Around town

My first weekend in Rosario was an exciting one. I meet the rest of the group at UCEL on Saturday. We spent most of the day walking around Rosario's downtown area, which is very nice. There is an entire street that is closed to vehicles and there are shops on both sides. It is kind of hard to shope because to figure out how much stuff costs i'm still converting it back to US dollars. Even though some of the stuff seems expensive, when you convert it to US dollars most of it is pretty cheap. We also went to the flag monument here in Rosario. The monument is located in Rosario because this is where the flag was first made and raised.

On Sunday I went downtown again this time just with part of the group, and without Jim (our fearless leader). We ate lunch and afterwards walked along the river. It was a very nice time. The highlight of my day though was getting to talk to my family for the first time since I left for Argentina. It was so nice to see them, to hear how things were at home, and to tell them how i was and what i've been doing.

Though I have had alot of fun so far and have had a really good time, i have to mention the two scarry times I've had thus far. Since i live pretty close to Natalie we decided that we were going to take the bus together so that way neither of us had to go it alone. We were on the bus headed toward UCEL when another one of the passangers on the bus started talking to us. At first it was just casual conversation but later in the ride he was trying to explain something too me. Now before i continue i must say that i honestly didnt want to talk to this guy because he looked kind of dirty and smelled pretty bad. But i didnt want to be rude either. Anyways he pointed to me and then pretended to have something in his hand which he then pretended to snort. This was very odd. In the end Natalie and I guessed that he was trying to sell us some kind of drug. We both said no and just ignored him more or less for the rest of the bus ride.

Now on the way back from UCEL the same day we took the bus again. Luckily the guy wasnt still on there. But we took the bus and decided that we would just get off at the same stop we got on to go to UCEL. Unfourtunately the bus never went past that stop. At first we thought that maybe we had taken the wrong bus but it definitely wasnt the wrong bus it just didnt go past our stop. So we took a ride through the bad part of Rosario. And the projects in Rosario are not a real pretty place. The poverty there was crazy. There was people living in huts made of old scraps of metal, and anything they could find more or less. It was very sad, but very scarry too, because we didnt know if the bus would go back to our stop. And we definitely were not going to get off the bus in the neighborhood we were in. At the end of the route we were the only ones on the bus so we talked to the bus driver. He told us to stay on the bus because the bus would go back that way. So we finally got to our destination.

Both instances were pretty scarry. However, both times everything ended up working out ok. Overall these were pretty minor events, and have not made me dislike my experience here. I look forward to going to Buenos Aires tomorrow, and starting classes next monday.

Well from me here in Rosario, goodbye,

And stay classy Iowa!