Sarah Silverman's plan to end world hunger.

Take note, Amnesty International. This is how you do it.



Silverman has made a very interesting and valid point here...without having to make a poop joke. Kudos.

When the Gallery Owner is the Artist...

Another weekly digital journalism project is in the can!

Check it out here. I don't know if it's going to make The Ithacan yet, but I like it. And it was really fun to make.

I basically want to be Daphne Solá when I grow up. She's really a strong woman with a point of view and and the strength to follow her passions. I hope that as I grow older, I'll be able to retain that kind of power and passion within myself.

One part of my interview with her that I didn't include was about how she came to learn how to make paper at a conference in Japan. In the span of a day, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., she made the decision to go to Japan for a month and booked her flight. Needless to say, it was kind of surprise to her husband when he got home from work.

Adios, Mercedes Sosa

Just noticed in the New York Times that Mercedes Sosa, one of the most famous folk singers of Argentina, passed away this morning.

Sosa's face was everywhere when I was living in Buenos Aires. She released a new album not too long ago, and it was recently nominated for a few Latin Grammy Awards. Even though she was 74 she would record songs with some of the most popular musicians of 2009, including Shakira, Fito Paez and Calle 13. The only artist I can really think to compare her to, that a lot of people would recognize, is Joan Baez.

We read her lyrics and dissected them in my classes to better learn about the Dirty War and human rights in Latin America. They've always moved me. Sosa was a true icon for a generation, and one of the greatest examples of the ability to merge human rights and art.

Here's a live performance of Sosa singing the politically-charged song "La Canción es Urgente," or "The Song is Urgent."

Happy Jew Year!

Sorry for the delay. Life just seems to take over sometimes.

The past two weeks saw the coming and going of two major holidays, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This was the first time since high school I've been home for the new year, and it was AMAZING. Even though I was only home for one day, it was fantastic just to relax and spend time with my family. And eat the five pounds of mashed potatoes my mom made.

As I learn more Spanish, I think more about the context and meanings of the vocabulary I study. For instance, the word "esperar" has two meanings: to hope, and to wait.

And during the high holy days this year, the relationship between those two words kept coming back to me, and how amazing it is that in Spanish they are one. As the new year comes we are waiting and hoping for a better year than the last. We are waiting and hoping for this year to be the one we are in Jerusalem. We are waiting and hoping for the Messiah to arrive and usher in a new era. Esperar.

To combine the two words, to wait and to hope, somehow makes the word "wait" all the more fragile. When you're hoping for something, that doesn't necessarily mean that it is going to come. But when you're waiting, you're pretty positive that it's on its way. So in a way, esperar also makes "hope" stronger, in that it's paired with something so concrete.

Does this make any sense? I'm running on about five hours of sleep here.

So ANYWAY...my first weekly project for digital journalism is on the Ithacan's Web site!

I know, I left the Ithacan my freshman year with guns (and middle fingers) blazing, but since I need to submit stuff to the paper for class, I figured I'd just go with it. Hey, at least I'm getting some clips on the Web.

And my partner and I get to choose our own weeklies. Our first one was about the Iron Chef competition at AppleFest. Even though it took about eight torturous hours to cut together, attending the event itself was a lot of fun. You can check out our soundslide of the event here.

Apples to Apples

If heaven exists, it would be an apple orchard.

Across the street from a peanut butter factory.

And I, armed with a knife and a spoon, would have unlimited access to both.

Yesterday I went with Hillel to Littletree Orchards in Newfield, NY for some pre-Rosh Hashanah apple picking. And being that apples are one of my favorite foods, I was like a kid with a golden ticket in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: very hungry and a little crazy.

Then again, I'm always hungry and crazy so I guess this wasn't out of the norm for me.


The plan was for everyone to work together to pick three bushels of apples: one for use to share, one to share with students on Rosh Hashanah, and one to donate to Loaves and Fishes, which is a local soup kitchen.

Unfortunately, not too many of the apples seemed ready for picking yet. It was safe to taste the apples right off the trees, and I didn't encounter any that were particularly delicious. We managed to get three bushels, but it was tough work and I can't say how many of those apples are actually going to taste good.


Although the pears were very tasty.

Oh well, Applefest is in two weeks.

A weekend-long festival dedicated to my favorite food. I am the luckiest kid on earth.

