La última vez

The last time

Hello all. Whether you have been a faithful follower of my blogs and checked in on me, or not, this is, I am sad to say, my last and final blog that I will send from Argentina. I will send a follow-up after my return when I am feeling up to it and have calmed down from the shock of changing everything in my life, for the um-teenth time. I arrive home late morning of the 22st in PDX. If nobody hears from me for quite some time, don´t be surprised.


El gobierno y la plaza (The government and the plaza:)
Some say we "extranjeros" have no right to have strong opinions about politics in other countries or try to say things about problems that other countries face. I care to disagree. I have talked with a wide array of people, I have read the papers, I have seen the life of the people, and I have witnessed the voice of the locas and residence of this country. I have studied and learned about the history, especially of the government and politics, and though I am no expert in any of these areas, I have gathered enough information to be able to form an educated opinion and take a stance.
There are still issues with los campos. After 30 days, the people of the campos decided to sit down and talk with the government. The government wasn´t ready - and still isn´t - to listen and was/is not about to change it´s mind about increasing the taxes - to an outrageous and unacceptable tariff totaling 80%. I believe someone said this was the recent amount. The government´s greed for money is costing the country much grief, and the people are very divided. The campos resumed their huelga (strike) since the government wouldn´t cooperate as much as they said they would, but do they ever? Last I heard, the campos are thinking about pausing the paros of the highways and transportation of the food so that there is at least some products left in the stores and so the people won´t go crazy or think that they will run out of food. I have witnessed first-hand these paros, and it isn´t scary, but it is eerie driving by and seeing the power of the people be put into action.
On top of this national issue, here in Rosario, in el centro, there are several homeless and poor people making a stance and "protesting," I guess one could say. We have been advised not to walk near the plaza if possible, but most of the time, there is hardly anyone there. Basically what is happening -and this is all from my understanding talking with a few people - is that the governent pays the people, say $1,000. They don´t educate them, and they don´t teach them a skill or trade; thus not teaching them the value of work. The people don´t work and then continue to rely on the government for money. They raise their children this way, and thus there are people each year expecting and waiting for yearly sums of money from the government. If they don´t get this money, they set up their "tents" and cardboard dwellings -literally - and protest and cause a commotion, going to lenths such as blocking streets off, and they won´t leave until they have been given the amount of money they demand. Last year, it lasted about a month and a half, according to someone here.

Granted I am no expert and things are heaps more complicated than this, but I, like most/all Rosarinos, have very strong opinions about Kirchner, and not good ones. We had a communications professor who teaches here in Rosario come and talk with/to us students about the situation and it is all centralized on poverty and social protest mixed in with dirty and corrupt politics. He understands the situation pretty well, however, it was really hard to explain to us U.S. students, and on top of it, the forms of protest down here, and what is understood down here to be normal or not is not that which is found in the states making it increasingly difficult to understand the situation in the plaza. But anywho...


Despididas (good-byes:)

So, our good-bye dinner is this coming Thursday, and that is it: the end of what has been the quickest and shortest three months of my life. Finals are this next week, so I am busy finishing up everything for that. I REALLY wish I could have stayed for another session or two, at least summer session one, but alas I cannot. I am extremely grateful for the time I did have down here and all of the sights, sounds and places I did visit andexperience. Nobody knows how greateful I feel and how blessed I am to have come here; however, I still am sad to say good-bye to that which I have come to know and be familiar with. It will be strange to not ride the coli to the church group where I go, or to the orphanage, or dance classes. It will be strange not walking down España from home to go eat lunch before my afternoon classes. It will be wierd not seeing signs, documents, and other everyday items in Spanish, nor hearing Castellano spoken around me all the time.....tooooooooo many things to which I must say good-bye. Worst of all, I have to say good-bye to my professors, the few friends I have made, and to my host mom. She has been so helpful and supportive...as much as she can taken into account the language barrier and her not understanding all the time the meaning of what I say. She tried so hard to help me feel comfortable.


Pensamientos finales (final thoughts:)
As short and uneventful as this blog has been, I am sorry to say that is it. I cannot really think of much more to say, but that is about all that is new and that I have left to say. I have many stories that I can tell, many foods that I have tried that I can account for, many sights and sounds to describe, as well as over 2,000 photos to share - may I remind you that I have been around the WHOLE country for three months. If you think my 2,000+ is bad, one student I know filled up 2 - 2GB memory sticks, put them all on CDs and other memory devices, and then is starting to fill them up again. I think I am in good shape.
I hope and pray this final blog finds you well. I will see you all shortly. For me, it is a bitter sweetness, but I am sure for you, it is a great thing. Please bear with me as I adjust to life again, or attempt doing so. I must say, this truly has been adventures abroad.....

Thus, I leave you with one last look at Rosario:

La Cuna de la Bandera

El monumento de la Bandera is in the general shape of a barco, ship, facing the Río Paranà.

Fotos en Ushuaia, "el Fin del Mundo"

Fotos de Perito Moreno, Calafate, Argentina

No me queda mucho tiempo

(I don´t have much time left)

It is sad for me to see and realize that I have been here for not quite a month and a half, and I am to return on the 21st. I really don´t know what to think about it. Reality has not sunk in, and I don´t think it will until I after I have returned. It is going to be SO hard for me to leave that which I have come to know. Time will fly by SO quickly. I know that I will blink and then I will be on the plane. But let´s not think about this for now.

