Sunday, voting day updated

I walked into a voting location today. It was pretty well organized. There were soldiers with rifles keeping the safety though. Weird. But yea, a politician who lives across the street from the election location was there, smiling, talking to last minute voters.

Studied the whole evening with Gonz for Tuesday's test on which i have to get a FLAWLESS grade in order for my stupid program to transfer the grade as an A. So not fair. And it's SO hard to get a 10/10.
But anyway, I'm studying really hard and think I can do it. All tonight, and all tomorrow... THere's nothing like a LOT of pressure to get one's toosh motivated...

Kirchner won. NOT. His party lost seats in the senate and lost the general Buenos Aires vote. That's what you get for moving vote dates around.

B, I'll be home around August 3rd, ojala.

viernes

j and N came from wisconsin today. we went to gallery nights, a parilla, and el millon.

also studied most of the day and went to the UCA to register myself to the test. With Gonz, chatted to Juanita, a Columbian girl in our class. If it weren't for that she would have forgotten to register to the exam, and wouldn't have been able to take it. I think she appreciated it...
and then there was the whole thing with Fernandez-Nuñez. G knows... fun day. big weight off of my shoulders! ouf!

monedas article in The New Yorker

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2009/06/08/090608ta_talk_surowiecki

Jueves

in class it was just me, the prof, and the visiting prof. Jerks didn't come. but it's ok as it was super interesting, and quite personalized. Got to get them to talk about whatever I wanted. Talked about argentine security, drug trafficking, us security.

After class, I went to the UCA to try to get signed up to my exam. The office was closed. The following day I realized that I had been told to go the wrong office.

Went to tango lesson. It had been almost a month since the last time but it was really nice dancing again.

Then went to see a play called "la pipa de la paz" which I highly recommend. It's playing at Esmerelda 449, at the Maipu theater. About a old and crazy mom and her young, idealist son. He come down from NYC (peacemaker for UN) to fix things for his mom between her and his sisters. Turns out the mom is kinda crazy, but just afraid of being old, dying, retirement homes. But that's not the main point to take from it, thre's much more. It is hilarious, I didn't stop laughing except the times when it got really sad from touching on those human emotions that *involve crying*. REALLY GOOD> GO TO BUENOS AIRES TO SEE IT IF YOU ARE READING THIS

then went out for pizza with Mario and the rest of the kids that were there. he has awesome friends. One of them works in theatre and pointed out a few not-so-obvious, but important flaws of the play.

realestate and mario's dinner

when i feel like it, i'll talk about these two.

Mario had about 20 kids over as birthday dinners. Who cares about the birthday... I just wanted the delicious food made by S. He made us an arab meal. Taboule, couscous, the best humus ever... it was SMOKED... salad, beans (more latin than arab)
with WINE!
yay! happy birthday everyone!

Also, talked to S after, besides being a chef, he's also an architect. He told me that the best place to buy real-estate is in la boca as well as barrancas. In theory, I agree, although I still need to go to both and walk around. But yes, in theory because they're both very close to the downtown area and have good axes of transportation to and from the center. I could picture rich bankers living in remodeled 19th century apartments...

hmm 2

when I come tonight after dinner, I'm going to write about three different wines I have here at home. This, of course, while writing a foreign policy paper.
haha I'm such a snob.


Nevermind about wine, I think there's something more pressing to write about here. The elections are coming up soon, on Sunday to be exact.
Now, first of all, I need to mention that these elections usually take place two months later, and these elections are for the deputies and senators who will take offices in DECEMBER. It is ABSURD to have to vote for someone who will take office 6 months later!!!
This was changed by the Kirchner Government, it was approved by law,


ridiculous.

Another aberrance was on the news last night. There is a group of indigenous Gauranies in the northern provence of Formosa who have been deprived of their documentation and this identity. They were taken from them them by the authority of that region so that they won't be able to vote come Sunday morning. Of course, they're going to vote against the person in charge, who totally denies having anything to do with their documents and denies knowing where they are.
THis isn't the first time that this has happened to the Guaranies though. In past years, they would travel to the location for the vote, they would stay there the night, be fed and given blankets, and then magically, the next morning they would be given their documentation back, right before their vote. Food+blankets+poverty=vote? maybe? talk about coercion...

also, just one last thing, Scioli, the current Governor of Buenos Aires, is also running for deputy chair. Scioli and Kirchner are both running for different deputy seats in the same party (Kirchner's) for the region of BA. On the ballots here, there is a system where, because Scioli is in Kirchner's party, and if scioli decides not to accept his position as deputy, all his votes go to K. There is a big scandal as to how this is just a trap to get more people to vote for K. And what if he does accept the position? does he keep the position of Governor of Buenos Aires too? nobody really knows, and the 'judges' are saying the situation is legal.

