October 24

My weekend, was well, interesting. On Friday, we went to school and really didn’t do much else. We went shopping for clothes to go clubbing. I got this really sexy red dress. And I was so excited to go to the club. We didn’t end up going on Friday.

That day we went to the gym and then later we 3 girls went over to Nube’s house to watch tv. It was really nice just being able to hang out like I did in the united states. I feel like I really have friends now.

So that night, a friend of mine asked me if I wanted to take a ride on his motorcycle with him, and even though I reallllllly want to ride a moto, I had to turn him down on the account that it was 3 in the morning and my friend Angie really likes this guy. So, I finally went to bed.

Then Saturday came and I was excited the whole day to go to Cuba! I was supposed to meet so many people there and have a great time! And I did! But, I’ll tell you about that in a bit. We went and found accessories for our outfits for the night, and this is when I noticed that Nube is quite absent-minded. We would be driving around for no reason and I’d be like “Nube, where are we going?” and she would say “oh yeahhhhh, the bank, I forgot!” this happened twice. And she’s easily distracted. We went to find accessories and she ended up buying probably 1000 pesos worth of clothing at 4 different stores. It was funnn except that I’m sick again. I seem to always be sick here. I know that I’ve said that before, but it’s true.

So, that night we went to Nube’s house to get all ready. Nube, Angie, Jane, Maguii and I. We looked soooo good! I was so excited! We were gonna dance and have so much fun. And we did! I saw Josee there and he said that he was going to bring his twin brother manuu there, but he never ended up coming. Poor Jane was heart-broken. I felt really bad for her. And then afterwards, she was crying and I felt bad too. It just kinda put a big damper on my whole night which was really fun. So, eventually, we went back to Nube’s house and had some jamoncitos and talked about how much fun we had and what had happened and everyone was laughing again which was great. I got home around 8 this morning and slept until 11.

We had lunch with the family and Nacho and Laura were here too. Laura is almost always here at my house, but it was nice that her brother was here too. We had chicken and rice for lunch and then afterwards, Nacho and I went to the ice cream store and bought popsicles for everyone. We went for a little vuelta afterwards and it was nice to kinda bond with my host cousin.

I tried sewing some more today, but lucky me, I broke the needle in the machine, so I’ll have to go and buy one tomorrow since everything is closed today. Other than that, I have a volleyball game at 7, which I probably won’t play in. Well, at least I’ll go and cheer on the team. OH! I forgot to tell you that on Wednesday, we (jane and I) played volleyball with these men who play after us. It was really intense and really tiring but really good practice. So, they said that they might come to watch our game today which would be cool. I mean, I guess. I don’t want them to see me not playing though. Anyways, I’ll let you know how that goes. Chao.

October 21

Well, I am really exhausted but really happy. I think I’m getting sick again. No, I know that I’m getting sick again. I can’t go like a day here without either being on my period or sick. I hate it, but I’m having a good time. Today was exhausting.

I didn’t go to school today. I had a “headache.” And afterwards I sat outside and watched all the san Lucas kids go home from school and I got to see my friends, which was really nice. And then I had dance class from 2-4:30. That was physically draining. Arabe is such a work out and so is ballet because we just do the same thing non-stop over and over for over an hour. When I got home, I sat down to eat, and I could barely get back out of my chair. I was so sore!

I slept until I was going to meet everyone at the gym but they had gone to meet me, so Nube and I drove around until we found them. Then we went back to 2 more hours of dance class. It was so exhausting.

When Jane and I were walking home, we investigated this party looking this at this brand new building. There was free food everywhere! There was cake, and drinks, and lots of boys. We watched this cool drum line and then walked around and all these people (guys) kept trying to come up and talk to us. At first it was these two guys from the gym and then it was these two old guys that work at the Sheraton that invited us to go to the pool there whenever we wanted. That’s pretty sweet. They were really nice, and not creepy. Then, all the boys came up and like surrounded us and were talking to us and asking where we were from; where we went to school; if we were going to Cuba tonight. I felt like an animal in the zoo! They all wanted to talk to us and get kisses, it was soooo funny. We had to make an escape. But it was a really good and it made me genuinely happy to see all those people be together and celebrating. It was really nice.

That was it for my day.

It's been a while

I know I’ve missed like alotttt of time, but I’ve been busy and when I’m not busy, I’m depressed. I’m gonna make this short and sweet and get back to my daily blogging again.

