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!