Bienvenidos a Buenos Aires

It's Monday night after my first full day in Argentina. I'm not necessarily in love but, to quote a friend on the program, I am already "deeply infatuated" with this city.

Yes, I am a total sucker for murals. This one tells the history of the slaughterhouse district; here a paperboy celebrates the victory of a renowned local boxer.

I woke from too little sleep to not care and find energy in adrenaline instead. After a long but fascinating morning getting our intro to Buenos Aires (safety, history, money advice; "No matter what you are talking about in this country, you are talking about Peron"; "If you're an intellectual in this country then you don't go to the discotequa"; "Get used to traveling like a sardine on the subway") we emerged for a leisurely lunch and a long walk downtown.

All the reverse culture shock we might have expected from the end of IHP and a return to the USA seems to have hit us here in Argentina instead. Things feel suddenly, radically, surprisingly familiar and comfortable: ample sidewalks to walk on. Tall buildings with the top stories shaped like overgrown staircases so as to not block out sunlight on the street (just like in New York). A clearly planned grid; Western clothes everywhere; McDonalds and Starbucks and a store called Clandestine that seems like an Argentinian version of Claire's but for slightly older women. And since I'm lucky enough to actually speak the language of the people who live here, existing in this city feels so easy that it's a little jarring - I'd really started to get used to not knowing how to talk to anybody, to assuming I know nothing about the meaning behind particular clothes and gestures, to learning by making sense of what seems like chaos initially.

But I also keep thinking of an extremely pretentious but also very well-put phrase that a guest lecturer from Harvard once said at Yale: that the purpose of history is "to normalize the exotic, and exoticize the quotidian." In other words, learning about the world at once makes you realize that what you had once assumed to be strange or confusing or Other to you is actually quite understandable - and simultaneously makes you understand that things you take for granted, assume are normal, or think of as inevitable, really have extremely complex stories of their own that you never knew about. IHP does that, relentlessly and beautifully, and I'll bet that my time in Buenos Aires will be no different. Just maybe more on the "exoticize the quotidian" side of things.

Quotidian to be exoticized?

Exoticism to be normalized?

Buenos Aires has so many of the things I have enjoyed and found excitement in about New York and Chicago - the walkability, the endless visual stimuli, the hidden architectural surprises, the masses of humanity, the food to eat as you walk, the accessibility of opportunities for intellectual stimulus with museums and bookstores and the like - and it also happens to be in Spanish, which is sort of the perfect combination for me. Here are a few photos to show you why I'm starting to feel infatuated:

SO MANY BOOKSTORES

AND SO MANY CHURROS

Traditional "scratching" protest tactic - throw paint balls at a building to "scratch" it and reveal the corruption of the building's owner. Started after the Dirty War.

"Our homeland is not a business," more or less

Ongoing protest about government response to the floods. A lot of protests here...

New bike lanes

After the walk we retired to our home-stays, and mine is ridiculous and wonderful. This husband and wife (parents of three, and grandparents of seven) used to run an artisan/household materials store out of their huge home not far from the heart of Buenos Aires. With imports from China hurting their business in the 1990's, they closed down shop and started looking for something else to do. When a friend mentioned to them a growing number of study abroad programs in Buenos Aires in perpetual need of good home-stays (and willing to pay decent money for them too), they decided to make use of their huge house and opened it up for guests in 1995. 18 years later, they have yet to look back and - except for the two months they take off each year to travel the world - generally have about ten study abroad students staying in their house at any given time, their hijos adoptivos.

El Ateneo, South America's largest bookstore - housed in an old theater

Now is no exception, and we three IHP boys joined up with seven more students for what looks to be four weeks with a very caring and relaxed family. Domestic wine is served with each huge dinner; our host dad throws us peeled bananas for desert from as far back as he can go in the kitchen; we have a key to the house in case we join the crowds and stay out dancing until seven in the morning, but we also feel comfortable staying at home and - though he will allegedly make fun of us for not taking advantage of the chance to party - hearing all his amazing stories and political musings.

How this infatuation is problematic or complicated or other things can like that can wait; for now, Buenos Aires, mucho gusto conocerte.

Beef is king in Argentina...