isn’t an ideal way to win a date.
My teacher Lio is great. My classmates are all lovely. The school is excellent and everyone there appears to go out of their way to make sure everyone else is having fun and enjoying themselves. It’s definitely not them; it’s me. I learned a bit of Indonesian last year but that was only for a couple of hours every week. This is full-on, full-time study with mountains of homework. It’s draining, it’s daunting and it’s hard. I hate to say this too, but I’ve a feeling I’ll learn more if I change to private lessons, preferably with a hot local twenty-something male who wants to practise in a series of exciting locations, to help it all sink in.
I hate to be a quitter, though.
Being here makes me wonder how the hell I ever learned English. Having called my mum and asked, she confirmed that yes, I picked it up quite quickly when I was two. I’m not sure why it is then, thirty years later, when I’m more advanced, more willing to learn and less distracted by things like shiny spoons and Elmo, that I can’t even remember how to say, ‘Is that dog shit on your shoes, Julio, or Milka?’
I’ve had to email my friend Autumn, who’s flying out to join me soon for some Patagonian adventures, and let her know that she should get onto all the Spanish apps and learning programs she possibly can in advance. Meanwhile, I’ll just have to keep at it.
At least I can ask for wine now I suppose, which is as good a place to start as any. ‘Uno mas vino tinto, por favor!’
23/08
Bed-wetting, bad dates and The Lion King in Hebrew …
The other night I had a blind date with a local guy called Eduardo. He’s a friend of a friend from Sydney and he kindly offered to show me the nightlife in the Buenos Aires barrio of San Telmo. I’ve been practising my Spanish with Eduardo on Facebook chat and, although I declined his online invitation to join him and his mates for an asado first, we arranged to meet afterwards in a bar, at 9.30 p.m.
The Argentineans love asados , by the way. These are basically BBQs, usually in people’s back yards, that would make your average Aussie griller weep into his perfectly marinated prime ribs. During my first week, I attended one at the home of a very hospitable man I met via some other students at Expanish and found the whole thing quite thrilling, if a little scary.
An asado can last all day and all night and the main aim is to consume as much meat as is humanly possible. The catch is that you really never know what it is you’re eating. Every single part of the animal is consumed and absolutely nothing is spared in this act of carne carnage. You could be tucking into a bull’s testicle and thinking it’s beef cheek, or a pig’s brain, thinking it’s a deep-fried cheese ball. It’s just another situation where the lack of a Spanish vocabulary puts a girl in seriously dangerous waters.
After an asado it’s expected that you’ll sit around smacking your lips, burping and drinking red wine, before heading out to a nightclub. At least, that’s what I experienced at my first one. While asados are sociable and delicious affairs, the bulk indigestion and resulting strings of meat wrapped around your back teeth aren’t exactly ideal precursors for hitting a dance floor, but this is how the Porteños roll so I rolled with it … and felt a bit sick.
Anyway, 9.30 p.m. swung around. I ordered myself a drink at the bar and waited. 9.45 came and went. 10 p.m. I sat there checking my phone for updates, but Eduardo was silent. 10.30 ticked along, as did 11. By then I was chatting in Spanglish to some very nice guys, both of whom had bought me a couple more drinks. I imagined Eduardo must have passed out in a meat coma and forgotten me, but much to my amazement midnight rolled around and in he walked. We recognised each other from our Facebook photos.
He pottered over to the bar, doused in a special Argentinean cologne of Marlboro and meat sauce and
My teacher Lio is great. My classmates are all lovely. The school is excellent and everyone there appears to go out of their way to make sure everyone else is having fun and enjoying themselves. It’s definitely not them; it’s me. I learned a bit of Indonesian last year but that was only for a couple of hours every week. This is full-on, full-time study with mountains of homework. It’s draining, it’s daunting and it’s hard. I hate to say this too, but I’ve a feeling I’ll learn more if I change to private lessons, preferably with a hot local twenty-something male who wants to practise in a series of exciting locations, to help it all sink in.
I hate to be a quitter, though.
Being here makes me wonder how the hell I ever learned English. Having called my mum and asked, she confirmed that yes, I picked it up quite quickly when I was two. I’m not sure why it is then, thirty years later, when I’m more advanced, more willing to learn and less distracted by things like shiny spoons and Elmo, that I can’t even remember how to say, ‘Is that dog shit on your shoes, Julio, or Milka?’
I’ve had to email my friend Autumn, who’s flying out to join me soon for some Patagonian adventures, and let her know that she should get onto all the Spanish apps and learning programs she possibly can in advance. Meanwhile, I’ll just have to keep at it.
At least I can ask for wine now I suppose, which is as good a place to start as any. ‘Uno mas vino tinto, por favor!’
23/08
Bed-wetting, bad dates and The Lion King in Hebrew …
The other night I had a blind date with a local guy called Eduardo. He’s a friend of a friend from Sydney and he kindly offered to show me the nightlife in the Buenos Aires barrio of San Telmo. I’ve been practising my Spanish with Eduardo on Facebook chat and, although I declined his online invitation to join him and his mates for an asado first, we arranged to meet afterwards in a bar, at 9.30 p.m.
The Argentineans love asados , by the way. These are basically BBQs, usually in people’s back yards, that would make your average Aussie griller weep into his perfectly marinated prime ribs. During my first week, I attended one at the home of a very hospitable man I met via some other students at Expanish and found the whole thing quite thrilling, if a little scary.
An asado can last all day and all night and the main aim is to consume as much meat as is humanly possible. The catch is that you really never know what it is you’re eating. Every single part of the animal is consumed and absolutely nothing is spared in this act of carne carnage. You could be tucking into a bull’s testicle and thinking it’s beef cheek, or a pig’s brain, thinking it’s a deep-fried cheese ball. It’s just another situation where the lack of a Spanish vocabulary puts a girl in seriously dangerous waters.
After an asado it’s expected that you’ll sit around smacking your lips, burping and drinking red wine, before heading out to a nightclub. At least, that’s what I experienced at my first one. While asados are sociable and delicious affairs, the bulk indigestion and resulting strings of meat wrapped around your back teeth aren’t exactly ideal precursors for hitting a dance floor, but this is how the Porteños roll so I rolled with it … and felt a bit sick.
Anyway, 9.30 p.m. swung around. I ordered myself a drink at the bar and waited. 9.45 came and went. 10 p.m. I sat there checking my phone for updates, but Eduardo was silent. 10.30 ticked along, as did 11. By then I was chatting in Spanglish to some very nice guys, both of whom had bought me a couple more drinks. I imagined Eduardo must have passed out in a meat coma and forgotten me, but much to my amazement midnight rolled around and in he walked. We recognised each other from our Facebook photos.
He pottered over to the bar, doused in a special Argentinean cologne of Marlboro and meat sauce and
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