happy new year!

So I am in Buenos Aires right now and it is great. Here are a few things that I have experienced:

New Year´s was uneventful. The airline did give us champagne with dinner, but that was around 10pm. When midnight came around, nothing happened. Not even an announcement that New Year´s had arrived. We passed through one time zone, around the bahamas, i think, but it was really not a big deal at all.

Rob greeted me in Rio De Janeiro, we went to his apartment that he was renting in Copabana. I was very impressed with his ability to speak portugese while he negotiated the cab fair. We immediately went to the beach. The sand felt like powdery squeaky snow and was really comfortable to lay on. It was really hot, there were lots of people on the beach, and yes the majority of the women on the beach were wearing some kind of version of the thong. Later in the evening we went to a district called Llapa for dinner on the bus which was an adventure by itself. They drive like maniacs down here and don´t care for pedestrians. The city also smelled like pee.

The next day we headed to the airport to get to Buenos Aires. Brazilians really have a way with time. Our flight was supposed to leave at 10:30am, but our flight ended up being 2 hours late because they couldn´t check everyone in on time. The check in line took an excruitating 2 hours.

We made it to Buenos Aires, met up with Azure, Mike, and Ernest. (After 2 hours on a non-airconditioned bus, and then a subway ride. We were drenched in sweat. Best welcome ever. we had no idea it was going to take that long either) We went out to dinner and found a small community of people that we knew all at the same restaurant. Mike´s cousins who live here where there, we went with Aviva´s friend Nathan, who lives here, and then our friend from college Steve was there randomly with a few people from UW as well.

Afterwards, Rob, Ernest, and I went out to Tango night, which was awesome and one of the most beautiful events i have witnessed. There were about 30 couples out on the dance floor dancing the tango, with tables surrounding them, and really good music playing. Rob and I went out even though we didn´t know what we were doing. It was really fun, we made friends with a Brazilian, and went out dancing at a club, then came back around 5am to the hostel.

So far, we´ve had amazing food, for really cheap (about 8-13 US dollars per person for all-out ordering, plus wine, plus dessert, plus coffee) the city is beautiful, the weather was great today, and the people have been very friendly. I am having a great time and will post pictures as soon as i can.

Happy New Year!