Days 9-12 Runnin' (in) BA

 4-7 August 2014 : Academic Week 1

This past Monday, classes started at Universidad Torcuato di Tella and I’ve found quite a few that I absolutely love!  In fact, in one of my classes, the professor started singing an American war song in the middle and then continued to compare much of U.S. foreign policy to The Simpsons, so that was a fantastic start.  Luckily, I managed to schedule no classes at all on Fridays, which will be super-convenient if I ever decide to travel (who am I kidding, I’ll at least try to go to Uruguay in the near future).

Tuesday this week, I went to exchange money in Av. Florida with some of my other compañeros.  In Argentina, there are two USD to ARS exchange rates, the dollar official rate, 1$USD to ~8.3$ARS, and the dollar blue rate, 1$USD to ~12.3ARS.  Exchanging currency at the dollar blue rate is neither legal nor illegal.  So there we were, a bunch of Americanos trying to get a better rate for our money.  As I walked down Av. Florida, there were people standing on the street yelling, “Cambio, cambio,” which mean change or exchange in Spanish.   We ended up asking some of our local friends to lock in an exchange rate for us so we wouldn’t be cheated.  200$USD came out to 2460$ARS, which means I ended up with almost an extra 100$USD by exchanging at the dollar blue rate.  Can anyone say, more steaks for everyone? Or maybe just more steaks for Kathy, party of one?   

Every Wednesday is family dinner night at the Terrera household.  So around 9PM, all of the kids of the family came and sat together for a wonderful dinner that Andrea the Wonder Woman puts together.  After this small family reunion, my host sister Cata made a Banana cream pie of sort and it was the most delightful dessert I’ve eaten in my life.   Sorry, Baked & Wired! 

Meanwhile, I made yet another attempt to run off the delicious meals and this time, I ran (literally and metaphorically) into a couple of things:

1.     I was attacked by a dog , it was one of those that chases after anything/anyone that is running

2.     There is a bridge in the Recoleta neighborhood with really cool political graffiti

3.     Eva Perón’s resting place only blocks away from me in the Recoleta Cemetery

4.     The doorman of my apartment building finally remembers me other than the Chinese girl

Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, my academic abode for the next five months

Antique record store 

Buitres o Argentina

Bridge with graffiti near La Facultad de Derecho de la UBA

The Duarte Family's resting place in Recoleta Cemetery, including that of Eva Perón