Roll Into My Heart, Baby

So at the beginning of the school year (only three weeks ago?!), my friends and I sat down and made a bucket list. Even though it was only August, we could feel graduation breathing down our necks and decided to make a list of everything on and off-campus that we had yet to experience. Even though we've been in Ithaca for almost four years now, there was really SO much in the area that we never did.

I blame homework and alcohol.

But ANYWAY, tonight my friends Katie, Brian and I were able to scratch one of the most important things on our bucket list: go to a roller derby match.

A very brief explanation of roller derby: two teams of women skate in a tight group around a circle, and try to keep certain players, called jammers, from breaking through the circle. Whenever the lead jammer passes through the pack, they get points for every person they pass.

Knocking people down and/or throwing them out of the ring is ok.

The teams: the Ithaca Sufferjets versus Buffalo's Devil Dollies.

The final score: 131-130, Sufferjets. The final point was earned in like, seriously, the last 20 or so seconds.

The experience: I want to find my old skates and run over bitches. It was amazing. I don't typically get pumped up for sporting events...ever...but this roller derby match had me out of my seat and screaming. I would have been cursing too, but Summer Bludgeon's mom and baby girl were sitting right behind me. I'm a respectful spectator when I want to be.

Then again, Summer Bludgeon was seriously skating the shit out of the Devil Dollies and got thrown into the penalty box at least four times. While her family kept cheering. Maybe they wouldn't have minded if I started screaming for their daughter/mother to kick people in the face with her roller skates.

After witnessing a match, I really think that roller derby is a good role model for little girls. Goodness knows, there were certainly a TON of them at the rink to watch. The roller girls show that you don't need to be a certain size or shape to play sports, and that because you're a girl you don't have to be dainty. It also really showed teamwork, with skaters in the pack working together to get their jammer through the group and in the lead.

Anyone with the balls (figuratively speaking) to run people over in roller skates can play. This is a sport where girls can get dirty, act and dress a little crazy and have a ton of fun.

Get me some skates and fishnet stockings and sign me up.

Here's some photos from the match, brought to you by Katie Venetsky. The quality isn't super great, but that could have something to do with the fact that everyone was skating in circles.


skating in a giant circle and out for blood.

Ithaca has the lead jammer!

The Ithaca Sufferjets just before the national anthem.

Gorge Hike

Every year since I started at Ithaca, I've been going on Hillel's hike down Buttermilk Falls on Labor Day. I love this event, it's always a chance to meet new people and go swimming without lifeguard supervision :)

It's a shame it's my last hike with Hillel. This year we had over 40 people attend, the most that I've ever seen. It was amazing to see so many Jews from campus concentrated in one place! And not on Yom Kippur, when suddenly everyone gets a case of the guilts for not attending services!

Anyway, on a less depressing note here's some photos!


Standing in a circle for the customary pre-hike getting to know you questionnaire. This year's special question: If you had a pet platypus, what would you name it? I said Napoleon, although there was a proliferation of Shlomos, Chaims, and Moses this year.



Katie in nature.







Josh took one for the team and went into the COLD water first.






Me and Katie. We want to make a photo collage of all the pictures we have together from our gorge hikes.


I love my macro lens!


This coming weekend should be a good one. Having Shabbat dinner at Boss House with Katie, Brian, Britt, and a bunch of other people, then Farmer's Market and a Sufferjets roller derby game on Sept. 12. Digital journalism workshop assignments start on Monday, so I'm enjoying life as much as I can until then.

It's like you want me to fail my other classes

Sorry for the posting gaps...I found other ways to shirk my responsibilities for a little while.

Like moving back to school!

I didn't realize just how much I missed Ithaca until I got back. Yeah, I've mentioned a lot that I missed it. But just pulling onto campus with my parents...it was crazy. I missed the trees, the wonky weather, the people, the DECENT CLASSES. IES' classes were a nightmare; it's great to finally be learning again!

There hasn't been too much homework yet, so I've been trying to enjoy myself as much as I can before I have to glue my ass to my desk chair. Going for long walks and bike rides, visiting the farmer's market, smoking hookah with friends and wondering how I managed to go almost eight months without seeing them every day.

Of course, these luxuries aren't going to last too much longer. I'm taking a digital journalism workshop, where I'm going to have two multimedia projects due every week for the rest of the semester. The teachers have essentially said that if we don't get so frustrated that we imagine ourselves bludgeoning people with our laptops and tripods...we're not working hard enough.

I feel like the counseling center and I are going to be great friends.

