so i made it home alive, in case you were wondering.
sorry i am the worst blogger ever.
i am currently accepting donations to the "Get Alana Back to Argentina" fund. Accepted forms of donation include, but are not limited to,:
plane tickets
job opportunities in buenos aires (that pay in dollars preferably :P )
cold hard cash
hugs, mimos and kisses also welcome from a select few

so i had the most amazing trip of my life, and I am sure the people who read this already know that because it's all i talk about. i still have dreams in spanish and i miss going to restaurants and bars and being able to say "puede ser [insert whatever i want]" and hearing spanish on the street. i also miss the exchange rate and the benefits of that, but most of all, i miss all the wonderful people i met and memories we made over the past 6 months. i treasure the impacts these people have made on me and my life, for better or for worse, because they have helped me find out who i really am and who i want to be. i really think i learned a lot about myself from this trip and from the relationships i have built with people from around the world. i found out that i am able to survive living in a foreign country all by myself. im really an adult now, as scary as that sounds. my dreams are applicable and if i want it enough i can make anything possible. that feels really good. while its great being home and i am slowly getting myself re-accustomed to my old life, i feel like i am a new, better person. i still may laugh at the same things, have fun with my favorite people, enjoy the same foods, etc but i think i know myself better now. i feel more confident, more ready to enter the world. i can accomplish anything, i just have to put my mind to it and i can find a way. sometimes you make mistakes, and that s okay. sometimes it's alright to slack off a bit in school- to go out and make a fool of yourself. to laugh at yourself. to make memories and "seize the day". i am never going to be 21 again, and this is my time to make my mistakes, to be a little crazy, but on the otherhand, also to figure things out and make the goals in my life a reality. i realized that i am strong and can make things happen if i want them to, but that sometimes you have to let go and go with the flow of things. that you sometimes have no control over a situation so you might as well embrace it.

i hope with all my heart that i'll be back in buenos aires within this year. i view it as my new years goal, since i don't believe in resolutions. i love it too much to not go back. you may ask me why, whats so special about that place? whats wrong with you? its not one certain thing, i think it was my experience in general. while i know coming back wont be the same, that most of the people who made my trip so amazing won't be there, i feel confident bsas has so much to offer and i want to experience it all over again. the people, the food, the culture, the city, the boliches, the museums, the ferias, the LIFE. mi corazón siempre se queda en buenos aires...

it seems to be the end of my journey and the end of this blog..(or is it? i might surprise you all) thanks for reading and following this as long as you have.. i appreciate it :D catch me in the states while you can, cuz i have these dreamns that i just cant resist ;-)












Alana

Empieza el viaje!!!


although i didn't think it would be possible to be more worthless at updating my blog... i will apologize in advance for perhaps not writing for awhile.
but today i got my trips for the next two weeks all planned out!


so here is a map of argentina to show you wheeeereeee i'll be going



FRIDAY nov 10- leaving buenos aires and taking a wonderful bus ride to SALTA. the capital city of the northern province of Salta, in northern Argentina.I am going with my friend Randi who has a friend who lives there. there are some really amazing ruins, lots of outdoorsy stuff to do- (we got allt he bus stuff figured out and will find excurciones once we get there).


so we plan on hanging out in salta til tuesday the 14th. we had originally wanted to go from salta straight over to iguazu but'apparently buses don't route that way... so we are making a little detour 10 hours south of salta to CORDOBA. Cordoba is actually the second biggest city in argentina; so we plan on spending a night and like day and a half there, exploring etc. take a little city tour.... heres a castle that i can apparently see there in cordoba... haha


then taking yet another bus to IGUAZU FALLS, one of the 7 wonders of the world. its way up in the northeast corner of the country in the state of misiones where argentina, paraguay and brasil meet. im so excited to see these amazing waterfalls. also my roommates lily and lisa are planning on coming with some of their friends and the other friends italians fede, fedo, andrea, etc. so we are going to take some tours of the waterfalls, decide if i really want to pay 100 dollars to go to brasil and see the cataratas from that side (100 dollar tax they charge all americans because we apparently charge them that to enter our stupid country, booo). then we are leaving the 21 and will be back home in buenos aires 22.

i am pretty stoked to get out of the city and see some new things!!! hope my culo doesnt fall off after about 4 days in a damn bus.. but for all the travel i paid 520 pesos (so like 175 bucks). cant really beat it....
ill try to update and ill have my OWN pics up afterwards....

