunch and later hung out with Marie and Analía who drove us to Parque Rodó where we rode some of the rides in the amusement park and chowed down on some churros. I had the ones filled with chocolate and they were delish. It was a small park so it turned out to be OK that I ate before riding anything. Thank goodness. Enjoy the pictures and if you click around you can find the rest of my pictures as well.

Parque de Diversiones

Paro

2010-10-07T12:20:00.003-04:00

Today Uruguay is having a "dry strike", un paro seco, against the government of Pepé Mujica as he starts working on a new budget proposal. This means a lot of people are going on strike by not working today. Some services affected: Transport (buses, taxis), banks, health (except emergencies), Schools (all public schools and la República, the city council, among a few others. UM still had classes, but midterms today were postponed until next Thursday as some people can't get to school since the buses aren't running.

Here's an article in the national Uruguayan newspaper, El País. On the upper righthand side of the page you can choose the language of the article by clicking on the corresponding flag.

Oh, and our cleaning lady went on strike too. We actually had to take our own trash out for once. :P

Joaquín Torres García

2010-10-06T21:59:00.000-04:00

Joaquín Torres García (1874-1949) is a popular Uruguayan artist. He developed a technique called constructive universalism, and this combined with the colors white, blue, yellow, and red are some signatures García's later paintings that can be found all over tourist items such as magnets, t-shirts, and hand bags. He actually had a strong argument for changing his painting style so drastically which you can somewhat see through a progression on his drawings I managed to find on the internet below. His idea was that Latin America needs to find its own identity away from that of Europe by drawing artistic inspiration from the indigenous people of their region of the world while also using universal abstraction. Interesting, huh? My favorite painting of his has to be the one of South America inverted. Don't even need a teacher to explain that one to me. :D

A museo dedicated to García is located right by Plaza Independencia at Peatonal Sarandí 683 and if you can don't happen to be in Uruguay you can check out the website.

I Don't Know What to Call This

2010-10-05T12:24:00.002-04:00

I had this written a while ago (Sept. 25), but I was holding on for pictures.

First, I betrayed my beloved Penarol when I went to a Nacional game this past weekend. My friend Sol and I went to another smaller stadium by Parque Batlle called Parque Central. The game was somewhat exciting as a player got nailed pretty badly in the first fifteen minutes of the game and one red card was given to Nacional. One thing I hate about soccer games though it that I just don't know what to say. My Spanish may be coming along, but I don't know how to talk trash at a soccer game very well. I can, however, tell the flag person where to shove their flag (Por que no te metes la bandera en el medio del orto?) and a few other basic things like Corre, hijo de puto, corre!, but not much else. It was good fun overall though. We sat in the setting sun the entire time which means the sun was in our eyes for a good portion of the game, but it was actually a lovely, warm day which we are getting more of these past couple of weeks, so I didn't complain too much.

The next thing was el Dia de UM that took place on September 22nd. The university gave us tickets to trade for food and in between panchos and hamburgers you could play games like miniature soccer and basketball, ride a bull (I almost lost my camera on this sucker), and find a friend to beat up with padded fighting poles. It reminded me so much of the sober night event my high school hosted immediately after prom except the promotion of sobriety wasn't happening even if we were in the courtyard of a high school. Unfortunately, my camera faked me out by looking like it was charging for hours the night the before, but didn't so I have no pictures of my own to show. However, I will take no shame in stealing them from my friends' facebook accounts to show you guys.

In other news, I think I found someone who I can formally teach English. I can already tell it's going to be a challenge, but a good one. I'm just glad she can't speak English as well I can like so many other people I have met here or it would be entirely too easy. My first time teaching her will be this upcoming week so we'll see how it goes!

Rap in the Unlikeliest of Places

2010-10-04T20:53:00.000-04:00

So, in my sociolinguistics class a few weeks ago we were talking about how the Bible has influenced English and one of the uruguayans started to sing Gangsta's Paradise by Coolio. How in the world did that song even reach this side of the world?! In case you never heard of the song, the rap starts with the Lord's prayer "As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death...", which we were talking about in class that day. Imagine a uruguayan girl rapping that in the middle of class. Unfortunately our older British professor did not get the joke at all, but that was his loss. I, however, was having trouble breathing from laughing so hard.

Procrastinators Unite... in Latin America

2010-10-03T18:01:00.001-04:00

Two time zones may separate the east coast of the US (GMT -5) and Uruguay (GMT -3) causing a one hour time difference in the winter time and three hours in the summer, but this is not the only time difference to be overcome. Welcome to Uruguayan time where you can add an "-ish" to whatever time and still be on time. Anyone familiar with Latin America has already heard of this phenomenon, but experiencing it is another, wonderful thing.

I don't feel bad about late for anything here. Usually how late I am depends on the situation. If it is a very informal situation such as a party, which they don't really get going until about 2:00 or 3:00 a.m., I will be hours late. For more formal things like class and meetings about school I'll be up to 10 minutes late. Anything definitely formal or serious I will be on time for like exams... nope, not those. Meetings with International Program personnel... not them either. Or maybe... no, definitely not that. Hm, I think the only thing I've seriously had to be on time for were the UM sponsored trips that went by a strict schedule. This country really is very informal.

In fact, I don't think I have ever heard someone say "You're late" to anyone. Ever. And it's so nice to be in a place that doesn't stress being on time. Of course, being punctual is still a valued trait as Latin America most often tries to adopt Western rules when it comes to looking professional, however the times when this is necessary are obvious such as appointments with the embassies or a hospital/clinic, job interviews, and arriving to work on time only if your job requires it, of course.

I know this new time system is going to bit me in the butt when I get back to the states. Enjoying it while I can.

*Edit. To make things even more complicated I just figured out the States and Uruguay don't change their clocks at the same time. In Uruguay we will be moving our clocks ahead one hour today, October 3rd, while the states will move their clocks back our hour November 7th. That means there will now be a two hour time difference between the east coast and Uruguay. On November 7th it will be a three hour difference. Have fun processing that.

79 days till I'm US bound.

Afro-Uruguayans

2010-10-03T00:04:00.005-04:00

1) 4% of the population in Uruguay is Afro-Uruguayan. This is compared to the caucasian population being 88% and mestizo (mixed) being 8%.

2) On a typical day, I see one other black person and he goes to my school. He's really tall; he can't be missed. It's mostly the fact that I go to a private school and happen to live in a decent neighborhood. Depending which way I walk to and from school I might see the black lady who tends to the cars on the street around the corner. I have never spoken or had a reason to speak to either of them.

3) I want to steal the black lady's dreads.

4) Afro-uruguayans are known for two things: being brought into the MVD port and mostly shipped elsewhere in Latin America and candombe.

5) Their contribution to society has been greatly overlooked with Soccer players as the majority of the most notable of the Afro-Uruguayans.

6) I have no idea where they get their hair done. It's probably why 80% of girls I see are wearing braids or have their hair cut really short.

7) The stereotype of being black in Uruguay isn't a particularly positive one. While most people have been treating me with respect I have had instances where kids will openly point me out to their mothers (cute), mothers will yank their kids away from me (really?), and my favorite is when I was standing in line at McDonalds and a guy grabbed his wife and pulled her to his other side, wrapped his arm around her, and kept looking at me the entire time I was waiting for my order like I was going to do something (rude). These occurrences, thankfully, are few and far in-between.

8) I feel like there is no black subculture here at all. I'm not all tied up in the this particular subculture in the states, but I miss it something awful sometimes.

9) This one is just opinion, but I feel like I have a much lower chance of getting robbed. This upsets me a little because number two on my list of things to accomplish here was to not get robbed and it seems like no one is even going to try.

Afro-Uruguayan Alvaro Pereira who started for Uruguay in the 2010 FIFA World Cup

Why Uruguay?

2010-10-01T01:34:00.000-04:00

This post will kick off my writing marathon of 31 posts in 31 days. Prepare for nonsense and happy October!!

This question always follows the typical conversation of "Where are you from?", "Do you like Uruguay?", and "Are you travelling?" that every extranjero experiences when they meet natives of the country they just happened to arrive in. But my favorite question after "Are you from Chile?" to which I immediately think "did you just inadvertently call me a native Spanish speaker? Why yes, then. I am from Chile." But as my second favorite question, "Why Uruguay" I like it because it reminds me after seven months of catching my first glimpse of Uruguayan fields how I came to be here in Montevideo, Uruguay of all places.

So... Why Uruguay? I am a Spanish major seeking fluency through a year in Spanish, so hence the study abroad in the first place. Now, my heart has been set on Mexico ever since I discovered my passion for Spanish and the lucky people out there that happen to have been born in hispanic America. Unfortunately, the Mexican drug wars occurred right as the final deadline came which made my parents very uneasy and to be honest I was no where near prepared enough mentally to take such a big voyage away from everything I knew for an entire academic year. So, I got to sit on this decision to study abroad for the rest of the semester and during winter break while I got my mind straight and prepared to go somewhere in South America as that was the only way this late in the game that I could still study abroad for two consecutive semesters. (S.A. has reverse seasons compared to N.A. which means the first semester begins in March). The only thing I really knew was that I didn't want to attend a university located in a big and, even worse, touristy city. I remember my supervisor throwing out Uruguay because she had studied in Argentina and our school had a program nearby in Uruguay. (I don't think a program in Argentina was available at the time). I did some research online and decided Uruguay would be perfect.

Now that I'm here I get asked this question all the time by uruguayans who can't believe I would actually chose Uruguay over all the other cities and countries in Latin America. So, as those three months of winter break passed where I was constantly looking up new information on Uruguay and beginning to fall in love with it, my answer morphed into something like this: most students in the states go to either Mexico or Spain. I wanted to do something different and go some place less explored in South America. And can I be anymore different by going to Uruguay? No one I know has ever travelled to Uruguay and I certainly have never met any uruguayans. Plus, it would be a great opportunity to explore a place that is often called the Sweden of South America and educate people about it as I will be giving a presentation about my year abroad at my university when I return.

Despite the fact that Uruguay wasn't my first choice, I don't regret coming to Uruguay one bit. I like what I've gotten out of this experience academically and personally plus my Spanish is 400% better. Mission accomplished with three months to go.

Semana Internacional

2010-09-18T15:29:00.006-04:00

The students at la Universidad de Montevideo got to experience the first ever International Week which took place this past Wednesday through Friday. A few of the international students participated by giving presentations on their home countries and universities. Honestly, I had class during both days of presentations so I can't really say too much about them though I was able to see a little bit of the Powerpoint slideshow by our Canadian students before I had to scoot to class. However, I did hear good things about these charlas from the domestic students who attended. I'll take their word for it.

Then on Friday we had everyone come together to eat food and play games from their respective countries. Unfortunately, this day didn't incite much participation and only three countries were represented. I'd like to think it was something about the event taking place in the evening on a Friday, but who knows. The uruguayans loved this day the most though. They were able to build a true mexican piñata thanks to Saira, enjoy an apple and grape strudel made by Nina from Germany, and dive into a marble cake decorated with M&Ms embedded in the frosting, chocolate chips cookies, and sugary sweet tea straight from the southern part of the States thanks to Sunny and me. I admit I only did the tea. My reasoning is this: I can barely cook a decent meal for myself yet alone a savory dish representative of my own country. Plus, the people needed something to drink. So, really I was thinking of the group as a whole with my decision to stick to beverage making. You're welcome.

In other news, more pictures have been added to the Picasa web albums if you haven't checked it out recently. They all still aren't up yet because my USB likes to says its full when its not

A Video

2010-09-11T19:19:00.004-04:00

I just happened upon an informative video about Uruguay. By the way, the manner in which he says 'Uruguay', 'Montevideo' and 'Buenos Aires' drove me craazy. :P Disfruten!

Vete, Santa Rosa!

2010-09-04T19:06:00.003-04:00

Santa Rosa would be the current rain storm our region of South America has been experiencing for four days now. Today I'm just staying in the apartment because it's just not fun outside. Though a good story did come out of all of this. Analia came in soaked two days ago and I asked her where was her umbrella. She proceeds to curse about how the wind was blowing her umbrella around till she said screw it and got completely soaked walking home from work umbrella-less. Probrecita!

Forunately, staying in yesterday and today has given me time to upload pictures. How exciting! Months after being here I finally am able to post pictures online for all you out there to see. Much organizing and many more pictures need to be added, but to put a better visual to my experience down here I present to you: Casey's Picasa Web Albums.

There are pictures from the Colonia trip a few weeks ago. We mostly just walked around and hung out, but it was a great time. By the way, it was freezing when we went. Don't let the pictures fool you. Then one day I went for a walk and managed to walk ALL the way to the port, from Artigas mind you, and barely catch a sunset. It was kind of foolish for me to do that seeing as how Ciudad Vieja is very dangerous at night, but you'll see I took the rambla route and managed to snap a few more cool pictures. And then, in Spanish class we had a day where an instructor came in and taught us the basic steps of tango and the same day I told Analia about it and she practiced with me in the apartment.

