Nosotros en la Argentina (semana 2)

Wednesday December 23, 2009
We arrived in Buenos Aires a little after sunset. We were supposed to be met by someone so we kind of hung around until we were. He drove us from the airport to our cousins house, Katie. Interesting how we communicated, we spoke in French. We came to Argentina to speak in French? I don't know, but because it'd been about four years since I'd spoken, I most defiantly was a little rusty. We just spent the night catching up with each other, eating good cooking and drinking good wine.

Thursday
So, we didn't have to much to do today, so my mother and I decided to go check out downtown. We got on a train and headed that way. We walked around a bit until we found the main touristy road; Avineda Florida. It was about a two mile stretch of a pedestrian road filled with malls. You go in one place and then you realize that you just walked into the biggest mall you've ever been in, then you go across the street and same thing. Go down a block, different malls with the same expanse of things to buy. So of course, the first order of business was starbucks which wasn't actually to hard, it was in one of the first mall we went to. Then we proceeded to buy our cloths for that night's festivities and the cousins'. We walked pretty much the whole stretch, sat down and ate and then walked back without destroying out check books too badly. We took the train back to Katie's house and I took a nap, being tired from all the walking(I'm not used to shopping).



Later that night, we headed over to my other cousins', Veronicas', house. Beautiful place, which I later learned she did the architecture for. So this being Christmas eve in South America, apparently the thing to do is have a giant outdoor party; lots of food, lots of drinks, lots of games, and of course, lots of fireworks? I spent most of the night playing fooseball with my little cousins and there friends. At midnight, we launched off the fireworks, huh, it was better than the forth of July in Los Alamos. It's nice being in a place where your allowed to do what you want when you want instead of "No, fireworks are illegal. No, drinking is illegal. No, Parties are illegal. And you must be quiet for heavens sake!" It sounded like the entire city of Buenos Aires was partying that night.







Friday
I was one of the first to wake up that day, it was me and the second youngest one. We spent the morning trying to find a common interest in things to do. He liked soccer games, I like shooting games… Once every one was up and about, we opened presents. I got a nice wallet, belt, shirt, and a CD. We then proceeded to eat a huge "left-over from the night before" lunch at around 3 in the afternoon. Afterwards, we alkyd around the neighborhood. It felt super strange to be skating in the 80 degree heat on christmas, normally it's snowboarding in the back yard in the cold. It was a very relaxing day and at the end of it, my mom and I went back to Katie's house.

Saturday
Today we woke up, packed our things, and headed to the airport. We were off to Neuquén in Patagonia. When we landed, we walked out of the airplane to there one baggage claim. we then met Anna outside and she drove us to her sisters place to drop off all our stuff. Later that night, we met with the parents and went out to a pretty nice restaurant where I pretty much ate an entire goat with a chocolate fondue for dessert. Afterwards, Anna, her friend, my mom, and I went out to a fancy bar for some drinks.

Sunday
We got up somewhere around 11 and started our day by going to eat lunch with Anna's parents at a nearby vineyard. Real nice place, good food, good wine. Then of course, we went on the tour of the factory (all in Spanish) and bought some wine there. From the vineyard, we went to there summer house on the lake, about an hour drive away. We walked around the lake for a little bit and just relaxed in the sun. After the lake, we went back to the house to wind down for a little bit before the aside. The parents that night hosted a giant family feast/birthday party. An asada is pretty much a giant barbecue with tons of different kinds of meat. We ate fillet mignon, steak, cow intestine, blood sausage, and tons of other different kinds of meats. After dinner, we sang happy birthday to Anna and ate cake and drank this champagne, lemon fizzy drink. My mom and I were tired afterwards so we just went home but apparently, Anna went with some of her cousins to a party until 730 the following morning.






Monday
Because Anna had partied all night, we didn't do to much today. We did a little shopping in town where I got a few shot glasses and cigars(Cuban) and my mom got some presents for her friends back in the states. We ate dinner at the parents house and drank cocktails.

Tuesday
We woke up early and hit the road. We were driving from her city, back to Buenos Aires, about a ten hour drive or so. We arrived somewhere around 8-9 at night, dropped of our stuff in a hotel and went to check out a tango show. Although we sat way in the back, it was still fun. We drank decent wine while talking in French to a couple from Reunion, a little island of the coast of Africa.

Wednesday
Was our last day in Argentina and we had some last minute shopping to do so we had Anna take us back to the main touristy part of town. We walked around for another few hours checking out the downtown and buying a few things. We then headed of to the airport once more to take off for Rio for the new year.




This is a little video of some of the sights we saw while in Argentina. The sound is from a video that I recorded of a street performer while in Buenos Aires