Recap:

So I don’t think that I told you that Jane and I went to a waterfall that’s right in town. Right on the tres fronteras. It was so beautiful! We could stand at the top and let the water run over our feet and then we went down below and there were hundreds and hundreds of butterflies! I’m assuming that if you’re reading this because I posted it on facebook, that you will have already seen the photos. We got to actually stand in the waterfall and it was soooo fun! It was so sweet and I’ve never donw anything like that before in my life. Well, let’s see, I loathe my school. Don’t get me wrong, I love my classmates, they’re great, but the school and the teachers are the worst ever. I have the worst time of my life there. I honestly dread going there everyday. I get sick in my stomach when I think about it. Honestly. I spent two days in a row crying in school. And the teachers don’t even try to help at all! They just let you sit there and cry! Went out to Cuba again both Friday and Saturday. It was an interesting weekend at Cuba. Um, Friday night just ended really badly with angie and I crying and Saturday was just completely wild! It was really a good time, but sooo crazy! Other than that, nothing else important to tell except that we started taking 2 more dance classes and going to the gym too.

Today:

I went to school. Hated it. I took a test in Culture and Communications and I think I did alright for not knowing the language or studying at all. At least I gave it a shot. But yeah, I’ve been trying to get sent home from school by not wearing the uniform. I even wore the uniform of another school yesterday, but they never say anything to me! They yell at everyone else but me! Ugh. I really just want to find some way to get out of that school. I’m desperate. I can feel my brain rotting as I spend time there.

Okay, so afterwards, I went home and took a little nap, but I was woken up by someone yelling “SHE CAN’T BREATHE!” I leaped out of bed and ran out to the living room to find my mom choking and my dad giving her the Heimlich. Luckily, everything turned out alright, but it sure was a scare. Everyone was running around and Coni was in the shower, so she ran out naked hiding behind me to see if everything was okay. It was a scary experience. Then I had lunch and then Jane messaged me to rescue her from her little “date” with some guy from a market by her house. I was supposed to go with her, but then didn’t have to but then she got scared, so I walked all the way to her house and she wasn’t there, so I walked about and couldn’t find her so walked the 30 min back home. I then met Angie to tomar some sol, and Jane came too eventually.

Later, we all went to the gym and I did some ab workouts. Felt good. Then Jane and I went to Belen’s house cause it is her birthday. It was kinda awkward and it ended up that Jane and I were upset about the fact that we have no idea why everyone is in love with Angie. We can’t figure out what it is, but everyone that looks at her immediately falls in love. What on earth is it???

Anyways, that was the extent of my day.  

I can cook!

So yesterday, was pretty great! It was the day that I made my favorite food for my family: tacos.

I made the tortillas with Jane, Laura, and Chabelli yesterday and it took forever! They turned out okay, but really hard. Like, physically, they were really hard. So, when it came time to assemble the tacos I had to figure out how to make them soft again. Wait, but first, I have to tell you that this lunch had me sooooo nervous. I couldn’t sleep the night before because I was worrying about this lunch. I was playing in my head over and over what I would need to buy and do and at what time and in what order. I wanted everything to be perfect for them. I wanted them to really like it too.

Okay, like I was saying, I had the problem with the tortillas that I wasn’t totally expecting to be that difficult. But I know that I had to do something. I tried putting them in hot oil. Too fatty and didn’t work well. Then I tried Jane’s idea of making a steaming device with a large bowl and a strainer. It worked, eventually, but that took too long. So eventually, I found that if you put the stack in the microwave with a glass of water for a long time, it works quite well. So, that was one problem.

I first made the Chi Chi’s corn cake. Yes, I looked up the recipe because it is my favoriteeeee! (and daniel’s too. Lol) It was interesting to make and when I was making it, it looked pretty watery, so I kept adding more cornmeal, I should have left it alone because it came out a bit too solid than what I was used to, but it still tasted AMAZING! The best thing that I’ve ever made! I’m so proud of it. Then, I mixed my spices for the taco meat. (oh yeah, during school, I made this nice little list of everything I would need to buy at the store, and I went right after school and bought way too much stuff because we already had half of the stuff. Haha oh well.) My mom helped me cook the meat and it turned out pretty good. I would prefer it spicier, but she said that the little girls don’t like spicy things, so I left it as is. I cut up onions and lettuce and tomatoes and put them on a platter and served everything up and hoped for the best. They loved it! I was so happy! Everyone ate a lot of tacos. They were really messy tacos because of the homemade shells, but everyone said that they were so good. I hope that they weren’t just saying that. Only myself and my mom ate the corn cake, but that’s okay with me. That means more for me later. It really was a good lunch and I was really pleased.