But they also encouraged us to use other forms of media to build up our skills and our resumes. Hence, I have an excuse to continue posting. Now I can put of my homework and be productive at the same time! Imagine that.

Today is "Labor Day" (I learned about the real Labor Day in Argentina, this one is bullcrap), so no classes. This afternoon I'm going out with Hillel to Buttermilk Falls to hike and swim. This is going to be the fourth time I've done this with Hillel, and probably the last.

Being a senior feels like I'm counting down to my death. It's my last time for a lot of things, and then suddenly I'm going to be thrown into some great big unknown.

New Travels

Summer's not over quite yet, but my vacation almost is. Last week I quit my job and have been using the extra time to pack up the bags I feel like I've just unpacked from Buenos Aires.

Saturday is Ithaca, until mid-October.

Home is kind of becoming something of a posting station between my travels.

Over the weekend I decided to check some cookbooks out of the local library, to you know, practice not killing people. I grabbed a copy of Moosewood Restaurant Celebrates, a collection of recipes from the Moosewood Collective dedicated to all kinds of holidays and celebrations.

The book has a lot of references to Ithaca, from local celebrations to tofu kan to the Tibetan population and its influences. And it hit me, it finally hit me, that I haven't been in Ithaca since December.

This is going to be a school year dedicated to really getting to experience the Ithaca outside my campus. More hippie organizations, gorges, festivals, art shows, contra dances, EVERYTHING I can possibly get my hands on.

Oh, and getting a job.

Other super-important question: what should I do with this blog? One thing hasn't changed since Argentina: I'm still an attention whore. If I kept blogging about random happenings, would you guys still read it?

People who say "they are blogging for themselves" are stupid attention whores that like to make pretend that they are ignorant of the fact that they are attention whores. I am not one of those whores.

Example: I had a really bad experience a few semesters ago where my professor told the class we had to blog about every single assigned reading, which I did. Apparently about three months into the class, I was the only one that still did and no one told me. Even the professor gave up reading the damn things.

I had a bit of a blog meltdown after that one. Not pretty, kind of scary.

Go me.

So what do you guys, if anyone still reads this since I haven't updated in almost a month, think I should do with this thing?

Home.

Jeez Louise, I've been home almost a month.

Sorry not to post sooner. Returning to a state of normality has been a pretty taxing experience, both physically and mentally.

Like the simple act of coming home. Fun story: while I felt fine during my last day in Buenos Aires, during the flight home I came down with a cough.

By the time I arrived in Philadelphia the next morning I had not only a nasty cough, but a snotty nose, clogged head, weakness and the shivers.

Basically every symptom of swine flu but a fever. I'm still amazed I wasn't tackled and tazered by security when I left the airport.

It was bad. I ended up missing my first day of work at the JCC, and it took me quite a while to recover from my faux swine flu (which I also passed on to my dad. He wasn't so happy that I came home after that).

And during one of my first healthy days, I started to get itchy. Contact with...something gave me a tasty case of contact dermatitis (probably spelled wrong, sorry!). This fun little illness looked like prickly heat, and made my arms and legs itch like crazy. The doctors still don't know what caused it.

My parents decided that I just have bad case of Argentine-itis and that I'm having an allergic reaction to America.

And I think they're a little right.

Little culture shocks just keep coming and coming. Like today I went to Panera with some co-workers and I ordered a small coffee. A small coffee in the States is the equivalent of like...a large at a Havanna in Buenos Aires. The large may acutally be a smidge smaller.

Just looking at that huge cup in my hand really made me want a little one there instead. Also Panera's coffee kind of sucked.

I miss you, Cafe Arenales!

Don't get me wrong, I do like being home. I'm get to see my friends and family every day, and am able to enjoy the little things I used to take for granted in the States. HBO! Peanut butter in every market! Cantaloupe in every fruit salad! SALAD! A shower I don't have to squeegie!!!!

Actually I really liked my squeegie-able shower. So scratch that one.

But I miss Buenos Aires'...everything. The city really changed me. For one thing, I definitely feel more independent. I don't need to rely on friends to make plans and enjoy myself...or speak the local language very well to accomplish things.

I've also learned that it's ok to be a little late, to screw the schedule and take things as they come (Argentina's so unpredictable that there's really no other way to take things), and to simply take everything a little slower. Especially meals :). So far as I know, you only live once so you better fucking enjoy it.

Minus the "so you better fucking enjoy it," it sounds like a Hallmark card. But it's true!