So, there. All about my new online photo albums and unblogged moments in one paragraph. Someone referred to my blogs as novels, so I'm trying to stop being so wordy. Enjoy the albums!

August Review

2010-08-31T22:06:00.004-04:00

Alright, I'm sticking to my two month review thing I have going.

Number one question: How's the Spanish? I don't even know anymore. I speaka the Spanish but there are still moments where I freeze up and stare at people, like right about a two hour class in English, and people have stopped correcting me. I know the latter is a good thing, but I know for a fact that I don't speak perfectly and it's rather ambiguous when people just stop correcting you. Does that mean what I say makes sense or have they learned how to understand my non-perfect Spanish and just don't bother to correct it anymore?

Man, I really hate to admit this, but I just want to go home lately. I'm not going to moan and groan in a post but I'm dealing with things both here in Uruguay and in the States and it's stressing me out. I think a trip to Buenos Aires is in order where I will splurge on McDonalds and Starbucks coffee then visit a mall. And, I must see a Tango show since for some reason I'm on the side of Argentina that says they invented the tango instead of Uruguay. Sorry, Uruguay. You know I still love you.

I finally got the ball rolling on volunteering to teach English. Believe it or not I think my university here might come through with an offer and other language teachers have been looking for positions for me. I'm pretty excited.

UM is really frustrating me lately. I think it's only fair to say that they are still a program in progress and I have been very patient with them until now. Basically, we are three weeks into classes and I'm still dropping and adding classes because the advisors don't know how to deal with international students who want to take classes in different faculties. LE SIGH. Anyone who knows me at all knows I'm much more frustrated than how that reads.

Aaand, my Uruguayan family (Mary, Analía, Pilar, Marie, made and devoured pizza over the weekend together. I had a lot of fun and I hope we do it a lot more often.

Ser Uruguayo

2010-08-27T01:46:00.006-04:00

*The post that follows is from my foreigner viewpoint and is very generalized. I'm not spending too much time on this either so if I made a mistake or there is something you wish to add please let me know in the comment section.*

One reason I love Uruguay so much is that they are so much more different than I pictured people from Latin America. I had never heard of Uruguay before my study abroad plans for México fell through and apparently neither has the rest of América from the kinds of questions I got when I told people where I would be living this year. So, I thought I would take a post to explain how uruguayos are so unique from the rest of Latin America.

First off, it's urugua-sh-o. This is not the 'y' sound you learned in school, my fellow Spanish language learners, and I shall warn you of the similar 'll' sound as well. Both of these are pronounced as 'sh'-- the same sound you make to silence someone. Another shocker is the voseo where ¿Dedónde eres? and Tú puedes hacerlo become ¿Dedónde sos? and Vos podés hacerlo. I'm by no means a Spanish teacher, or any kind of language teacher, but I plan to have a blog where I do my best to explain both the accent here and the voseo. *Coming soon*

Secondly, you must use these words in your daily conversations: capaz, tipo, este, dale, che.

Next, if you don't like mate, smoke, think mayonnaise is the best condiment ever made, clap at the end of movies in the movie theater, prefer agua con gas, wrap your scarf around the bottom of your face in winter, use the word tranquilo to describe your country, enjoy beef as your favorite meat, then you deserve to have your citizenship seized and be dumped into the Rio de la Plata.

Fourthly*, you must be laid-back and pessimistic, but have a serious sense of pride in your country despite it's many setbacks and still struggling economy.

Screw porteños (people from Buenos Aires), you won the first World Cup and they are all going to get fat from drinking their mate with sugar and Tang.

I definitely plan on doing a part two and maybe three and four to this one day. I was just reading a lot of blogs about Spain and felt inspired to define (sort of) what it means to be Uruguayan.

La Cumparsita

2010-08-26T23:09:00.004-04:00

It's a little after midnight here as I watch an Antonio Banderas movie, Ritmo y Seducción or Take the Lead in English where Antonio's character works with troubled kids through ballroom dancing. So, why do I bring this up? Well, they happen to be doing the tango which originated in Uruguay... or perhaps Argentina. (There's a big debate about it actually.) And what song do they dance to for the big number? La Cumparsita. This is one of the first and most popular tango songs ever written and it came right out of Uruguay. Well, what do you know?

Saturday on a Wednesday

2010-08-25T13:17:00.004-04:00

Last night was La Noche de Nostalgia (August 24th), or Nostalgic Night. Did I really need to translate that? I hardly did anything nostalgic though I did hear a Beetles song at some point. I just spent my night hanging out with some friends and we made pizza (from scratch!). Then we ended the night by watching some youtube videos and the girls introduced me to a a great channel of an Argentinean girl which I have been watching since I woke up. She's funny. If you want to know how they talk here, she is a good example.

But my experience of this holiday was actually a little atypical. I imagine most people go out to the club or a bar, which I hear are carísimos in response to the holiday. They play oldies music like the Beetles and Michael Jackson and apparently with this being the closest holiday to Halloween people also dress up in costumes though I hear not many do this. Maybe just the Americans/ foreigners?

So, after partying until the sun comes up and one wakes up in the middle of the afternoon the next day to the wildly celebrated Independence day of Uruguay (August 25th). Oh, wait. Wildly celebrated? What I meant to say was "looked over" since not a single thing is done to celebrate. It's like a Saturday in the middle of the week. Everyone went out last night, no one has to work today. Let us just relax.

By the way, I realized that I never spoke about how within my first couple of days being here that I witnessed the inauguration of the Uruguayan president Pepe Mujica. What an oversight. A post and pics to come shortly. In the meantime enjoy this video:

1950 World Cup Champions

2010-08-18T19:58:00.004-04:00

I just read a wikipedia article on the 1950 World Cup win by Uruguay. It's intense. I highly recommend it. Basically Brazil was expected to win and Uruguay shocked the world by coming back towards the end of the game and beating Brazil with 11 minutes on the clock. I only wish they would have commented on if the whole team made it back safely seeing as how they were playing in Río de Janiero...

1950 World Cup: Uruguay v. Brazil

I Speaka the Spanish

2010-08-12T22:52:00.002-04:00

Ya empiezan las clases! Todavia estamos en la primera semana de clases y estoy contenta para andar el semestre. Desafortunadamente no he escogido todas mis clases porque la mayoria de ellas no tienen un enfoque de America Latina. Entonces estoy andando con clases que son mas o menos electivas o clases que no quedan en ningunas de mis carerras. Que pena. Pero ya se que mi clase favorita es Sociolinguisitica. La clase es en ingles y el profesor es ingles. Me da risa cuando oi el acento del profe porque americanos les encanta el acento ingles. Y, estoy buscando universidades inglesas en que puedo inscribirme para un masters en TESOL (la ensenanza de english a hablantes de otras idiomas) entonces es por dios que tengo el para ser mi profesor porque puedo hacerle preguntas sobre la linguisitica, inglaterra, y como puedo viajar el mundo como una profesora de ingles/ lengua. que suerte!

Ahora porque estoy andando una clase en ingles? Estoy aca para aprender espanol, cierto? Pues si, pero mi universidad ya no tiene el programa de Linguistica entonces solo una clase en ingles no va a arruniar el espanol que he aprendido. Todo esta bien. Y puedo escuchar el acento ingles dos dias cada semana. Vale la pena.

Sobre mi espanol... necesito hablar mas para mejorarlo. En mi mente tengo todo que necesito para hablar con fluidez en espanol pero no me sale. Creo es porque yo se que estoy capaz de hablar bien espanol pero toma tiempo y solo que oigo es mal espanol entonces no quiero hablar si no es a nivel que quiero. Estoy frustrada con esto pero en serio voy a ser mas involucrada este semestre con voluntariado y pasando mas tiempos con amigos uruguayos. Vamos a ver pero tengo confianza que puede lograrlo porque mi meta numero uno es tener fluidez cuando hablo espanol y no voy a regresar si no es asi.

Ademas los estudiantes internacionales tienen un viaje a Colonia este fin de semana. Ya fui pero estoy emocionada para pasar con tiempo con ellos y es mas o menos gratis con la excepcion que necesitamos pagar para el almuerzo, los museos, los recuerdos, etc.

Bien. Como fue mi espanol? Me di cuenta que hablo de espanol todo el tiempo y estoy en Uruguay pero nunca hablo EN espanol. Entonces aqui esta. Cuando tengo tiempo voy a agregar los acentos porque mi teclado no los tiene. Hasta luego, ches!

---

Classes have started! We're approaching the end of the first week of school and I'm pretty excited about this semester. Unfortunately, I still haven't chosen all my classes the majority of them don't focus on Latin America. So, I'm mostly taking electives that have nothing to do with either of my majors. But this also means I get to take one class that I've always wanted to take-- Sociolinguistics. It's actually taught in English by an English professor. I was smiling so big when I first walked in because us Americans love British Accents. Also, I am currently looking up universities in England where I can pursue a Master's degree in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Others Languages), so it's the work of God that I found myself in his class. Now I have to ask about linguistics, England, and how I can travel as an English/ Language teacher.

Now why am I taking a class in English? I'm here to learn Spanish, right? Well, yeah but my university doesn't have a linguistics program any longer and I've taken an interest in linguistics after I took a linguistics class my sophomore year so it's a great opportunity to take a course I wouldn't otherwise be able to take. And, having just one class in English out of the ten I will take here won't hinder me learning Spanish. Plus, it's worth it if I get to hear an English accent two days a week.

About my Spanish... If I want to continue improving I really need to talk more. I think I've hit kind of a wall with my Spanish that I will have to break through by just speaking up more. In my mind I have everything I need to speak fluently in Spanish it just doesn't come out that way. I think it's because I know I'm capable of speaking Spanish well but fluency takes time and a lot of patience which I don't have right now. All I hear is bad Spanish. I feel like what I say comes out all jumbled up and doesn't convey the deeper thought I had intended. It's just hard to hear the bad Spanish and think I can surpass it to where I don't cringe after hearing myself speak. It frustrates me but I'm seriously trying to get past it by becoming more active through volunteering and spend more time with my Uruguayan friends. My number one goal here is to speak Spanish fluently and I refuse to graduate with a Spanish major and not being able to say I'm fluent.

In other news, the international students have a trip to Colonia coming up this weekend. I've already been, but I'm going this time to get to know the other students. Plus, it's free minus things like lunch, museums, souvenirs, etc.

Alright. How was my Spanish? I realized that I talk about Spanish all the time and I'm in Uruguay, but I never speak IN Spanish. So there it is. When I have time I'll go back and add accents since this keyboard doesn't have them. Later, gators!

Puerto Rico, Papi!

2010-08-10T22:39:00.004-04:00

I said I would talk about Puerto Rico, so here we go. Puerto Rico is niiiiice. It wasn't so nice and wonderful when I realized I missed my flight-- not my fault-- and that there was no tourism booth to help me find accommodations. But thank God Puerto Rico is indeed a US territory so my cell phone worked. My mom ended up booking me a hotel from thousands of miles away and gave me an address which I relayed to a taxi driver who took me safely to a Holiday Inn where I passed out while watching my first American show without subtitles in months.

Ok, let's back up a little. I like to see where things went wrong (or shall I say right?) So, the whole thing can be adverted in the future. Lesson one: Do NOT assume an hour is enough time to get through customs (especially applies when returning to the US). Thanks to the huge flight it took an hour to get through customs, but by then my flight had already left. The kicker is that it actually left early. Now why would it do that? Because I bought my tickets last minute and had to fly on two different airlines. This means I wasn't checked in for my US Airways flight and they assumed I wasn't going to make it so they gave my spot to someone else. Nice. Lesson two: Check-in for your flight before you leave the house. Lesson three: When in trouble, call your Mommy. She will always be there for you.

After the chaos of missing my flight and during the long hours I spent in the airport trying to insure a flight out the next day (can you tell I was a little traumatized?), I was finally able to slow down for a little and eat some Mcdonalds. This is where I fully realized where I was. Puerto Rico. Where they speak Spanish and 80% speak passable English. Before I studied abroad I was working so hard to find a way to avoid grad school yet continue on my career path, but, folks, I could go write a paper on grad school about Puerto Rico. The bilingualism there is beautiful. I'm talking about the cashier was able to speak perfect English AND Spanish as tourists and Puerto Ricans alike came to order at Mcdonalds. No hesitating, no errors, just perfect.

I know it seems like a huge exaggeration on my part, but I have never experienced personally two languages coming together so fluidly. Can I say it was beautiful one more time? I seriously plan to write a paper about it one day. Maybe even my Ph. D. thesis pa-- OK, that's going too far. Let me just get to grad school first.

I wish I had pictures to post in this blog of my overnight vacation but to be honest I was actually in Puerto Rico, as in not in the airport, long enough to get to my hotel and sleep. I was exhausted after an overnight flight from MVD to Panama then from lugging all my luggage around for hours in the airport. It did remind me a lot of Florida though. Especially Miami.

