taking the good with the bad

I finally got around to reading the "guide" to studying abroad that Butler gave me 5 months ago, only to discover that i have been doing the whole study abroad thing wrong. Well at least the culture shock part. Apparently you are not suppose to tell anyone how miserable you are. Apparently you are suppose to fake happy until your face muscles have forgoten how to frown. If you cannot tell, there is a hint of skeptism in my words.

Yes I understand negative attitudes can snowball; that focusing on the bad can make the good shine less brightly, but really I don't think I can fake it nor do I want to. This culture shock, the misery, the homesickness and the tears are real and they are part of this journey.

To lie and say I am completely happy and Argentina and I are great buddies now would be to ignore the truth of Argentina. There is a reason I am crying. This country is completely different in a scarcy, awful, saddening, beautiful, glorious way. This makes me cry.

So I guess this is a disclaimer to everyone. I am not as miserable as I sometimes sound. Sometimes I am that miserable and sometimes, usually when I am far from skype in a random cobble stone street, I am happy. But it is important for me to be able to be honest about my misery. So I have given you all fair warning. For all the misery that spews out of my mouth, there is silent joy in the far reaches of my heart.

To continue on this path of honesty, I had a pretty crappy weekend which included a brief stomach ickness, getting lost (yes again), and once again not understanding a word the grocery guy said to me.

Then today I put that all behind me, cried one last time before I left the house and headed to the feria in San Telmo...and it was everything I wanted it to be. The fair had fantastic old jewlery, one-of-a-kind fotos and entertainment of every type. Then at lunch, fate finally smiled on me and I was seated next to a pair of ladies from Nevada, one of whom was originally from Argentina. They assured me that the first month was going to be hell but then suddenly one morning the light in my head would turn on and I would finally really be in Argentina not just looking at it from sidelines.

They also said I need to speak now. I need to get over this "I sound like a foreigner" crap and start really speaking to people. So I am determined again. I am going to throw my stupid pride out the window and learn to speak without regret. And to live in Argentina without regret.

Fotos in my mind
- So I finally took out my real camera and had time to snap a few fotos before my batteries died. Here are the photos I missed taking.
1. A small kid on my subway licking the pole while his mom was talking to her friend.
2. A steet vendor sharing his mate with his neighbor.
3. The graffiti on the old wall of San Telmos that read "We cannot be together but just the same you are mine."