BESOS

21st birthday in Buenos Aires!!!!


[i realized i never posted these pics from my birthday...].
soo definitely one of the best birthdays being away from all my favorites and family.. went to dinner at this amazing and randomly picked restaurant (i found it online) called ROOF in Palermo, a barrio where you can find any kind and the best food. as a group of 20 it was a fun night and i realized just how many fun interesting friends i have made from around the world. awww, YAY

the beautiful birthday banner lily made me on lined paper and crayons. love it

me and my birfdaaay dress ( 21 dollars; gotta love the exchange rate)


our ridiculous dinner arrangement

enjoying my cake!!!

a legal glass of wine with my randi!!!

here begin the pics of me and the whole world: ITALY with roommate lisa and fede

America- Erica, Ashley and Lily my roomie

FRANCIA!- Marin and Adelaide

Más America: Emery and Danielle

Las Americas Ulda (Ecuador) y Matt (Nueva York)

Samu (Catalan/argentino) y Augustina (former roomie argentina)

PERU- roomie Rocio and I (with a cute little matt in the back)

bufanda Marin y Adelaide got me from Bolivia, sooo pretty!!

FUN BIRTHDAY!!!

twas a good night, eh? :-)

School and Buenos Aires...?!?

so i have been quite awful at updating.
apologies.
and although most people don't really consider that i have been "studying"that much the past 3 and a half months, it is crunch timeeee. ahora estoy trabajando muchisimo, porque solamente hay dos más semanas de clases.
This week is nuts-
I had a 6 page paper due today- (wrote about a peronist guerilla group of the 70s, Los Montoneros).
Tomorrow I have a test in my globalization class about MERCOSUR, sus relaciones con la unión europea, NAFTA and Asia Pacific; I studied some yesterday but have been really stressing working on my paper for my economic history class. It's due thrusday, and I have a good chunk of it done, but it just takes forever. Still can't believe i am writing all these crazy papers ALL in Spanish. I think a lot of it takes me so long because i want to write in spanish at the same level as i do in englihs (which i not nearly at yet, but working on it).
So I have that paper due thursday- (its about ex argentine president Menem and how his neoliberal policies in the 90s caused poverty).
Thursday I also have another paper due for Political Economy of Argentina, which is a set of questions about specific economic nonsense for the most boring profesor i have. we lovingly call him el hombre triangulo (triangle guy) since he seems to draw triangles representing argentina and its development pretty much every lecture. no matter how awake i am before his class, even if i drink like 3 cafe con leches or lots of mate, i always manage to fall asleep to his monotonic (sp?) drone.
so next week i have the final exam for hombre triangulo and a paper about modern politics about a latin american nation that is having elections this year (Vanessa sound familiar?)
THEN I AM DONE WITH SCHOOL FOR THE SEMESTER!!!!!!!!

and so begins the traveling.. on the plan so far is a trip to Iguazu to see the waterfalls, a journey through northern argentina- to see Salta and maybe Tucuman, wherever. I am debating on if i want to go to Chile or Brasil for a week as well. taking your votes suggestions of course-
Oh yeah- I am going to see SHAKIRA on november 25th!! (happy thanksgiving to meee). waaay excited about that one. so the traveling will be focused around being in buenos on that date, but probably leaving again after and coming back since I definitely want to be back and spend my last week or so in mi amor Buenos Aires.

well i better get to studying.
[like how i update when i have 943753 things to do? of course, procrastination at it's finest!!! :D]
Lots of pictures will be posted soon i hope...
chau chau un beso

oh and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Jazz en Buenos Aires

Last night we had a fun little evening out- Randi, Lily and I hit some some sushi libre (pretty much all you can eat, mm mmmm) with Randi's friend Wells. Although we were planning on going to the movies afterwards to see some random argentine movie, Wells knew of this little jazz club near us that has live music on thursdays and we decided to check it out. porque no!?
Best idea- the place was reaaallly cool. a fun little intimate venue called Thelonious (after Thelonious Monk as Wells informed me) that had a great band a cool atmosphere. it's one of those places you wouldn't even notice if you were walking down the street unless you were looking for it. They also made reaaally good drinks (had my first cosmopolitan! delish!). So I think we will be definitely heading back there before we leave to check out the music some more- it was def a place you would looove dad.
I finally got my stupid visa- hooray. i had to make another trip down to migraciones today (takes like an hour to get there) but now i have my stupid piece of paper saying its okay i'm in argentina. I was pretty disappointed that its not like an actual visa en my passport but a print out on a normal piece of copy paper. are they really expecting me carry that around, or worse, not to lose that? sheesh! at least i am considered legal and will get credit for my classes i'm taking here.

