Martijn's Blog

Yippee! I passed my third exam (intermedio 1) today. Tomorrow I am off to Bariloche for a week of skiing :-)

Yes there was a little accident with the ski lifts there but hey what are the chances of that happening twice in one year?

Last week we (some people from the school) went to Tierra Santa on the recommendation of someone (forgot who). It's supposed to be some christian amusement park. Well we ammused ourselves but not in the way the makers had intended I guess. It was kind of ridiculous: basically it consisted of bible scenes displayed with lifesize dolls either moving or not. Well judge for youselves:


The resurrection was an hourly event


Notice that Judas is black ? Not completely politically correct if you ask me.

I have reserved the apartment I am in now until I leave Argentina, because I like it and it is close to the new school. The school used to be in Belgrano but has moved to Recoleta because it has grown fast over the last 2 months. Now I can walk there in 10 minutes instead of having to take the subway.

We just celebrated the día del amigo (day of the friend).



and I introduced some friends from the school the the famous "kaartjeblazen".

I have moved to a new apartment which is really quite nice. It's only 2 blocks away from Avenida Santa Fe and is on the 8th floor (the top) of the building. It has 2 rooms and a little balcony, and finally I can look onto the streets. (My previous apartment didn't look onto anything but blind walls).
I immediately used the apartment a lot because I was kind of sick the last few days. Just a bad cold which is clearing up again now. I'll put some pictures up later.

We went to Uruguay this weekend. Friday night we took the fast ferry to Colonia which is only an hour away and from there we had another 2 and a half hour bus ride to Montevideo. Because of the torrential rain it took the bus a bit longer and we arrived in the hotel around midnight. After that we still had to find somewhere to eat. With a big group (27) always fun to walk around a city, not. (a lot of 'schutteren' was involved). Luckily we found a place which had a club downstairs where a band was playing some typical Uruguayan music (whatever that may be). Anyway we stayed out until 6am which is easy in South America because nightlife doesn't start until 2am.

The next day we still got up early to see the city, which is much smaller and quieter than Buenos Aires. A nice break I thought.

For lunch we had a mixed barbeque containing steak, chicken, chorizo (sausage), morcilla (blood sausage), kidney, intestines and 'choto'. None of us really knew what choto was but as the brave European I tried it. It tasted like blood and was very chewy.



Well it turned out to be a Uruguayan speciality made out of sheep's penis: lovely!
When we returned to school the next Monday and explained (in Spanish) what we had done in Montevideo I tried to explain what I had eaten: "Comí choto"
The teachers immediately had a new name for me: pervertido.
Apparently 'choto' is not food in Argentina but has some other meaning....

Passed my second exam yesterday. Next week I will move on the the intermediate 1 level. Finally it should be getting a bit more challenging. We'll see.