I'm sure lots of other pretentious college students say this, but I've never really felt completely at ease in the States. Possibly because I spend most of my time in Jersey...and it's Jersey, but I've always had the travel bug and I don't know why. And now more than ever I feel like a round peg trying to shove itself into a square hole. I'm the peg, America is the hole. I'll eventually be jammed in somehow, but I'll never truly fit.

But I'm ok with this. Because it means that even though I'm back in the States, I still have a little bit of Buenos Aires living on in my heart.

Sappiest. Post. Ever.

The "Oh Jesus I Can't Believe I'm Going Home in Three Days" Mega Playlist

So I finally recharged my ipod, and have been listening to it as I walk to school and my internship. But for the past few days, I've unconsciously been going back to the same few songs, listening to them again and again. Seem like with only three days to go, my mind has created a "good bye get traveling" playlist. So for your viewing pleasure, here's what has been on repeat on my ipod and computer:

1. Homeward Bound-Simon & Garfunkel ("Sittin' in the railway station, got a ticket for my destination...)
2. Across the Ocean-Azure Ray ("Now I'm traveling across the ocean, with the same shoes just longer hair...")
3.It Won't be Long-The Beatles (although I've been listening to the "Across the Universe" version)
4.California-Joni Mitchell ("I'm gonna see the folks I dig, even kiss a sunset pig, oh California I'm coming home...")
5.Just Don't Think I'll Ever Get Over You-Colin Hay
6.The Only Living Boy in New York ("Tom, get your plane ride on time...")
7.June on the West Coast-Bright Eyes
8.Chipi Chipi-Motorcycle Diaries Soundtrack (I've been here four months and just this week I could finally understand all the lyrics)
9.Al Otro Lado del Rio-Jorge Drexler
10.Trying to Pull Myself Away-Once Soundtrack
11.Get Back-Bright Eyes and Neva Dinova
12.The Maker Makes-Rufus Wainwright (from the Brokeback Mountain soundtrack)
13.The Song of Purple Summer-Spring Awakening (closing song from the show)
14.Perfect Day-Lou Reed

MOST DEPRESSING PLAYLIST EVER.

Weird Buenos Aires

As my time in Buenos Aires is drawing to a close (Saturday makes one week WTF), I've begun to explore all the little nooks and crannies in the city that I walk by almost every day but have never really noticed.

And they're strange nooks and crannies.

For instance, take in this beauty.


This is Floralis Generica, a GIANT metal sculpture with its own park in the Recoleta barrio. It runs on solar energy and is capable of opening and closing like a real flower. When the sun rises, the petals open. When the sun sets, the petals close up again.

Or that was the initial concept.

Unfortunately, it's constantly breaking. It's really fun to walk by just as the sun goes down and watch the tourists holding up their cameras, waiting for Floralis Generica to close and then realizing that it's not going to happen. It's like watching a bunch of kids realize that Santa Claus isn't real.

Exhibit B: Siga la Vaca.

Haha, that's the door handle of this amazing parrilla (steakhouse). A forty-five peso lunch at this Puerto Madero eatery gets you all the salad and meat you can eat (seriously. All the meat you can eat), a drink and a dessert.

But notice Siga la Vaca's logo.



That little cow's face is all over the restaurant. And the whole time I was eating, I just kept thinking of this:



Mooby the Golden Calf watched me commit the sin of gluttony. I'm waiting for Matt Damon to slay me.

And finally, the coup de grace of weird Buenos Aires (at least to me): the hair salon across the street from my school.



Notice the portrait on the left of the sign.

Yes, that is Sawyer from Lost.

No, I don't get it either.

It`s the Final Countdown

Ten days and counting, folks. ¡Diez días!

It`s really weird for me to think that next Sunday, NEXT Sunday I`ll be getting off the plane in Philadelphia and my parents will be there waiting for me. If they remember that I`m arriving on Sunday, and not Saturday, that is. But I have faith they`ll figure it out. I come from smart stock.

Every time I walk home from school, or go to my favorite cafe down the block from my apartment (that`s Cafe Arenales on the corner of Larrea and Arenales, for any folks visiting Buenos Aires in the near future), I just think "well that`s one less time that I`m going to do that again." And here`s the thing. I may hate school, but I love the walk more than anything. Unlike Ithaca, I do not need to manuver through freezing rain and snow.

