Chabad Sheva Brachot/Wedding After Party

This past Monday night, I went to Bafici Film festival, an annual independent film festival held in Buenos Aires, featuring movies from all over the world.  I saw a Canadian film called Radiant City, which explored the notion of Suburbia, discussing reasons as to why people move to suburbs and the problems that can arise.  A very interesting film, I thought, with lots of subtle humor and statistics about suburbs.  One point I thought was interesting (or at least this is what the film thought) was that people often move to suburbs to create a sense of community on a smaller scale.  But what often happens is that one becomes very isolated and often doesn't even know his neighbors.  For example, I wouldn't even recognize my neighbor who lives across the street from me.  Problems aside, suburbia seems to be a North American phenomenon and it's pretty foreign in Argentina.  So it seemed to me that the rest of the audience aside from my friend and me at the movie simply had no concept of the movie's subject.  But definitely a thought provoking film which questions the type of home we'd want to live in. 

Anyway, last night, my host family hosted a sheva brachot for Shmuel's sister, who got married on Monday.  It certainly was the most entertaining sheva brachot I had ever been at.  It all started out normally, with everyone gathering around the table to eat, obviously with tons of meat.  And then the music started, and quite a playlist it was.  Here are some of the songs that were featured:
1.  Paparazzi, Lady Gaga
2. If you wanna be my lover, Spice Girls
3. Viva la Vida, Coldplay
Of course, there was Jewish music as well, plus some Latin American pop songs.  But when these American pop songs came on, all of the men just went crazy, jumping up and down, putting their arms around each other, dancing without a care in the world, celebrating a family member's marriage.  All I could do was just watch and laugh.  Where am I??? After asking Chaya, my host mom, if Chabad in Buenos Aires tends to love American Pop, she said that it loves all types of music.  Hilarious.  In all seriousness though, one can really see how important family is here in Argentina.  I haven't seen that many families that are as close knit as the Kiesel family. 

This is one very small world:
At sheva brachot, I saw this girl that looked very familiar.  It turns out, she graduated from Maryland last year ( in fact, she worked in the Hillel dining hall) and is now dating Shmuel's brother.  Is this for real??
Then tonight, I went out to dinner at this dairy place (the meat place closed) in Belgrano and ended up meeting this Argentine who lives a floor above my brother Ilan on the Upper West side.  Ridiculous

One aspect of Argentine conversation that I really like is that whenever you say thank you, they say thank you back: For example, when I buy something at a store, I say gracias, and the clerk always responds "no, de nada (your welcome)," or "no gracias a vos (no, thanks to you)".  It really makes me think that I do them a favor by coming to their store, or ordering their food.  In other words, it is they who should be thanking me.  Maybe I'll try and introduce that into American speech. 

Getting up in 5 hours to fly to Iguazu Falls, a huge waterfall on the Argentine/Brazilian/Paraguay border. 

Shabbat shalom

Ariel
In case you haven't heard Paparazzi, by Lady Gaga