MAFIA MAFIA


MAFIA



MAFIA

hmm numb leg.

post, to be updated later tonight... or tomorrow...

so, 5 days, ago, or this past Thursday the 18th, I woke up and could not feel anything in the anterior part of my lower leg, otherwise known as my shin. This numbness continues on up until right above my knee. It feels like the blood circulation is cut off, but I can still walk and run perfectly fine. Just, there's no feeling.
This lack of feeling has been wearing off, at least I think, these past two days. I'm not sure if the nerves are working again, (if they were ever malfunctioning) or if it' s just my brain making up the sensation.

Point being, something strange and unexplained also happened to me in Cairo last semester, I found a suspicious bump in my neck area and had to get it checked out. Ended up being nothing and went away soon after, but still, I guess it was just weird. I don't like when my body does stuff on its own without being told.

superman was here

What do you see when you see this? I tested Adriana as we walked by this spot one day. She didn't notice anything out of the ordinary. When I see this, first of all, I notice it, second of all, I think: "oh, that's probably where "The Hulk" or "Superman" landed last time they came to Buenos Aires, and things are just too slow here to fix it.



Also, I would like to thank meem for the arabic practice site: http://www.ikea.com.sa/index.php?lang=en
Ikea does a great job a translating, just switch back from page to page.

mendoza

Today when talking to my dad, he asked me, When are you going to cut your hair? (haven't showered yet today) When are you going to get a crew cut(all off)? I answer, that I can't get a crew cut because I have a hideous scar/tumor on the side of my head which just won't permit a crew cut.
He says "oh, well then just cut around it!"
ooh dad.


two weeks ago I was in Mendoza.

A went on a horseback riding tour of the andes and I went to a famous bodega about an hour from Mendoza, in Lujan. Bodega Norton. There are tons of fb pictures. The tour we did was 30 pesos. It included a nice glass of rosé champagne and then a tour of the wine making process. In this we got to taste the wine in its different stages of production. The first cup, was acid, violet, and disgusting. We poured it into our cups directly out of the 500,000 liter vats. The second glass was from the oak barrel but it had just begun maturing so it was still pretty bad. We took it directly out of the barrel with a pipette. The last glass was the final product which was much much better, but still not amazing if you ask me, but that's just me. A Brazilian sommelier on the tour thought it was great.
The view from the villa overlooking the vineyards with the Andes in the background was breathtaking.

fridays and Mendoza flashback

Yesterday I finally received a letter from my dad. He posted it nearly one month ago. Horray for snail mail.
Also yesterday, I had a delicious homemade (by a real (half) Mexican) Mexican lunch with S and J. I really need to hit them back up with the equivalent in wine tasting. The main dish was quesadillas but this was garnished with toooo many other dishes. Namely, Nopal (cactus, delicious but the juice reminds me of Beethoven the dog's drool), thin paper slices of carrots doused in lemon juice, guacamole, Michelada (spicy drink, I also added jalapeno seeds) salsa, beans, rice, an authentic Mexican meal, quoi.
I learned from S, who is Columbian, that in Columbia, people use the word "regalar" (to offer a gift) instead of the word "vender" (to sell). This makes for some funny situations when transferred to other Hispanic countries. (e.g. "hell no, i'm not giving you this lcd! *punch*)

Later I was also offered an awesome shirt. It reminds me of my grandpa and my grandpa's bowling shirt. It's definitely a grandpa shirt. It's gold yellow with grey blueish winged-lions and gold coloured pillars. Made in Italy with Egyptian cotton. One peso, sea ~30US cents. gota love thrift shopping. look out for pictures of it on fb.

MENDOZA

Let's shoot two weeks into the past and pretend I'm currently in mendoza publishing this from my hostel.
Arrived in Mendoza around 10am. Found a great hostel run by super friendly women.Dropped our stuff off and went off to the bikes and wine tour. We did about 5 different stops, took pictures, had a nice time.
Got back to hostel late.
Ate at a delicious pizza place.
Made plans for tomorrow.
tomorrow: police encounters following a nortonic experience.

tacos

Taken from a friend's facebook status on a taxi driver who took her home at 6am a few weeks ago:

se demande s'il est normal que, à 6h du mat', son chauffeur de taxi lui raconte qu'à 55 ans, après 30 ans de mariage et un divorce très difficile, il a eu quelques expériences avec des "chicas de la noche" pour finir par devenir gay grâce à une rencontre avec un jeune homme de 23 ans, mais qui maintenant lui demande "plus de passivité" dans la relation... pas facile en effet.

"asks herself if it's normal, that at 6am, her taxi driver tells her how at 55, after 30 years of marriage and a very difficult divorce, he had a few encounters with the "chicas de la noche" to end up going gay with a young man of 23 years old, but who now asks him "more passivity" in their relationship... not easy indeed.

The portrait above the bar at El Millon.
I Went there last night for M's rushed departure/get together

mendoza

This post will be updated as soon as my finals have finished beginning. But as a teaser, I have lots of gorgeous pictures, presents, stories (involving the police (two (stories))), and much much more, to come...