Today, we talked about cultural differences in my Spanish class. I have Spanish four days a week. We're an awkward, but interesting bunch: a tall, lanky and very tan French girl, two Korean girls, a Japanese guy, who is actually half Argentine, but grew up in Japan and sports an extremely long dreadlock, just one that is, and another American girl who is actually from California and went to UC Berkeley.
Practically every class we go around and talk about our respective countries. For example we read an article about how Argentine youth are lazy and not doing anything particularly good with their lives, then we each went around and talked about how the youth are in the States, Japan, Korea, and France. Needless to say, there are lazy youths in all parts of the world.
But today, I had the chance to vent a little bit about the things I notice here, that I notice because they are things that make me feel like I stand out. First off, I had to complain about how no eats in the street. Mainly, because I have to convince myself that "its okay" if I want to eat an apple in public (also they cut all the fruit they eat rather than just gnaw away like I do). Not only that, but to consume a beverage on the street you must use a straw as to not offend anyone by opening your mouth too wide (I guess). This must be why there is home delivery. FOR. EVERYTHING. Ice cream, Chinese food, groceries. Good forbid, you'd have to eat on the street.
The next thing I noticed when I went to see a documentary this past weekend and was sitting in an overheated theatre. I had to remove some layers and as I shifted in my seat I noticed that everyone was completely still. So still. Not even uncrossing their legs. The documentary wasn't even that good! I shifted so much in my seat due to the heat, due to my nature and this woman just sat so calmly next to me that I thought she might have died.
I must say I write with a bit of tenderness since in these past months I have come appreciate even the quirkiest of Argentine custom. Although the ones that I write about aren't drastically outstanding, they are every day reminders that I am not from this place and I'm far away from home.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Monday, September 24, 2007
A Complex and Perplexing Tattoo
I've seen strange ones before: one guy with the Ramones logo on his shoulder, a Rolling Stones logo peaking out from a girl's waistline, etc. And I ask, why? But who am I to judge?
A man's calf caught my eye: the Rolling Stones lips on an Argentine flag, all superimposed on a large marijuana leaf. All in color. Must I say more?
It can be confusing in these parts.
A man's calf caught my eye: the Rolling Stones lips on an Argentine flag, all superimposed on a large marijuana leaf. All in color. Must I say more?
It can be confusing in these parts.
To Study Abroad
I don't really accept that I´m ¨studying abroad¨ (don't tell Oberlin) since my experience so far, in these last two months, has had little to do with school and studying, but adjusting to life in a different country.
Adjusting completely just does not seem plausible since I hold onto many things that make me American, and a distinct pride for my country comes out of this. Every day I know this place a little better, but out of that I miss the States. There is so much richness in our own culture that is easily overlooked. And the critic that I am of the United States, I'm surprised by how much I appreciate.
I've said many times to peers that my experience here happens much less to be about learning what it means to be an Argentine, than what it means to be an American. (By the way, here you aren´t supposed to refer to yourself as ´´americana´´ if you are from the United States because South Americans are also Americans.) I have had to articulate to myself and others what I represent or what I believe and then in turn analyze what about this makes me American. I think this is why I study Latin America : how do I reckon with my country, as it has perpetually messed up the entirety of Latin America for its citizens, while it grants me so much freedom?
Adjusting completely just does not seem plausible since I hold onto many things that make me American, and a distinct pride for my country comes out of this. Every day I know this place a little better, but out of that I miss the States. There is so much richness in our own culture that is easily overlooked. And the critic that I am of the United States, I'm surprised by how much I appreciate.
I've said many times to peers that my experience here happens much less to be about learning what it means to be an Argentine, than what it means to be an American. (By the way, here you aren´t supposed to refer to yourself as ´´americana´´ if you are from the United States because South Americans are also Americans.) I have had to articulate to myself and others what I represent or what I believe and then in turn analyze what about this makes me American. I think this is why I study Latin America : how do I reckon with my country, as it has perpetually messed up the entirety of Latin America for its citizens, while it grants me so much freedom?
My first impressions
My first mass email:
I've been in Buenos Aires for more than three weeks now and I wanted to get in touch with you and give you a little taste of how things are going down here...this is a bit long...you can skim:
Not only has school started already, it is winter down here! Rainy, then sunny, foggy, one day they had snow, a historic occurrence. I live in a nice apartment a little far from the center of town, but the subway is right nearby. The A line, which I ride, mostly runs old subway cars, wooden interiors, doors you have to pull open, leather straps on the windows to open them...Also people step out as the train is moving and the doors basically shut again barely after the train has stopped. Despite a pace and rhythm that is slower and more drawn out, there's lots of urgency.
I'm taking a couple classes here and there, a couple at UBA, the public, free university that 300,000 Argentines attend. At UBA, the facades of buildings and the insides of classrooms are adorned with graffiti "YANKEE GO HOME!" "US FUERA DE IRAQ" and the like. When you enter the buildings, there is a line of people handing out propaganda. Someone told me that during a lecture, two different sets of students came in and put political posters up on the board behind the professor. The university is totally disorganized, dilapidated, strikes are common, yet maintains itself as the MOST prestigious university in the country. It was only 20 years ago that this country got rid of the military dictatorship; its a young democracy and they take freedom of speech seriously. Evita and Che are far from forgotten and their names are everywhere tagged on walls.
