Birthday Eve

Thursday, July 30th

Woohoo, the day before my birthday! I woke up and Maria Laura was already cooking. She has had about triple her normal cooking orders this week, as the company she works for just switched to an online system. I seriously think the entire time I’ve lived here she has worked maybe twice a week with cooking. She has done it every day this week….and all day too, not just the half days I’ve seen. It’s intense.

I took the subte to Olleros, which is a really nice subte stop, btw. I figure it’s because it was added later, but it’s really big and spacious and just cleaner looking.

At class with Florencia, I got my first real mate experience! Now, mate is like tea. But the Argentines drink it out of a cup with herbs, into which they just constantly pour hot water. Also, you drink it from a metal straw. And you share it like a peace pipe. I had been offered it several times before, but never accepted what with all the swine flu hype and several times it was people I didn’t know, like on the bus or something. So no. But I was going to be really sad if I left BA without officially trying it, and Maria Laura doesn’t drink it.

So I started talking to Florencia about it, and the next thing I know we’re sharing it! You take turns by drinking down the water, then passing it back, refilling, and the other persons turn. It was Awesome! We also had a long talk about bus robbers, etc. in BA, and it has made me SO paranoid. I mean, I’ve been really jumpy since my backpack got unzipped, but now I feel ridiculous but I suspect everyone. It’s really stressful and I need to chill out a bit, but every person is a suspect. Oh, also, Florencia has been dating her boyfriend for 5 years now. She’s 22, so definitely still young. But I hope that when I’ve dated someone for five years that I still smile about them the way she does. It was so cute!!

Class with Hernan passed with him discussing his IT works. Thanks to my dad and Drew I was able to say that I had at least heard of a lot of the terms he was throwing at me. We talked about servers, computers, credit card transfers, blablabla. He also explained how his language call center works…help desk for the software they sell.

I then found out I’ll be coming back next week. Their teacher has the flu, and since they’re paranoid they don’t want her to come back until they’re sure she’s better. Apparently they liked me, so I get to come back next week. I truthfully believe that my best teaching tool is my enthusiasm. Even if the material is hard or maybe not put together in the best way, I just smile and put on my really interested face, and the class time passes really quickly!

I stopped by McDo again, but their credit card swiper was down, bummer. After that, I needed to go to the orphanage. I had been debating whether or not I would go, but I decided to do it because I would have to travel by myself and I needed to make sure I could navigate the bus system. So I pulled out my GuiaT and found the square on the map where the bus should stop. I had to ask a few people to point me in the right direction once I actually made it to the street, but I made it onto the bus. I didn’t feel like reading, so I just watched the scenery as the hour trip took place. When we got on the neighborhood street, I asked the bus driver to tell me when we made it to my crossstreet.

I walked to the orphanage through a deserted but really pretty neighborhood. It reminds me of the nice neighborhoods in the States. Upon arriving, Ada, the orphanage coordinator, announced we were going to the Plaza. When we got there, I played some games with the boys in the beginning…their versions of tag, etc, but when I finally actually tagged one of them they decided they were tired of the game. Go figure ;)

Aside from that 20 minute game, I again didn’t feel very useful. They have lots of adults at the orphanage, as well as other volunteers. Most of the time I feel like I’m just sitting. One of the other volunteers there today was from England. He is 18, just graduated high school. I felt old.

We had to walk another 20 minutes to make it to the bus. From there, it was about an hour ride back in town, especially with the traffic. By the time I made it on the subte I knew I was going to be late for my lesson with Julian. I was about 14 minutes late, and he was like, is everything ok? To which I explained that I was coming from the orphanage, and I think he was ok with it, but I’m not sure. We talked about Argentina politics the entire time, which was interesting. I have no idea what we’re going to talk about next Tuesday though, our last class.

On our way out, he didn’t invite me to ride home with him. Well, I then asked him if it would be ok for his cab to drop me off at a street he already crosses at. I felt kind of bad for asking, but I really don’t want to have to ride the subte from there.

Back at home, I had a dinner of rice and chicken, then met Rebe and headed to Sierra’s apartment. I met a lot of new people, as well as officially turned 21!!!