Thursday, June 30, 2011

Montevideo: South of Buenos Aires

Palacio Salvo
We just got back from a brief trip to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, where Jen did some training for a group of young American college graduates in Latin America working as teaching assistants. Montevideo lies directly across the Rio de La Plata from Buenos Aires and is actually slightly south of BA, a fact that might win you a bar bet someday. It's a three hour trip by boat, but on this occasion we took the thirty-minute flight on Uruguay's flagship carrier, Pluna. Leaving a chilly, but bright and sunny BA, we were greeted in Montevideo a half hour later by wet, stormy weather.

"What the hell?" I thought, realizing I had brought neither coat nor umbrella, and cursed the internet's predictions of steady sunshine. Driving along the coastal road into the city, it became clear that we had run into a pretty serious storm blowing in unexpectedly from Antarctica. "Southern winds" is how our driver put it. No kidding. The seafront, where the giant Rio de La Plata estuary meets the Atlantic Ocean, was being pounded by high tides and angry, choppy chocolate-brown waves. The wind was blowing a gale. Muy frio.

Punta Carretas Fruit Market
Our seaside hotel was nice, but not exactly central. We checked in around noon and had the rest of the day free, so we decided to take a city bus to the Ciudad Vieja (Old Town). Piling on all the clothes we could find, we ended up wandering around downtown Montevideo on a Sunday afternoon, which was strange because the place was completely deserted, as in ghost town deserted (I don't think the weather helped). We soon got back on the bus and headed back to the hotel. [Once the weather calmed down a bit on the second day, we got a proper tour of the city center and some of its interesting architecture.] Nothing to do at that point but relax and think about dinner.
We did some internet research and found that there was a highly regarded restaurant just around the corner called La Perdiz (The Grouse). As it turned out, there was nothing to grouse about. The food, sevice, and ambience were all excellent, and we ended up eating there three times, including the full group scarf-a-thon prior to departure on our last day. This mid-day repast featured beef carpaccio, fried cheese, chorizo sausage, fried ravioli, potatoes w/ mushroom sauce, fried fish, topped off with a giant steak! Wimpily, we declined the dessert.
Montevideo looks like a pretty cool place - miles of seaside with palm trees and beaches (kinda California-ish), with a center city that is reminiscent of (small-scale) Buenos Aires. We'll have to go back during the warmer months to get a proper feel for the place, I think. That wind, direct from the South Pole, was really freakin' nippy!

Sunday, June 19, 2011

The (Meat) Hangover


Asado!
Well, it's a muggy, lazy day here in Buenos Aires ("El dia del papa" according to Hallmark en espanol), and we are struggling to overcome the effects of a "meat hangover" brought about by our attendance at a friend's asado (barbecue) last night. In fine Argentine tradition, we were scarfing down steaks sometime after midnight, got to bed around 3 am, and have been moving at half speed all day. Anyway, we've now been in Argentina for almost five months, and I think it's a perfect time to make a few more observations about our surroundings:
  • Argentines love scarves, especially women, but men as well - everyone wears them. At the first hint of autumn, the scarves come out in force, protecting sensitive necks from sub-70F degree temps. As the temperature approaches 60F, some locals take to wrapping their faces. It's part of an overall tendency to wear serious cold-weather gear in the "winter" months: long, heavy quilted coats, wool caps, gloves...I think mostly though, scarves just look fashionable!
  • La bufanda (the scarf)
  • There are an incredible number of red-headed people in this city. We've been a lot of places, but nowhere can compare to BA for the number of ginger-tops. I have no idea why this might be the case, but I intend to make inquiries.
  • Pigeons in Buenos Aires are the most raggedy, sickly, motley bunch of birds I've ever seen. Again, this is a mystery as the climate is benign, there is little air pollution, and there is a tremendous amount of bread lying about in the streets (there's a bakery on every block here). They should be thriving, but as a whole, they look like the victims of a mad scientist's experiment gone wrong.
  • The best place to get a coffee (quality, price, serving size) is, unbelievably, Starbucks.
  • Argentine politics are incredibly Byzantine. This is an election year and things are beginning to heat up - I just wish I could figure out what was going on. It seems that Cristina (the Prez) is due to cruise to an easy victory, but there are so many other political figures running for various positions in the city, the province, and nationally that it makes my head hurt.
  • "Gone to get the morning paper; back in 10 min."
  • When we first got here, I saw several one-armed people around town. Lately, I've been seeing a lot of guys with one leg. Quien sabe?
  • We had a garbage strike that lasted a few days. Stuff piles up pretty darn fast, I must say. Also, we have seen several abandoned toilets on sidewalks around our neighborhood. Seems odd.
  • Homeless people often carry their mattresses around with them and set them up in high-traffic places. Also, much like everyone here, many enjoy reading the newspaper, and it's common to see a homeless guy stretched out on his public bed, deeply engrossed in current events.
  • I just now went to the market, and two guys have installed a sidewalk mattress on our corner. As I passed, they were blissfully sawing logs. I'm tempted to say, "there goes the neighborhood!", but maybe they'll be off to greener pastures by morning.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

300

Group work
Hey ho! Maybe you remember this title from a Gerard Butler movie about a Greek battle. Joe tells me 300 Spartans held off the Persian Army. In my recent experience the number more refers to the number of participants that I "held off" or, better, kept engaged at my last big presentation venue. 400 participants signed up for my last workshop.  The ones that attended cordially worked "with" me! I have been marketing my workshops with the ministry and binational centers since my arrival, and I have struck paydirt! There is a list-serv that the ministry runs that reaches over 8000 teachers throughout the country. As soon as my presentation on Lesson-planning was advertised people were filling out the online google doc (I had no idea that google docs could handle registration info and put it in a tidy excel document for you!).
We capped the registration at 400 which meant around 50% were predicted to show. It seems as though the best of intentions cause people to eagerly fill out registration forms, but often at the last minute something comes up. Well . . . 300 showed up. You can tell from the pictures that the participants were "golden"! They worked in groups and pairs  . . . it was magical (and exhausting!). However, once you manage this kind of group in an interactive plenary . . . you can do anything, right?


All ages event!
We advertised the same presentation again, and in 24 hours over 200 had registered! Amazing. We capped that one right away and will see if the audience that shows up next Thursday is, in fact, more manageable. Ahhh, how to deal with success?? A dilemma that I welcome :) In the meantime, I made a quick trip to Rosario, a city about 3-4 hours northeast by car. The audience there consisted of 20 language school directors. . . so intimate! Afterwards, I was able to run around the city pedestrian mall taking quick pictures before the sun went completely down. I was even able to capture a short video of a young accordian player being intently watched by an older gentleman (maybe a fellow player?).
Pair work with a smaller audience in Rosario
Anyhow, things are picking up . . . which is exciting. My biggest challenge is to take presentations that I am accustomed to delivering to 20-30 participants and make them more user-friendly to a large audience. I have already started moving them to a PowerPoint format, making pair and group work more explicit, asking for microphones for both me and audience member comments, and posting handouts online for participants to print ahead of time and bring with them to the venue. Coming soon to an auditorium near you! Check your local listings