Plumbing...

As always, it has been quite a while...

But an update or some record of this adventure that is now my life...as I vowed...will be important.

Since July, we have moved to a new apartment...had major kilombos (argie word for mess/disaster) with the apartment itself. No CO poisoning, but broken plumbing, no cable/internet for a month, getting cable/internet 1 day...and on that same day, Cooper chewing through the cable and cutting us away from our cable tv bliss!

The plumbing situation is as follows: in the bathroom there are two faucet thingers. one controls the water to the toilet and the other, the water to the sink and shower. In a normal situation, those faucets could always be on/open. But in our situation, the toilet one causes the sink to dribble water constantly. And the other faucet, when on makes the sink run full force and you cant control the sink by the little handles on the actual sink...they are un-turnable for God knows what reason.

So...if you are following this, in order to turn the shower on, the "sink/shower" faucet needs to be open, which means water runs full force automatically in the sink. Therefore, when you turn on the shower, you have to go quick, because the water will be running in the sink simultaneously...and we have what is called a termotanque which is kind of like a ghetto hot water heater...when it empties (after 1-2 showers) there is no more hot water.

You might ask, "Liz, if you had such a major plumbing problem when you moved in on the 1st of August, why didn't you call your landlord and ask her to send someone over to fix it ASAP"....OH well...one would think that is how this would be resolved, but no..no...we are in Argentina. Nothing is that simple. I could try to explain the process of having to go through the dumbass real estate agency for any problem with the apartment and not being able to contact the owner directly...ever....but that would be silly and you would likely not understand, because it makes no sense.

When we did get a plumber to come..he came once, and didn’t leave this stupid paper that says how much the work would cost (which the real estate agency needs to present to the owner, get it approved, and so on)...he disappeared after and we called him for weeks. Turns out his sister was kidnapped, raped and murdered and that’s why he wasn't working. It's actually just terribleeeee and awfulll...and like WTF?!?!?!?!

AND we still have broken plumbing.

One other plumber came, gave us a new paper (presupuesto) and then the owner didn't approve it. Shocking.

Today, yet another plumber came and he submitted this new presupuesto to the real estate agency. Now we wait. I am not going to hold my breath.

Anyways, enough about plumbing...aside from that, I am continuing to do rugby..practice 2x / week, games every other weekend or so. It's nice to keep playing, but I was sad to miss homecoming a few weeks back. It looked like so much fun and I miss all the girls so much.

Mati and I have our tickets booked for December! We are both uncontrollably excited about the trip...When people asking me what I am going to do in the USA, I start listing off foods that I plan to eat!!! gah. such a fatty, but I can't wait!

Things are getting pretty dicey here with Cristina's impending dictatorship, 40% inflation, and a whole slew of other problems...but it's still my beloved Argentina...I still love my medialunas, ferias on weekends, the language, the wine, the steak, mate, plazas, the music...there are still things here that are great, amongst all the crazyness!

I will write an update when the plumbing is fixed. Hopefully it will be before 2013!

It's been a while...

Gah, I knew this blogging thing wouldn't work out. I tried. But then life got in the way, and I just forgot to sit and write it all down.
There is absolutely no way I could summarize or express in any concise way my life over the past 5 months...So I am just going to pick random things to tell you all about. In no particular order.

I got a job in March...about 2 weeks after I got here. I am an "International Executive Headhunter"...or at least that's what I tell all the CEOs and bigshots i talk to everyday.
But really the job is great, I am never bored, it's intense...great people to work with...we are all expats pretty much.

About a month ago, Erin from study abroad came. She is staying with us, got a job at TXT too, and now we are all getting an apartment together to move out of Devoto. It's a much bigger place in Villa Crespo, and fingers crossed, we sign early next week. It's gonna be sweet.

Things in Devoto were fine, until I got a headache for an entire month, and then through my hypochondriac-ness, convinced myself we had a Gas and/or Carbon Monoxide leak...and THEN WE DID! like could have died. To make a really long and stressful story short, we ended up in the hospital twice to get pumped with oxygen and get our blood taken. In our building, they shut off our gas line...and then the next day, said the whole building was effed...and shut off everyone's gas.
We were really popular with our neighbors...but when they started to sass me...I was just like..HEY I MIGHT HAVE SAVED YOUR LIFE! k thanks.
SO yeah...we are now going on week three of no hot water, no way to cook...it's pretty bad.
This is what we do:
step one: we get smelly
step 2: we call one of our friends
step 3: we say..."hey,....wanna hang out tonight"
step 4:...we then say.. "oh, and by the way, can I shower at your house"

So yeah...kind of very inconvenient this whole not showering in our house thing...Everytime I get the opportunity to shower at someone else's house, i jump at it...because i don't know when I'll get my next shower. I am like a mal-nourished kid who eats every meal like it's his last...except I am a filthy 20-someting...who takes every shower like it's my last.

