COUNTRY: Argentina
PROGRAM: GapBreak
PROJECT: Care Work
WRITTEN BY: Antonia Ioannou
Buenos Dias amigos!
Here is the first blog from the second group of 2012 Argentina Gapbreakers!
For some of us it was a casual trip over from Europe after travelling for a few months. For others, a direct flight from Sydney with an airline that didnt believe in putting milk and sugar in tea and for the rest it was smooth sailing flight up until they missed the flight from Santiago to Buenos Aires due to flight delays and airline problems.
In one way or another it all worked out in the end because we are all sitting in our Roadhouse, settled in.
We all realized quickly how difficult the language barrier was as we only knew basic Spanish so it was good that our Spanish lessons began immediately. We were put in two separate classes with two extremely enthusiastic teachers ready to teach us some espanol. A week on, some of it must be sinking in because Antonia C was sleeptalking in Spanish!
We’ve been on a few walks around our beautiful neighbourhood of Recoleta, found the best places to have empanadas (Annabel is in the lead with 11) and found the Buenos Aires super store called COTO that sells anything from 3L Cokes to bags of yoghurt and toasted chicken. A few of us also took advantage of the bottles of beer that start at 1L at a very low price.
A few days ago Buenos Aires had their first official day of spring (Dia de la Primavera) which entails a huge celebration! Our Spanish teachers, Yahaira and Yanina, took us on a gorgeous picnic at the beautiful park La Bosques de Palermo, where they were setting up for this big event. The day started with a confusing game of celebrity heads and became quite eventful with a few of us starring in a commercial for chocolate milk!
We had our first beautiful day on Saturday with sun and no rain for once! A few of us decided to go to the famous Recoleta Cemetery and visit the conjoining markets. Everyone was dying to get in to the cemetery and once they were there they discovered a beautiful historic place.
After a few shopping trips to the busy street of Santa Fe and finding our favourite hangout at a local bar which has every board game imaginable, (an intense game of pool also took place which resulted in victorious girls) we are all ready to begin our volunteering which will be an intense but amazing experience for us all.
Hasta luego!
-Antonia I, Antonia C, Cailey, Courtney, Alice, Tim, Annabelle, Felicity, Amy, Henry, Freya, Anna, Ciara, Guilian,
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