From May 13-June 9, 2007, I will be enjoying the porteño life in Buenos Aires, Argentina. During this time, I will be taking a TEFL course - basically learning to Teach English as a Foreign Language. This will make me qualified to teach English anywhere where English is not the primary language. I imagine I will also have a number of exciting adventures here in the bottom half of the globe, so read on! I left my home at noon on May 12, left Chicago at 2pm, arrived in Houston at around 4, where I waited around until 9pm for what would become my longest flight to this date - 10 1/2 hours! I arrived in Buenos Aires(written as BsAs) at 9:30am and easily found my luggage and pre-arranged transport to my host family. Buenos Aires is a huge city- in fact, 1/3 of Argentina´s population lives in Buenos Aires and the surrounding area. More exciting facts about Argentina and BsAs from my guidebook to come...
Here I am living with a hostmom who has 3 children, all grown up and moved out. Our apartment building has a security guard outside the door (for all of you worried about my safety here in Latin America) and luckily, an elevator to take me to my 12th floor apartment. Rita, my host mom, is a delightful woman who is thrilled to have 1. a female student and 2. a student who speaks English. She told me the last two students she had stay with her were guys who barely said ¨hola¨and ¨sí¨to her. She´s a good cook from what I can tell so far - for lunch on Sunday we had spagetti (I told her about how I don´t eat sauce and she was ok with that). They eat a lot of pasta down here because of the strong Italian influence. She also made empanadas for dinner, this after seeing me drool over an empanada restaurant near our house. My host mom is a psychologist and actually sees patients in our living room during the day. We also have 3 bedrooms, a kitchen, 2 bathrooms, a patio that overlooks the city. It´s really nice here, and the city reminds me alot of Chicago. Although it is a bit chilly here for me. Here it gets up to about 60 degrees during the day - not the lovely summer weather you might except in Latin America. But I´m pushing through... with a sweater, a fleece, and a coat on. The wind from the river in the downtown area by my school makes it worse, but in the sun it´s alright.
Classes started today, and I have my first assignment I have to work on! Chaou!
2 comments:
Susie
If you can get from the airport in BsAs to the high rise in the city, then you can get from the Orlando airport to the place where we are staying. LOL Yes, there is another adventure awaiting you, 8 children to be exact!!! Keep posting I love reading this and so do my co-workers!! We miss you!!
Thanks for all the info. Now I can picture you and feel you're alittle safer that you're on the other side of the equator. Sounds like your new adventure is going well but alittle on the chilly side. Guess BsAs will not be on your list of homebase choices. Keep posting. You definitely would make a good travel guide for school groups. We Americanos back here love to hear about life south of the equator.
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