Also, because we are in Argentina..there is really nothing you can do when everything is completely effed in your apartment: still have to pay full rent and building fees. And our entire water heater needs to be replaced...and that probably won't get done before we move out.  THrough out this whole Carbon Monoxide Fiasco, I have had a couple "I HATE YOU ARGENTINA" moments...it happens to the best of us, Mati included.

But enough Argie bashing....obvi I love my home away from home. You all know that. Some things, that I had an aversion to before...I have now completely embraced as part of life, that maybe during study abroad I was a little bit meehhh about...here are some ejemplos:
-Milk in a bag. milk in a cardboard box...not practical, but still delish.
-Tang-like juice...here Clight is my fave, which is a small packet of mysterious fruit-like sweetners that you stir into water. After fernet, it is basically a national drink here...or at least in our home.
-Cat-calling...MAMI, QUE BUEN CULO QUE TENES...obviously, that does not warrant a response, but in my head, rather than be disgusted by these nasty men who feel it appropriate to yell things out about your personal appearance on the street and make overtly sexual gestures...I have learned to look at it as "why thank you, all that working out in rugby has toned up my buns"
-Eating dinner at 11pm at night. makes no sense, but that's what we do. As of late, Erin and I have been on a "go-to-bed early" kick because we find ourselves falling asleep at our desks by 3pm...that has allowed for a couple 930pm dinner times...and this past monday a..wait for it...7:45pm dinner time. Downright crazy talk here.
-INFLATION: i wouldn't say that I have embraced this...but it's just the norm...Yes, every item you look at is about 4x more expensive than it ought to be. Fortunately, pesos are like monopoly money, so you don't feel as bad spending them.  Only thing, that the amount you would spend on Park Place or Boardwalk doesn't get you the highest valued property on the board...it get's you an empanada...and maybe a Coca Cola...but that's pushing it.
-People bashing the Government (mainly la Presidenta...and anything that has to do with her...which is a lot of really shittty stuff).: it's a national sport here. It's completely warranted, but it's just crazy. People have no filter. And then there is that 1 Kristina-supporter who speaks up...some times at risk of his/her life. Then everyone shuts him/her down. It's pretty gnarly.
-Asados: also a national sport. Eat meat till you can't anymore. It's similar any college drinking game...how much can you drink / eat before lying down on the floor and crawling into the fetal position...due to an overly worked belly.
-In rugby, we kiss the each girl on the opposing team on the cheek after the game. For those that don't know...traditional and expected greeting here, especially for girls is 1 kiss on the cheek (sometimes between boys that don't know each other they aren't expected to "saludar")...So...after a rugby game, instead of slapping hands and saying good game, you give each girl a peck on the cheek and say good game. At first, I thought this was wierd as shit...not because I am anti-sportsmanship....but because I am sweaty and dead, and I don't want to rub my sweaty and narsty cheek up against some other girl's sweaty and narsty cheek. It was just all too intimate at first, BUT, like most things, I have learned to accept it, and it would now be weird without it.
**Warning...when I do make it to the Guwrfc alumni game....sorry I might try to kiss you on the cheek. Don't be alarmed.

The list could go on, but right now I should start to wrap things up. I am currently sitting in Colonia, Uruguay (had to make a Visa-run). I just ate a Chivito which was delish, and I plan to walk around a bit, and get back on the boat in about 2 hours. I got here at 1030 this morning, and my boat leaves at 4:30ish.

In all, the last few months have been great, and I really feel like I have settled into a life here...with Mati, with Cooper...now with Erin (who we like to call our hija..haha)...a Job, an apartment...real stuff. Good stuff.

But as always, with all the good...there is some bad...and that is that I am so far from all of those people that i love so much....fern, nor, kate, mary, lulu, joc, marta, anne, emi, kat, margaret, ellie...mom, dad, emma, nana, papa jim...the list goes on. It's hard to make a move like this and not feel sad about missing those people...but again..EMBRACING THE GOOD, but not taking away from I MISS AND LOVE YOU ALL SOO MUCH. AND WHEN YOU WANT TO VISIT..COME. Doors are always open.

Okay, so this was my attempt at getting back in the blog-o-sphere. I do want to be better about this, to keep you all updated (those that care...i think I have got a solid 2 followers) and to have some record of all THIS!!!

