Hola! This weekend was great! Saturday night we had a delicious dinner, it was like Shepherd's Pie type of thing and so good. Mr. D, you wanted to know about the food....IT'S FANTASTIC! Words can't even describe how delicious everything is. Oh, and in response to your comment, I plan on living at your house if Mel sells my stuff! ;) Anyway, after dinner Saturday we went to an Irish Pub called O'Connell's and were there for a little with the ambassadors and the Simpson kids but it was really expensive so we went to that little place that reminds me of Pickels and Chips and hung out there again. Then we went to Madam, a boliche.  I didn't get home until 7 Sunday morning. They told me they were very proud that I finally stayed out until a normal hour, yes apparently that is the normal time. I didn't really sleep well so I finally got up out of bed at 1:30. I was supposed to go shopping with Nicole but things changed so I did my homework and then my host mom's niece came over and her daughter Ines came as well! They are painting an amazing portrait together, its so beautiful and Ines drew the whole thing free-hand! I was sitting watching the two of them paint and we were listening to music. I'm surprised by the amount of music from the states that they listen to. What I noticed though was its all older music, her niece loves Kelly Clarkson but it was all her older songs. We had gnocchis for dinner, so good. Then I tried to go to sleep early because I had to get up early for class this morning. My professor from UCEL who teaches my 3-5 class had to change the time of class because her mom is really sick. We now have class from 8:30-10:30 in the morning so she can be done teaching at 1 and get home. Needless to say, waking up this morning was rough. I went to my classes and then had lunch with the kids from West Chester. After we went to the park to drink mate and terere! Mate is basically the unofficial drink of Argentina, its a tea. I'm not going to give you all the details about it, if you want to know here is the wikipedia page haha! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_(beverage)
But anyway mate is very common to drink with friends. We met at UCEL to walk to the park and while we were walking with the ambassadors and the Simpson kids we had one of the stray dogs become our friend and follow us. People buy dogs and then decide they don't want them so they just let them out in the street. It's sad how many strays there are but they're all so nice! The one today followed us from UCEL to the park and then sat with us at the park and barked at any other dog that came near us! He was like our little protector, we named him Chiquito! We all sat in a giant circle and drank the mate. Everyone passes the "cup" around and drinks it. Someone puts in the herbs, fills it with hot water and then passes it around. You drink the whole thing then pass it back to whoever has the water and refill it. When I told my mom this afternoon she said it sounded like a bunch of indians passing the pipe around and I would assume thats what we looked like! We also had terere, which is the same herbs but you put juice in it instead of the hot water. I liked that one better because I'm not a huge tea person. I'm definitely going to attempt to bring some back to the states.....if I can get it through customs. We weren't in the park too long because it is unusually cold here today, and I didn't bring a jacket haha. We were told that it's usually around 65-75 degrees around this time, its technically winter, and I distinctly remember my professor telling us that the last time he was here this time of the year he wore shorts and a tshirt everyday. Needless to say, I'm not dressing warm enough if it continues to be like today. I do have some scarves but their really more for fashion not warmth, I'm going to go to the mall or the shops on Cordoba Ave to look for one tomorrow. I have a quiz tomorrow, already, so I'm going to go study a little bit! I'll post again tomorrow hopefully!! Chau! Oh yeah, I learned that they don't spell ciao like other places it's chau!


Here is a picture I took of Addi drinking mate today in the park!