And I love being able to go to Cafe Arenales, where they know me, and I can sit for hours with my tea and my computer and just relax. I`m ready to go home, but I`m not ready to give up a lot of the things Buenos Aires has offered to me.

Especially cafes. The only real cafe near me in NJ (and by "real" I mean not Starbucks) is CoffeeWorks in Voorhees. A lot of the relaxing experience is taken away when you have to drive 20 minutes to get there, and you never know if there is going to be live music. Don`t get me wrong, the live music at CoffeeWorks totally makes the scene for me. But there are days that I just want to go to a cafe with a book or paperwork, and live music days kind of kill that.

Does anyone know if any new cafe has opened up in the area? Not a Starshmucks?

I`m definitely going to be in for some culture shock. And as much as I mentally prepare myself for it, for the lack of cafes and the need for a car and the dinners at 5pm instead of 9pm, there`s really nothing I can do.

Oh, and the English. The fact that I can speak English all the time. Although that could be a very very pleasant type of culture shock, that I can sound like an articulate human being again.

Let's Go to the Movies

This is something I've wanted to post about for quite some time: movie titles. You know, some movie titles just don't translate well into Spanish. So the film companies play around with them for a bit. For instance, I was watching TV the other day and A Very Brady Sequel came on. But it wasn't A Very Brady Sequel, it was "El Impostor."

For those who don't speak Spanish, El Impostor means...The Impostor. Yeah. Thanks to the perils of translating, the Brady family's little movie was turned into a spy thriller.

Here are some others that I find curious and entertaining. There are definitely more and better ones out there, these just happen to have been on the top of my head. If I see or think of more, I'll be sure to post them later!

Revolutionary Road has become:

Only in Dreams

Confessions of a Shopaholic is:
Crazy for the Shopping

Happy Go Lucky has become:

The Happiness Brings Luck

Adventureland (which I just happened to have seen this past Saturday)

Adventureland, a Memorable Summer

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince:
Harry Potter and the Mystery of the Prince

Jersey Girl:

Single Father

Not as good as Engrish, I'm sure, but still entertaining. Or maybe I only find them entertaining because I enjoy translating them? You tell me.

Oh by the way...less than 13 days until I'm back in the States!

¡Cordoba! ¡And Argentine Hopsitals!

It finally happened.

Every semester...every semester since I was a freshman at Ithaca College I manage to become sick or injured once. Just once, but it makes up for the rest of my healthy time by being the worst illness or injury ever.

Some highlights:
Freshman: pulling my back out and a stomach virus that kept me from eating chocolate, dairy, caffeine or anything else that made me happy for two weeks.

Sophomore: pink eye and the flu. At the same time.

Last semester it was bronchitis.

And now...drum roll...

A cold and a urinary tract infection! WOOOO!

Yesterday morning I ended up giving into the cranky germiness and went to the local hospital...which I have to say was really well organized and efficient. It´s all about taking a number (from one of those red machines you see at the deli counter at an American supermarket), and the lines move pretty fast. It could very well have been the time of day I arrived, but I was in and out in about two hours. Quite an improvement over the five-hour wait-a-palooza I had in Ithaca when I pulled my back out.

One thing that concerns me is that the doctor prescribed me antibiotics without actually inspecting my body. I came in and was like, "well I think I have a UTI." And he went "okey dokey, here are some drugs. Give a urine sample and we´ll see in five days whether or not I gave you the right meds."

I´ve watched House. I KNOW that when doctors do that, the patient is misdiagnosed, then gets worse then the doctor says something snarky and then saves the day, when the patient is already on their death bed.

Anyway. I think I´m getting better, but I have to hang around Buenos Aires for the next couple of days to pick up the results from my test. Which basically ends all future travel plans, since this is the last four day weekend I´ll have before I go back to the States.

I´m sad, but at the same time ok with this. Now I have time to explore the rest of Buenos Aires that I haven´t had time for previously.

But last weekend...what a way to send off Argentine traveling. I went to Cordoba last Thursday to visit my friend Claudia. We were roommates together last year at the Charles Schusterman Leaders Assembly in Israel and kept in touch. So when she found out I was in Argentina, she invited me to spend a weekend with her family.

And it was amazing. It was wonderful to be able to sit down with a family for Shabbat dinner, and everyone was so nice.

