Do I have to come home?

Well after face timing with my parents yesterday for what I think was only the second time since I've been gone, I realized that I have barely been communicating with anyone at home. Including my blog! Sorry everyone! I've been so engulfed in the culture and living life as an Argentine. The culture here is so rich and amazing and nothing like I've ever experienced in the USA. Last weekend we visited Uruguay, it was a very quick less than 24 hour trip but was well worth the time. I'm all about traveling and the lovely new stamp in my passport is an added bonus ;) We ran into some trouble coming home because 3 people from our group had forgotten their Argentina entry fees! You don't need a visa to just visit, if you pay the entry fee you can stay for 3 months. When I came here in 2012, the entry fee was paid at the airport and they put a sticker in your passport saying you were allowed in the country for the next 10 years without having to pay again. Simple, easy, and here I am with no problems. Something changed the past two years and now you have to pay the entry fee before you come to Argentina and carry the receipt with you, it's not a sticker in your passport anymore. We almost lost 3 West Chester students to Uruguay, haha. Thankfully we met up with one of our professor's friends so she was able to help us get them back into Argentina. We left Uruguay around 2pm and got back to Rosario around 7. We came home and took a nap and then headed out to the boliche! We ended up leaving around 5:30 am and heading home. Sunday was Argentina's first game of the World Cup and let me tell you, things are CRAZY here. Argentina colored everything, everywhere you go. Jerseys, flags, scarves, hats, anything you can imagine is being sold on every street corner in the city. I absolutely love it. We went to a restaurant/bar for the game and it was probably one of the most exciting days I've experienced. They didn't play well at alll but they still won. After they win any game, everyone proceeds to flood the streets and go to the flag monument to celebrate! It was quite an experience. Monday was the USA game. We ended up going to our new favorite place, Bar del Mundo. It is really a bar of the world, they have beers and drinks from every different country, and food! It's the only place here I've found cheese fries and chicken fingers so we were loving it. While we were the only ones there for the game it was like a private viewing! After USA won the bartender gave us free shots. Friday was flag day! The first flag of Argentina was hoisted here in Rosario so the National monument of the country is here! Not only was everything decorated for the World Cup, there were double the amount of flags hanging everywhere on Friday. We didn't get to see the parade because our bus to Iguazú left at 2pm. Merrick and I live close to each other so we headed to the monument around 11. We walked around, took pictures, and after we didn't find the rest of the group from WCU we decided to grab some lunch at VIP. VIP is the restaurant right next to the flag monument that is owned by Messi's father! It was really good. After that we headed to the bus station. We were able to watch some of the parade and speech by the President on the TV in the bus terminal. At 2 we left for Iguazú. It was a wonderful 19 hour ride....not. The bus seats are pretty nice so it wasn't hard to sleep. The next day we arrived in Iguazú. We weren't able to check into our rooms in the hostel yet but we were able to drop our bags off and then we went to check out an Indigenous village, of the Guarani. It was really cool to see how they live, and interesting. The government has been trying to eliminate their village to put in hotels and resort space for the waterfalls. After that, we went back into town and got lunch and watched the Argentina game! Thankfully they won, even though they still aren't playing very well. We checked into the hostel, MangoChill, and then headed to the Tres Fronteras, or the three borders. You can stand in Argentina and see Brasil and Paraguay across the rivers, it's really cool. Then we went back to the hostel and showered and got settled. The hostel was having a pool party that night. They don't have a kitchen like normal hostels for you to bring your own food and cook but they have a chef! He was making beef, chicken, and shrimp kabobs, THEY WERE DELICIOUS! They also had a bartender which was pretty cool. We made friends with people from California, New Zealand, Scotland, China, and I can't even remember where else from! At 4am, the party was still going strong but we all headed to bed since we had to be up to get to the falls. Sunday morning we woke up and had the best breakfast I've had while I've been here. They don't eat the traditional breakfast foods that we eat, its usually a medialuna (croissant) or a small piece of toast with jam. At the hostel, there was bread, eggs, lentils, and then the Argentine breakfast food. It was heavenly. We arrived at Iguazú National Park around 11 and ventured off into the jungle. There has been a lot of rain in Brasil this "winter" and so the falls actually flooded. It's never happened before and the park was closed for a while. We didn't know if we would be able to go on this trip! Thankfully the park opened back up, but the Garganta del Diablo (Throat of the Devil, the biggest attraction) will be closed until mid to the end of July because part of the bridge was washed away. Also, part of the superior trail was washed away. The water was apparently 33x higher than it normally is. When we looked across at the Brazil side, you could see how half of their side was missing, washed away into the river. We spent more time taking pictures to spend the most amount of time we could in the park. We did the superior/upper trail first since part of it was closed. After that we went to lunch and then hit the inferior/lower trail and got soaked walking past some of the falls! We did some shopping and waited for some people to be done the boat ride. At 6 we left the park when it closed and headed back to the hostel to grab our bags. We got changed and went to a restaurant to get some dinner before our bus left at 9pm. We got to watch part of the USA game and then boarded the bus. It was the worst bus ride of my life. It was probably 40 degrees, FREEZING, and there was a screaming child behind me the whole time. I've never been so excited to take a shower in my life when I got back to my house. Last night Maria Jose made dinner early and I passed out. Today I'm just catching up on my readings/movies that I have to do for my paper and obviously writing this for all of you. The group just got done class so I'm gonna go have lunch with them but will post pictures later! Chauuu