All I have to show for it are a key chain, a pretty post card of some building I never even saw, and a tiny flag. Even still it was the best place to miss a flight and I will be back. Best believe!

I'm Back

2010-08-08T19:29:00.003-04:00

I officially think in Spanish. I returned the sixth and have been speaking almost non-stop Spanish both inside and outside of the apartment. It's nuts. I was wondering how to start this blog post and immediately started thinking of what I wanted to say in Spanish. It was a 'Whoa' moment.

Going home was worth it. I was burned out a little after exams and it was a welcome break. I didn't do much of anything seeing as how we moved and I didn't know the area nor anybody nearby. But I did visit the mall several times in an attempt to experience American culture in the best way I know how. Other than that I just hung out with my family since I missed them like crazy and visited a few friends.

Actually, I had a lot of problems trying to return to the States then again when flying back to Uruguay. My first flight to the US almost had to make an emergency landing because someone fainted, customs was slow in Puerto Rico and I missed my flight thus having to spend the night, had my flight cancelled in Charlotte on the way back to MVD, experienced bad turbulence on a small plane in a thunderstorm... Basically, my faith has not been restored in airplanes at all and I am thankful that I have to fly two more times this year then I'm done. Ugh.

On another note, I met the new international students the same day I arrived and I absolutely love them. There is a good mix of people and the university has really listened to our suggestions by adding uruguayans to the group in the form of volunteers and interns to help them out. I can tell it has made a world of a difference. Though I admit I feel kind of like an outsider because while I'm an international student I don't really need the help of the International Program anymore or to go on tours around the city. So, I'm mostly just doing the same tours and lunches among international students that I did last year, but more with a purpose to get to know the students and help where I can. I've only been around the group as a whole one time, but I can already tell that the group this year seems to be much tighter than the previous one.

I planned on writing a little more, but I'm falling asleep on my keyboard. Look forward to a blog about Puerto Rico. Dare I say, I might retire there one day. It was perfect.

Hello, America

2010-07-16T15:05:00.004-04:00

First and foremost, I just want to say that I am so proud of the Uruguayan soccer team in this year's World Cup. I don't think anyone in the country really expected us to get farther than the first round and it was awesome to be there and watch the patriotism grow exponentially with each win. Volveremos a ser campeones, Uruguay!

My birthday was July 6. I bring it up because I wrote about it in my letters for study abroad about how I wanted to experience a real birthday in Spanish. Actually, my birthday was celebrated more the Friday before we a fiestita, or little party, at our apartment then I treated myself to Mcdonald's and the movie Eclipse on my actual birthday as I had an exam that day then the Uruguay game immediately after. It was drawn out a little as I got on a plane two days later on my way to the States and people who looked at my ID would say happy belated birthday to me.

Speaking of being in the States-- it's true! I'm pretty sure I said I wasn't going to return before December but things happened to fall into place at just the right time and I was able to buy a flight around 3 in the afternoon and fly out 12 hours later. Don't ever do that in July. Ugh. It gave me such a headache trying to find a not outrageously priced flight the day of. I have learned from this experience that if you buy a round-trip ticket just stick to it and buy your ticket at least 4 weeks beforehand. Otherwise you will give yourself a headache trying to remember all the jingles from commericials such as Expedia and Hotwire so you can find the cheapest flight possible.

But I'm glad I decided to come back for three weeks. I've been here for a week and have already managed to visit Walmart numerous times, two malls, and ride my bike a few times. I'm living the life. My only regret is that I won't be there when the majority of the new international students arrive but I will barely be there for orientation so I can't feel too bad. I'm just soaking up the sun while I can and trying to absorb almost 5 months of American culture via TV, internet, and friends while I can.

Bringin' it back to Uruguay: I found a blog post about customer service (servicio al cliente) in Uruguay. I only skimmed it, but I agreed with a lot of what it said.

I'm going to be here foreverrr (Review)

2010-06-30T12:16:00.006-04:00

It's that time again, folks-- Review time! I'm four months down with six months to go. So, how are things?

My Spanish has improved by leaps and bounds though I feel I've reached a plateau lately in the speaking area. I'm not in the mode of surviving anymore, so I know how to say everything I need to say and I know where to buy the basics and how the Bristish Hospital works in case of emergency... Basically, my everyday life isn't new anymore and I need to get out there more to keep improving my Spanish and stop being true to my introverted nature.

I just say I live here now. Ten months is almost a year and when you stay in one place for that long you pretty much live there. Plus I'm in a weird situation where my family moved while I was here so I don't even know what my real house looks like in person and probably couldn't even find it on a map. I...I think I just had an identity crisis.

Food wise ferias and the internet are my best friend. I buy my fruits and veggies from the feria then type in that I want to make chicken and that I have these ingredients into google and it spits out millions of recipes. I just find an easy recipe that works in our tiny kitchen and viola yummy chicken. That's Chef Casey to you thank you very much.

The homesickness thing has come and gone. It helps that I'm trying to limit my facebook time and only talk to my family once a week on Skype, but I still miss it, of course. I'm just trying to focus on getting to know this country so I can forget about missing my own. I loved seeing the US crowd during the World Cup matches though.

And traveling around has made me realize that I want to travel everywhere. Everytime someone mentions some new place I just add it to my list. Consecuently I've been looking more into TESL jobs so I can find a way to make enough money to travel the way I want while thinking about student loans. It's definitely possible, but it means graduate school and me will unfortunately be seeing each other at some point and it's the reason I'm trying harder to get a TESL volunteer job. Experience can go a long way in that field it seems. But first things first, I need to work on speaking more and milk this opportunity for everything it's worth so I can have a solid foundation for my future career.

How awesome was that last paragraph? I just linked this study abroad experience to my future job. Mom, I deserve to have cookies shipped to me or something. I is growed up!

Last but not least, I have added pictures and videos where I deemed necessary in all my posts and have even edited the posts since the last review. That was my past week right there, folks. Enjoy.

La Mundial

2010-06-27T15:24:00.005-04:00

I woke up in one of the best ways the other day. It was to all the apartments surrounding my patio-room shouting Gooooooool! followed by firecrackers and more muffled shouting. Turns out Uruguay had just scored in the first few minutes of their game with Corea del Sur and I rushed out my room to the nearest T.V. Then as I'm glued to the tube waving my huge Uruguay flag around for no one to see I realized how atypical is the situation I am currently in. I've been alive for several World Cups, or Mundials, and couldn't even attempt to answer a multiple choice test on what happened in them. I think this phenomenon is largely due to being in a country that is quite the opposite of apathetic when it comes to fútbol and knowing exactly what it means if Uruguay were to win this year's Mundial.

Did you know Uruguay hosted the first Mundial in 1930? The stadium where the game was played is actually located here in Montevideo next to my school in Parque Battle. One of the main reasons it was chosen to be held in Uruguay is because 1930 is also the same year that it celebrated 100 years of independence. The event then solidified itself in this country's history as Uruguay won the very first Mundial against Argentina 4-2. Go, Uruguay! For more info visit the Wikipedia page.

So, what would it mean if Uruguay won the Mundial? First off, it would mean that Argentina didn't win. Yes! Also, Uruguay tends to be a pessimistic nation and after taking a history class on the beginnings of this gaucho nation they have every right to be. They are between two big giants Argentina and Brazil who used to be ruled by the powerful Spain and Portugual. Together the nations warred with Uruguay and even the nation's hero at the time Artigas eventually fled the country for Paraguay after Portugal's second invasion ruined any progress that was being made in Uruguay. Then sometime in the 1900s there was a huge economic crisis made worse by a fellow uruguayan family who stole money from the banks and put them into foreign accounts. So, Uruguay winning a Mundial would be a well needed boost to the nation's ego and it would show those Argentinians and Brazilians that we are a force to be reckoned with... on the football field!

Back to my story above, I then went to 18 de Julio to celebrate with my fellow Montevideans while waving my Uruguayan flag and joining in the chants. Even though it was Sunday cars lined the street and everyone was cheering, honking horns, and showing off anything light blue that they owned. Ok, less talking, more showing.

Post game traffic

Soy Celeste

Lyrics:
olé olé olé, olé olé olé ola
cada día te quiero más
oooooh, soy celeste

Uruguay

And because I hate being silent during the games due to not knowing any fútbol vocabulary I learned some words and thanks to Lorenia Lorenia shouting at the T.V. I also know a lot of cuss words to say. Most of which include the F-word, B-word, and talking about people's mothers. Love it. Here's a short list of a few of the terms:

Soccer player: futbolista
Coach: entrenador
Field: cancha
Score a goal: hacer un gol
Out (of bounds): afuera
Yellow/ Red: tarjeta amarilla/roja

Hopefully, Uruguay will keep progressing in this year's Mundial and I will be able to post a lot more blogs about it. We shall see. Vamos arriba, Uruguay!

First day of Winter

2010-06-21T16:56:00.004-04:00

And if today is not the first day of winter then don´t read this post until it is. Google is extremely northern hemispherically biased. Today is the coldest day by far that I´ve experienced here in MVD. I was actually using the computer earlier with gloves on and the radiator scooted as close to me as I dared. I am seriously glad I dropped all that money on a thicker jacket in BA because I sure needed it. Air conditioning I can live without but central heating? I´m worried about making it through July. Brr

Actually, I just might make it through July since I plan on going north for a few weeks. Professor willing, my one exam is the middle of July will be pushed earlier or later in July and I can get some solid traveling in. My plans are Mendoza (Argentina), Santiago (Chile), and Cusco (Perú). I had added Bolivia to my trip until I realized it was the only country that I would have to pay enter ($135 USD) and also that with the way I travel it might take 3 weeks just to get there. But it might still happen if can find a way to live more cheaply and hopefully crash on some couches the whole way.

I´m trying not to plan anything because this is Latin America we´re talking about. I have heard all kinds of stories of delays, cancellations, and problems with tickets that I´m just going to take it a few days at a time. I have my new traveler's backpack and the right attitude about it, so I'm excited.

In other news, I wore my hair was out in the biggest afro I dared to wear out in public today and I found the response to be amusing as it always is. I got a lot blantant staring and it made me smile. The best response I've ever recieved though was from the tour guide in Ushuaia. He related me to the Jackson Five then handled my hair like it was the eighth wonder of the world when I said he could touch it.

I think one of my new goals will be to make sure I wear my hair out like this in every country I visit and gauge the reaction of the people. So, I keep making reference to this goal list I have for South America, but never actually write it down. Here it is... as I can remember it:

Goals:
1) Be fluent in Spanish
2) Don't get robbed
3) Visit 10 out of the 13 countries in S.A.
4) Couchsurf
5) Wear a big 'fro in every country I visit and gauge reactions

BTW, I made up a word in this post. I´m sure you found it.

How to be Uruguayan: Instead of saying "está bien" just say "´ta".

Ahh, Buenos Aires 2

2010-06-19T12:40:00.005-04:00

Oh, Buenos Aires. A week later I still miss the place and look forward to going back and doing all the things I didn´t get to do. *daydream*

Ok, so less about what I did in B.A. and more about it. I´m going to start this blog post off with safety in this big city, and well any big city, because I think it´s definitely something to know and very real that your chances of being robbed, pickpocketed, etc. are likely.

I can´t tell you how many I know that have gone to Buenos Aires and came back with a story about how they were robbed, lost something, tricked, etc. It happens. So, why have I been to Buenos Aires twice and nothing has happened to me when I scream tourist, am a women, and tiny at that? Because I learned from a wise friend how to visit Buenos Aires and return with everything you came with and not paying more than you should. I´m sure I´ve talked about what happened to her in this city, but it deserves repeating. Rachel was walking through a park between two museums off very little sleep. So, she had everything in her camera case (money, camera, passport) and was not fully alert to prevent what was about to happen to her. It is common for people to rig things that will fall on your or throw things on you to make you flustered and lose your sense of awareness. In those few seconds where you´re wondering what happened they are stealing everything on you that they can reach as they pretend to help you out. Rachel had "bird poop" fall on her via a device rigged to a tree and while she was looking to see what happened two people approached her pretending to be great samaritans and stole her passport and expensive camera. Ouch. She was on her way to Mendoza, so immediately she was stuck in Buenos Aires going to the US embassy to get an emergency passport and she still hasn´t replaced that expensive camera.

So, how to avoid this?

First off, protect your passport! ALWAYS lock it up (even if you´re all buddy buddy with your new hostel friends) when you aren´t willing to carry it on you. Then I think one of the best inventions for travelers is the pouch you wear under your shirt or under a jacket. It easily holds passports, money, and important paperwork (folded) and should contour to your body so no one even knows you´re wearing it. When I am in the midst of traveling I never take it off since I sleep very easily on buses and on airplanes I´m more worried about dying than if someone is reaching for my purse and not the cup they just dropped. Protect the passport, ladies and gentleman. It works better than a license, school id, credit card, ISIC card, bus ticket with your name on it, etc. and in the case that it is stolen head for the embassy and be aware you might have to file a police report first.

