Back from Buenos Aires
I am back from a short Spring Break “escapadita” to Buenos Aires. I went with two ladies from my adult Spanish class… ¡Hola Kathy y Donna!… and we had a ball. They were great travel companions. The three of us stayed at my mother’s apartment in Buenos Aires and launched our city tours everyday from there. The weather in March could not have been more beautiful, the sky could not have been bluer and the steaks not tastier.
The trip was a new experience for me as well as I had not seen Buenos Aires from a “Tourist” point of view. It was my first time to go on a city tour bus with other tourist from around the world, spend the day at an estancia or attend a Tango Show/Dinner.
I would suggest to anyone to try to be a tourist for a day or two in your hometown. It was a very odd and experience for me…
For my travel companions this trip was their first time to South America and they were very good in noticing and expressing occurrences, customs, views in language and culture that I was just too used to find anything special or different about them. We were able to realize many cultural differences and amazed that something so ordinary for one would take someone else for such a surprise and have a “how strange” effect.
- Seeing a car parked with an empty bottle on its roof can mean only one thing…right?… It’s FOR SALE of course.
- Making a “ks ks” sound to call someone on the street
- Being able to buy empandas where ever you can buy pizza
- A car receives a license plate when it is “born” with 0 km. It will keep that same license plate, even when it is sold or until it disintegrates
It was interesting to pay attention to language intonations, melodies and perception. When you speak both languages fluently some of those little faux paxs pass by without noticing that they are not right. On the sign below, which we found in the Tango Show restaurant, you can see how Spanish speakers hear the English word “No” pronounced with a “U” at the end.
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