As I sit here preparing to write this blog, I am snacking on some delicious grapes. However, all grapes here have seeds. The more seed-full grapes I eat, the more I realize how underrated seed-less grapes are.
Friday (2/20) - We went to the concert, which was a pretty cool event for free. Just in the center of the city, next to a park, at a major intersection, they had a large stage set up infront of a plaza. There was an opening band and then the feature trio, and there were quite a lot of people there. It was very crowded and the lines to get food were not short. There were a lot of picnic-ers (ourselves included). After the kids got tired and Romi decided it was time to go, I met up with some of the language school friends who were also there. We hung for a while, and after the concert ended, I walked the 8ish blocks to a bar called Lucuma to meet up with a local buddy and his friends. It was "Irish" night at the bar as they had irish live music with bag pipes and people dressed in kilts. There, I met other foreigners from Spain and Germany who were staying for about a month like me. So here I was - an American at a bar in Argentina, listening to Irish music, conversing with a German native and a Spanish native in English. I should probably take more time to sit back and realize how unique these experiences are.
We eventually escaped the bar to a 24 hour Sweets bakery a block away, and it was absolutely eye candy. I was willingly forced to try the "Chipas", which are freshly baked little circles of cheese bread and they are far beyond delicious. They definitely top the list of best foods I have had on this trip so far.
Saturday - Started to get down to business a little bit with the planning of my travels, post Rosario. Apparently there are a lot of things I need to book ahead of time, so I am trying not to miss out. The Rosario Central futbol game started at 7, but I was told to arrive at Claudio's house by 4:30. Claudio, Juan (his 5 year old son, this was his first game), Narendra, and I walked the 7 blocks to the stadium, straight through the rowdiness of the "hinchas" which includes but is not limited to: loud yelling/chanting, jumping and waving of the arms, throwing shredded and unshredded newspapers in the street, consuming beverages, showing an abundance of excitement, and gunshots.
Like I have mentioned before, there are no open parking lots in the city, so the stadium is not really visible from a far as it sits behind some trees and another building or two. Like Newell's it comes in a complex with other sports, this time a very nice swimming pool. And Central's stadium overlooks the river. We went to sit in the upper deck for a better view. There are seat assignments on your tickets, but few people obey them. Our seats were on the lower level. In fact so many people were on the upper level that the isles were full with fans sitting, and that seemed to be very normal.
Before the team ran out, people were handing out rolls of receipt paper for us to throw as streams towards the field when the team entered the field. They handed out a lot of paper rolls. Eventually, the sidelines had mountains of while paper rolls on them, and probably 40-50 staff members had to help clear the field. Some indecent fans kept their roles and threw them at the refs during live play. Some fans even waited for a corner kick and then you'd see a flying paper roll land right in front of the ball. I am sure those fans was chuckling while everyone else was hissing at him/her/it.
The game was very slow paced, we think that was Tigre's plan in order to take the crowd out of it. It worked for most of the game as the crowd's songs were not that loud and there was definitely a lack of energy throughout the stadium. There was an extreme low in energy when there was a 10 minute stoppage of play because medical staff had to attend to the head coach after he was hit in the head by something thrown from the crowd. Classy.
About 42 minutes into the second half (it's 1-1 at this point), Tigre got their second red card, which now made it 11 vs 9 players, and now there was a lot of energy buzzing. However, during the 14 (!!!!) minutes of extra time, Central couldn't seem to score. Finally in the 13th minute of ET, Central scored on a corner kick-ish and the crowd went absolutely crazy. It was an incredible experience in person to witness such a dramatic victory.
Later that night, we went to the house of a Swiss/German couple also taking classes at the language school and hung there for the night. We have made friends with a group of locals who work as English-Spanish translators, so it works out great because we all get to practice our Spanish and they get to learn about English as well. And they make sure we know about all of the fun things to do around town (hence Carnival, free concerts, adventures on the river, etc).
Sunday - I made my way to "Playa de Florida", a beach with a small entry fee about 5 kilometers north of our area. It is a very nice beach area with plenty of space, sand volleyball courts, restaurants, a stage for performances, etc. The sand was too hot for vball though, so after an hour+ of asking and searching, I finally found a water source and got to play some. People are friendly and love activity and foreigners, so it is super easy to get a pickup game going.
Then, later, I enjoyed a nice dinner with my buddy Brendan at Club de la Milonesa. It was very tasty and we were able to hang out on the patio for a while.
It is crazy how I am already over half of the way done with my time in Rosario, time seems to work the same way down here as it does back home - it flies by. I still have a lot to plan and book for my upcoming travels, and the more I do, the more excited I get about them. But there is a lot to be excited about, I try not to leave the present.
Feel free to Viber, WhatsApp, email, facebook, Snapchat, etc whenever you'd like!
