¡Córdoba!

Hello everybody! Sorry that I haven't written in a few days, but there's been a lot going on which means I've got an extra-long entry today! I'll scatter in some photos for those of you who might be limited by time and/or attention span.

My Schedule and Living Situation

My room (books were provided)

Sunday evening, after a tour of the city, we met our families and moved into our new temporary homes. I live in fairly nice residential neighborhood with an older couple (60-ish I would guess) and their adult son, who's 24 years old. Despite having his own job, and being finished with school, he still lives with his parents, which is not all that uncommon in Argentina from my understanding. They've had a number of exchange students before, so they're familiar with the process, which is nice. They've been generally nice and friendly, and more than willing to converse, which has provided good chances for both practicing Spanish and learning about the culture here. It's also nice to have someone else close to my age in the house, especially since he's been very willing to talk to about whatever aspect of culture I might be wondering about. The house has both wireless internet and outlets that take American plugs, so from a technological standpoint, I feel right at home.


We take classes at the campus of the Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, which as a pretty big campus, although we only utilize a very small portion of it. Because it's the middle of the summer here, there are few other students on campus, so we have it mostly just to ourselves. Classes are Monday-Thursday from 9am-2pm, with the three day weekend usually dedicated to some sort of cultural excursion that takes up anywhere from one day to all three depending on the trip. The classes I'm taking are a spanish language course, Argentinian history, and Argentinian cinema. The spanish and history courses are taught by university professors, while the cinema course is taught by the Prof. Mosquera, the Union professor who accompanied us for the term. Both of the university professors seem both friendly and competent thus far, so hopefully that continues for the rest of the term (although history looks like it has the potential to get rather dull at some points). I've had Prof. Mosquera before, and his classes are usually enjoyable, and the subject of Argentinian cinema is definitely an interesting topic. It almost feels as if I'm back in high school again, because I take the bus in the city center in the morning, and back again in the afternoon, and I'm on campus during the day. Because my house isn't particularly close to the university campus (more on that later), there's no chance of going home for lunch or anything like that, and we only have around 5 minutes between classes, which adds to the high school feeling. I must admit that I miss the typical US system of living on campus and only walking a few minutes to each class. Oh well, I suppose sacrifices must be made!

Impressions of the City

Impressive looking cathedral

After only a few days in Córdoba, snow, ice, and cold weather seem like a distant memory, but I guess that's what happens when it's 85-90 degrees all the time! I've been in Córdoba a few days now, and have begun to settle in a little bit, although it's still a process. The first thing that I noticed about Córdoba is that it is a BIG city. At 1.3 million people, it's quite populous, but even more so than that, the city is extraordinarily extensive and sprawling. According to Wikipedia, the city proper is 222 square miles, which is several times larger than the total area of Boston, and more than 10 times the size of Providence. As I found out firsthand, travelling through the city by bus or car can be very slow going, especially as you work you way through the center of the city, which makes the city seem even larger, because it takes so long to go through it. As I mentioned before, my house isn't particularly close to the university (~7 miles) and the slow travel through the city makes it a 40 minute commute twice a day, which is less than ideal.

Another church, slightly less elaborate than the other one.

The center of the city is an interesting mix of new and old, with a number of very old buildings right near some more modern high rise apartments. Although there are certainly nice areas, downtown Córdoba is rather grittier and dirtier than I expected (although I can't say that I had any real basis for those expectations). Two of the most striking characteristics of the city are the amount of graffiti (lots, and usually just scrawled messages, not artistic pieces) and the number of stray dogs, neither of which I was expecting. As with any city, some areas are quite nice looking, but there are a lot of areas that are much less aesthetically pleasing.

Plaza!

One thing I do like about the city is the presence of plazas, which are a staple of Latin American cities. They serve as places to congregate, relax, or do whatever, and are usually surrounded by rather important buildings for business, government, or religion. They're a nice aspect of the city, and there's no real equivalent that I can think of that exists in American culture.






My Experience

Two views of the city from a vantage point on our tour.
(Below right as well)

So far, my ability to explore the culture has been limited, since we haven't had a weekend yet, and everyone's still getting settled in. The other afternoon, a group of us met downtown to go buy phones, and walking through the downtown area looking for a good place to buy them was a fun way to observe and soak in the environment. After successfully purchasing phones, we went to a streetside empanaderia and ate....you guessed it, empanadas! The empanadas in Argentina are absolutely delicious; nice dough filled with meat (usually beef or chicken) and then whatever else one might want, including veggies, cheese, and potatoes. My other significant culinary experience thus far was going to my first asado, the Argentinian equivalent of a barbecue. Hernán, my host brother, invited me to come to an asado with him and a couple of his friends. It was a nice, low-key affair with a couple of his friends, one of whom had lived in California for nearly 15 years, so we compared notes on the differences between the countries, although he's undoubtedly much more at home here, considering he he was born here, lived in Córdoba for the first 8 or 9 years of his life, grew up speaking Spanish. As for the food, it was absolutely delicious; there were several different cuts of meat, including beef, pork, and sausage, and all was slow-cooked over a charcoal fire. Meat in the U.S. is quite nice, but I haven't had anything quite as good as this, and this meal was put together by several 20-somethings in a backyard. Tomorrow (friday) the whole group will go up to the city of Jesús Maria for the day. Jesus Maria is ~50km north of Córdoba and is home a huge festival every January that celebrates traditional gaucho culture, featuring music, dancing, and horse riding. It seems like a very authentic Argentinian experience, so I'm excited that we get the chance to go up and see it. I'll be sure to take plenty of photos and write an entry on the festival.



Overall, everything's going well thus far. It's a good group of students, and my family has been quite friendly and helpful, so no complaints there. The different hours of Argentinian culture has been a slight adjustment - dinner is frequently not served until 9:00 or 10:00, and people generally stay up pretty late, even on weekdays when they have to get up early the next morning. Luckily, I've usually got a couple hours in the afternoon to relax and take a siesta. I've wanted to go running and look for a pickup basketball game (there's a park with a court near my house), but I haven't been able to do either one so far, due to settling in and trying to figure out a typical schedule. Saturday and Sunday are free though, so I'll try and use those days to get going on those two items.

The whole group at our hotel on Sunday

Soon I'll be going back downtown to meet up with the rest of the group at a bar/restaurant, where we will meet our Argentinian speaking partners for the first time. The idea is that we meet periodically with an Argentinian student and alternate speaking in English and Spanish so that we can both practice our language skills. Hopefully all goes well with that, and I'll keep everyone updated on everything else here. If you read all this, thanks, I appreciate it! ¡Hasta luego!