After, there was no time to take a siesta. Jane and I had to finish they choreography for our gym class. Well, we didn’t finish it, but we got enough done to get us through class. I’m really pleased with it. And I’m kinda excited that they are actually letting us do this whole choreography thing; especially since Jane told me that someone showed he the tape of the last year’s class and she said that they had to perform it in front of a bunch of people and it was awful. I want to have a really good dance if we have to do it in front of other people.

Then, I really needed my siesta, so I slept, well not really slept just laid there. But apparently, I laid there for too long because Jane came into my room at around 8:15 and was like, ready for dance? Shoot. I had forgotten. She did also and didn’t remember that it started at 8 tonight. So, we didn’t end up going.

We went to a rotary meeting and I don’t think I’ve ever been so bored. That was basically the end to that day. I talked to Daniel and watched South Park with him. It’s not the same as before, but it was nice.

Today was a good day at school despite the fact that it was raining and we didn’t have electric and there was like no one in school. Yeah, we still had school even though there wasn’t electric. My host dad was like when there’s no electric at our school, we don’t have classes. Yeah, we’ll apparently we’re little troopers at my school and we sat in the dark. It was pretty fun though. We joked around and we had to do this thing for Economy or Law, I’m not sure which, but we had to copy notes off of a photocopied packet. (because we don’t have books or the money to make photocopies) So, we copied down 6 pages of notes by having someone read them from the paper and everyone else wrote them down. It helped me to learn how they say things and how to spell words. That was good. And another fun thing is that Jane has this book with all kinds of slang words in it and some of the definitions are hilarious! Nico was asking up what everything meant and how we say all this bad stuff and it was just so so funny. I was laughing so hard I was crying. So, that was school.

We had a good lunch and then I helped Cony die her hair back to its original color because she didn’t like having such light hair. Oye. It was fun to spend time with my sister. I took my nap and tonight I have ballet. It’s my first time with point shoes, so I’m gonna go practice that. Chao!

District Conference Part 2

Okay, like I was. Surprisingly, Perez Montalvo let us go out to the boliche that night. So, we all went to Cuba and had a good time and then Octavio wanted to go to La Baranca, but I didn’t want to go there because it’s all old Brazilians and I’d have to pay to get in whereas I can get in free at Cuba and I’m VIP. So, yeah, Jane, Angie, Jim, Eli, and I went back to Cuba. It was really fun. It was Camile’s birthday and I got to hang with Nube too. It wasn’t as fun as last week, but it was still a good time for free. So, I got in at 6 and had to be at the hotel at 7. I showered and left basically. So we went to the waterfalls again with the whole group and it was a lot of fun. I don’t know how, but I managed to get more bug bites. And I was wearing long sleeves and pants the whole time! Those things are killer! We took lots of pictures and I made more friends. It was a really good time. The only thing I didn’t like was that the chaperones yelling at us to hurry up all the time just so we could wait somewhere else. It really got on my nerves and that’s what I envision the Patagonia trip would be like. Alll the timeeee. For 17 daysss. No thank you.

So we had to wait like forever for everyone to leave, but it was okay, I guess because we got to bond some more with the other exchange students. Then we took Angie downtown. And then, I went to bed I was sooooo tired.

The next day, I didn’t go to school because it was raining. Yes, that is a legitimate excuse here. I have to walk 10 minutes to school, and I don’t want to do that in the pouring rain. It slept all morning and then had lunch and then went back to sleep til 6. It was soooo boring. It finally stopped raining right before we had volleyball, so I went to Janes house and we walked to the park, but no one was there! So we went and bought fish sticks and watched a really funny show that was called “I survived a Japanese game show!” you can imagine the rest. It was so random and so amusing. I came home and finally got to talk to my boyfriend and went to bed.

Today was really good. I went to school and myself and the other students in my class had some bonding time in English class where they helped us with our Spanish and we helped them with their English. We had to tell funny stories. I told the one about Alex slapping the butt of Mr. Pod. HAHA! Oh, and I turned in my collage of things that represent me and the teacher really liked it. That made me feel good.

After, I tomared some sol with Cony and then had lunch. Hot dogs. Ick. But then Jane came over and we sun bathed some more. I got sorta burnt, but it will turn into a beautiful tan. I love the weather here. It’s spring and still so warm. Then we did our Portuguese homework and bought things to make tacos. Then for a while, we played around with Chabelli and Laura. They are so cute sometimes.

My next project was making tortillas. It took foreverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr but I think that they turned out alright. They’re hard, but if I put them in some oil tomorrow they should soften up, I think. I really hope that my family likes the tacos I make tomorrow. I need to go to the store tomorrow right after school and buy some ground meat. I think that I can do that right by my house. Well, that’s all that’s happened today. Chao!

