Time for an update. I have been really busy lately, no time to write even a few lines. But if I do not do it now, it will be much later. As mentioned, Buenos Aires is a fab place. I have been attending Spanish classes since last week, so there was little time left to explore the city.
I have been meeting heaps of people, among them Ian, a Canadian, who works as expedition leader on tours to Antarctica. One night I went out together with him and a few more people who work on his expedition ship. Who knows, they might employ me as expedition photographer?! Probably not, but hey, who knows. If I could lecture on geophysics, I would have gotten an asignement straight away. I might try and catch up with him in Ushuaia, as his ship has already left Buenos Aires on Tuesday.
The Spanish school is really great, the teachers are all highly motivated and very friendly, most of them about my age. And where else would you be greeted by your teachers with besos every morning?! Last week I took six hours of lessons, four in a mini-group (three people), and two individual. This was actually too intensive! So I changed the schedule to just four hours of group classes a day. At least now I can do something besides attending class (e.g. writing this). The other students are a great mix of people, we go out frequently together for all sorts of activities. Last weekend we went to a very professional Tango Show in the Centro Cultural Borges, which was truly impressive (see a few pictures in the photos section).
On Sunday we contrasted this experience with a visit to the football stadion. We went to see the match Boca vs River Plate (the two major clubs of Buenos Aires), which was a real experience. Unfortunately I was afraid to take my bulky camera, but I still hope to get a few pictures from Elise, an other student. The atmosphere was truly exciting, heaps of shouting and singing - already an hour before the game started! When the teams finally entered the stadion, you would believe the whole place would explode!! For 90 minutes nobody would stay on their seats... And it certainly did improve my Spanish ("burro", "hijo de puta" etc.). They were in fact almost celebrating carnival - drums, trumpets, all sorts of instruments and banners... They actually had to clean up the field >before< the game had started to remove all the litter. And later on, during the break, again, of course. Especially the Boca fans were incredible. They just did not stop singing and shouting, not even long after the game had ended. The actual match was a little boring, actually.
Then there are so many art exhibitions on all the time. Have been to a few, yesterday to one with drawings and prints by Dalí, earlier the contemporary Latin American Art. Yesterday we went with the whole school to a photography exhibition, which was partly interesting (photographs of painted bodies - cuerpos pintados). If I can muster enough energy, I will later go to an other photography exhibition of young photographers from Buenos Aires. It just means I will have to cross this crazy city twice... But tonight is an other music/tango show and for the weekend I will go on a short trip to Colonia and Montevideo in Uruguay together with four or five of other students. My plan is to do the Spanish classes for at least one more week, maybe two.
(All pictures by Elise, the Melbournian chica in the middle of the group picture in the stadion.)
