Marcela was standing in front of me, making sure I was listening properly.
¨Ojo, Lissie.¨She said, using her pointer finger to pull down lightly on the skin beneath her left eye. ¨Cuidadate niña¨, Buenos Aires is very dangerous. Hold your purse, make sure you have a porteño with you at all times.¨
The ¨ojo¨sign is probably my favorite of the argentine hand gestures. It is done almost universally in South America, and has one meaning: watch out. Men do it, women do it, people on the streets who are worried about your safety do it, and now, I do it. I think it´s hilarious, a physical reminder to keep my eyes open and aware that as a peliroja, I am not always attracting positive attention.
We spent three days and three nights in the city. We stayed with Veronika´s friend Abel, who has an apartment in the Palermo barrio of the city. I got to spend all three nights with Ashton and she took us all around to different bars and places. Her Spanish is incredible (although she will absolutely deny this) and it was incredible to merge our two trips together, if only for a few days.
On Saturday Ashton took us to the Ricolletta Cemetary, a grave site of sorts, except instead of tombstones, it holds hundreds of grave houses, almost monuments. I´ll put up pictures to help my ailing description. We stood saw Evita´s gravesite, which is still adorned with fresh flowers and people of all nationalities posing to have their picture taken in front of her eternal smile.
Outside of the cemetary is a huge Fería, or fair (thanks castellaño) and there we ran into Devin´s friend from 6th grade who is studying in Chile but just happened to be in Buenos Aires in the fería at the same time as we were.
We spent most of the rest of the day with them. They were even there when I had pizza and beer with the beautiful Noell twins. We all laughed and exchanged stories of misunderstandings, amusing cultural differences, and the eternal ¨ojo!¨from our host mothers.
¨Ojo!¨ We would yell, pointing our fingers and extending the skin beneath our eyes.
¨Ojo Deveeen!¨ I would shout as Devin almost was hit by a rogue Taxista.
In the apartment, in the open air bar, in the birthday party we stayed at until 5 am:
¨Ojo! Ojo! Ojo!¨
I laughed so much and ojo-ed so much that it should have been no surprise that when I woke up yesterday, my last day in Buenos Aires....
with a bad case of Conjuctivitis in my left eye.
Conjuctivitis for all of my none premed friends, is pink eye.
So now I´m donning my glasses, sans mascara and eyeliner, until the over the counter remedy Norah gave me works its magic.
But, don´t go thinking I didn´t have a good time. I had an amazing time, full of friends and music and dancing, and great food and beautiful scenery. This little infection will clear itself up soon, but the memory of dancing in a room with thousands of other people, hearing only Castellaño is something that will never leave me.
And who else can say they went to Buenos Aires and came back with a case of pink eye?
¨Ojo, Lissie.¨She said, using her pointer finger to pull down lightly on the skin beneath her left eye. ¨Cuidadate niña¨, Buenos Aires is very dangerous. Hold your purse, make sure you have a porteño with you at all times.¨
The ¨ojo¨sign is probably my favorite of the argentine hand gestures. It is done almost universally in South America, and has one meaning: watch out. Men do it, women do it, people on the streets who are worried about your safety do it, and now, I do it. I think it´s hilarious, a physical reminder to keep my eyes open and aware that as a peliroja, I am not always attracting positive attention.
We spent three days and three nights in the city. We stayed with Veronika´s friend Abel, who has an apartment in the Palermo barrio of the city. I got to spend all three nights with Ashton and she took us all around to different bars and places. Her Spanish is incredible (although she will absolutely deny this) and it was incredible to merge our two trips together, if only for a few days.
On Saturday Ashton took us to the Ricolletta Cemetary, a grave site of sorts, except instead of tombstones, it holds hundreds of grave houses, almost monuments. I´ll put up pictures to help my ailing description. We stood saw Evita´s gravesite, which is still adorned with fresh flowers and people of all nationalities posing to have their picture taken in front of her eternal smile.
Outside of the cemetary is a huge Fería, or fair (thanks castellaño) and there we ran into Devin´s friend from 6th grade who is studying in Chile but just happened to be in Buenos Aires in the fería at the same time as we were.
We spent most of the rest of the day with them. They were even there when I had pizza and beer with the beautiful Noell twins. We all laughed and exchanged stories of misunderstandings, amusing cultural differences, and the eternal ¨ojo!¨from our host mothers.
¨Ojo!¨ We would yell, pointing our fingers and extending the skin beneath our eyes.
¨Ojo Deveeen!¨ I would shout as Devin almost was hit by a rogue Taxista.
In the apartment, in the open air bar, in the birthday party we stayed at until 5 am:
¨Ojo! Ojo! Ojo!¨
I laughed so much and ojo-ed so much that it should have been no surprise that when I woke up yesterday, my last day in Buenos Aires....
with a bad case of Conjuctivitis in my left eye.
Conjuctivitis for all of my none premed friends, is pink eye.
So now I´m donning my glasses, sans mascara and eyeliner, until the over the counter remedy Norah gave me works its magic.
But, don´t go thinking I didn´t have a good time. I had an amazing time, full of friends and music and dancing, and great food and beautiful scenery. This little infection will clear itself up soon, but the memory of dancing in a room with thousands of other people, hearing only Castellaño is something that will never leave me.
And who else can say they went to Buenos Aires and came back with a case of pink eye?
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