A Puro Tango

Not a whole lot has been going on lately, just getting down to the grind of things and all that fun stuff. We finished up the final two tango lessons this week and last night went to a tango dance hall or Milonga to dance the tango and milonga (milonga is pretty much tango to a faster beat). I'm not entirely sure the tango hall is called a Milonga, I'm still a little bit confused about what they're actually called. I'm not one to take dance lessons, but I'm really glad I took advantage of this. It was a ton of fun and honestly, there's no way I could've studied and lived in Buenos Aires without taking tango lessons. Our instructors, Florencia y Nicolás, were amazing and really cool and funny, which made it a lot more fun. The Milonga was an experience, too. It was basically a huge room with a ton of tables and chairs facing a huge dance floor. We kind of jumped right in and started dancing our amateur tango steps, but no one seemed to care too much. The majority of the Argentines there were pretty old and it seems like the tango is a dying culture, sadly. We stayed there for about 3 hours dancing and watching others dance, and it was probably one of the more enjoyable nights I've had in the last few weeks. Completely surprised me because I usually hate the whole idea of having to dance and all that business, but I guess I needed something to open my eyes, haha. I would really like to take more lessons, but I'd have to find a few other kids to take them with so they would be cheaper, so we'll see.

I pulled the whole Argentine night thing and I've been out 'til between 6 and 6:30 AM the last three nights in a row, I'm a little worn out, but here's what else has been going on.

This last Wednesday was the memorial day for the veterans and fallen in the Falkland Island War (Guerra de las Islas Malvinas). We didn't have school and they played the memorial service on t.v. all day, which pretty much involved a bunch of speakers, including the now even less popular president, Cristina Kirchner. I wouldn't include this as it's not a really huge deal, but I think it portrays a lot of how the Porteños view things; I'm not entirely sure on the exact words, but I'm pretty sure she made a comment along the lines of how the Falkland Islands will one day belong to Argentina again, or that they should be Argentina's. I'm not going to go into how ridiculous I think that whole situation was, but I thought that was an absolutely incredible, if not ludicrous, thing to say. I'll get off that subject though so I don't make a really ill-informed statement, more so than I may have already done.

The farmer's strike is now on a thirty day break as of last Monday, but the repercussions of the whole situation are still being felt. Last Monday thousands of people in "support" of the government marched in Plaza de Mayo with their signs in support of the government. I had to take a bus through the Plaza that day to get to class, but luckily it took another route, though it added an extra twenty minutes to the ride. People tell me that the government pays these people a set amount to march in support of the government which, as I stated before, I have no trouble believing. The people don't all look like they're from Buenos Aires and a lot of them look like they were probably in need of the money. Now though, I think the government has blocked all exportation of meat and dairy, or at least greatly limited what can be exported. There was an article in La Nacion talking about how many grocery stores are having a hard time keeping their shelves full and the meat that is actually on the shelves is of really bad quality and pretty fatty. It also reports the prices in many stores have gone up, in some cases up to 20%. We haven't been eating a whole lot of meat in the house lately and the meat I've had outside is pretty bad. It's not a life changing ordeal, but it's still interesting to see the effects and after-effects of an oppressive government tariff and how the farmer's decided to handle it. Good old economics in action.

I came home from class the other day and the porter on duty was freaking out and running around and made me use the back elevator. He was speaking really fast to me in Spanish and I had absolutely no idea what was going on, but I went ahead and went up the back elevator, instead of the main one like I normally do. I got back into the apartment and Rafaela, our live-in maid, was standing by the door to main elevator and informed me that my host mother and her friend were stuck in the elevator. They ended up only being stuck for about five minutes, and it was a pretty funny thing in the end, but I've been crossing my fingers since, hoping that I don't get stuck. The elevator isn't even old, it's like a normal elevator you would find in the States, with automatic doors, a rarity here (the norm: the ones you have to open and close the doors yourself). Glad I wasn't the one that got stuck though.

I have a set schedule now, which a huge relief. It's not OFFICIAL yet, but it will be after I turn in my form to the COPA office, but here it is

• Economía del Desarrollo (UCA)
  
• Historia Argentina (USAL)
  
• Literatura Argentina y Latinoamericana (COPA)
  
• Castellano: Música Urbana (required Spanish course through COPA); should be really cool, we got access to like 300 Argentine rock songs to listen to for free
  
• Marketing Táctico y Operativo (USAL)
  

All of the classes except for the UCA one meet once a week for three hours, and the UCA one meets twice for an hour and a half on Monday and Tuesday. I don't have class on Friday's so hopefully that will allow me to do a little travelling. So far I like all of my classes and they shouldn't be too terribly hard, though I will have to read a lot for all of them. Should be fun.

Don't have a whole lot planned for this week, just class and hanging out, probably watching the NCAA national championship tomorrow night at the American bar. Friday the Olympic torch is supposed to be in Buenos Aires, so I think a few of us are going to go try to catch that event and then maybe go out to eat that night for my birthday, at least that's the plan right now.

Chappy and Chris, thanks for bringing your classic conversations to the blog comment area, it made me feel like I was back in Georgetown, haha