Yesterday, I spent about 5 hours sitting in a cafe, actually doing school work for the majority of the time, the first day that I had done more than 20 minutes of school work since mid December. I forgot how rewarding it is to work hard.
Now that I got that painful day out of the way, I get to look forward to Pesach, where I am excused for all 4 yom tov days, which means that from next Tuesday through the following Wednesday, I will not be in school at all b/c of a national holiday Thursday and my usual Friday off: It's rigorous, I know... Though I do have to work on an oral presentation about Tango for tomorrow.
This was a super packed and enjoyable weekend. On Friday night, I went to my friend Martin's house for dinner. It was really nice getting to know his entire family, which included a hilarious grandma, one of those bubbies who tends to have great stories. She had her best line when she was talking about her family. She concluded with: "si, he criado tres generaciones de boludos," which means "I have raised 3 generations of assholes/morons." Don't worry, she was being sarcastic, a very entertaining lady.
After a great meal, which included 2 types of meat (what else), different salads, kibbeh, and lahmajin, we were discussing the family's desire to leave Argentina and go to the United States. Many people simply feel very unsafe in Argentina. When they said that they wanted to move to Portland (they already have family there) but send their son to Frisch, I pretty much attacked them with excitement, explaining to them why they should definitely send their kid to Frisch. In case you didn't know, I've still got tremendous Frisch pride.
Shabbat morning, Jonah and I walked to Once, a very frum area in the center of town, about 1.5 hours from Belgrano. We honestly felt as if we were in Brooklyn or Mea Shearim. Tons of shuls, yeshivas, Jewish owned shops, shatles (wigs), and key chain belts, which remain prevalent due to the lack of an eiruv ( a thin rope built around the perimeter of a town to allow for carrying on shabbat). Shul was quite the scene- everyone was doing his own thing, learning, talking, yelling, davening, shuckling. It was very interesting to see- many American Chabadniks marry argentine girls and move to Buenos Aires, where in Once, there exist some esteemed Yeshivot and Kolels.
Our host was my rabbi from Maryland's 1st cousin, who just married an Argentine and is learning at a Kollel. We had a great time, and I learned a lot about the Lubavitcher Rabbi, and the attitudes about him regarding his place as the messiah. Stuff I had never really known about. It was a great lunch and good time.
On the walk back home, my luck finally ran out on me and I stepped right into dog poop- if you're not looking down, you've got no chance to avoid it, so for me, it was due to happen.
Saturday night, I went to see River Plate, one of Buenos Aires' 2 major futbol (soccer) teams, with some guys from my program. I was told not to speak any English b/c I'd probably get killed and not to bring valuables if I wanted to have them the next day. I couldn't resist bringing my camera, however, and we ended up sitting in the middle section, below the nutjob/hard core die hard fans. The game had a playoff atmosphere by US standards: the crowd yelling all game, singing songs in support of their team- unfortunately, I didn't look up the lyrics of these songs so I just made up the words, which is what I normally do when listening to any song. 1 constant word that the crowd shouted, whether after an injury, a bad call, or shot on goal, was "puta," which means b#$ch. Some people even yelled it when nothing was happening.
It certainly is an understatement to say that the crowd went wild when RiverPlate scored a goal. Thank god we won or else there probably would have been some rioting and burnings.
Reflection on my volunteer work: While my folding skills have certainly improved, I have experienced some issues in determining clothing size; for example, I have no idea if pants would be more fitting for a 4 year old than for a 3 year old. I think the women working there get a kick out of it when I ask them every few minutes to help me identify the size.
Anyway, going to the Buenos Aires film festival tonight.
ariel
ariel go to a boca game!!
ReplyDelete