29 August-8 September 2014: Kathy and Mom take BA
On this week’s edition of “Kathy without the H”, Mom came to
visit Buenos Aires! As it turns out, she
ended up coming in on the same flight as one of my host sisters. What are the
odds, right? Upon welcoming my mother
and meeting my new family member, I was absolutely determined to show Mom the
real BA! Therefore, I took her to Av. Florida, home of the dollar blue market,
to exchange money. It was the first time
Mom has seen any transactions of this sort and she thought it was scary, yet
entertaining to listen to these “abuelitos”, meaning “little grandpas”, yelling
“cambio, cambio” on the street. I mean what’s a better way to be introduced
into a culture outside of the black market?
In an effort to turn my mom into a living and breathing
“argentine” like myself, I showed her some places I had already visited:
- Recoleta Fair
- San Telmo Fair
- The Pink House
- La Boca
- Palermo SoHo/Palermo Hollywood
- Chinatown (We found love [read:home] in a hopeless place)
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| Terrera Family--the loveliest family you'll ever meet |
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| Floralis Genérica |
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| Casa Rosada/The Pink House |
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| Tango at the San Telmo Fair |
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| La Boca |
As per usual, on Wednesday my host family had their weekly
family dinner and they were nice enough to invite my mom to it! This time, the entire family was there and we
had delicious food while we enjoyed wonderful conversation. Thankfully, most of the family is fluent in English,
so Mom made it through without being too confused or left out of any
conversations. It was really nice for my
mom to be able to see where I’ve been staying/where I’ll live for the rest of
my abroad experience here in BA.
On Friday, Mom, my host sister Josefina, and I went to a
Tango class at la Viruta in Palermo. Coincidentally, we were not the only gringas
in the class as there was a group of students from University of Georgia, who
seemed equally as foreign to Tango as the three of us. During the class, we learned a simple 7-step
beginner’s tango. Luckily, any toe stubbing just turned into bursts of laughter
and any traffic on the dance floor turned into the perfect time for us to
practice Argentine slangs. At first I found it extremely challenging, but once
we began to understand a little of what we were doing, we had so much fun that
we stayed for the Salsa class afterwards!
Afterwards, Josefina, or Jose for short, and I committed to two
more classes at La Viruta, where we will try to dance intermediate Tango. Wish us luck!
As our lovely week ended, I decided to take her to La Boca,
which is a neighborhood in the south of Buenos Aires filled with colorfully
painted houses and a rich immigrant culture.
After our adventure in La Boca, we went to an asado (which is the word for BBQ here in BA) manned by my lovely
host brother, Mariano. It was absolutely
delicious and the best going away party Mom could have asked for!
I'm so thankful to have had Mom here in Argentina this past week and I couldn't have wished a better visit! Shout out to Mom for an über time and safest travels back to the Land of the Free!
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