Second, spread your things out. I usually use the pockets I have on the front of me to put things in, so I will put money in one pocket and my camera in another. Being mindful of pickpockets, though, I try to wear tighter jeans and I wrap the string of my camera around my belt loop once. I, also, have a jacket that has zippers on the pockets so I will use those as well. And being a proud new owner of a traveler´s backpack don´t keep important things in the outside pockets but in hidden pockets (usually on the inside with zippers) and between other things like pairs of pants.

Third, be paranoid and keep checking to make sure you have everything... but be subtle about it. I would casually make sure I had everything as I was reaching in my purse for my wallet at Mcdonalds and patting my pockets while waiting for a light to turn.

Fourth, don´t make it easy for them. Examples: I keep my hand on my purse at all times. If I feel like someone behind me has been by my purse or my backpack too long I shift to the other side. With my smaller backpack I would use my two small locks and keep the two compartments closed at all times.

Fifth, even if you don´t know what you´re doing or where you are look like you do. Confidence is a huge crime deterrent. Go into a super market, Mcdonalds, or some place that seems safe to ask people questions and pull out your map.

Sixth, trust people when they say a certain area is safe or not. This one I say with a condition. If you´re a traveller who is there for a few days then please follow their advice. If you´re like me and you´re living there and people say not to go to Cuidad Vieja then, I can ignore them. Hah, I probably shouldn´t but I think I know how to handle myself and I never take anything with me I wouldn´t mind losing or that isn´t easily replaceable. And my pepper spray (thanks, dad).

Those are just some of the big things I think people know to do so your awesome trip to the big city won´t be spoiled. And, by the way one of my goals while I´m here is not to get robbed and it´s still alive!

Other things about Buenos Aires are that there is a neat arts and crafts fair on Defensa which is partly made of cobblestone which I always love. I didn´t have time to walk the whole street but it seems like it covers a great deal of it and some side streets as well. It is tourist central! I heard some languages being spoken and saw a lot of North Face jackets. The fair has lots of painting, jewelery, antique pieces, and a few shows such as tango, a guy with a doll with the strings attached (I forgot what this was called-- marinette?), and I saw a guy who painted himself and his costume white and stood still like a statue.

Riding the subway or the subte was fun. Usually maps have the routes marked in different colors that match the colors in the subway so you can figure out which train to take and where it goes. Despite how many times I wondered around aimlessly it is a pretty straightforward system and even when you get on the bus there is a little map telling you all the stops in both directions so you can figure out if you got on going the right way or not.

Buenos Aires is also called the Paris of South America. I cracked up at this when I read it and had to read the reason why because Paris didn´t cross my mind a single time when I was in B.A. They actually say that because there is a big French ifluence in the city which can been seen through the architecture and pasta restuarants. The closest thing they have to the eiffel tower is the Oblesico which I will see next time I go and instead of burets the most popular hat at the moment seems to be the gaudy blue and white hats to support Argentina in the World Cup. Paris, indeed. Haha I´m making fun of it but I read about this after I went to the big city, so of course I didn´t notice it.

Also, while researching for a paper yesterday I came across another blog that talked about Argentinan bus tickets.

Buenos Aires, te extraño! I´ll probably be back around my birthday in July though on my way to Mendoza then to Chile, but that´s another post for another time. I´m off to walk 8 de Octubre and hopefully buy a Uruguayan Flag and whatever else I feel like I need for the next Uruguay game. Dale, campeon!

Ahhh, Buenos Aires

2010-06-14T22:37:00.005-04:00

The first time I saw Buenos Aires (as a pit stop to Ushuaia, then on the way back to MVD) I wasn't very impressed. In fact, I was overwhelmed, nervous, and very naïve. Then again, I had only been in South America for a month when I hit up the B.A with my friend Rachel, so it was perfectly natural to feel the way I did. This time, though, it was just me using the Spanish skills I´ve learned thus far and my paranoia. Haha I´ll explain this one later.

My trip actually didn´t start off very well. I had packed everything the night before and had enough left over Argentinan pesos from my other trip to bring with me, but no matter how prepared I was, I was not prepared to leave wide awake at 5:30 in the morning. This meant I was in no shape to double check my passport to make sure the slip of paper inside of it which contained my entrance stamp for Uruguay was still in there. Huge mistake. I took a bus/boat combination to Colonia and when I had to present my passport to immigration in order to get on the boat for Argentina... I didn´t have it. This is where all of the episodes of Locked Up Abroad that I've watched came back to haunt me. As soon as the lady realized I had no evidence proving I was a study abroad student and legally in the country, she demanded to know what I was doing in Uruguay and why in the world I didn't have my stamp. I´m not going to lie... I did get a little teary eyed as she made me look through all of my stuff and made me hang up my phone as I tried to call someone in my apartment to see if I had left it somewhere (like that would have done any good). But the lady was reluctantly nice to me after watching me having a badly contained almost panic attack in the middle of immigration and let me pass with a stern look. Lesson learned!

I didn´t do too much in B.A. because I was actually leaving to renew my 90 day tourist permit and could only stay the weekend. This is called a border run, my friends. I did manage to do a few fun things, however.

The first day I arrived to a rainstorm and a quiet city. Buenos Aires a quiet big city? Nahhhh. I actually arrived right in the middle of the Argentina vs. Nigeria game. There were tons of empty resturants and full pubs/bars as people watched the game and it was actually kind of cool to walk through the city that way. I then arrived at one of the best hostels I´ve ever stayed in, Carlos Gardel, and headed out to find a cheap lunch. According to my guide book Calle Florida was a great place to grab something to eat and indeed it was. Calle Florida is a nice, long pedestrian street that is full of resturants and all kinds of shopping. My orginal goal when I arrived to Buenos Aires was to buy a big coat and a backpack and I definitely could have done so within the first few hours of arriving to B.A. after walking this street. It goes for blocks and being a Sunday it was flooded with people and even more so after the fútbol game ended. I ended up just grabbing some Mcdonalds and walking to a fancy mall called Galeria Pacífico where I had fun listening to the baristas of Starbucks try to call out my name and sat down in the middle of the food court cheering on the USA in their game against England. The mall wasn´t really my style because it had expensive designers like Dior, but it did have a museum that I´m not sure I was suppose to pay to see, but no one said anything to me.

The second day there I had all day to try to find a backpack and a jacket, so I set off just before the Australia game for a shopping center the girl at the hostel told me about called Abasto Shopping. Loved it. I had to take the subway and definitely spent a good while looking for the entrance on the right side of the street which was conveniently located in the middle of a park. Then I had to pull my map out several times to make sure I was going the right way and that I knew how to transfer trains and then which direction the next train needed to go in. It was confusing and I looked like such a tourist but I made it without asking a single person. As soon as I stepped out of the subway on the other side Abasto Shopping was right in front of me. So, I spent the next few hours trying on jackets and travelers backpacks making sure I would be content with my purchases. The guy at the first shop I went too was actually really frustrated that I was taking up so much of his time and when I went back the third time to buy the backpack I knew he and another of his coworkers were betting if I would buy anything from the store. It was annoying at first, but honestly, I had taken up a lot of his time and I probably would've done the same thing if roles were reverse, though, I would have been more subtle about it.

So, I bought my things and headed to the biggest food court I have ever seen in my life to go on another adventure via the subway. By the way, the food court had tons of restaurants lining both sides of the space which included an Arabian restaurant, McDonalds Kosher, a sushi restaurant, two sit down restaurants in the middle of the food court, among plenty of others. I was so happy to be there it made not being able to find a seat for over 15 minutes of walking around and having to eat while standing seem not as bad. It was still bad though after all the walking I had done and would do that day. Ooouch.

The next day I had to leave at 2pm so I tried to wake up early and see at least two more things. I actually woke up two hours later and got hung up watching the Denmark game and got to see one of them-- el Caminito. I´m really glad I chose that as my one thing to see. It´s basically a block of houses and restaurants that were painted by a famous artist some years ago. It´s a huge tourist trap but it was worth it to see this part of B.A. that you find all over post cards and to just take your time to look at how colorful it is. And when I saw a famous artist painted the houses, I mean solid colors. No huge murals or abstract paintings cover the buildings. Just bright colors. It is unique though and actually was somewhat near the boat terminal I had to walk to, so it worked out.

My overall impression of Buenos Aires is that it was awesome! There were so many things I didn´t get a chance to do and will definitely have to do next time when I will hopefully have more time to meander. It almost makes me wish I was in B.A. instead of Montevideo, but I´d never get anything done because there is just so much to do.

Did you think I could say everything I wanted to about B.A. in one post? I think not. This one is long enough already, but I´ll write another one to cover what I missed.

And notice how I marked my days by fútbol games? I´m not a soccer person at all but put me in a continent where it is a big deal and in a hostel where the games are always on and people are talking smack then I´ll watch a little.

Math and Foreign Countries

2010-05-31T15:08:00.004-04:00

I thought I was seriously done with math after I took College Alegbra two semesters ago. Wrong! It´s not like I´m doing calculus or stats in my classes but more the everyday things like paying for things, finding out what time it is and what it is in the US, and figuring out buses.

Exchange rates. Oh, man, they are not what they used to be. When our economy was doing much better in 2005 the exchange rate was 24 pesos uruguayos to 1 US dollar. Now it´s about 19 pesos to a dollar. Not really a huge change but considering how much I have to draw money out from an ATM (I can only get $263 USD out at a time or 5000 pesos) it starts to add up quickly. I think I avoid being charged for exchanging currencies this way by taking my money out of the ATM in pesos because the bank only says it charges me a fee for using an international card. Hmm...

Uruguayan money. This is something I should have looked at before I arrived. Uruguay uses Uruguayan pesos and money appears in bills (billetas)as such: 1000, 500, 200, 100, 50, 20. A bill for 2000 does exist but it is hardly ever seen and I have never seen one. Coins (monedas) come in denominations of 10, 5, 2, 1, and .50. The half a peso coin perplexes me. I only really use it at the grocery store when I owe .50 to .60 pesos. So, if my order is 143.60 pesos then they ask for it and I lose .40 of a peso because it doesn´t even exist. Does that make sense? I feel like someone is always losing with the half peso coin unless it comes up to exactly half a peso. Oh, Uruguay...

Time. The 24 hour clock is widely used as is the 12 hour clock. Ahhh. Everyone fully knows both clocks but they like to throw curve balls and say "Hey, let´s meet up at 15:30!" after I´ve been looking at my 12 hour watch and cell phone all day. What in the world. So, I have to figure out which method to use to find out what time we are suppose to meet and usually end up using my fingers and sometimes freezing in place so I can think of the right time. It´s a very simple thing to use a 24 hour clock, but I´m simply not used to it. I usually have to subtract two from the hour which works from hours 1 to 20. Then I just remember that 20 hours is 8 o´clock and add and substract from there.

Daylight savings time. When Uruguay is in daylight savings time, while the US consecuently is not, Uruguay is one hour ahead of Eastern Standard time. When it´s the reverse Uruguay is three hours ahead of EST. Then, of course, traveling is made difficult because which time zone you're in depends on the country in South America. This means you need to look up the times for each country you're going to travel to. I tried doing this for Uruguay before I arrived and even the internet would get it wrong. My suggestion is to use a map to figure out which time the country is in, look up legitimate sites (government or tourist department websites) or buy traveling books for the country/region which should be able to offically tell you the time zone and if daylight savings is observed and if so when and what regions are affected. Be sure to look up other places you´re traveling to as well because I know for a fact that Buenos Aires and Brazil have different times from Uruguay depending on the time of year.

Buses. I still haven´t figured everything out about buses yet but I´m pretty sure the numbers help to indicate the general area the bus will travel to. For example, most, if not all, of the buses between 100 and 109 with their variations travel from Plaza de Independencia and up 8 de Octubre. I know there are other patterns enough but I´m not confident enough to put them here so I can confuse people.

Taxis. They have two different fares: night and day. I´m not sure if they charge by distance or time, but there are a few that will purposely take the long way with the most lights/traffic if they sense you don´t know where you´re going, you are an obvious foreigner, or drunk. We had a driver this past weekend who was about to bypass Gral. Artigas in favor or taking the longer way to our apartment and Lorenia said "Estoy borracha pero esto es Artigas!" (I´m drunk but this is Artigas) to the cab driver and made him turn onto the main street. It was pretty funny because right afterwards we went on a bump and she was back to being inebriated and pretending we were on a rollercoaster. This is especially bad in Buenos Aires as I think every time I had to take a cab in B.A. I got ripped off one way or another. It´s just how it is in Buenos Aires so allow for it money-wise and know where you´re suupose to be going.

I find that stores, restaurants, and buses are more relaxed with their money. If you´re missing a few pesos they of course make you look for it, but if you can´t find it then it´s fine. I bring this up because I was a cashier for about five years at places where they would count your drawer and you would get in trouble if you were missing too much. Usually, I would have to add my own money and go looking around at the floors on my breaks to come up for whatever money I knew I was missing. So, it´s cool they aren´t strict about money.

