Semana Santa, CAF, y mi hermana alemán

Alright, so my posts are becoming less frequent, but I realize I should make them more frequent, just so I can include more details that I can remember, and so that my posts aren't such huge blocks, like I'm pretty sure this one is going to be. Thanks to mom for reminding me when to update!

Alright, so we had a four day weekend for Semana Santa. Most people went and traveled to different places, but I just stayed in town. (Saving my money for the Week of May when I have to travel.) But I wasn't the only one that stayed in town.

I went with my friend Gabriel to a bar on Wednesday night, called Ochentoso. Wednesday nights are ladies' nights there, so of course that's where a lot of Córdoba's lesbians congregate. It was actually really interesting. We had a couple of drinks, and met a few interesting people. Meike, the german girl, (who's also in PECLA, but not CC-CS) was the one girl in our group who got hit on a lot. It was funny, because we'd watch her talk to all these girls, and then she'd walk back to our table and say, "I have no idea what they just said." There were a few girls in the bar that were amazed when I told them that I was also studying Japanese alongside Spanish. They were like, "OH wow! THREE languages! How do you do that?

I can't distinguish what I did on Thursday and Friday, because they both run together in my mind, but one day I woke up at like, 1:30 in the afternoon, and after I got dressed and got into the kitchen, Mimi already had a family party underway. I just remember Mimi made me eat in the kitchen. The food they had for Good Friday was this soup with these grainy dumplings, and empanadas with fish and vegetables. (It was the first time I've eaten fish here. Argentines don't eat seafood much.)

After I ate, I sat at the table in the living room as Mimi pointed out different family members. I had a hard time keeping track of everyone's names and if they were cousins, sisters, brothers, nieces, nephews etc. There were like, five, conversations going on at once, and they all pertained to their personal lives, so I couldn't figure out how to assimilate myself into the conversation and practice my Spanish.

Sometime after all the family members emptied the house, I went by myself downtown to Patio Olmos and see Como entrenar a tú dragón just so I could get out of the house. Patio Olmos was the most crowded I have ever seen it. It's because it was one of the few "shoppings" that was still open for semana santa, which is treated as pretty much a federal holiday here in Argentina. The movie was really cute though. It wasn't hard to catch all the Spanish dialogue, and if there was apart that wasn't clear, or was too fast for me, I was just admiring the details in the computer animation.

So on Friday I went to Córdoba Anime Fest! (Hey, I wasn't leaving town, and it cost only US$10 to get in.) I tried to take the bus there, but I got on one, and it went in the opposite direction, so I took a bus back to the centro, and then walked all the way there. It was located at the Córdoba Polish association building. The whole Convention was just in one big room, but there was also a small side room to get food, and a courtyard out back.

So I took pictures of cosplayers, looked at all the vendors tables, and bought some food and manga (which of course is in Spanish.) I didn't buy much else, because a lot of the merchandise is the same stuff I can get back in the United States, or stuff that I bought back when I was in Japan. So I was about to leave early, since I had seen everything in the one room. But there were two lives bands that played some anime songs, and they were actually really good. I got interested when they started playing songs that I knew. I, along with a lot of guys actually, rushed forward when they started playing songs from DeathNote.

The first band was called Sephiroth, and the second one was called Tamagotchi. Both were good, but Tamagotchi was a lot more fun to mosh to. They played the Pokémon themesong in Spanish and they also, for some reason, played the Ghostbusters themesong. I couldn't really mosh as hard as I wanted to, because I had my purse flailing around, and still had to hold on to my bag of manga that I bought. (And if anyone's wondering I got Nana vol.1-3 and the first volume of D.Gray-man. So if anyone wants to try reading any of these manga in Spanish when I come back, just hit me up!)

I was about to leave the convention after the last band finished playing, but then I was pulled over by this strange guy, who asked if I was the same girl that lives "en la casa de Mimi." I was shocked for a minute, because I didn't recognize him, and I had no idea how the hell he knew who I was. But then he introduced himself as Maxi, el sobrino de Mimi and that he recognized me from the party at Mimi's house. I hung out with him for awhile, until the convention was over for the day. We talked a little bit about the manga, anime, and video games we liked, and watched the cosplay contest.

After the cosplay contest, there was a drawing for prizes. (Everyone was given a ticket when they entered the con.) There were a few times when they called numbers that were close to mine. The grand prize though, was an Xbox, and the number they called was pretty close to mine as well. (I didn't win anything.) But as they called out the numbers I was thinking, how cool it would be to win the Xbox, and then I thought; "What am I going to do with an Argentine Xbox? Would it even work back in the United States?"

But anyways, after it was over, I took a taxi back with Maxi and his friend (I forgot her name, but she was cool though) to the centro, and took a bus back home. He was really helpful. We traded cellphone numbers and emails, and he kept asking me if I knew my way home, and said, "Call me if you get lost." It was really sweet, but of course I knew how to get back home. I've been taking the colectivos and taxis back home since I got here in February, so of course I can handle it.

Anyway, I spent Sunday catching up on my homework, and around five, our German student showed up! Her name is Federica, and she's nice. She's taller than I am, and she just graduated from High School about two and a half weeks ago, and is 19. She brought over some German chocolate as a hostess gift for Mimi, but we all got to share it.

Federica also speaks English. She's been studying English for 8 years, and Spanish for 5. Seeing her arrive and get adjusted is like watching myself when I first arrived here in Argentina. She's not having as rough a time as I did, but I think she does have a more negative outlook. She's studied abroad before in Canada for 6 months, and she says she loved it. She also said at dinner one time that she went to London and loved it, and that English is her favorite language to study. She's also overwhelmed because she's juggling three languages. She has to speak Spanish with Mimi, and when she speaks to Taylor and Me, she uses English.

She's only staying in the house for one month, but she's supposed to be in the country for 2. She's doing this program where she goes to school for a month, and then next month go and volunteer at a school in the country somewhere for mentally challenged children. I think the shock from the first two days of realizing, "I don't know as much Spanish as I thought I did," hit her hard. She told me she doesn't want to do the volunteer portion anymore, because she doesn't think she can do it with her level of Spanish. She can still technically opt out of the volunteer portion now, but she doesn't have the money to change her ticket, because it isn't open-ended.

I told her she should just give it time, before she decides to opt out, and that if she does, she should check her budget now to see if she can just spend the whole month traveling around Argentina, instead of trying to go home early. Because her Spanish isn't bad at all, although I don't think her program is going about it the right way with helping her. Her first week is all Spanish classes, but the teach in English for the first week, it's not full immersion until next week. When Taylor and I got here, the program and orientation was completely in Spanish right from the beginning, the moment that greeted us at the airport.

But Federica is finding her way around the city with her friends from her program faster than I did, so I think she'll be fine. She's a good housemate. I wish I had more than one month to get to know her.