Claudia, Guillermo (another friend from Israel), and Claudia´s boyfriend Mati and I had a great time. They showed me around the city, which was BEAUTIFUL, and I got to see how the Jewish community thrives there. There are only about 7,000 Jews in Cordoba and Clau seems to know them all. Since it´s a pretty small community, everyone sticks together. All the kids go to the same Jewish day school, go to the same three synagogues, and frequent the same Jewish community center.

It all REALLY made me miss IC Hillel. I can´t wait to go back to Ithaca and get the semester started.

I could have stayed in Cordoba forever. It was wonderful.

I was a loser and took no pictures.

Uruguay...Argentina's Canada

Sorry this post was such a long time coming! I ended up going to Uruguay not once, but twice, and decided to just stick both weekend adventures together for your reading pleasure.

Oh, and I'm lazy. I'd rather watch reruns of "Miami Ink" and season two of "So You Think You Can Dance" than tell fuel my ego with this blog sometimes...sorry.

So anyway. You must be wondering, "Bri, why are you nicknaming Uruguay after a big North American nation that has a ridiculously similar culture to the United States?"

I imagine you saying this as you're sitting in a little kindergarten chair behind a little kindergarten desk, with your hand eagerly raised. I also imagine offended Canadians.

Well, it's because Uruguay is very similar to Canada in the respect that while Canada has many cultural aspects in common with the United States (or is it the other way around???), Uruguay has much in common with Argentina. Accent, food, ethnic makeup, etc. And like traveling to Canada from the United States, it's really easy to travel to Uruguay from Argentina. Many Argentines escape to Uruguay for weekend vacations during Saint's Week and the summer, since Uruguay has some really fabulous beaches. There are some places in Uruguay that even make excellent day trips.

So let's so you my not one, but two vacations to Uruguay.

The first one was to Montevideo, the capital of the nation. According to Anthony Bourdain, exemplary scholar in food and badassery, Montevideo looks so much like Havana that many films including scenes in Cuba actually shoot in the Uruguayan capital. Like "Miami Vice."

I have to agree, even though I have never been to Havana. There was lots of colonial architecture and palm trees, and it was pretty sweet.


The oldy-timey entrance to the city.

Unfortunately, I don't have too many pictures of the city. Why, you ask? Because Amanda, Jeremy and I made it a goal to eat tons of Uruguayan cuisine.

Example one: the chivito. It is a sandwich which typically includes:
1.beef
2.hard boiled egg
3.ham
4.bacon
5.cheese
6.mayo
7.lettuce
8.tomato

This, ironically enough, was a "Chivito Canadense,"or a Canadian chivito.

My heart couldn't handle this. I got boiled chicken for lunch.

Another food highlight: Puerto Mercado. Amanda and I were inspired to eat there by this "No Reservations" clip. The scene from the Puerto Mercado is near the end. Vegetarians and vegans, avert your eyes!


Anyway, that heavenly meat extravaganza couldn't be left ignored. So me, Jeremy and Amanda wandered the old city and sat down in the "Land of a Thousand Parillas" and snarfed down this:


Sweetbread, lamb and cow tripe, chorizo, ribs, chicken, blood sausage, red peppers, lots of little unidentifiable things...yeah we definitely contributed to the decrease of the farm animal population in Uruguay that day. That tasty, tasty day.

I'm going to be a vegetarian for a while when I get home. I'm seriously going to need to detox all the meat I've been eating out of my system.

The weekend after Montevideo, I went back to Uruguay for a day trip with my friend Lizzie and her housemate Charlie. We took a ferry to Colonia, a little coastal that's so small, they don't have stop signs and you can ride golf carts through the streets.

Which is what we did. We rented a golf cart for twelve American dollars and drove 5km to an old bullfighting ring in the middle of nowhere. Problem was, it was pouring rain and we didn't think to rent a golf cart with windows. I wish I had windshield wipers on my glasses like Harry Potter...

I did not look cute on the golf cart, I was a soaking freezing mess. Hence, those pictures will not appear here. So here's one of me in front of a random person's house in Colonia...shortly before I fell in the mud.


Colonia is really super cute, it's lots of riverfront property with promenades and colorful houses. Even though it was wet and cold and I only had a sweatshirt, I really enjoyed myself.

On a final, non-Uruguayan note: can you believe it's June already? I'll be back in the States in 23 days!

"Spring" Break pt...whatever let's just finish this

Don't know if the creative title tells you anything about my state of mind, but yeah. I think I've blogged enough about my break, don't you? All that's really left to talk about is how I didn't pack enough socks and I kept having a weird dream that I was married to Chandler Bing.

