Last Day at La Juanita

24 September 2009

Today was my last at La Juanita. I almost wish it were more bittersweet, because I haven’t really formed bonds with many of the people here, other than the volunteers. Because of this, not many people knew it was my last day, and Ilana was sick as well. Poor shanti…

Allie bought some dog food for the little puppy that was left at La Juanita yesterday…it was entertaining watching her try to buy dog food by the kilo from the open 40-lb bags, just open on the sidewalk. I’m surprised the stray dogs don’t get into them, but then again, I’m sure they’re fed table scraps and don’t want the real dog food.

The kids in the jardin were a mess, as usual. Our short time in the jardin was spent blocking the doors so the kids couldn’t escape or get into trouble inside while everyone else was outside. Mauri and Lucas with the mullet were up to no good again, and I actually had to pick up Mauri and bring him outside. Yet another testament that kids need some kind of discipline.


Not all of the kids showed up for class either, including the two I’ve been helping a lot recently, Rocio and Abigail, doing multiplication in Spanish. It was hard enough to remember how to do long division and multiplication, and having to teach it in a different language was quite a feat. But with no kids to help, I had plenty of time to finish my own homework before my Spanish lesson at 6:30. Carlos came and chatted with us for a bit, actually helping Allie teach English phonetics and me with my homework. (Carlos is a guy that comes frequently to speak with us in English and has been studying English for many years, diligently. He has an internship with Boomtown in Bossier City, starting in December. Explaining the Cajun accent has been an on-going source of entertainment.)

Martin, a former student of ours, came to the cooperativa drunk today, so that was a source of excitement for a hot minute. He wasn’t violent or anything, but disrupting class and generally being a creepster. We had to call for some help in getting him out of the room and out of the center, since it’s really not appropriate with the kids there and all. His intoxication got me thinking about the street drug here, paco, which Ariana just informed me about. It made me want to do a little more research, and it’s essentially cocaine paste and byproducts, mixed with whatever else they can find. I don’t know if he was using at all, who knows.

After La Juanita, I had a pretty strenuous Spanish lesson with Gisela, listening to audios about lumfardo, the slang here in BsAs. Afterwards, I was exhausted and cranky, and couldn’t decide whether I wanted pizza or wine (or both). Wine won out, and I vetoed the pizza because of my growing food baby from eating so well in this town. So I headed to the supermercado next door…and it was closed, only 20 minutes after I’d passed it open on my way home. So I kept walking, perhaps I’d stop at Lo Bebe parilla and have a salad, or make my way to my café for a glass of wine. I decided to stop in Lo Bebe, and it was definitely interesting, to say the least. I ended up getting a sandwich, marcipan, and a side salad, since it would come out the same cost-wise as if I’d gotten a large salad. I’ve had churipan before, which is delicious, but I’d never had marcipan and wanted to try something different. And it’s definitely blood sausage. Yeah. And also came with fries, surprisingly. I knew exactly what it was when I cut into it, and it took a lot of effort to get a large enough portion down to remain polite to the chef. Or grill master… I’ve never had it before, and it was very rich, and had the consistency of the not-so-mushed variety refried black beans. I think the knowing what I was eating was the pin in the coffin for me. I ended up taking home the rest of it, because I was so afraid of offending someone! So I need to trash that eventually, or feed it to a stray dog or something. I think in the future, I’ll stick to delicious churipan, which is essentially a sausage sandwich with delicious sauce that totally makes it. But major diet time when I leave BsAs. My body cannot handle this any longer! I am really starting to love it here, but I can’t wait to leave this gastronomical roller coaster ride of a city!