First email

Needless to say this has the makings of a fantastic semester.

Despite a total travel time from SJO to BAs of 22 hrs, the flight down went pretty well, the city is beautiful, yada yada yada... Franky, pull up the highlight reel.

Wednesday night i went out to this club called "museum" with a blonde/blue-eyed 6 from Maine. I had no intention of scoring with her but would have not regretted it had it happened. I've hooked up with American girls in CH, I was now on recon patrol. After paying a A$20 cover (US$6.50) we walk into what a really small mall would look like if it got abandoned and taken over by Smirnoff Vodka and techno djs: a main dance floor with 3 floors of surrounding balconies above it. bars, flashing lights, soap bubbles and sleazy Argentine guys and girls everywhere. Just beautiful. Immediately she goes apeshit. Picture a 6-year-old walking into Santa's workshop. "You don't understand, I'm from Maine. In high school, we threw parties in the woods," she explains. Understood. Being the gentleman I am, I tell her, "be careful, guys here are pretty aggressive." "What do you mean, aggressive how?"
Kindly, a string of 30-year-old guys in their best happy hour clothes explained for me by: ass and shoulder – yes shoulder – pinching and grabbing, pouncing (literally pouncing, as in bouncing of a couch and grabbing her be her shoulders – I can't thank them enough for the opportunity to use such a pun), slurred Spanish pick up lines literally translated into drunken English and more physical invasion of her private space and verbal harassment. She was a sport and laughed it off. I too laughed... mockingly, but just as well... a good night, all around.

Orientation, on the other hand, has been less than appealing. It has been keynoted by a written Spanish exam.
Please REPRODUCE a 200 word op-ed piece on the true value of using celebrities endorsements in advertising. Then write a 200-word description of an object that symbolizes your country.
- Ms. Casey, if we finish early can we leave for recess?
I clocked in at 14 mins and 29 seconds which included a 30 second pen-change pit stop.
There has also been the use of scare tactics to dissuade against walking in dark alleys and proper etiquette with our host families. Very engaging.

Thursday night I attended an open-house/party at the military circle. Rest assured this isn't the name of a trendy club or a euphemism for somebody's totalitarian-like host family. It is a social club for members of the Argentine military forces. it is roughly the equivalent of the Pentagon having a palace built in French academia architecture for all the people who work for them to have a place to socialize. I need only tell you that after WWI the richest and most aristocratic family built it as their mansion modeled after the most popular Parisian trends of the time and imported every single brick and roof tile for it. It was like being at Beast's techno-party. It happens once a month and I will be attending every time.

Friday night i went out to a place called Pekados with two gringas and a gringo. Good times were had all the way into the 6th hour of the morning. Coupled with the extra patience for gringo spanish vodka tonics apparently fortify me with, the night was a great success thanks in no small part to getting my first digitos and having her friend give me and one of the aforementioned gringas a ride home.

tis all for now.

more to come,

grego