Oh, and Bariloche. That place was pretty important.

Bariloche is in the northern part of Argentine Patagonia, AKA Switzerland for people too cheap like me to go to Europe. It's lots of mountains and lakes, and is very very beautiful. My friends and I were very fortunate because we picked a hostel on top of a hill. It was a bit of a slog to get up all the steps, but to be able to see something like this every morning, it was well worth it.


On our first full day me, Sarah J, Lizzie, Jenny and I took a chair lift up a mountain. It was cold, but we got to see awesome things like this on the way up and from the top.

Did I mention the chair lift was called "The Gringo Trail?" Gringo doesn't have nearly the same connotation as it does in other parts of Latin America...but still. Really?

Lizzie decided to take on the Gringo Trail barefoot.




On Friday, me Lizzie and Jenny braved the pouring rain to go to a multi-trek on Tronador. Tronador is a mountain in Nahuel Huapi, South America's first national park. It was gorgeous, and we got to see A BLACK ICE GLACIER.

It's black because when it slid down from the mountain, it picked up a ton of volcanic ash. It was a pretty tough hike (partly because I was stupid and didn't bring a coat), but was definitely a highlight of the trip. Well worth the 7 or so hours of cold wetness.




That concludes my blogger presentation of my "Spring" Break travel extravaganza! Next stop on the globe is...Uruguay! Or as one of my professors here calls it, Argentina's Canada!

Reality Check

We now interrupt your regularly scheduled "Spring" Break broadcast to get you up to date really quickly with what I´ve been doing since I got home from my trip.

I got stuck in a riot.

On Sunday afternoon my friend Danielle and I went to an Israel Independence Day celebration being hosted by the city. There were speeches, music, and dancing and there was a pretty decent sized crowd. The event was happening on a blocked off street near the Casa Rosada, and Danielle and I were near the back.

All of a sudden we heard a loud bang, some screams, and then people just started to RUN. Since Danielle and I were in the back (and short), we didn´t see the group of 25 protesters burst out of the nearby subway station with signs and weapons. They had sticks and nunchuks, and just started hitting people and screaming in Spanish. We started to run too.

I`m still not really positive who they were. Some people in the crowd were shouting that they were Nazis. Articles I´ve been looking at have said that they were anti-zionist, pro-palestinian, or anti-semetic. Now, these things don´t always have to go hand-in-hand so I can´t really say for sure who they were. Some people are starting to speculate that the rioters were hired just to create a ruckus.

People started shouting for the police, who took a really long time to come. Oh, there were police there--I saw them talking on their cell phones and walking away. Some went to help, but most didn´t. Three people ended up being injured. The front page of most newspapers yesterday showed a young Jewish man holding his head. There was a lot of blood.

Danielle and I ran to the other side of the crowd, away from the protesters. Once the police got their shit together, the program started again and people started coming back. It took about maybe...another 30 minutes for an ambulance to show up, and it came in from the wrong side of the stage so it just had to back up and go around the block to get to the people that needed help. And security still seemed sketch, so Danielle and I booked it.

Argentina has a history of anti-semitic and anti-Israel attacks occuring. In the 1990s the Israeli embassy and a Jewish cultural center were blown up. In addition, the South American nation was a hub for Nazis fleeing Germany after WWII.

But I never thought these things would directly affect me during my semester in Buenos Aires. I´ve essentially been able to be open about my Jewish-ness here, and suddenly all at once I´m not so sure that´s a good idea. I appreciate better now why many Synagogues in the area and the Hillel building still check our IDs and passports before we can come in.

In Argentina, the past is always having a major, direct effect on the present. Sunday was definitely no exception.

"Spring" Break pt. 3: Santiago

I'm leaving for Uruguay this weekend, and I'm still not finished posting about "Spring" Break! I'm just going to have to put my homework off more, so I can play more with this blog. Not a problem.

Anyway. We stayed in Santiago for less than twenty-four hours, from Sunday night to Monday night. So I really didn't get the best impression of the city, but it was still cool to see.

For one thing, we found what has to be the craziest municipal park in the world. You have to sign a guestbook when you enter, and instead of sprawling out it sprawls UP. It's like in a giant spiral upwards, until you reach a little tower at the top and you can see the entire city.

The view from...err...pretty high up in the park. Towards the top there was a lot of smog, and made it kind of tough to take good pictures.


The park tapered off at at little tower at the top. Not for those afraid of heights or steep steps.