I'm also taking a couple of art classes through UBA's cultural center. This is interesting because old ladies and students and adults, anybody who wants to comes out to register and take these classes. There is so much culture here, it is overwhelming. The government does a fantastic job of funding the arts, music, theater, there is SO much to do!
The city is CRAZY. Literally, emotionally, physically. So many people everywhere, dogs are really popular, so is not picking up their poop. Stepping in poop is so common people say that is good luck. I like the people. Buenos Aires has a huge per capita or whatever you say of people seeing therapists, they really want to be European, it is just as Jewish as it is Catholic and the people are extremely good looking. The men wont stop with their stares and with the comments, "hay que linda," but people are friendly and eager to know where I'm from and my political stance on things. They are not so quick to consider themselves Latin Americans, although they certainly live within the Latin American unreality.
The language is tough, was really hard at first. I still can't understand what people are saying sometimes. All the double Ls are pronounced "shh" and the y's are pronounced similarly. They say "vos" instead of "tu" and they even decided it would be funny if they had their very own tu form of verb conjugation! But I'm getting by....
This last weekend, I went to Iguazu, northern Argentina, boarders Brazil and Paraguay. AMAZING! The cataratas, the waterfalls, there are something like the biggest in the hemisphere. I've never seen anything as immense, threatening, beautiful.
I've been in Buenos Aires for more than three weeks now and I wanted to get in touch with you and give you a little taste of how things are going down here...this is a bit long...you can skim:
Not only has school started already, it is winter down here! Rainy, then sunny, foggy, one day they had snow, a historic occurrence. I live in a nice apartment a little far from the center of town, but the subway is right nearby. The A line, which I ride, mostly runs old subway cars, wooden interiors, doors you have to pull open, leather straps on the windows to open them...Also people step out as the train is moving and the doors basically shut again barely after the train has stopped. Despite a pace and rhythm that is slower and more drawn out, there's lots of urgency.
I'm taking a couple classes here and there, a couple at UBA, the public, free university that 300,000 Argentines attend. At UBA, the facades of buildings and the insides of classrooms are adorned with graffiti "YANKEE GO HOME!" "US FUERA DE IRAQ" and the like. When you enter the buildings, there is a line of people handing out propaganda. Someone told me that during a lecture, two different sets of students came in and put political posters up on the board behind the professor. The university is totally disorganized, dilapidated, strikes are common, yet maintains itself as the MOST prestigious university in the country. It was only 20 years ago that this country got rid of the military dictatorship; its a young democracy and they take freedom of speech seriously. Evita and Che are far from forgotten and their names are everywhere tagged on walls.
I'm also taking a couple of art classes through UBA's cultural center. This is interesting because old ladies and students and adults, anybody who wants to comes out to register and take these classes. There is so much culture here, it is overwhelming. The government does a fantastic job of funding the arts, music, theater, there is SO much to do!
The city is CRAZY. Literally, emotionally, physically. So many people everywhere, dogs are really popular, so is not picking up their poop. Stepping in poop is so common people say that is good luck. I like the people. Buenos Aires has a huge per capita or whatever you say of people seeing therapists, they really want to be European, it is just as Jewish as it is Catholic and the people are extremely good looking. The men wont stop with their stares and with the comments, "hay que linda," but people are friendly and eager to know where I'm from and my political stance on things. They are not so quick to consider themselves Latin Americans, although they certainly live within the Latin American unreality.
The language is tough, was really hard at first. I still can't understand what people are saying sometimes. All the double Ls are pronounced "shh" and the y's are pronounced similarly. They say "vos" instead of "tu" and they even decided it would be funny if they had their very own tu form of verb conjugation! But I'm getting by....
This last weekend, I went to Iguazu, northern Argentina, boarders Brazil and Paraguay. AMAZING! The cataratas, the waterfalls, there are something like the biggest in the hemisphere. I've never seen anything as immense, threatening, beautiful.
Justicia y Memoria
My second mass email:
Two Sundays ago, I accompanied my host family to a ceremony to commemorate my host mother's ex-husband, Julio Cesar, killed in 1974 (this was two years before the military took hold, Perón was still president). My host mother, Ana María says, "Fue primero" as in he was the first disappeared. His body was found two days after her was kidnapped and soon afterwards the matter was all over the news. Nothing like this had happened before: the Triple A hadn't appeared yet, there were acts of terrorism by anonymous groups loosely tied to the government, bombs and so forth, but disappearances weren't rampant.
