Winter Break Update

After a whirlwind few weeks of winter break, things are calming down and I am settling in for the long haul of three weeks stuck in Jersey before my South American adventure. Highlights so far have been a quiet Christmas with the family, New Year's with Jaclyn, and Sherri's 21st birthday!!! In fact, the night of her birthday party I got my housing assignment for Buenos Aires. I'm going to be living with a single mom, Nancy Marchese, with two young daughters, Oriana age 6 and Giuliana age 4. I think I'll fit right in :)

They live in Puerto Madero, the neighborhood where UCA (Universidad Catolica de Argentina, my school) is located so I won't have a dreadful commute to school. However, everyone from GW I have talked to is in either Recoleta or Palermo, the more residential neighborhoods that are 40 minutes away. I am worried that it will be difficult to meet up with people in the evenings since I've heard traveling the city is not easy. I guess I won't know til I get there.

In other news, I've been spending most of my free time stalking the New York Times travel guide to Argentina and Buenos Aires' own tourist website. They have proved extremely informative and relieved a lot of my anxiety about traveling to an unknown city. I know you can't really get a sense of a place until you go there but learning the differences between neighborhoods and which museum is on what avenue has made the city less of an abstraction and therefore less scary. I am working on a top list of attractions to see and things to do while in Buenos Aires which I'll post when completed. 

New York Times: http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/guides/central-and-south-america/argentina/buenos-aires/overview.html

Turismo Buenos Aires: http://www.bue.gov.ar/home/

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