La Ciudad Rica

La Ciudad Rica -- Rich City.

That is exactly what B.A. is. The food and coffee, especially. All I want to do here is spend money. I tell myself, Amanda, you have to spend your money only on special things that you can´t find at home. The problem with that? EVERYTHING I FIND IS UNIQUE. I want one of this, one of that, books in spanish to use with my classes, books in english about spanish, shoes, clothes, jewlery, arts and crafts, mate, magazines, newspapers, wine, food, souvineers....ohhh it is PAIN!! But of course, fun nonetheless.

Classes began Monday and I am really happy with them so far. I am taking an Argentine Literature class entirely in spanish...it is going to be quite a challenge. Good news is my professor is quite jovial and seems to really enjoy his job. That always makes a difference. Also, it is different from IWU because all of the students in the class are at different levels, so we can all help each other out. For my english major, I am taking a Literature and Politics class that so far has been pretty fun. It is quite an intoxicating feeling to be learning about the history and culture of a people while actually living in that country. We learn ´world history´´ all through high school, but are never actually know what it is like to be in any of the countries that we discuss. This is awesome. I also have a teaching internship here and THAT is definitley going to be my favorite class. We meet in class once a week and twice a week we teach a class of our own at Lenguas Vivas, a school of languages. I will be teaching mostly secondary students with a very low level of English. This will be an awesome way to start interacting with younger porteños. Surprisingly, I am also the ONLY one in the class with teaching experience. Most people in the class just thought it sounded interesting and have teaching as a back up career (not sure how i feel about that...) but I give them a ton of credit! There will be much for me to teach them, and I know that i will learn a lot from them as well. There is always something to be learned from a person starting fresh in the education track...they have a mind that is innovative and unconstricted by overanalyzation or theory.

The week is over because class was cancelled for tomorrow. My friends and I are headed out to the province Cordoba this evening in our Cochecama - bed bus. The bus leaves at midnight and we sleep on the bus and arrive in Cordoba around 10:00 in the morning. This will be our first independent trip, so I´m really excited to see how it goes! The city of Cordoba is a college town, full of people our age. And it is the first weekend after classes have started...its bound to be a good time! There are some gorgeous hiking trails around the area and fun tango clubs. I´ll update about it when we return Monday morning. Take care, and thanks for keeping up with me. I miss you!!!!!!!!!!!