3-Tooth Willy

First of all, my mom informed me that I should put up the times of my classes. PS I'm an hour ahead of the east coast right now.

Monday: 6pm-9:15pm Argentinean History (Yeah, sucks!!!)

Tuesday: 3:30pm-5:30pm Tango

Wednesday: 2:30pm-4:30pm Tango Outing (We go to a show or watch a movie)
6pm-8:15pm Spanish Language

Thursday: 10:25am-12noon Basic Processes IV
1:30pm-4:15pm Argentinean Literature

Friday: Nothin'

Just to let all of you know, I've found a club where I can play water polo. It's called Gym and Fencing of Buenos Aires. To become a member, I need to get a health certificate from an Argentinean clinic. We'll see how that goes...because Argentina has universal health care. I went there today and they told me to come back tomorrow.

Getting your books here for classes is way cheaper than in the US because there aren't any copyright laws. All the texts are photocopied for the students. This is awesome, but it's a pain in the butt to actually get the copies. First, you need to find the photocopy place that the teacher uses and then wait until they have time to copy the materials. The first month of class is usually hectic because sometimes it takes awhile to get them.

Walking in Buenos Aires is like going through an obstacle course. First of all, there are 15 million people in Bs As. Second of all, there are the dangerous obstacles....the old ladies with broad shoulders, the millions of windowshoppers, the broken sidewalk, random construction, dog poop (seriously there's a lot), the people that hand out flyers (at almost every corner), the random liquid that drips from the apartments, the biggest pigeons I've ever seen in my life, the dogwalkers that are literally getting walked themselves, the runners, the bikers, the newsstands every 15 feet, and so on......I'm just saying that walking to school is at times interesting and frustrating.

So I guess you wanna know who's 3-Tooth Willy....well he's my history teacher. First of all, I'm going to say that he's incredibly smart and a great guy. Ok...so usually I can understand the majority of people that speak in spanish, but he's not in the majority. He's got three teeth and by the looks of it, at the end of the semester he won't have any. Remember....he's a great teacher...no joke! The way he talks and the sounds he makes with his mouth are just incomprehendable. I can get like 70% of what he's saying at times, but that's when he's talking clearly. Oh...I forgot....he has his doctorate for history, so he's Dr. 3-Tooth Willy.

Back to School

So I've tested out all the classes that I was interested in, and I've made my decision on the five classes that I'm going to take:

Argentine Literature (with 5 other foreigners)
Tango (with 10 other foreigners)
Spanish Language (with 2 other foreigners and 12 argentineans)
Argentine History (???)
Basic Processes IV (with 30 argentineans)


Basic processes is a psychology class for the second semester of the second year for psychology majors in Argentina. What am I doing taking the course? I have no idea...but seriously for my Global Studies major this class should be able to count for one of the requirements. At first it was a little overwhelming because I sat there surrounded by 30 argentine students, the professor and the auxillary teacher. However, everyone was really nice to me, even though it's hard for them to say my name.

I tried the class called International Negotiation but I didn't like it because it was pretty much a business class. I don't see myself as a businessman.

Everyone one of my classes meets once a week for about two hours and I have fridays off. Also, I don't have class on Mondays until 8pm, so I almost have a 4 day weekend every week. :)

I miss all of you so much!

Travelling in Argentina

The last few weeks I haven't been doing much. I was running almost everyday, but I developed shin splints so I've had to take some time off. A few of my classes have started and I love my class called Spanish Language because it is teaching me the little nuances of Spanish Grammar. It's a really difficult class, but it's great. I've also attended my Tango class and my Argentine Literature class. I will have started all of my classes by the end of next week. My classes seem really interesting now and I hope they stay that way. I'm really excited to go to my International Negotiation class tomorrow.

This past weekend I went to the waterfalls of Iguazu in the north of Argentina. I had an absolute blast. I went on a beautiful day and I took some great pics...they are all on facebook. I even went on a boat that went under the water falls and in the devil's throat (nickname for one part of the falls). I also went to the Jesuit ruins in San Ignacio. There, I was able to walk around a former village built by the indigenous people and the Jesuits. It was so incredible that I was left speechless. You really feel that you are standing in a holy place. A great movie about the Jesuits in South America is called "The Mission" starring Robert DeNiro.

To do list:
Open bank account to avoid all the fees from my bank in the US
Plan trip to Chile
Plan trip to Machu Picchu
Go to Montevideo, Uruguay with my Chilean friend
See a Tango show
Go to the theatre
Watch the Brazil vs Argentina World Cup Game on September 5th

He's Crazy...But I Understood Him

On October 11, I will be running 20 some miles in the Buenos Aires Marathon. I know it sounds crazy, but I'm doing it to prove to myself that I can....It's a mental thing. So I'm trying to run at least 4 days a week in the morning, and so far so good. Still, I haven't found a water polo team but I'm not too worried about it because I'm focusing on the marathon. This week I've just been walking around the city trying to get used to it. The other day I was walking down a street and saw a man standing in front of a pile of broken glass with a big crowd around him. He's know as The Crazy Glass Man...original...I know. He's on youtube. Type in El loco de vidrio. Well, this man is very charismatic and a crowd-pleaser. He throws the glass in his face and jumps and marches on the glass. For the final part of the show, he lays on top of broken wine bottle necks with a few people standing on him. So he chose a few guys from the audience. The were australian soccer players....wait, one problem...they didn't spanish and the crazy glass man didn't speak english...so the crazy glass man asked for an interpreter in the audience. I raised my hand and he chose me to help him. So, I explained everything to the guys that the crazy man said, and it went exactly as planned. The crazy man told me that my spanish was really good and that if I'm as nice to the people in Argentina as I was to him, I will make a lot of friends. The australians were really surprised that I could speak spanish. Another day this week, I went to a buffet with my friend from Mexico, Arturo. For about 12 bucks, we ate all the cow, lamb and pig we wanted with drinks and dessert. Argentina is world-renowned for it's meat and now I know why. The buffet was absolutely delicious.

Miss all of you guys!