February 4, 2015—sitting at the living room table

Today is day four of our month-long adventure in Argentina. I have essentially been going non-stop since arriving at 3:45am Sunday morning after an uncomfortable 10.5-hour flight from JFK. I can’t imagine wasting one minute watching TV or napping while there is so much going on here. This city is a unique and beautiful place that has taken its European roots—which are a serious point of pride for some locals—and established its own vibrant and interesting culture. Some neighborhoods (“barrios” here) remind me of Rome or Madrid, with their classically influenced architecture; some have a distinctly modern feel. The city isn't huge, but it has such an eclectic ambiance in each barrio that it feels as if it’s several cities at once. Since we've only been here four days at this point, we have a lot more to explore in Recoleta, but we've done a lot in a relatively short amount of time thus far.

Buenos Aires is as far South of the equator as Virginia is north, and February here is like August in the mid-Atlantic. Because Buenos Aires is on the Rio de La Plata, the heat is bearable and it hasn't yet felt like we’re walking through water from high humidity. Uruguay is across the river and we plan to take a short ferry trip to one of its more historic cities and nearby beach. Argentina itself is a massive country, extending from the Tropic of Capricorn almost to Antartica.

Our apartment has three bedrooms with air conditioning, a very tiny kitchen, a sauna for a bathroom, and a cozy living room with a two-person loveseat that Billy managed to sleep on Sunday morning after our night of disjointed and poor quality airplane sleep. It just goes to show you, exhaustion really lowers your standards for comfort. Our housemate is a very sweet Brazilian girl named Thais who was brave enough to come here for two months on her own to learn Spanish so she might increase her chances of getting into grad school. She spoke absolutely no English when we arrived, and poor Lara was forced to act as interpreter until we picked up a useful amount of Spanish (which has actually happened in our 4 days). We have since taught her some important phrases about Harry Potter and tuberculosis.

Our apartment is located at the edge of the barrio Recoleta (in the north central part of the city, near the water) and technically may be in the barrio Balvanera. Recoleta is the Eagleton (Parks and Rec reference) of Buenos Aires—after the European colonists invaded and settled in the area of La Boca, they found it to be overcrowded and smelly, so they moved north and west and Recoleta was born. It has several nice restaurants, beautiful buildings, a large park area composed of several smaller parks, and a huge cemetery with hundreds of mausoleums and crypts. Eva Peron is buried there, and her grave is a massive tourist attraction. The country has mixed feelings about her in their history. She was a champion of the underrepresented, and the wealthier stakeholders in the government felt she was not of noble enough birth to merit her popularity. She died young from cancer, and there was a huge fight over whether she could be buried in her family’s crypt because her father was married to another woman and had a “legitimate” family when his affair with Eva’s mother occurred. The locals we have come across so far generally feel she is an important icon and think fondly of her.

Roommates in El Cementario de la Recoleta: Thais, Emily, Angela & Lara

Floralis Genérica

Sunday we spent the day wandering around Recoleta, including a long walk around the cemetery where we saw tourists from just about every country. We explored the parks around the cemetery and saw the famous Floraris Generica, a mechanical metal flower which has been broken for about a decade, but is still beautiful. It is sort of like the Bean of Millennium Park in Chicago. That afternoon Billy’s friend Pablo—a native of Buenos Aires--visited us at our apartment to sketchily exchange USD for Argentine pesos at the “blue market” rate. He made us an authentic cup of mate, which is a quintessential local tea. He told us that if someone gives you a cup of mate that is too hot, it’s an insult and they want you to leave immediately. We then spent the evening walking around the barrio Palermo Soho with Pablo, which is probably most similar to the Washington Square Park or Rittehouse neighborhoods in Philly. There are restaurants with outdoor seating lining every street, a mix of upscale and more affordable shops, and lots of families playing in the park. Palermo itself is a huge barrio and includes a large central park with a rose garden and a few distinct regions that have a different feel than Palermo Soho.

Mucho dinero

Monday we took a humiliating oral Spanish exam indicating that Angela and I know next to nothing. Meanwhile, Lara is basically a pro. Morning Spanish classes consist of 2 hours of conversation class where we learn the basics of actually using the language to communicate. These classes are followed by 2 hours of Spanish grammar. Angela and I are in the basic/beginner/know nothing level of class with another American who works as a sommelier and is in Argentina for four months to learn Spanish and study wine in Mendoza. The other student is a German girl who is a camera operator for film and TV in Cologne. We are all similar in age, which makes us feel less terrible about all our difficulties learning a language as adults. Our conversation teacher is a journalist by trade and our grammar teacher is a full-time Spanish teacher. Lara is in a more advanced class with two other Americans and another Brazilian girl who also speaks no English.

Tuesdays and Thursdays, Angela and I are spending our mornings shadowing residents at the local children’s hospital in their well-child clinic. Argentina’s medical training system is very similar to that in the US where residents are overseen by chief residents (in their fourth year of training) and attendings. We aren't totally sure how their years of training break down, but it is a similar system in which medical education falls between university and residency, and the residency training is required and typically of a few years’ duration. The clinic itself resembles something we might see in North Philly and our patients seem to have the Argentine equivalent of Medicaid. There is another medical student from Australia in the clinic trying to accomplish the same goal of learning Spanish in a medical context. The major difference between the Spanish here and at our school is that the residents and patients all speak SO MUCH MORE QUICKLY. They’re probably speaking at a natural pace, but I’m picking up about 20% of the conversation if I’m lucky. The medicine itself is really similar, including follow-up recommendations and vaccines. We have our second day tomorrow, so hopefully it’ll go a little more smoothly. Or at least my blank stare will be less noticeable. On the days we work in the hospital we have two hours of private Spanish lessons in the afternoons. Since these are private we can choose what we want to learn on any given day, including any medical Spanish we want to brush up on. Yesterday we chose to go by the book and learn more about the verbs for “to be” since having a conversation without being able to say “is” is rather difficult. See?

Our afternoons and evenings have involved subway trips to various parts of the city for exploration. A more detailed list of restaurants and neighborhoods will follow when I am less tired to make it. For now, Angela has finished designing our blog page and I need to shower, so we’ll wrap up for today. 

- Emily