On Thursday afternoon, Cain, Mary and I went with the Language and Justice group (the other international students in Rosario through AHA) to view the Museo de Ciudad (Museum of the City). I didn't really know what we were going to get ourselves into, as Karie signed us all up to go and then left the three of us to go on our own. I walked to the park with Essence, who is the only other student from Ball State here, and we got to catch up on how our trips have been. Even though we both use the same building for our classes, we usually only wave hello in passing, so it was nice to finally talk to her about everything we've been going through here. To find the museum, we walked through Parque de la Independencia (Independence Park), which was beautiful and is definitely a place I want to visit again,. A tour guide met us outside the museum (which is in the center of the park) and showed us pictures of what the park looked like when it was first created 100ish years ago. Then we went inside and she explained the rest of the pictures and showed us a pharmacy they have preserved. The museum was neat but also a lot to take in all at once, and the tour guide told us that the point of the museum is that you will go through it once with a guide and then return to explore it on your own. I thought it was interesting that Parque de la Independencia was initially a gated park for only the elite of Rosario. When we walked through it, there were people from all walks of life enjoying the afternoon, and it was neat to compare the social and political changes of Rosario in the same physical setting.
Today we had our Culture and Community class in the morning, then went to Spanish to watch Diarios de Motocicleta (Motorcycle Diaries). This movie is about a motorcycle road trip that Ernesto Guevara (later known as Che Guevara, a revolutionary of the Cuban Revolution) and his friend Alberto Granado took in 1952 from Buenos Aires to Venezuela. Guevara was studying to be a doctor, but seeing the injustice of the world on his trip eventually led him to become a revolutionary...well I kind of extrapolated a bit based on my limited knowledge of Che's life and since the movie ends while he's still young. It was really powerful to see how much the injustice of the world affected Guevara and led him to fight actively against it, even at the age of 24. Since I don't know much about Che's activism (and apparently Che isn't a topic you should bring up in casual conversation in Argentina because people feel so strongly about him and his actions) the movie didn't change my views of him politically, but I thought it provided a neat anecdote for how pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone helps you to see the world differently and change your actions to reflect your newfound awareness. Maybe I picked this out because I feel like I'm currently having that kind of experience myself, but I really liked the movie and its message (Padre, I fully expect that you will go look this movie up on Netflix now).
This weekend, we're going on our first school-planned excursion to the province of Córdoba, which is the province to the west of Santa Fe and home to the second largest city in Argentina. I don't believe we're actually going to the city, but we're going to tour Che's home and go trekking (I'm pretty sure Beba told us there's a zip line and I'm super excited). It wouldn't be a real adventure if there wasn't something sketch involved, so we're leaving from a GAS STATION at 3 in the MORNING (this is a SCHOOL-ORGANIZED excursion, let's not forget). So that we don't all have to walk across the city alone at 3 am, Terry and Karie are hosting a movie night for all of us, followed by (as Karie put it) bar-hopping with "Terry [who is] committed to hitting the town." Terry and Ella aren't going on this excursion with us, so Karie is sending Terry out with us so that she can sleep before our bus ride. The rest of us will just have to sleep on our significantly-shorter-than-any-bus-ride-to-an-excursion-that-I've-been-on-in-Argentina bus ride, which is what Beba initially recommended for us all to do (it's not like she knows we're a bunch of college students or something). I'll let you know when we get back how our excursion to Córdoba was (and which boots Terry decided to wear tonight). Next week will be a little busy since it's our last week of classes for ESOL A (I can't believe how quickly this program has flown by!) but I'm already looking forward to having a low-key weekend in Rosario while we wait for ESOL B to start.
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