Iguazu y las cataratas (Iguazu and the waterfalls:)
Wow! I am left speechless. What a natural wonder of creation. I cannot believe what I saw. I probably took about 100 photos of each fall, but they are just SO majestic and beautiful. I don´t even think my photos, or the photos that others took can truly capture the feeling and the reality of these natural wonders. No matter how one describes them, no matter how great of a photographer someone is, the splendor of the falls cannot be quantified.
I was talking with someone, well, two or three people, about it and they, too, were agreeing with how I described them and the feeling and true nature (no pun intended) of the falls.
Anywho, we - six of us students: Natalie, Rachel, Walker, Brian, Corey, and myself - left Thursday afternoon (about 16:00) and arrived just before 12:00 on Friday morning. That should let you know how long it takes to get to places in Argentina. But also, we ran into some paros, or places where the people of the campos (country) where blocking the roads. The trucks that carry the produce to anywhere and everywhere in the country were/are parked along the roads making it difficult to pass, but we passed through both on our way there and on our way back. We checked into a hostel and then took a "shuttle bus" to the falls. We ate some lunch and then walked across a bridge/walkway which was about 1.5 km long or so. It took a while to reach la Garganta del Diablo (the Devil´s Throat,) but it was well-worth it. We lingered there for a bit, and then headed back. We only were able to spend a few hours there because it was approaching closing time. -- Although it was bright and sunny, due to the "low" season of tourism, the park hours change...so we heard.-
The following day, we headed to the park and got our 50% discountnt for returning for the second consecutive day. We hiked around to just about, if not every other falls. We each probably took about 20 pics or so of each cataratas, but we took one from pretty much every angle possible. We even crossed over to San Martin Island and hiked up a LOT of stairs to three or four viewpoints where we saw several falls from yet another perspective. We also saw a man and his wife, who arinsanelyly good painters, and they had ceramic magnets and wall hangings of the falls. They paint them all by hand, and they even gave us a quick demonstration...it took two, MAYBE three minutes. They said that the demo wasn´t that great - it was awesome, not with many details, but still good - but those that they were selling were the better, more detailed ones that took a long time.

Later that evening, we went out for drinks for Natalie´ birthday. We would have gone out the night before, which was actually her birthday night, but she got too drunk before we left to go out...sad. But that night was MUCH better, ´cause nobody had more than two drinks. Here, at Jakie Brown, I tried a mojito and something else...don´t remember, but I have it written down.
The following day, we just walked around town. We had wanted to visit the ruins in San Ignacio (sp) but we were just too tired. We had bought our bus ticket, left our things in a "locker" at the terminal, then walked aimlessly in Punto Iguazu. We ate lunch, and walked around some more. Right before we left on the bus, we all went to a local supermercado to buy food for the ride home...which is a story in and of itself. All in all, excluding the bus rides, it was an AMAZING trip and I am glad I decided to go.

Gaucho Party

So, yesterday, we crossed the Victoria Bridge which connects Rosario/Santa Fe with Entre Ríos/Victoria. It wasn´t too long of a ride, but I understand what Beba said when she said that it takes a long time to cross the bridge, or to even get to it. But it was a VERY pretty drive. We would first leave the city of Rosario, cross over el Río Paraná and then go through a green part of Entre Ríos, and then ended up in the grassland where the estancía was located.
Shortly after we stepped off the bus, we were served empanadas de carne (meat.) Those who are veggies were served empanadas de choclo (corn.) Shortly after this, we sat down and began the asada with salads and then they brought out the meat. We were first served chorizo and then morcilla, for those that wanted it, and then the "real meat."&nbsUnfortunatelyly it was just ribs and it was more fat than anything. Dessert was served after, but not for some time, just to let our main course settle. We then had the opportunity to ride horses. I was verdisappointeded. We could only walk. Also, it was pretty much walk 100m, turn, walk back. WELL, this was not good enough for Joanna, so she cheated and actually worked her horse a bit. He - who actually didn´t have a name - responded okay; didn´t help that he was new, but all of the horses were ill-mannared. Thus far, I have not been impressed with the horses here in Argentina.
We then saw a group of people perform traditional folk dance and other dances performed in the campos. I think there were about six or seven dances they performed, and then they chose some students to participate and they danced around for a bit. It was VERY interesting to see the traditional dances and even more interesting to see the other students try to dance with the locals. :o) After the dancing, we left for hom again. It was another lovely drive.

Hogar de Huerfanos (orphanage:)
So, I totally forgot to say that I have been volunteering at an orphanage about once or twice a week. I used to teach English, but then the girls didn´t want to learn. Now, when I go, I just play with the younger ones or talk with some of the young adolescents. Depending on who is there and what they want to do, I just do that. It is so cool to go and to visit and to just sit and listen to what they have to say. My heart goes out to them and it hurts me and kills me to have to leave. For, I feel, at least with one girl, I have connected some and to just leave, I feel like I am deserting them, and I know that they each have had some sort of hurtful experience where they have not been wanted or somehow have been hurt by some form of rejection. Does that make sense? It will just be hard for me not to go there anymore once I leave, or to leave in general.

Un poco de todo (a little bit of everything:)
So, the weather is not regular here. It finally got a bit cool/cold. It hasn´t rainned too much, but it has been a nice temperature. Then, just on Thursday and yesterday, too, it was really sunny and warm. It was exteremely warm yesterday out in the campos, too. Everyone is, unfortunately getting sick, getting over being sick, or fighting being sick. It is crazy how many people have been sick and how many times. I don´t think there was a moment in which there was NOT someone sick. Really sad to me. Um...finals are around the corner and things are speeding up, although the program is slowing down. I guess why I don´t want to return is because I don´t want to forget what I have seen, heard, and learned. I will miss the food and those that I have met here.


Well, I think that is it for now. There is not too much to talk about these days. But I am still trying to keep a list of ideas of what to write about. So, until we speak again, chau.