And I'm Back!

I've been on a blogging hiatus...because I felt that blogging about "Livin' South of the Equator" while living north of the equator may be a little misleading :)

But fortunately, I am back in South America...back in Buenos Aires!!!! FINALLY! To make a really long story short, stuff in Chile didn't work out, job-wise. My boss in Puerto Varas quit, so the Santiago office opted to close down the office in Puerto Varas...meaning I had no job. I returned to Chile on February 21st to Santiago and spent the day at my friend Julia's (a PiLA at Fundacion Chile) apartment (she's married to Kris). I really just relaxed and recovered from the long flight. In the evening Julia came back home. Laura (another PiLA living in the same apt building) Julia, and I went to a pancake dinner at their non-denominational, inter-faith church to celebrate Fat Tuesday. It was really nice, and the church is international so there are people from all over the world. After dinner I took a taxi to the terminal to take the bus down to Puerto Varas.

I got in Wednesday morning (Feb 22nd) and went to Jess and Mai Ann's house. I re-organized the stuff that Janine and Mai Ann had moved to the house and fit it into my suitcases. I met up with Barbara, who was shutting down the office, moving all the things out etc. Mujeres Empresarias is keeping her on to work from home for the time being. I had lunch with Jess at Cafe Mawen (where we went my very first day in Puerto Varas) and did more rearranging back at Mai Ann and Jess's. That night, with Jess and Jason (Mai Ann and Jess's house mate) we made stir-fry. It was yummy! The next day I walked around town, red along the water...and it was surprisingly nice weather...like in the 70s and sunny. Barbs bought me lunch, which was very sweet, and then I picked up some things for the Asado...that we were having that night...it was sort of a goodbye thing for me. A bunch of people came..a lot of the rugby boys, etc. and it was really just lovely. I crashed at like 4am, only to wake up at 6am to go to the bus terminal.

My bus left Puerto Montt at 8:15 (i magically managed to get all my bags on the bus) and I was exhausted. I dozed basically until we crossed the border into Argentina. It was wild crossing over because there was all this volcanic ash up in the mountains. Everything had like a coating of this dull grey powder. Kind of depressing. We made it to Bariloche by 4pm and had a 1 hour break...then the long leg of the journey began....the bus was kind of narstyyy and I was in a window seat that had water leaking out of it all over me. Lovely. NOT.

At like midnight or so, they woke us up to switch buses (I think we were in Neuquén). In the morning we made it to Bahía Blanca and had a little break in the terminal there. We finally made it to Buenos Aires at like 7:30pm on Saturday...35 hours on the bus. I can honestly say I don't want to be on a bus again. ever.

Mati picked me up and we went to two birthday parties...first Mati's old coworker Gaby...who's married to Yanil. When I was here in August/September, I got to know her. Very nice family. After that we drove to La Plata to celebrate Catalina's Bday (Mati's niece) We stayed in La Plata until Sunday evening and then headed back to Capital. I had my interview with TXT International (the headhunting firm) on Monday. It went really well and they asked me back that Thursday to meet with one of the directors...who offered me a job. That was last week. This week I am meeting with the other director to figure out the details of my start date, etc. I also had interviews with a consulting firm all last week. But I am for sure going with TXT :)

I met up with Clara last Friday to have dinner...at La Cholita!!! She's a friend from Georgetown who moved to Argentina in December. It was really great to see her and it's great that she's here in Buenos Aires!

Saturday, Mati and I went to La Plata to hang with the family, and then we came back to Capital because we had to get up early in the morning to go to the wedding of one of Mati's teammates. The church ceremony was a noonish out in provincia, and then the wedding was in like an outdoor garden that was gorgeous. It was hot as ballllss so we were all sweating a bunch. We left around 10pm...so it was like a 9 hour wedding...but totally awesome. Highlights include: one of the clementes doing an improv skit which ended in him taking off his pants...and pretending to be a rabbit...OH, and how I somehow got tricked into a 6 couple dance off....Mati and I magically weren't the 1st eliminated. 2 other couples got eliminated before us! Not because we are particularly skilled, but because we hid ourselves strategically where we'd less likely be seen. When a Tango song came on...we were both screwed. Yes, I studied tango for 1 semester...but that was 2 years ago. I forgot everything. And what I did remember, was the male part, so I started dragging Mati around the dance floor (he had no idea what to do)...Yeah..that got us eliminated.

Anywho...Today I am going back to rugby at DAOM! I am pumped to get back to playing!

More updates to come....