Julio was the father of my "host siblings", Leo and Mariela, who were 4 and 3 at the time. Julio Cesar was a photojournalist who had been at a socialist event, taking a photograph that led to his arrest. Nothing until now has ever been done to investigate or even commemorate what happened to him. There is a group of people who call themselves Los Vecinos de Balvenera and Almagro, two districts (I live in Almagro) in which it is estimated was the home of 200-300 desaparecidos. Julio Cesar grew up a few blocks from out apartment.
My host mother told me about this a couple weeks ago because she wanted to invite me a ceremony in which they were going to install a plaque in his memory. Not to gloat, but my my host mother told me that she had never told any of her previous exchange students about this, but she felt like she could because she sees the way I speak about things and that I have a "mente amplia."
So on Sunday, Leo and his girlfriend came over for lunch and then around 4 o' clock my host parents, Ana María and Eduardo (her second husband, adopted father to her children) and Leo and Claudia and I walked to Julio Cesar's house. There, people gathered in front on the sidewalk where a plot to place the plaque to mark his memory. People spoke about Julio Cesar, who he was, what he enjoyed: Neruda, Lorca, Mercedes Sosa. We all wore small photocopied pictures of him that were stapled to little red paper cranes. People spoke about how this does not mark an end or a goal, but stressed that we must continue to remember and make statements that recognize the disappeared so that this never happens again. ¡Nunca más! Afterwards, the family and others came back to the apartment and chatted and laughed and spoke softly of this lovely, simple, poignant ceremony.
A few nights prior to this event, I told my host parents about my father's parents who were communists and investigated by the FBI. As I told them this, about how my grandfather was essentially forced to stay in Phoenix, AZ where he felt protected, but dissatisfied nonetheless, a glimmer of recognition passed across Ana María and Eduardo's faces. The morning of the ceremony when Leo came over, Ana and Eduardo bragged to him, "su abuelo era comunista!" and then they told me, "Leo es comunista, también," and they all smiled at me in approval. And after the ceremony for Julio Cesar, I stood alone observing everything and Ana walked up to me and said, "Era, comunista, ¿sabés?" pointing to the plaque for Julio Cesar.
I never knew that I could ever feel as accepted as I did on that day, welcomed into a different culture, a people, and a family. They recognized me and let me in, into Argentina.
Two Sundays ago, I accompanied my host family to a ceremony to commemorate my host mother's ex-husband, Julio Cesar, killed in 1974 (this was two years before the military took hold, Perón was still president). My host mother, Ana María says, "Fue primero" as in he was the first disappeared. His body was found two days after her was kidnapped and soon afterwards the matter was all over the news. Nothing like this had happened before: the Triple A hadn't appeared yet, there were acts of terrorism by anonymous groups loosely tied to the government, bombs and so forth, but disappearances weren't rampant.
Julio was the father of my "host siblings", Leo and Mariela, who were 4 and 3 at the time. Julio Cesar was a photojournalist who had been at a socialist event, taking a photograph that led to his arrest. Nothing until now has ever been done to investigate or even commemorate what happened to him. There is a group of people who call themselves Los Vecinos de Balvenera and Almagro, two districts (I live in Almagro) in which it is estimated was the home of 200-300 desaparecidos. Julio Cesar grew up a few blocks from out apartment.
My host mother told me about this a couple weeks ago because she wanted to invite me a ceremony in which they were going to install a plaque in his memory. Not to gloat, but my my host mother told me that she had never told any of her previous exchange students about this, but she felt like she could because she sees the way I speak about things and that I have a "mente amplia."
So on Sunday, Leo and his girlfriend came over for lunch and then around 4 o' clock my host parents, Ana María and Eduardo (her second husband, adopted father to her children) and Leo and Claudia and I walked to Julio Cesar's house. There, people gathered in front on the sidewalk where a plot to place the plaque to mark his memory. People spoke about Julio Cesar, who he was, what he enjoyed: Neruda, Lorca, Mercedes Sosa. We all wore small photocopied pictures of him that were stapled to little red paper cranes. People spoke about how this does not mark an end or a goal, but stressed that we must continue to remember and make statements that recognize the disappeared so that this never happens again. ¡Nunca más! Afterwards, the family and others came back to the apartment and chatted and laughed and spoke softly of this lovely, simple, poignant ceremony.
A few nights prior to this event, I told my host parents about my father's parents who were communists and investigated by the FBI. As I told them this, about how my grandfather was essentially forced to stay in Phoenix, AZ where he felt protected, but dissatisfied nonetheless, a glimmer of recognition passed across Ana María and Eduardo's faces. The morning of the ceremony when Leo came over, Ana and Eduardo bragged to him, "su abuelo era comunista!" and then they told me, "Leo es comunista, también," and they all smiled at me in approval. And after the ceremony for Julio Cesar, I stood alone observing everything and Ana walked up to me and said, "Era, comunista, ¿sabés?" pointing to the plaque for Julio Cesar.
I never knew that I could ever feel as accepted as I did on that day, welcomed into a different culture, a people, and a family. They recognized me and let me in, into Argentina.
Buenos Aires: 1
I have been in Buenos Aires now for two months and all my thoughts on being a foreigner in this country have finally found an arena.
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