(For some reason uploading pictures isn't working right now, they will come!! It's always something...)
Friday (2/20) - We went to the concert, which was a pretty cool event for free. Just in the center of the city, next to a park, at a major intersection, they had a large stage set up infront of a plaza. There was an opening band and then the feature trio, and there were quite a lot of people there. It was very crowded and the lines to get food were not short. There were a lot of picnic-ers (ourselves included). After the kids got tired and Romi decided it was time to go, I met up with some of the language school friends who were also there. We hung for a while, and after the concert ended, I walked the 8ish blocks to a bar called Lucuma to meet up with a local buddy and his friends. It was "Irish" night at the bar as they had irish live music with bag pipes and people dressed in kilts. There, I met other foreigners from Spain and Germany who were staying for about a month like me. So here I was - an American at a bar in Argentina, listening to Irish music, conversing with a German native and a Spanish native in English. I should probably take more time to sit back and realize how unique these experiences are.
We eventually escaped the bar to a 24 hour Sweets bakery a block away, and it was absolutely eye candy. I was willingly forced to try the "Chipas", which are freshly baked little circles of cheese bread and they are far beyond delicious. They definitely top the list of best foods I have had on this trip so far.
Saturday - Started to get down to business a little bit with the planning of my travels, post Rosario. Apparently there are a lot of things I need to book ahead of time, so I am trying not to miss out. The Rosario Central futbol game started at 7, but I was told to arrive at Claudio's house by 4:30. Claudio, Juan (his 5 year old son, this was his first game), Narendra, and I walked the 7 blocks to the stadium, straight through the rowdiness of the "hinchas" which includes but is not limited to: loud yelling/chanting, jumping and waving of the arms, throwing shredded and unshredded newspapers in the street, consuming beverages, showing an abundance of excitement, and gunshots.
Like I have mentioned before, there are no open parking lots in the city, so the stadium is not really visible from a far as it sits behind some trees and another building or two. Like Newell's it comes in a complex with other sports, this time a very nice swimming pool. And Central's stadium overlooks the river. We went to sit in the upper deck for a better view. There are seat assignments on your tickets, but few people obey them. Our seats were on the lower level. In fact so many people were on the upper level that the isles were full with fans sitting, and that seemed to be very normal.
Before the team ran out, people were handing out rolls of receipt paper for us to throw as streams towards the field when the team entered the field. They handed out a lot of paper rolls. Eventually, the sidelines had mountains of while paper rolls on them, and probably 40-50 staff members had to help clear the field. Some indecent fans kept their roles and threw them at the refs during live play. Some fans even waited for a corner kick and then you'd see a flying paper roll land right in front of the ball. I am sure those fans was chuckling while everyone else was hissing at him/her/it.
The game was very slow paced, we think that was Tigre's plan in order to take the crowd out of it. It worked for most of the game as the crowd's songs were not that loud and there was definitely a lack of energy throughout the stadium. There was an extreme low in energy when there was a 10 minute stoppage of play because medical staff had to attend to the head coach after he was hit in the head by something thrown from the crowd. Classy.
About 42 minutes into the second half (it's 1-1 at this point), Tigre got their second red card, which now made it 11 vs 9 players, and now there was a lot of energy buzzing. However, during the 14 (!!!!) minutes of extra time, Central couldn't seem to score. Finally in the 13th minute of ET, Central scored on a corner kick-ish and the crowd went absolutely crazy. It was an incredible experience in person to witness such a dramatic victory.
Later that night, we went to the house of a Swiss/German couple also taking classes at the language school and hung there for the night. We have made friends with a group of locals who work as English-Spanish translators, so it works out great because we all get to practice our Spanish and they get to learn about English as well. And they make sure we know about all of the fun things to do around town (hence Carnival, free concerts, adventures on the river, etc).
Sunday - I made my way to "Playa de Florida", a beach with a small entry fee about 5 kilometers north of our area. It is a very nice beach area with plenty of space, sand volleyball courts, restaurants, a stage for performances, etc. The sand was too hot for vball though, so after an hour+ of asking and searching, I finally found a water source and got to play some. People are friendly and love activity and foreigners, so it is super easy to get a pickup game going.
Then, later, I enjoyed a nice dinner with my buddy Brendan at Club de la Milonesa. It was very tasty and we were able to hang out on the patio for a while.
It is crazy how I am already over half of the way done with my time in Rosario, time seems to work the same way down here as it does back home - it flies by. I still have a lot to plan and book for my upcoming travels, and the more I do, the more excited I get about them. But there is a lot to be excited about, I try not to leave the present.
Feel free to Viber, WhatsApp, email, facebook, Snapchat, etc whenever you'd like!
(For some reason uploading pictures isn't working right now, they will come!! It's always something...)