First off, just so everyone knows there has been a Change of Plans:
I was originally supposed to be come nov 20... but it turns out ill staying in Argentina til December 14th (be home in Albuquerque the 15th, be ready amigos!) then probably going to see my awesome 90 year old gramma for christmas in San Diego, but home for new years. :D
soo excited! pretty sweet too that i was able to change my flight for only cost 25 dollars thru the student travel agency... really gla di did that. (Vanessa te recomiendo que hagas lo mismo!!)
so now i have pretty much an extra month to enjoy my Argentina, perhaps with a little chile or brasil action. travel destinations tba. I still can't get over the fact that i'm in south america traveling around and having the best time of my life and i get to stay even longer! (although we all know ill be back...)

other news:
+first the good-grades form midterms are trickling in slowly. So far, 9/10 in Globalization (woooo), and 9/10 en Sociedad Abierta (wooooo!) high hopes for the others, should be in later this week or the following. seeee, i'm studying here, too!! jaja
+not so great news- there was a robbery by my house... kinda freaked everyone out. we actually saw part of it from Lisa's window. the first time i have actually witnessed crime like that in front of me in the entire time i've been here (miraculous in itself, but i have had friends run into some shit). horrible thing, but kind of opened up all our eyes and made me realize we still need to be careful. dont worry mom, im not planing on walking over that way anytime soon and ill continue to take taxis at night...
+i went to a bookstore today and picked up some reading finally! ive been meanign to get some stuff in english just to give my head a rest. the english pickings were slim but i found a copy of to kill a mockingbird which i havent read since high school and remember liking so i was excited. also got a book en castellano by Isabel Allende-chilean author who i like. its her newest book looks pretty cool and will be a good test to see how much my spanish is aaactually improving lol. i hope to finish it before i leave :P

On my way to becoming a true porteña!

I recently took the next step to fitting in here by buying my very own mate and becoming a yerba mate addict. the other weekend we headed to plaza francia which has one of the best street fairs every weekend where you can find all sorts of awesome crafts and random stuff. i decided i needed a mate and found this really pretty wooden one (less comon then the typical ones made of calabaza gourds but nicely made with a stand and very cool); it also came with a really cool bombilla (the metal straw thing for drinking the mate) all for around 10 dollars.
so what is yerba mate? according to trusty wikipedia, Yerba mate is a species of holly. (wierd, didn't know that lol). The infusion called mate prepared by steeping the dried leaves in hot water (has to be hot but not boiling or you'll burn the yerba!) rather than boiling water like tea or coffee. It is slightly less potent than coffee and much gentler on the stomach. Drinking mate with friends from a shared hollow gourd (also called a mate in Spanish) with a metal straw, the bombilla, is an extremely common social practice in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile, southern Bolivia and Brazil. but Argentines claim it to be their national drink (another rivalry between portenos and uruguayos). its great to see porteños in business suits walking around with their fancy thermos and mate. its pretty typical to see argentines hanging out with their mate and a thermos in a park or wherever chating with friends, etc. According to some legend... The Guarani people started drinking mate in the region that now includes Paraguay and north-east Argentina. The Guarani have a legend that says that the Goddesses of the Moon and the Cloud came to the Earth one day to visit it but they instead found a Yagureté (a kind of Jaguar) that was going to attack them. An old man saves them, and, in compensation, the Goddesses gave the old man a new kind of plant, from which he could prepare a "drink of friendship". [thanks wikipedia]
anyway, im becoming obsessed with my mate a bit. great to hang out with friends, good for a little buzz for studying without making me feel too sick like coffee can. here is my prettymate:



next- get myself a thermos :P