And of course, always buy tickets early whenever possible when traveling out of the country. I know for a fact that flights are cheaper to South America when you´re already in there so plan ahead and always ask your fellower travelers where they went, why, and what did they think about it as well as to ask for any traveling tips. I know this has kept me from doing things not worth my time or money. Alright that´s my two cents. (See how I ended with a clever math pun? I didn´t even mean to. Honest.) :D

La UM

2010-05-24T16:53:00.007-04:00

I realized that I'm here in Uruguay for school and not really talking about my school experience. So, here is my attempt to make up for it.

First impression of the school: Wow, this place looks fancy. The white buildings were very well kept with gates surrounding the property and security guards watching out for the students who would hang out outside to smoke. It's kind of complicated to get to the school and even more complicated to explain how to get to my apartment from the university. Most of it's buildings are located right around the park, but it's not clearly marked and the streets are intricately crisscrossed in such a way that it makes things difficult. We even have to cross an intersection where five streets come together with no stop signs, so we have to literally watch all sides as we cross four other streets almost simultaneously.

This school only has a population of about 3,000 students which is nothing compared to the 20,000 students at UNCG. I feel like I already know one third of the students that attend UM just meeting people in my classes and in the international program ceneter. Also, I think it´s different that the students are always dressed nice for classes. It might come as a given with private schools but I never see anyone come to school in pajamas and it's hard to find students that look like they rolled out of bed and into the classroom. This could also be because everyone has to commute to campus, but who knows. (There is no on-campus housing at any of the universities in Uruguay).

As far as diversity is concerned, what diversity? I´m pretty sure only three african-americans attend this school (one being me) and that most of the diversity comes from international students. Of course, Uruguayans all have a mixed race usually involving indigenous roots with a european heritage mixed in, but it's the same mix for everyone. The majority resemble Europeans more than anything, though It's a little weird coming from a university that is the most diverse school in the UNC system to UM where I'm surprised to see people of other races. Then again, Uruguay is known to be the one of the most European-looking countries in Latin America.

UM is a very Catholic school (Opus Dei). All classrooms have Jesus on a cross on the right or left side of the chalk board. Even in different rooms of the buildings you'll find religious art and paintings. Since they are so spiritual we, also, always have no school on Christian holidays.

Classes are generally held later than they are in the US and are also longer. All of my classes are least an hour and a half and more than half of them are held at two in the afternoon or later. This school is even so small that in each faculty there is a board with all the times and meeting locations of the classes. The classes usually aren't held in the same classroom every time they meet, so the room number definitely comes in handy when you can't find your class where you thought it would be. I definitely like the later schedule here because I can sleep in late most days, but at the same time when class doesn't get out till 7:40 p.m. on a Friday it cuts into weekend traveling plans.

There are NO meal plans. Every time you want something you have to pay out of pocket and it's not an all you can eat buffet. I tend to get a ham and cheese medialuna which is just a sandwich. The prices are reasonable and you can even charge your prepaid cell phone here. Huge plus.

Speaking of school, students in the obligatory levels of schools that are public have to wear uniforms. It's mostly the younger students so primary school and, I think, secondary school as well have to wear them. I think they are so cute because you can wear whatever clothes you want underneath but have to wear either a white or green and white checkered overcloak-like uniform. Another tidbit is that the uniforms have been worn since around the 30s or 40s and, in my five-year old opinion, the boys look like they´re wearing a dress. :D

Exploring Uruguay

2010-05-19T21:07:00.005-04:00

So, in the past two weeks I went on two trips within Uruguay: the interior and Colonia.

My Spanish for Foreigners class (all four of us and the teacher) went to a town past Carrasco and we invited Lorenia along too. We only went to the outskirts of the interior, but we were in the countryside of Uruguay nonetheless. We ate then rode on horseback around the ranch. I, actually, took a horse drawn cart with the teacher because I wasn't feeling confident with the horses. Have I mentioned yet that I´m not an animal person? This little boy around 8 years old drove the cart for us and the landscape reminded me so much of North Carolina. It was fun to get out of the city and see some of the cows that are soo famous here. And probably where the asado came from. As mentioned before, I was done with asados on week three, so I had chicken.

Then I went to Colonia this past weekend by my lonesome. Colonia is about two and half hours away from Montevideo and was a nice break from city life as well. It's a small historic town with a long coastline and expensive food due to a lot of vacationing tourists especially the ones from Buenos Aires looking for a break. I have to admit I wasn't too impressed with the place. Not to say it wasn't worth it--I´m glad I went-- but I wish I had gone with lower expectations. One of the biggest attractions was a string of museums where you could pay a one time fee and have the ability to browse all of them. That ticket, also, lasted a couple of days or at least two when I asked the ticket lady about it. I could only get into six of the eight because one was closed for rennovations and one wasn´t open on the weekends. I think the museums are more for history buffs, though. I walked around and thought it looked nice, but I wasn't thrilled by them. Now the nice views were more exciting. I'm not good at taking pictures, but the way the town is set up it's hard to take bad pictures unless there are dogs humping behind you as you push the button. Ahem. And even though there are restuarants contructed in original buildings from the actual colonial period, they still manage to look hip and romantic. These restuarants actually make Colonia a great couples town. It's a nice and relaxed place, and with some well placed dining in view of the water.

The rambla, or boardwalk, offers great peeks at the beaches and the river of Colonia and I think I experienced this the best way by renting a bike for a few hours and just cycling it. I was very much out of shape, but the rambla was reasonably flat so my limp the next day wasn't too severe. Also, the rambla had nice rest spots where I would abandon my bike for a picture and to stand on the beach. I enjoyed it a lot since I got into cycling before I came here and was missing my bike trips something awful. Overall, it was a good trip even though it wasn't all I thought it would be.

Package update: I received my package! It actually arrived in customs in Montevideo ten days after it was sent, but they failed to send me a slip of paper letting me know this. So, I waited over a month extra for a package that was already here. Bummer. But really glad I got my package and everything was intact... until I dropped my laptop right after I took it out of it's case. So, I have to find someone here to fix it for a reasonable price and, if not, then when I possibly go back to the US in July I'm going to buy a Mac. (Mac>PC)

Speaking of heading back home in July... I never actually planned on stepping foot back on US soil until my ten months were up. I was talking to my parents before I went to Colonia and my dad asked me out of the blue if I was going to come back during my break. I thought he was kidding and jokingly asked him if he was going to pay. He said yes.... So, if time permits I'm going to head to Chile after exams then head home for a few days in July. We shall see...

Random: This guy in Colonia really surprised me when he thought I was from the frontera AFTER hearing me speak Spanish. What? haha. Even more progress!

Feriados y tráfico

2010-05-09T17:46:00.005-04:00

Saturday the first of May was Día de Los Trabajores here in Uruguay also known as Labor Day. This doesn´t happen in the US until the first Monday of September, but it´s the exact same holiday (feriados in Spanish). If I´m not mistaken it started in Chicago and is now celebrated all over the world. It started Friday night with a lot of businesses shutting down early and went through Sunday. I, unfortunately, wasn´t able to see the city shut down for the weekend since I was held up in my apartment studying for mid-terms. If you want to read a blurb about it on the Exploring Uruguay blog here is a link. The blog also offers another link to see more about labor day and it just links to the Wikipedia page for the holiday.

Mother's day is today... in the States. Usually it occurs on the same day in Uruguay, but today was election day! They voted for their intendente or city council. The reason I bring this election up is because I found out a very interesting fact about voting in Uruguay. As a citizen, you have to vote. Those that don´t vote will be penalized a fee. I think it's funny because they say Uruguay is passionate about politics and naturally you assume that they don´t have incentive to be this way. Wrong. And I´m guessing that the tax is not a light one either with how "passionate" these Uruguayans are about politics. I joke about it, but I really think they do care. If you're going to vote, you might as well make sure it's someone you can support. Uruguay, also, has an interesting political past that involved a dictatorship that actually ended not too long ago. I can´t give you dates or names just yet, but in my Uruguayan history class we´ll get to this at some point and I can tell you all about it. Once again Wikipedia offers a great synopsis of politics in Uruguay. It talks about the structure of politics and a little history as well. Just scroll down to see the few paragraphs to see the section.

I, also, found another blog I liked a lot. This guy Seth (NY, USA) is traveling around South America and managed to stop in Montevideo for three weeks and it looks like he had fun! I haven't read the entire thing yet, but his talks of fútbol and especially the voseo were better written than my accounts of them. He was in Uruguay from February 10th, 2010 to March 2nd (so you can find the posts more easily). He traveled throughout the rest of South America too, if you´re interested in viewing the rest of his blogs.

I saw my first traffic accident here. It was unfortunate as it involved a guy on the motorcycle, but he was laying on the ground talking on his cell phone, so I don´t think he was too badly hurt. This incident made me realize something. Despite how crazy they drive here, Uruguayans are pretty good drivers (ignoring the blocking of intersections outside of Tres Cruces today that involved excessive leaning on car horns). Surprisingly, there are not always lines on the roads here in the city so sometimes at an intersection there will be two lanes of traffic and other times three. Even with all the close calls of people indecisively floating between lanes and cutting through three lanes of traffic while turning in an intersection I havent seen or heard of a single accident. I'm, also, excluding when cars bump into each other while trying to parallel park as it happens all the time and doesn´'t really cause any harm to either cars. I guess they need to hit the car behind them sometimes to make sure they can't back up anymore. Also, I think this is the reason so many car alarms go off here. Go figure.

Speaking of transportation I am leaving by bus on Friday for Colonia (del Sacramento), Uruguay. I'm very excited since this will be my first trip by myself and because I walked into Tres Cruces today and bought my tickets on the spot. I felt so spontaneous and whimsical. I´m going for two and a half days which I think is plenty to explore this colonial place. I decided not to go to Buenos Aires mostly because tickets are more expensive than I would like when you try to buy them less than a week in advance and I want to try traveling by myself in a more low-key, safer place. We´ll see how it goes.

And, I got lectured briefly by Lorrenia again for slipping up and refering to the citizens of the US as Americans. I´m starting to realize that she is the one with the big problem with it and not Uruguay. Still I wouldn't say American though. It´s not politically correct and us people from the United States love to be politically correct. See how that was just a mouthful? I just say America when she's not around.

Random: May 1, 2010 in Uruguay is written as 1/5/10. The date and month switch places compared to the US version. And, tacos means heels on shoes here. Did you get a look at those huge tacos!?

Two Month Review

2010-04-29T13:34:00.005-04:00

I officially reached the two month mark of being in Uruguay this past weekend and thought I should write a review of how I view things here. I tend to make this much more organized than the last post, which I will edit by the way. So, how am I? All is good. My hand is 100% better, I don´t have food poisoning, and I´m not sick. I´m adjusting so much better these days and able to enjoy being here much more. I´ve experienced two waves of culture shock: one where I was missing America (wrote a post about this one) and the other one was about two weeks ago where I was still working on adjusting to the daily grind here and frustrated that things were so similiar yet so different to my life in the States. I think having to live in a tiny apartment with so many people added to it now, but honestly things are much better and I´m working on trying to be more involved here.

I started my volunteer class where I will be volunteering for a center that aspires to enrich the lives on families in at risk neighbors by educating the children and their mothers. I´m going to be working in a computer lab translating their website to English, but they said I could always take a break and play with the children and of course talk to them. I´m involved in a program that pairs me with a Uruguayan student where we speak both English and Spanish to each other and, also, I´m working on possibly going to the mini English school a few doors down from my apartment and seeing if I can volunteer there every now and then. So, I´m trying to get involved in the community and hopefully next semester I can get more involved in my school as an intern in the international program. *crosses fingers*

What do I eat? I think this is a very important question as I have brought this up in previous blog posts and tend to be a very picky eater. Oh, goodness, I am still working on that one. I´m not really a fan of Uruguayan food. I´ll order it in resturants but I´ll adjust the condiments and such to make it more of an American meal. For example, chivitos are huge here and they are pretty much just like hamburgers with less meat and tons of strange toppings. I just get the meat, lettuce, tomato, mayo and viola an American version of a chivito a.k.a. a hamburger. It´s cheating I know... but I do what I can to make things edible. I´m still cooking a lot of my own food which means I take three main foods and rotate them. It´s really sad. The foods are pasta with homemade tomato sauce, stir fry with just vegetables and rice, and eggs in a basket (toast with a whole in the middle where you put the egg that you fry) and variations of bread and eggs. I don´t know how to cook much, obviously, and I am actively learning how to cook more things. They do have plenty of pizza here so I do eat that about once a week. Yeaaah.

