Bariloche

I have been in Bariloche for a little less than weeks now! It started with Stephanie joining me for 2 days. It was really cold when she was here and we ended up being cold and wearing all of our clothes all of the time. I was worried that I would need to buy more pants and sweaters etc. With Stephanie we walked around looking at the touristic things that Bariloche has to offer. Bariloche is in the mountains on the edge of a large lake it is very pretty. We walked a lot and visiting a lot of chocolate stores and did some window shopping. We also went a saw a few of the chocolate factories, it was really neat to see the chocolate being made. We also took a chairlift part way up a mountain/hill and rode these really fun luge like things all the way down on a track. The day Stephanie left everything cleared up and its been very hot since. She must have taken the cold weather with her and left it somewhere else.

After Stephanie left I moved into a different hostal, the one that La Montaña Spanish School reserved for me and I started class on the 22nd of February. At first I didn´t like the hostal very much but I quickly realised that its a great place and the owners are very layed back and have a great business. The first night at the hostal they had an asado which was delicious and I got to meet a few people. The next day I went ¨hiking¨ with a couple from Brasil up a mountain called Cerro Campanario. I say hiking but it really was more of a SLOWWW walk. The couple was very slow but in the end the view was worth it. This place claims to have one of the top 10 views in the world. I am not sure who decided that, it was very beautiful but I dont know if it would make the top 10.

I am very happy with the school and I think that they did a accurate job of placing me in a class based on my level. The school organizes after school activities and the first night they offered salsa dancing lessons. Well I hate dancing but I decided to go for it since I didn´t know the next time I´d get the opportunity to learn how to salsa dance from the pros! The instructor was really good and it was fun at first but I got bored really fast. The next days school activity was a ¨caminata¨which means walk and we walked around this neat forest about 30km out of Bariloche.

On Friday I went to a beach along the Nahual Huapi with a few Canadian girls from the school. It was really hot and nice to cool off in the lake. The lake is very cold, probably similar to some lakes in the NWT. On Saturday I went on a hike with some other people of the school, majority Canadians!! (There were a lot of Canadians at the school last week for some reason.) The hike was great. We hiked up to a place called Refugio Frey. It took us about 3.5 hours to get up and was extremely hot. At the top they is a refuge where you can actually rent a bed for the night or pitch a tent outside. There is also a small lake which I waded around in to cool off. We had lunch at the side of the lake and then hung out a little longer. That evening I had to move into my host family so I had to be back at a specific time. Of course we didn´t leave until the last minute since we were enjoying ourselves so much and ending up having to speed walk/run down the mountain. It wasn´t the most enjoyable descent because of the heat and speed were were going but we made in down in 2 hours and arrived 5 minutes before the bus.

I then moved into my family. The family is kind of weird and I´m not sure what to think yet. The dad always throws in English words to everything he is saying which really bothers me since I am staying in his house to learn spanish. The mum is really nice but I haven´t seen much of her because he mum is very sick and therefore she spends every waking moment with her (which I don´t blame her at all). I am a little disapointed with the host family since I moved into a family to speak spanish and the only time I see either of them is 1 hour at dinner time. AND dinner another things that remains to be desired. I don´t know if its because she is in a rush but the food is all instant/frozen food that takes 10 minutes to prepare. I am thinking about going back into the hostal since a host family is expensive and being with this one is really not worth what I´m paying.

The only positive of the family is that there are two girls from another school that are staying with them and they are a lot of fun. On Sunday we went to the local pool which happens to be right beside the lake. The water was a bit warmer than the lake and it made it easier to stay in a little longer.

Overall Bariloche is a really neat place. Although it is very touristy the opportunites in the mountains are amazing. So many hikes with gorgeous views and lots of water activites as well. Sandy should be arriving on the weekend and I am looking forward to the adventures we will have together.

General Roca with Stephanie!!

Another week has gone by without and update. Time is flying. I´ve been in Stephanie´s host family for 2 weeks now and they are a really great family. Days here are very different from ones back home. Basically days don´t really start until noon when you have lunch about an hour after you wake up. I´ve been having a hard time sleeping in enough, and since the house is small there isn’t much I can do until everyone else is up. Still working on the sleeping in thing, just in time to start my 9am Spanish course. After lunch nothing much gets done until 5 or 6 because it is too hot out and all stores are closed until then.

Many days were just spent hanging and socializing and other days we went out and did things. Argentineans know how to socialize and if you go to someone’s house to say hi you are sure to spend at least 2 hours there. People entertain themselves by spending time with each other. A LOT of time is spent around the dinner table, chatting, eating or drinking mate (pronounced mattay). This ended up being really good for my Spanish; I mostly do a lot of listening and am slowly starting to understand more and more. When I get tired though I find myself zoning out, which can kind of backfire when someone is talking to me and I don´t realize it.

Here is a list of things we did while I was in Roca:
- Had an asado, an Argentinian BBQ which is a really big deal. Most families always have an asado on weekends and you can always tell when someone is having an asado because it smells really good near their house. Stephanie´s family always has asado on Sunday.
- Attending an Argentinean Birthday with a lot of talking involved (not on my behalf). Birthday involved getting together and eating dinner, in this case pizza and then having cake.
- Going to Cervantes, Stephanie´s old town to meet her friends. They are a great group of people and Cervantes is a very nice and peaceful town, now I know why she enjoyed herself so much there.
- Go to an old farm and guess what?! Socialize some more. The farm was neat because the house on the property is much different than a typical Argentinean home. It is much larger and really high ceilings. It was built by a German family in the early 1900´s and had some really neat antiques inside.
- Went swimming in Rio Negro! We first drank mate and then had a nice swim to cool off! The river is really pretty and a popular destination for many people to spend the afternoon.
- Went to Neuquén, a large city nearby. We walked around and picked up a parcel from our parents. We also visited a host brother that lives there. We drank mate and had lunch with the host brother. And then went and saw Avatar, fortunately it was in English with Spanish subtitles.
- Made empanadas, an Argentinean specialty!
- Went walking downtown and explored the grocery stores. I find other countries´ grocery stores fascinating.
- Made carrot cake and apple cake for Stephanie´s family to try, they liked both of them!
- Played lots of lots of cards.
- Went the National Apple Festival in General Roca. It was fun and HUGE. There was a ton of fast food, an attraction park, arts and crafts vendors and live music. Some of the music I didn’t really enjoy but there were a few bands that I really liked! The festival was free and they estimated 400,000 people attended during the 5 days that it lasted.
- Watched a friend of Stephanie an Ailen´s perform Arabic dancing at the Apple Festival.
- Watched the scarce coverage of the Olympics! They aired the Opening Ceremonies so we made pizza, drank beer (with peanuts…something they do here) and cheered on Canada (and Argentina).

Tonight Stephanie and I are taking the bus to Bariloche, the town where I am taking my 1 month Spanish course. Stephanie is staying for 2 and a half days and then heads home to enjoy the last of her summer break. I start my course on Monday and am really forward to it. The first week I am staying in a hostel and then I move into a family for 3 weeks.