Almost at the tail-end of my 2nd week in South America, Cordoba Argentina

Ok so here I am at the end of a full on 2 weeks in Cordoba, Argentina. Theres been much to report each day but being deep in the throws of the life of a 3 hours a day student and professional holiday maker prevents me from having enough available hours to keep you fully updated! Life is tough for me right!!! I want to capture in writing for myself all these amazing experiences as I know that before long they will be taken for granted by moi and thats not cool for a girl out soaking up the South American culture. So feel free to scroll down to the bottom for a gig at the pictures i´ve added, no one is being tested on the content of my entries!!

So I live in a house with an Argentinian women who is completely mad (Mimi), possibly madder than the other females i´ve lived with (which is very difficult to live up to!!!), shes mad in a whole different way though if you know what I mean..... then theres the Brazillian dude who had a minor obsession with me, along with alcohol, smokes and magazines. My body and limited language make up for what I lack in conversation. Anway the obsession seems to have died off as now he ignores me....hopefully thats a good thing and he isn´t plotting something with his fags and mags!!. Theres a young Brazillian couple I also live with, they´re lovely and go to my school aswell. They´re all on a mission to get me on the road to speaking spanish pronto! On a couple of occasions at the dinner table i´ve been made to write a word 20 times to make sure I don´t forget it!!!!

I catch a trolley bus into the city each day which takes around 15 minutes, around 30 minutes door to door. They have this really sophisticated (not) system where you can only travel on the bus with special tokens, not money. You gotta buy tokens from kiosks throughout the city, the tokens are individually wrapped in plastic so when fighting with the masses you gotta hunt down a token, undress it from its plastic and hand it to the driver in exchange for a ticket, by which stage everyone in the queue is saying things i´m not yet familiar with...practise will improve this transaction i´m sure...and I sure as hell hope!!!

Arrived on Saturday night and started Spanish school the following Monday, i´d basically organised this entire leg of my trip through the school so they had organised my accommodation, dance lessons, schooling etc needless to say I was pretty stoked to find that they also really did exist...and seemed to be pretty swave in their processes too (something which rates highly with me!). So anyway i´m getting private tuition with 2 different teachers. What a shock and surprise to find that during class time I would be taught and spoken to in strictly spanish! Good grief. So basically I do 2 classes each of 1.5 hrs everyday. I feel like a 5 year old learning all over again, its tough. Am also finding it difficult to master the siesta as I can´t get the sound of my teachers voices out of my head! Its very tough. There are folk from all over the world also studying at the school, some Swiss, Sweedish, 2 Aussies dude, a swazhili chap, Germans, an iranian, a dutch lass oh this really cool kiwi girl too.......you may even know her! Everyones here to rock on so are up for going out all the time, last night for example (Thurs nite-how radical of me I know!!!) I left the house at 12.30am, hunted down a taxi went to this jazz gig and got home at 3.30am, and by the locals standards that was an early night...bearing in mind we all have school in the morning. I really gotta get this siesta thing under control.

I´m also taking private dance lessons, my teacher Carlos assures me that my rythym is good and I have a good comprehension of the steps but I dance like a cardboard cutout! I´m slowy coming to terms with the blow.... My homework last night was to practise rolling my shoulders, that was definately done in the privado of my own room! To say he was unimpressed with my sneakers I wore to my first two classes would be an understatement too, so today I cut into the budget and invested in a pair of practical yet classy little heels, woohoo Bronwyn!!!

I got sick last week so took an interesting trip to the doctors..... apparently its common for new comers as the change in climate plays havoc with the immune system. It was 37degs on Thursday then rained heavily on Friday and the streets were flooded! Today its 38degs and I may pass out!! At night I sleep with a fan on and a bottle of water at the ready to sort the dry throat situation out, thats like boiled water come the morning. Its not unlike some of the days i´ve had in Queensland, the only difference probably being that in Queensland I had a stock pile of cooler clothing...something i´ve also since rectified.

I went all out last week and joined a local gym! The daily 1L beer consumptions and healthy servings are doing nothing for my psychic! After doing some thorough research and conducting a full-blown survey of pros and cons (on and scoring a free intro session at each) I committed myself. Cost me $45 pesos ($20nz) for 1 month! I can do all the classes and use all the equipment, I won´t say my attendance has been sterling but its been ok.

Have been out of town on few trips into the countryside which is beautiful and are now all psyched up to plan this weekends getaway, Cordoba is beautiful, there are lush mountains, hills and gorgeous lakes everywhere. Its a great place to have come to, I chose wisely without realising it. The people are soooooo incredibly kind and patient it constantly blows me away. They seem to love tourists here too and on numerous occassions randoms have gone out of their ways to help me, like the free taxi I got yesterday cause the previous taxi driver had dropped me in the wrong place. Serioulsy though, the kindness astounds me! Oh and the girls are completely stunning too, they´re everywhere!

Tonight i´m out on the town with ´Team Spanish Students´, theres some dance party on which has Karaoke, god help Cordoba if I get up to belt out a number! Oh yeah, i´m learning some spanish songs too, can´t wait till I can sing one of them loud and proud. But for now folks I must wish you all a very Merry Christmas Feliz Navidad! and Happy New Year, today is my birthday and therefore I must go and contemplate the last year over a nice cold Cerveza!!! Take care and all that.

xxx bron

You got it, the sunset shot from the hills of Cordoba

My Primary teacher ´Silvinia´ writing more gumf I may one day understand.....i´m pleased to say today that I now have the ability to communicate! Its basic but hey its something.

Lush Cordoba

The FREEZING watering hole at the bottom of the waterfall which didn´t exist as theres not been much rain. Of 6 of us (4 males and 2 females) I was the only one brave enough to jump in! Yes they make em tuff in NZ!

The trolley bus I catch each day

Plaza San Martin in the Centre of Cordoba

Some light bed time reading material....a childrens dictionary

Night out with Thiago and Marianna (brazillians I live with) and Mimi (the mad woman I live with)

My Street.

View of my accomodation in Cordoba from outside.

My bed and room.

You may not find this as amusing as I do but its a rubbish bin! These things are sticking out of the pavement in all neighbourhoods, kinda different to our Wheely Bins right.

Pic from day trip I took to Lago San Roche by bus. Great to escape the frantic pace of the city and homework! The bus dropped me in some random spot which was miles away from anywhere of interest so I rocked up to a local and attempted to ask if I could walk the narrow road to the beach, to which he insisted I get on the back of his motorbike and he chaffered me! Nice one.

They start young on the soccer here.

Graffiti ala Cordoba!

Cappuchinos Church in Central Cordoba fronted by the old Womans Prison.

Yep, i´ve made a tight connection with the Argentinian ´Helado´ (icecream) chain

Fireworks galore on the go all the time. This night they went off after we´d watched a free live concert in one of the cities big parks. Some famous Argentinian women who was too big to get out of her chair, thats all I remember.

Remember the girl from the taxi who was so nice to me to when I arrived, well this is her and her mates. They invited me out to dinner and cocktails, collected and dropped me off to my home and insisted on paying for everything!!! These guys are so welcoming!

Pic taken today of everyone having a christmas drink and someone leaked that it was my birthday so they all sang Happy Birthday but in Spanish, shame it didn´t entitle me to another glass of champas!!!

More free street entertainment, these guys were amazing! And sung one of my all time favorite songs too (4Non Blondes, Whats Going On)