After the last paragraph a really good question to ask is am I losing weight? Oh yeah, buddy. I think I´ve lost almost two pants sizes already. I think it´s a combination of walking and not buying meat to make my foods less expensive. Usually this is a good thing but I´m probably going to have to start buying new clothes pretty soon. I will be contacting the bank called my parents when that happens. (Hahaha if they read this then I´m kidding but I´m not) But clothes are fairly cheap here if you know where to get them, like in all places. I would be able to dress much more like a Uruguayan, finally, since all I brought with me are t-shirts with English. It´s the only thing that keeps me from blending in when I´m walking down the street. I´m actually kind of surprised by how many people assume I am from Uruguay when I´m just walking along. I´ve had several people ask me for the time and holding one way conversations with me looking like they fully expect me to understand every word. I´m sure as it gets colder and I cover up my shirts with my jackets I´ll blend in even more.

How´s my Spanish? It´s getting much better with all this practice I´m getting. I can conjugate faster and now I can even put the indirect and direct object pronouns (me, te, se, le, lo, etc.) in front of the verb. So, saying things like ¿me entiendes? and te dije que NO los he lavado are easier now. We still speak too much English. It´s hard to committ to speaking Spanish all the time when you´re around English speakers whose Spanish isn´t much better than yours. I´m going to improve this, though, by volunteering in places where I can speak to more Uruguayans.

How´s my English? It´s worsening by the day. I tend to spell things the Spanish way by default these days, so ´nation´ becomes nación and ´professor´ becomes profesor. The spellings are so close, though. And my Spanish professor wanted me to rewrite a part of my paper in English so she could understand it. Hah, then halfway through rewriting it in English I started to write in Spanish. I´m just getting the two languages mixed up a lot now. I´ll say chau instead of bye and ¿cómo se llama? instead of ´what is it called?´. My Spanglish is improving considerably as well. I can go from a conversation in English right to a conversation in Spanish much faster which I seriously strugged with when I first arrived here.

I went to a fútbol game about two weeks ago. It. was. insane. The game was nearby in Parque Batlle so Lorrenía and me were able to walk to it. It was C.N.F (Uruguayan national team) against Peñarol. I am a Peñarol simply because they have the craziest fans I have ever seen. From the other side of the park we could here them chanting before the game even started! The colors of Peñarol are yellow and black in a stripe pattern and somehow the three major sections of Peñarol managed to sit so that everyone on the top and bottom had yellow balloons and the people in the middle had black balloons. There was a percusion section in the middle of the Peñarol side that played the entire game. They threw up confetti when the team took the field and started to light fireworks and flares (those are allowed in stadiums here!). Complete madness. There were bomb squad people there and riot control. It wasn´t even that big of a game. I´m definitely going to make sure I go to another fútbol game. Corbin, a student from my university who is studying in Chile this semester, might come to Montevideo in June and we´re going to try to make it to a world cup game.

PDA is rampant here. I don´t have enough fingers and toes to count how many times I have seen people shamelessly making out in public. It´s what they do here. Children live with their parents until they marry usually so they only place to have to hang out with their significant other is in public.

Random: Hayley was on the bus and a random guy from California who was on the bus too called her out for being North American. She was kind of mad that she was so obvious. I smiled cheekily.

I am definitely going to stay here for another semester. I thought about going back for maybe a night before I realized I would be very disappointed with myself. So, I will probably graduate in the summer instead of the spring because of one class but that´s okay with me. I love being here and surrounded by the culture and always being able to learn something different about the language everyday. Did you know they use these <<>> to symbolize quotation marks? All those years I´ve been reading Spanish texts and I did not know that. Blew my mind.

Lesson: It offends people some Americas when you refer to the United States as America. There are two Americas and it´s pretty ignorant and biased to assume the US is the America. So, I now refer to it as mi país (my country), los Estados Unidos (EEUU), Estados Unidos de América (EUA) [their version of United States of America (USA)], or Norte América.

And Bring Some Servilletas!

2010-04-22T23:55:00.007-04:00

It´s been a while, eh?

Life isn´t very eventful these days. Parcials a.k.a. mid-terms are coming up, so I´m just trying to figure out how my school/teachers are going to handle mid-terms.

Yeah, and a day or two after my last blog post I became familiar with the British hospital here. It is quite possible to hurt yourself tripping up stairs. I was heading to breakfast in the hostel in Buenos Aires before we were going to leave on the boat for Buquebus on the way back to Uruguay when this happened, so it was very ill-timed. I had a water bottle in my right hand, so when I fell all my weight went on my left hand and I "traumatized" the joint. It healed pretty fast but I was left with the bruise for about a week and a half which hurt every time I tried to use my hand. I got to wear a sling for a few days and he wrapped it up for me too. It looked a bit dramatic for such a small wound. I survived though! I, also, picked up some new vocabulary as a lot of people in the British hospital don´t actually know a lot of English or at least they are very out of practice. Radiografías, sala de emergencia, and yueso are some and I found it funny no one knew what sling was in Spanish, but they gave me one to wear any way.

And the reason I waited till Uruguay to get it looked at is because I knew for sure where the British Hospital was in Uruguay and that they spoke English. I knew nothing at all about hospitals in Argentina. I just had Rachel help me with my jacket and carrying things and had to hold my hand out and away from the rest of my body for about 6 hours... but it all worked out. And to the lady who whispered to her husband in Spanish about me holding my hand out like a weird person... I heard and understood you. :P

Last thing, I am having to consider going back to the US sooner than I wanted. To make things less complicated: I´m having to drop my literature class that I said didn´t seem impossible before and it´s going to make me graduate in the summer now and not in the Spring. I was looking forward to being to graduate on time in the Spring of 2011 but now it will be Summer of 2011 unless I can talk to the Spanish department and get them to work with me. So, by staying the rest of the year I will probably have to graduate a little late and if I go back after this semester then I can make sure I graduate on time. I´d still become fluent in Spanish, eventually, if I´d just have to wait another year or so before I get to Mexico to start teaching English and if the other three years at UNCG have been any indication, I won´t be improving my speaking skills very much while I´m still in school. Choices. Edit: Just re-reading this and other posts I think it´s obvious which choice I was going to make.

Random: In my Communication and Culture class we read an article about Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Mulan. I read the entire article in an hour and a half (record!) AND understood it. (I love Disney in case I never mentioned it).

P.S. Servilletas are napkins. The title is one of our bad Spanglish jokes we make which are the stories of our lives down here. Example:

Me: Que te duele?/ What hurts?
Hayley: Este partido/ This game.
Me: Que? Parte?/ What? You mean 'part'?
Hayley: Partido!/ Game!
Me: OK, fui a un partido de fútbol ayer.... Entonces, 'parte'. / OK, I went to a soccer game yesterday.... So, you mean part.
Hayley: Oh, parte. You know what I mean!

We had a conversation just like this one almost two months ago over borracho and barato....

In Argentina 'oops' means 'oops'

2010-03-31T20:51:00.002-04:00

It´s my (belated) month-iversary! Today marks the last day in March which means I´ve been in South America the whole month of March-- four weeks and four days to be precise. Exciting.

Today is the last full day we spent in Ushuaia. We made it a very low key day by splurging on a really good lunch then visiting the Martime and Penal Museum. The museum wasn´t the most exciting thing, but we got a student discount with our ISIC cards which all study abroad students need at UNCG (I finally found a place to use it!). The museum was held in what used to be a prison and all the cells had information about the prision, prisoners, and even information about Argentinan ship expeditions. Did you know Argentina owns part of Antartica?

Backing up a few days, we did other more exciting things like a combination bus-boat tour around Ushuaia. The tour was nine hours and we were able to see some special kind of bird that I couldn´t focus on because there were sea lions right next to them. I don´t know how to describe the sea lions in a way that makes sense. They were so ugly they were cute? Then we saw a real lighthouse and an island of pingüinos! Unforunately, the penguins had already started to migrate, so there weren´t a lot of them like there would have been if we went a few weeks earlier, but it was an island of penguins! On my list of things to do here was penguins, glacier, Chile, and hiking, so I was super excited when the bus ran onto the island a little bit and we had about 20 to 30 minutes just to stare at and take pictures of the penguins. Never while I was planning this trip did I think I would see penguins. It was a possiblity, but at the same time when you see something on T.V. so much you don´t think it´s possbile to actually see them. It was surreal. We transferred to land afterwards and toured the first ranch in Ushuaia. We, also, drove through the mountains on a bus, and went to a husky breeding center that served great hot chocolate. I highly recommend this tour if you ever go to Ushuaia. You get to sit down a lot in a warm place and get pretty close to penguins. So. Worth. It.

We, also, went hiking in Tierra del Fuego National Park. It was just Rachel and me, so we were able to take our time and enjoy the view of the forest and the coastline as we hiked for about three and a half hours. With how I walk in the streets of Ushuaia always having to hold on to things so I won´t fall completely on my face as I trip over everything, I´m surprised I didn´t twist an ankle or something more dreadful (word brought to you by a British guy in the hostel).

And yesterday we went on our last excurision where we went riding in a 4X4, had asado for dinner, and went kayaking. Best Excursion Ever. Our guide was perfect for the job. He had special CDs made just for these trips and would get out of the car, while it´s still moving, and dance on the hood of the car. He would turn the overhead light on and off like a strobe light, let us sit on top of the car while we went through dips and turns and puddles, and made all kinds of jokes like the one in the title of this blog. There was even one instance where he went through a huge puddle, went up a hill, put the car in neutral, rolled back, and did it again. I was on top during this holding on for dear life. So much fun! The kayaking was fun, too, because it was my first time. Kayaking is as hard it looks. I had Rachel to guide me, so I feel like that´s the only reason we did not tip over and thank God because it was cold. We then did get stuck on a sand bar that was made of mud and had to have our guide rope us in while everyone watched and took pictures. Hah.

There were days in between where we did much less significant things not worth mentioning, too, of course. We were thankful for it because this is vacation afterall and it gave us plenty of time to relax.

With our extra time here we cooked to save money. Ushuaia is such a tourist town plus it´s so separated from everything that prices are a little crazy. After spending about $15 USD on a chicken sandwhich with no fries or anything we knew we would have to cook. So, we´ve cooked stir fry, eggs in a basket, pasta with homemade garlic bread, and we bought soup for about 50 cents so we´ve had that more than once. They were simple meals that definitely helped out our budget.

Other culture things: People in Ushuaia WILL pick you up if they see you walking (I experienced this first hand and aparently it´s nothing to be afraid of). Even though this is a semi-isolated town they still have brand names and seem to have way more labels in their closets than I do. I´ve been told that while crab from Ushuaia is widely sold here it´s actually not good compared to Alaskan kind crab. Just about every business is fully biliginual here so you can get away with speaking all English, if you wanted to. They take their siestas seriously here in that around mid-day a lot of stores will close for about three hours. Lastly, Ushuaia is the southernmost city but NOT the southernmost town. There are two towns one on the Chilean side of the Beagle Channel and one on the Argentinan side that are actually more south but a city here has to have at least 10,000 people which they both don´t.

Other things: Met a guy from the UK who laughs and shouts in his sleep and gave us a demonstration. La Posta hostel is the place to stay here in Ushuaia. It´s the closest to the airport and the furthest from town. It´s my favorite hostel out of the four I´ve stayed and I highly recommend you check it out if you make it to this side of the world.

OK, leaving Ushuaia tomorrow and going to spend two days in Buenos Aires then head back "home". Travelling is fun, but I did come here for school after all. :P

p.s. Made my first joke in Spanish that a native speaker understood and told me was very good. <---Progress!! What what!?

Ushuaia

2010-03-26T10:48:00.008-04:00

So, remember how I said I was going to Caractas (I still don´t know how to spell it)? There was a change of plans. I´m traveling with Rachel who has been almost everywhere I was planning on going, so she convinced me late at night one night to go to Ushuaia. Ush-a-whata-ya? Oosh-why-ya. It´s the southern most city in the WORLD and has penguins. Those are the only reasons I´m here. It´s about 43 degrees fahrenheit here (and it´s summer time!) and there are snow-capped mountains everywhere. It´s so beautiful in that cold, mountainous way. Rachel said it reminded her of Alaska and me never having been to any place like this just went "WoOoOoOow."

We left Wednesday evening and arrived Thursday at about 2:00 p.m. We took a bus to Colonia then a boat to Buenos Aires where we spent the night. And from there we flew to the airport in Ushuaia. Unfortunately, we had a hiccup with the boat in Colonia and didn´t board until about four or five hours after we were suppose to. We thought the boat was going to be cancelled due to rough waves in the harbor, so we had just refunded our money to purchase tickets with another company when suddenly the first boat was boarding. We had to scramble and plead with the manager to let us re-buy our tickets and let us run to the boat to make it but we did it and happily made our plane the next morning on about four hours of sleep for me and two for Rachel. By the way, when I said WE had to scramble I meant Rachel. I was exhausted and being the calm one of the both of us, so I just sat down at some point and let her do everything. Whoops :P

Where exactly is Ushuaia, you ask?

Well, we´ve slept a lot of the day away already here, so we´re just gonna check out some museums, take more pictures of the mountains, and maybe eat out. Who knows! Adiós from the other side of the world!

