De ahora en más

So, since I´ve announced it to my parents and to my boss and to a few of you, I suppose that it´s now going on to the blog: I´ve decided, officially, that I´m going to stay in Argentina longer than the six months I had originally planned.

My flight leaves on March 9, but it looks like I´ll be staying in South America a few months more. At the moment, I´m thinking of staying at my job until May, doing a bit of traveling and then making it home just in time for summer. Really, I just can´t see myself missing the annual Ben & Jerry´s bingefest, i.e. the week more universally known as ´´Turkewitz Family Vacation.´´

Reports of job conditions in the U.S. aren´t exactly roping me back in, and the sad condition of the economy has been made clear to me not only by my friends back home, but also by the suspiciously large community of expats who are here in Buenos Aires making ´´life changes´´ (a nice little euphemism for ´´I´m unemployed and it´s cheaper to live on the peso!´´) It´s a bit a ironic that we´ve fled to a nation with one of the worlds´most unpredictable economies, but hey, ironies make life interesting.

Mostly, though, I feel like I have so much more to learn down here. There are all kinds of things I still want to do, and my Spanish still has a way to go. I´m lucky to have a job, an apartment, a neighborhood to explore, a beach only a few hours away (the water may be brown, but hey, the world isn´t perfect), and easy access to a lot of amazing places. Also, I´ve finally decided that I´m tired of being the office joke, and I´ve enlisted a tutor to smooth out the rough edges on my language skills.

I´m moving along, and I´ve now learned some incredibly useful vocabulary such as ´´turnstile´´ (molinete . . . which actually makes so much sense because a molino is a grinder), ´´I hit my funny bone,´´ (me maté el codo) and Flinstones (picapiedras). As you can see, these are all very essential parts of my Spanish training which I would never have learned in the U.S., and clearly they will help my acquire my dream job one day. (Right?)

So, here´s to four more months in South America! And an announcement for all of you: Ellen just discovered a 688 US dollar flight to Buenos Aires. Wowzers. Email me for more info.