District Conference part 1

The Rotary Conference was good and bad. The first day was long and boring. We just had talks about the rules mainly. Some of the rules I think are so dumb! Like, my family cannot visit until after the 8th month. and no one else is allowed to visit me besides my immediate family. Not that anyone else would, but how can you say to someone, no you cannot come here to see your loved one? It really upset me. And I have a feeling that people will say to me that I shouldn’t have put stuff like that in my blog, but I don’t care. It’s how I feel.

We also are not supposed to have boyfriends/girlfriends in our home countries. In some ways I can see why that would be a good idea. I know that it has put a lot of stress on Angie, but for me it’s been what gets me through sometimes. I don’t get to talk to Daniel often, but having someone loving me and trusting me at home really makes me feel good.

Thirdly, our travel regulations are kinda ridiculous. Like we aren’t allowed to go anywhere if not accompanied by a Rotarian. So, my parents wanted to take me to Buenos Aires to see Cony’s school, but I’m not allowed to go because I’m not going with a rotary function. And the students are not allowed to travel together. If we wanted to get together for our own reunion, we wouldn’t be allowed unless it was a planned Rotary event. And Sr. Montalvo said that he really doesn’t want us leaving the district. So that would mean no Chile for me either. This is really such a bummer. I could go see beautiful places for free with my family, but Rotary is like forcing me to have to pay a lot of money to go on Rotary trips to these places.
Oh, so that reminds me, also, when our parents visit, we are not allowed to go to any other cities with them. So, I couldn’t take them to Foz or anything because once again, it’s not a Rotary function.

The other thing that we did the first day of the conference was talk about the trips that we are able to go on. There are the Brasil trips and the Southern Argentina trip. To be honest, the southern argentina trip doesn’t interest me at all. It is 17 of going around Patagonia and going to all the national parks and trekking all through the wilderness. That really doesn’t appeal to me. All I want to see is 1 penguin and that’s all. I don’t need 17 days of wilderness. The other trip is to the North beaches of Brasil. It looked absolutely amazing. You spend a day in the world largest water park. Go to remote beaces. Go snorkeling. So amazing. And it’s for a whole month. I want to go on it so so so so badly, but I don’t know that I have the money to do that. I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do. I know my parents said that they would help with a trip, but it really so so expensive. It’s like 3000 dollars. I mean, it is for a whole months, but still. I need to talk to my parents about it, but they haven’t been online in forever. I honestly haven’t talked to them recently and I really need to.
Well, honestly, I am exhausted and need to sleep. I will finish this tomorrow.

October 1

I know that I haven’t blogged in awhile but I haven’t felt good at all. I’ve had the worst cramps everrrrr. Ughhhh. And I guess that they don’t have pain relievers readily available here in argentina. It’s so awful. I spend the nights in such pain. And I just sleep half the day away. It’s so terrible.

Today was a great day though. Last night, I got a message telling me not to go to school. Sa-weet! So, I didn’t have school this morning and I could spend the whole morning making myself look pretty which I don’t get to do any other day because we aren’t allowed to look pretty at school. Stupid. Anyways, I had a great morning and a great lunch. Pollo con pasta. Chicken with pasta. Thennnn I went to Foz do Iguacu with Agostina and Jane. It’s in Brazil. I finally got to go to brazil!

There we had a good time together. I learned some more Portuguese and I finally got to buy dance shoes. It took us forever to find them though! Jane was all like, oh yeah, I know where the place is! And I doubted this because Foz is a big city, but I went with it and she had no clue how to get there. We ended up walking all over downtown trying to find a sports store. Finally we found a place that sold them but wasn’t the place that Jane had gotten them, so she went to look around the corner and there was the store that we had been looking for for the past hour! So, I’m really excited about my shoes.

It was also really nice to hang out with someone. I had been feeling so bad and lonely recently since I was home alone most of the time, so spending time with Agos was great. Then when we came home, they stayed to visit for a while and Nube and Maguii came to visit us. How sweet is that! They are honestly my best friends here. They are such sweethearts. And so we talked to them for a bit and then Jane and I went downtown for a while. It was honestly an amazing day.

Well, this weekend I have a rotary orientation… all weekend. Woo. Hoo. The only ONLY thing that I’m looking forward to is the fact that I get to see my german friends again. They were really fun. So, I hope that they have fun in my “hometown.” I think that they have a trip to the falls planned and I zip lining trip, but I don’t think that I’m going to go on that because if I wait, my friend Belen can get us in for free. And I really need to start saving money wherever I can. It’s really hard to live on your own and not have a job to make money. I seem to have gone through so much money. I don’t know what I’m gonna do. Just not do anything that costs money I guess. But that’s so not fun. (frownie face)
Well, signing off!