¡Chau, Bella!

2010-03-21T15:26:00.004-04:00

Another week in Uruguay. I´ve been here for only 3 weeks and one day and I feel like I´ve accomplished so much already. I´ve actually had people tell me already that they´ve noticed how my Spanish has improved. Say what?! The girls and me offically switched to Spanish last Monday and while we still speak in English more than we should I can see everyone improving.

We started to learn el voseo in our foreigner Spanish class on Friday and I feel like I understand people so much better now! El voseo is a verb form that is only used around the Río de Plata, so mostly Uruguay and Argentina speak using it along with some regions of Paraguay. It´s a simple verb tense to learn and I can definitely recognize it now, however, it will take me a little while to begin to use it. It´s easier to use ´vos´ when I don´t have to conjugate a verb after it, so instead of ´¿Puedo ir contigo?´ you would say ´¿Puedo ir con vos?´. Súper easy!

I haven´t really done anything new this week what with school and unfortunately contracting food poisoning on Friday. The school work isn´t that difficult, but I´m not used to having to read about 40 pages of Spanish for homework. It´s pretty slow going and a lot of the works were written in old Spain Spanish, so that means new vocabulary and old verb tenses that aren´t used anymore. The work isn´t impossible, though, and I can´t wait for next semester when reading 40 pages of Spanish won´t be such a hassle.

As far as the food poisoning is concerned, I´m still not 100% sure what caused it. I´ve been fixing a lot of my own food lately, so I think this is something I did to myself. No one else is sick so it can only be the food that I bought for myself that caused it. I want to blame the ham, but I really don´t know. It´s my second time having it and to be honest I´m glad it finally happened because part of traveling is food poisoning or the more common TD. Of course, I still need to watch what I eat, but my body should be more adjusted to the types of bacteria found in the food and the water here and that means I can be more adventurous when I eat out...not.

Edit: I actually had gastrointesti-something. It´s just like food poisoning except it´s caused by a virus and tends to last about a week and instead of a day or two. It didn´t affect me as much since I´m already lactose intolerant and experience stomach aches regulary. I only felt slight discomfort while Rachel, on the other hand, ended up missing a few days of school and couldn´t eat for two days. Probecita.

Semana Santa is coming up. It´s like Spring Break in the States except it´s really an observance of Holy week which is what Semana Santa stands for. Makes you almost think twice about what you are going to do during the break... almost. We found out our school is a super Catholic school (Opus Dei) so, of course, they would observe this holiday. This is our one chance before exams to go as far as we can in South America for a whole week and a bunch of people have already booked tickets for Río de Janiero and are working on their visas. The schedule for Río doesn´t work for me and my classes, so I think I´m going to head for Caractas (I hope I spelled that right). It´s a place with a big waterfall where Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay join, so I would have an option of visiting either of the three countries when I get there. I still don´t know if I´m going by myself of not, but I refuse to sit here and do nothing during this whole week off, so if I must go by myself then I shall!

I am still enjoying it here and even plan on starting to read the newspaper, so I can know what´s happening and get more of an idea about the culture here. I, also, want to visit the feria, or an outside market, in Parque Rodó which is a short walk from where I live. I´ve read about it online and want to check it out for myself.

¡Chau, bellos! (I don´t think this is actually said here but I said it to Analía one day and she laughed, so why not?)

Funny, Funny

2010-03-10T15:32:00.004-05:00

I made a funny in class yesterday. Accidentally, of course, but the whole class laughed and even the teacher. We were doing roll call and, being an international student, my name wasn´t on the attendance sheet. So, when the teacher asked for whoever they didn´t call I had to raise my hand. After about eight people with Spanish names, she calls on me and I´m thinking ´Oh, boy, my name is going to stand out´. And it did. After hearing my name, everyone laughed and then I had to spell my it. I thought I would recover here and not sound so like international student when I knew how to spell my name. I even asked Rachel how to say the letters ´A´ and ´E´ because they sound so much alike that I mix them up sometimes. I so had it until I realized that I spelled my first name first when I was suppose to do my last name first. I guess I was nervous. Then the whole class laughed again and I had to actually speak to the teacher, so it became very clear that I am indeed an international student who can´t speak Spanish when she´s flustered. I loved it though. It was a nice icebreaker and you have to learn to laugh at yourself in those situations.

Also, I forgot to mention in my last post that Hayley, Kelsey, and I went to the beach earlier this week. We went late, so it wouldn´t be so hot and only stayed for a little while, but it was fun. I liked it a lot because it was fun to see all the people and it was way more relaxing than I though it would be. By the way, I know I haven´t posted any pictures but as soon as I get my laptop (Bestbuy STILL has it) I will go back and put up pictures of everything and post a link of whatever website I will use for photos on here.

On culture: I love trying to ride the bus in Montevideo. If you try to ride them like you do in the states you will never be able to get off. What I mean is you have to stand right at the door to show that you want to get off. There is no string to pull so you have to literally walk up to the door bus while it´s still in motion and stand there as the bus continues to turn and stop and whatever until you get to your stop. The closer to the door you are the better. To hail a bus you need to stick your hand out like you would for a taxi because if no one is getting off and no one hails the bus then it will not stop.

La Semana Santa is coming up and we´re in the midst of making plans! We´re thinking of going to Punta del Este (a great tourist beach area) the weekend before then heading to Brazil afterwards. We met some people in a hostel that will let us stay with them while we´re on our way to Río de Janiero. I´m so excited about this trip. Getting to see this place so soon after arriving is awesome. I just hope we can find an inexpensive way to do it since I have to make my money stretch for the rest of the year.

And last but not least, I finally found an apartment! I keep making corny jokes about it like when I take the keys out to open the door I´m like "Let me pull out MY keys to MY apartment." I´m a nerd, but it´s my first apartment ever, so I´m allowed to be a little over excited.

I Miss Los Estados Unidos

2010-03-08T14:53:00.005-05:00

America. The US of A. The land of the red, white, and blue. I miss it terribly today. I think I´m experiencing culture shock because I definitely find myself frustrated over little things lately such as the fact that a hot dog here does not taste like the hot dogs I´m used to. I´m tired of people always brushing up against me and walking to the left and not the right. And I want to have an amazing homecooked meal with American Coke (even though it tastes better here but doesn´t have as much of a kick) that ends with chocolate chip cookies.

But at the same time I still love it here. We finally found housing. Hooray!! Life should be way more stable now and if you want to send me packages of cookies I can give you a solid address now ;).

Our new apartment is pretty small and there are a total of five people living in it, but the two people who own it won´t be there much and guess who has her own room? Yup, I have my own room mostly because I´m a light sleeper and I love my own personal space. We have to buy our own food but Chef Hayley, will hopefully be fixing a lot of meals, so I should start eating much better now. I can tell I´ve already lost weight because my belts almost don´t fit me anymore... I think it´s in large part due to the strange meal times here (breakfast=before 10; lunch=1-3; 5ish= tea time or snack time; dinner=around 10). Well, dinner is mostly different with the added tea/snack time but that´s what´s killing me. At about five I´m ready to EAT, but a bunch of places aren´t serving dinner yet.

I think it´s funny that Hayley, Kelsey, and me have already gotten a rhythmn going after only a week. Hayley is the forgetful one. She is no longer allowed to hold keys to any of my locks as she is always misplacing them or almost losing them.

Kelsey is the FML (F*** my life)one because things are always happening to her and it´s hilarious. For example, somehow on the bus someone stole her passport from her purse and the lady called to ask for money in exchange for the passport. Well, Kelsey had to call the embassy and the police and in the meantime she´s passport-less which is definitely not good. It´s not really a funny story, but when I add that the same day, if not the day before, we had orientation where they told us all the things that we should not to do, like carrying your actual passport on your person, then it makes you smile. Also, one of the number one rules when you go abroad is do NOT carry your original passport on you! Make copies and carry those instead. So, it was an FML moment for sure.

And, me? I´m the one who knows where to go and just general info about Montevideo. I did the most research and am the most advanced in Spanish so I have most of the answers. We`re like the three musketeers.

So, I´m sitting in the computer lab typing this up as I wait for my 7:30pm class. Most of my classes are really late and I need to ask someone why classes are so late here. I´m not really complaining though. More sleep for me.

And I think it´s so awesome how I am a foreigner here. All the things we do to foreigners in the US is what they do to them here and my obvious accent is not helping. Plus, I don´t look like most people here and especially at my school so I alone stand out. Someone did ask if I was from Chile the other day (even after they heard me speak Spanish) and I almost said yes.

First Week in Uruguay

2010-03-06T16:04:00.005-05:00

You can read all you want about study abroad and the country you're going to, but it´s a whole different thing in person! I absolutely love it here and I'm glad I chose Uruguay. It is indeed tranquilo for a major city and I just love being surrounded by all Spanish all of the time.

I wish I could write more blog posts but I still don't have my laptop and the time I do have to get on a computer I am emailing professors, Skype-ing my parents, or looking for housing. My life is so unstable right now with classes beginning Tuesday but I think I found an apartment, so things should be a little less hectic in the upcoming week.

I feel like my Spanish is already improving after a week albeit not as fast as I would like it too. Something that makes learning Spanish harder here is the typical Uruguayan accent to pronounce ´llamo´ like ´shamo´ instead of the typical ´yamo´with emphasis on the 'sh' so I have to re-retrain my ear to listen for that sound. It's an obstacle sometimes especially when I discover a new word with the 'll' or ´y´ sound that is pronounced with the 'sh' sound, but with classes starting on Monday I'm sure I'll get accustomed to it real fast.

Living in hostels has been so much fun and dare I say too much fun? We get to meet travelers from all over the world who are traveling for different reasons with different accents. A lot of them speak English and very little Spanish so we do end up speaking English a lot. Hayley, Kelsey, and me said that we could talk in English as long as we lived in a hostel, but as soon as we moved into a permanent place there would be no more English. We did this mostly because it´s stressful living in a noisy hostel and trying to wake up early and go to orientation, do homework and discover a new city with the added pressure of speaking Spanish all the time. As we get more accustomed to where we are and more confident with our Spanish, we are speaking more in Spanish.

There are about 12 other international students here with the US students being the majority. I was glad at orientation that we finally got to meet them, so we could compare notes and help each other find housing and avoid the mistakes that other people have made since they arrived.

I've discovered so much these past seven days and learned so much about this new culture that this one blog entry can't do it justice. I experienced an asado, had to change my definition of clean several times, learned to trust people way more that I ever have, walked for miles just to see this beauty city, struggled with my American accent to simply order hot dogs and so much more. I wish I could write more but I'm hogging Hayley's computer.

But I'm really glad I came here and I am really excited that for the next ten months I get to call this place home and eventually help new international students explore this little known country.

after our 10 hour flight we made it!

Anti-climatic Flight Cancellation

2010-02-25T19:19:00.005-05:00

So, about 20 minutes before our flight it was cancelled due to the blizzard in New York. The phrase of the day is ´anti-climatic, much?´ We used this to describe our situation a lot and we waited over an hour for Kelsey´s friend to come back to Raleigh and pick us up just as she got back home. It was so crazy to be so nervous and so excited and then 20 mintues before you embark on this epic adventure you find out you have to wait another day even though you've already psyched yourself up. Man... So, I just got home and I have all these people to email like our hostel and our university to let them know what's going on and to save money so we don't get charged fees.

Our new flight plan is to leave Raleigh at 7:25pm and go to Miami. We'll arrive in Miami at 9:25pm then we'll have an overnight flight from Miami straight to Montevideo from 11:10pm to 11:20am. I hate that we are no longer going through Brazil but we're going to try to make it to Rio de Janiero at some point so we'll make up for it.

I only got three hours of sleep last night in an effort to exhaust myself so I could just sleep on the planes and also to clean and pack so I'm really exhausted right now. Well, good thing Raleigh isn't too far away from Greensboro so I can sleep in my own bed for one more night. I'm actually going to get eight hours of sleep this time as we get to do it all over again tomorrow!

Today is the day!

2010-02-25T00:42:00.004-05:00

This post isn't going to be long at all, but I won't have time to do it tomorrow so here we go!

At the moment I'm taking a brief break from my frantic packing to take a breather and open a gift a friend gave me (Thanks, Kelli, even though I haven't opened it yet!) Packing for 10 months is so hard to do and keep your suitcase under 50 lbs. I haven't weighed my suitcase yet, but I already know I'll have to take a lot of stuff out. I'm really exhausted and stressed and I hope that this means when I do get on the planes I will pass out before we even lift off. I HATE flying and it would be awesome to just skip the flights and just go through the airports.

I am just really nervous for this big adventure and hope that I can arrive safely and find a laptop or computer somewhere that I can get on before mine arrives in the mail. Bestbuy headquarters is STILL fixing my laptop over a month later and I'm just not going to get it back before I leave tomorrow. This presents a huge problem in that my cell phone probably won't work and if something happens... I'll just have to pay the outrageous international fees and call my parents somehow. I might just have to go to school early and see if the Director will let me use her computer. Who knows, but it's really stressful not having a sure way to tell my parents I arrived and I'm okay.