The high tower from below.


The park was full of beautiful fountains, sculptures, and buildings such as little chapels and memorials, and just pretty things like this. There was also a garden dedicated to Darwin. Jardin Darwin.


Me from the top, Sarah J and Brenna from below.

Afterwards we wandered around a little more, and got some lunch. I got a traditional Chilean soup, which basically consisted of chicken broth with a steak and some huge chunks of veggies thrown in. Strange, but REALLY good and something I hope to recreate.



Lizzie found a Dunkin' Donuts.

Neruda. Te Amo.

So on our last day in Valpo we made a quick stop at the number one place I wanted to go in the city: Pablo Neruda's house.

Yeah, of course I reserved an entire post for this. I'm spreading the Gospel of Neruda!

I didn't make it to all three of his houses in Chile like I originally hoped (although Jeremy Green did, the lucky bastard), but the opportunity to even see one was absolutely amazing. You can really tell that Neruda built it with love, and each piece of furniture and little knick-knack was picked carefully. The house is full of hundreds of odds and ends, from colonial-era maps of Chile and Japanese screens to a stuffed baby penguin chilling out behind the bar.

Unfortunately, I couldn't take any pictures of the inside of La Sebastiana (which is eclectic and super-stunning), but here are a few of the outside:

The view from the patio. Not bad.

Me trying to look "contemplative" on a bench carved with Neruda's silhouette.

The house itself, which is now a museum.

Also, here is a poem Neruda wrote about La Sebastiana, which ironically I read for the first time the morning we went. It just made me love the house even more, made me more excited to see what this magnificent poem describes. And after visiting, I can say that this poem definitely captures the crazy, romantic, eclectic vibe the house radiates in every board and nail.

This is translated from it's original Spanish. No, I didn't do the translating :(

To "La Sebastiana"

I built the house.

I made it first out of air.
Later I raised its flag into the air
and left it draped
from the firmament, from the stars, from
clear light and darkness.

It was a fable
of cement, iron, glass
more valuable than wheat, like gold--
I had to go searching and selling,
and so a truck arrived.
They unloaded sacks
and more sacks.
The tower took anchor in the hard ground--
but that's not enough, said the Builder,
there's still cement, glass, iron, doors--
and I didn't sleep at night.

But it kept growing.
The windows grew,
and with a little more,
with sticking to plans and working,
and digging in with knee and shoulder,
it went on growing into existence,
to where you could look through a window,
and it seemed that with so many sacks
it might have a roof and might rise
and finally take firm hold of the flag
which still festooned the sky with its colors.

I gave myself over to the cheapest doors,
doors which had died
and had been pitched out of their houses,
doors without walls, broken,
piled on scrap heaps,
doors with no memory by now,
no trace of a key,
and I said, "Come
to me, abandoned doors.
I'll give you a house and a wall
and a fist to knock on you.
You will swing again as the soul opens,
you will guard the sleep of Matilde
with your wings that worked so much."

Then, too, came the paint,
licking away at the walls;
it dressed them in sky blue and pink
so that they might begin to dance.
So the tower dances,
the doors and the staircases sing,
the house rises till it touches its crown,
but money is short--
nails are short,
door knockers, locks, marble.
Nevertheless, the house
keeps on rising
and something happens, a beat
starts up in its arteries.
Perhaps it is a saw, seething
like a fish in the water of dreams,
or a hammer which taps
like a tricky condor carpenter
at the pine planks we will be walking on.

Something goes and living continues.

The house grows and speaks,
stands on its own feet,
has clothes wrapped around its skeleton,
and as from seaward the spring,
swimming like a water nymph,
kisses the sand of Valparaiso.

now we can stop thinking. This is the house.

Now all that's missing will be blue.

All it needs now is to bloom.

And that is work for the spring.

"Spring" Break pt. 2: Valparaiso

What to say of Valparaiso...

It was heaven on earth. I was always really excited to go because I knew Pablo Neruda had an amazing house there, but it wasn't prepared for the rest of the city. It's all built on the side of a steep hill, so all the streets are really steep and twisted and narrow.

We didn't do too much there, other than walk around, shop, and eat. But that's all we really needed to do. It was amazing just to be able to wander and find new things. The whole city was like a maze, and every corner had something new and interesting. Just walking down a street we ran into performers, demonstrations, and even an impromptu fashion show.

I'm just going to let the pictures speak for themselves.