But yeah that's everything in a nut shell. I really hope everything goes okay and I would really appreciate prayers and thoughts for me and my travel companions for the next 48 hours as we travel and adjust to our new envrionment. Adios, amigos!

Almost there!

2010-02-19T14:11:00.005-05:00

Six more days until I take a 23 hour journey to my new favorite place! I can't be as excited as I want to be right now since I received three vaccinations yesterday and am currently experiencing flu-like symptoms. Not fun... but I will now be able to fight off Typhoid Fever, Hepatitis A, and Yellow Fever. Whoo!

For the first six days the girls and me have everything figured out so far. We've booked a hostel and met a girl, Rachel, who can help us get situated. She's from UNC- Chapel Hill, which is really close to our university, so I immediately feel comforted in that she will be the one to help us out.

A lot of people have been asking me about how I feel with the departure date looming and if I am excited. It really depends on the day how I feel about everything. I have days where I'm so excited then days where I am just making lists in my head. There's just a lot to think about and so many ways to feel about this situation. I've never left the country, even home, for more than ten months by myself yet I love Spanish and the fact that I'll be in an evironment where people, signs, and TV will all be in Spanish. I guess if I had to pick one word for it it would be that I feel overwhelmed. In both a good and bad way, but I'm keeping a positive attitude about the whole thing and taking everything in stride.

Nothing is set in stone yet after those first six days. I'm not sure if it´s just Latin American culture or the University I am going to. Or maybe it´s just an American thing to want to know exactly how things are going to happen and what to expect when you arrive to a new place. I know this is probably just typical study abroad things that people learn in my situation, but it´s harder dealing with it even though I knew it was coming. But everything will work out mostly because it has to! After all the research I've done, I feel good about this experience and that I will be able to manage it with the help of the other students from UM. There are only 13 international students including myself and we've already been emailing each other so that's a good sign.

And I would say the second most common thing people ask me when they realize Uruguay is a Spanish-speaking country is "Can you speak Spanish? Will you be able to get around?" Yes, I can speak Spanish though not fluently yet and yes, I will be able to get around. People always ask me this like they can't believe I'm attempting to go to a country that isn't too English-friendly, but I really don't think it will be too bad. I'm far enough along in the Spanish major where I can take the basics I've learned and start to really use them and build upon them to gain fluency. It definitely won't be easy going from speaking my broken Spanish to my American Spanish teachers to being able to speak fluidly to any Spanish speaking person, but I'm confident that I can accomplish this before I leave Uruguay. Plus, I'm pretty sure I have the most classroom hours in my little group of three people so I'll have to step my game up and make sure I can help us find housing and get around the city, and explore our new school. I write better than I speak Spanish, though, so if worse comes to worse I'll just whip out an empty notepad (International students would do this to me at UNCG and it seemed to really help them) and just write down what I want to say on it.

The only big thing that still needs to be done is for me to get my laptop back from HP headquarters. I reall need it before I leave, so I can contact my parents when I arrive via Skype and, of course, I'll need it for school. The next biggest thing is packing... oh, goodness. How on earth does one pack for 10 months?

I wrote this post over a few days and as I'm finishing it I have four more days until I leave. I find myself being very nostalgic as I spend my last days in this familiar place and even saying "Oh my gosh" out loud a lot as it keeps hitting me that I really signed up for this. I'm really looking forward to it and thankful for all the people that have helped me get here by filling out papers on my behalf and holding my jobs and just supporting me as I've had to watch all the other international students leave while I'm still here. So, thank you guys and the next post will be on the day that I leave... in four days... on Thursday!

25 days and counting!

2010-01-30T14:53:00.009-05:00

I still feel like Uruguay is so far away but it's finally under a month until I will be in Montevideo so it's getting there!

I do not have anything new to report really. I just found a lot more websites and I found an amazing blog done by a southern California family who relocated to Montevideo. They talk about daily life in Uruguay among other things and I am finding them to be helpful.

I, also, found another blog by a student who studied abroad in Montevideo. I have not had the chance to read it yet or find out what school she attended (probably the Univeridad Católica), but I am excited to read her blog.

I found out the other day that there IS a Mcdonalds in Uruguay. (Yesssss!) I must locate it immediately and find the shortest route because I do not see myself liking Uruguayan food at all. I'm a picky eater and the usual cusine of beef and seafood does not sound appealing to me. Bleh! But Mcdonalds will be my lifesaver.

I still don't know what to do about adapters and converters because everyone has their own opinion about them., so I will probably wait until I get there to buy those things. Downside is that if I can't charge my laptop or phone then I can't contact my parents when I get there, but my parents are talking about getting me a pre-paid cell phone and I found out last night that my international student ID has one so I can purchase an international phone card online. I think....

Hayley, Kelsey, and I are still waiting to get an email from the University about arrival dates and housing. Really we're waiting to get info about everything. We just know we were signed up for a foreigner Spanish course and that it´s about $225 USD (US Dollars). Hayley, also, found a blog on housing on the UM website and it was not encouraging. It made it seem like housing would be a challenge. Our options are host family or finding a place of our own. With host families, apparently you ask for a trial? You try them out for a period of time then sign a contract with them and you have to stay throughout the whole contract. I just hope we can move out if we're not happy with the family. Then apartment searching in a foreign country in a different language sounds difficult! Not to mention it seems like a lot of money trying to pay for a hostel while we search and finding a place in the city. o.O

I'm not worried about anything, though. Give me a week more without direct contact from UM and that might change, but I am still excited as ever and researching more about Montevideo and Uruguay in general every day. I am probably over doing it, but this is my first time ever doing anything like this. I don't mind being caught off guard or surprised by anything, but I'd rather be surprised with "Hey, they have Walmart here!" than "US citizens have to pay how much to arrive by plane in Uruguay?!". Know what I mean?

I'm starting to see that my blogs will always be on the long side... but I want people to get a detailed experience along with me, so it's kind of inevitable. I'm thinking maybe two more blogs before I leave on February 25th and hopefully those will be full of way more information from UM and not me just looking up things online that may or may not be true.

Chau!

Uruguay... that's in Europe somewhere, right?

2010-01-18T23:31:00.009-05:00

So, I realize a lot of people know I'm going to Uruguay, but have no idea where it is or what it's like. I'm going to use this post to briefly profile Uruguay from my study abroad material and things I've found online.

First off, Uruguay is NOT in Europe. Nor is it in Central America. It's located in southern South America with Argentina to its left and Brazil to the northeast. The rest is surrounded by water-- either the Rio de Plata or the Atlantic Ocean. I'll be in it´s capital, Montevideo, which is located on the southern coast along the Rio de Plata. The weather is fairly temperate and it´s seasons are reversed from those of North America. Temperatures in July average 52 degrees fahrenheit and 73 degrees in January (which are the peak months of winter and summer). It´s, also, free of natural disasters which my parents will love.

Population: 3.5 million people with a little over a million living in Montevideo (it´s capital).

Language: The official Language is Spanish with English and Portugese being common second languages. Near the border of Brazil a mix of Spanish and Portuguese is used.

Religion: Uruguay is one of the most secular countries in Latin America and there is no official religion. Roman Catholics do prevail, though, only less than half of this denomination attends church regularly. Church and state are strictly separated and religious freedom is guaranteed to all of it´s citizens.

General Attitudes: Uruguayans are very proud of their country and do not like to hear people praise other countries more than Uruguay. They have a motto "Nadie es más importante que nadie"(No one is more important than anyone else) and hate aggressiveness and arrogance. They tend to be pessimistic, opinionated, and individualistic. Punctuality is not a bad thing but it´s okay to be late. However, the more formal the event the more important it is to be on time.

Personal Appearance: Conservative well-tailored clothes. Subdued clothes are more common and makeup and jewelry are not usually worn. So, pretty much they wear jeans and a t-shirt which is standard for a lot of Latin America.

In other news, I finally bought my plane ticket! I will leave on February 25th at 1:50pm from Raleigh, NC. I'm really excited because I will be riding down with two other girls from UNCG going to UM and we'll have some fun connections in New York and Brazil before we reach Montevideo. We got our tickets for a little over $800 roundtrip so that is excellent considering we're leaving in the middle of day with two connections and going completely out of our way.

The coordinator at UM doesn't arrive in her office until January 25th, so we've gotten no packet of information on host families or classes since they've been on summer vacation. Unfortunately that means we bought our tickets without knowing a lot. Our plan is that if we arrive early we'll stay in a hostel for a few days and explore the city. We've already got one picked out and I'm sure we'll try to hit the beach before school starts.

Lastly, classes start tomorrow for UNCG. I'm pretty excited I get to relax for another month before I have to worry about classes even if I'll be in school in June while UNCG is out. Oh, well. But I'm super excited! I finally have a date I can tell people for Uruguay and it´s a little over a month away!

I've been into a lot of George Lopez things lately and really anything Spanish related, so here's a link to a funny video to end my post.

I got ants in my pants!

2009-12-28T18:42:00.008-05:00

I really want to put up a real post on this blog even though I'm not in Uruguay yet so... this is a post of my countdown and preparation for Uruguay. If I leave on February 28th, which is a date that is just stuck in my head, then in exactly two months from now I will be in Uruguay. So, I will use these two months to look up things about Uruguay and post about them so that when I actually am there I can check my information and provide a more accurate view of Uruguay and hopefully South America in general for everyone out there. Sound good? Okay. Alright well, here are some things I've been looking up and finding out about Montevideo/ Uruguay so far.

I just ran across an awesome article called What NOT to Do in Uruguay. It's not exactly the most positive article, but it gives me a reality check about Uruguay. It's not a booming metropolis like I keep thinking it is; its actually very tranquilo and stuck in the 80s. Not what I was going for at all when I chose Uruguay... but it will be a good experience nonetheless. The article also mentions that while Montevideo is rated one of the safest cities in all of South America do NOT stay out late. I know this is kind of common sense but every time I read about safety it mentions not being out at night and it seems like a very severe warning.

I, also, ran across another website thanks to Hayley, who is going with me to the Universidad de Montevideo, that talks about the more everyday things I need to know about Uruguay. I really like it because these are both Uruguayans and people who moved to the country and have firsthand experience that are offering their advice. They talk about where to find decent books in English, how the water supply is, where to find housing, what kind of adapters or chargers you may need (without a power converter any big voltage American appliances like computers, cameras, and blow dryers will fry INSTANTLY) and they even talk about what winter is like in Uruguay: windy and rainy, joy!. It´s just full of blogs and articles I've found to be very useful.

I mentioned South America earlier and how I wanted to be able to tell people about it. To explain that statement I will have at least a full month of winter break where I'm not in school where I'll probably be here by myself for a while. The study abroad students I have met will leave and others will be on their way. So... why not travel? If some students stay an extra week or two we can find a cheap way to travel, or if I make some good Uruguayan friends who are willing to be spontaneous with me, I'll travel with them. The only real downside I see to this is that this is the reason I will need to get a yellow fever vaccination now. If I didn't travel I wouldn´t really need it, but now I will need it. I hate shots. But I'll get to see some great things and I MUST see Rio de Janiero because I've heard from numerous people that it´s a beautiful place and that I must see it before I die.

Naturally I'll need a place to stay while I´m in Uruguay so I'm going to start looking at couches to sleep on and hostels as well. Couchsurfing is an international phenomenon where people or families offer up their "couch" or bed or floor space to someone for a certain amount of time. You contact the person directly and discuss arrangement as well as payment if they would like to be compensated. Hostels are like hotels but... better? I've never stayed in one but you can have your own room or sleep in a dorm-like setting with a number of people which, of course, is less expensive than having a private room. I think they offer their own entertainment like bars and social rooms to hang out in and are just an inexpensive way to have a reasonably safe place to stay.

Other things I've been doing to prepare for my 10 months abroad is just re-teaching myself basic Spanish skills via the Spanish 204 and 301 books I've kept, watching Univision (a Spanish channel on t.v.), and just today I picked up a Spanish newspaper, Qué Pasa.

Things I've yet to learn and need to get a move on are learning how to Tango (it's a big dance style there) and looking up Uruguay's history. The people in the study abroad office said I should really know about their history so I can understand their culture better. It's probably a great idea to get started on that since Uruguay is a liberal nation and I often read about (peaceful) protests and reforms going on.

I don't know if its too early in the game to be looking up all this information but I'm so antsy. I just want to be in Uruguay already and be experiencing these things instead of researching about them. I can't buy my ticket yet because I need to find an airline that is very flexible since my arrival and departure times are estimates right now. And I haven't heard anything else from UM since I got my acceptance letter so I don't know where I'm living or anything. I'm not too worried, though. I have two whole months to figure everything out and don't even have to worry about getting a visa until I get there. So, I'm just waiting.