Choir Performance from Colonia

I'm a little bummed that this is sideways, but this is the choir that performed for us in Colonia, Uruguay. They also sang "Ride the Chariot" but my file is too big to upload to YouTube. Boo.

Montevideo, Uruguay!

I spent the last week at a Fulbright conference in Montevideo, Uruguay. I got to meet Fulbright Scholars from Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, and Paraguay. We listened to everyone's research projects, which were all so diverse and incredibly interesting.

We went on a walking tour of Montevideo.

We met the US Ambassador to Uruguay, Frank Braxton.

We met some of the survivors of a famous plane crash in the Andes. They survived 74 days on the mountain before they were rescued.



We took a day trip to Colonia and....







....went horseback riding!




This is the view from my horse. As you can see, the man is leading my horse along. At the time, I told people that he was leading my horse because my horse was spooked and wasn't behaving. This is highly unlikely :) I'm sure he just noticed how terrified I was and thought it would be better if he led us along :)



We met a lot of new people as well :)



The girls at an awesome Mexican restaurant that we found :)



Me and Tanya, an amazing girl from Tufts who's currently researching in Chile.



Here we have my wonderful roommate for the week, Nicole and the lovely Rachel with Manuel, an AMAZING guy who's currently researching in Uruguay. I liked him so much that after our conversation, I asked him if we could be friends ;) Haha I'm so lame.



The whole Argentina Fulbright crew!

This trip was great for me because it definitely reinvigorated my excitement about my research project. People gave me great resources and suggestions. Montevideo is a beautiful city and it has 22 miles of amazing promenade along the River Plate. This is the view from across the street from our amazing hotel:





We had an amazing week and I have to say I was sorry to fly back to Buenos Aires. Please click here to see the entire album of photos from my Uruguay trip. I took so many photos that there was no way I was going to put all of them on the blog!

Birthday Dinner with the Fulbright Crew

The Fulbright crew got together last night to help me celebrate my birthday at...get ready... something new and different... Sushi Club! I love this restaurant. We had a great time and the Buenos Aires group was SO lucky to have Nicole in town from Misiones to celebrate with us!

Here we have Christina and Christian.

Here's the lovely Nicole and me!

Me with Chulie's boyfriend, Alejandro.

The gang.

Here's Abhay having none of my picture taking.

Nicole, Matt, Christina and Christian at a great bar in Las Canitas.



Last picture of the night: Chulie, me and Matt.

It's Only Talk

Saw an amazing Japanese film at the Buenos Aires Film Festival called "It's Only Talk." It's a beautiful story about a woman who suffers from manic depression caused by the death of her parents. The film was really long, but it was beautifully shot and the music is fantastic-- very cool use of color as well.

I highly recommend!

Happy Easter, Happy Birthday

So this weekend, my roommate Gaby's parents came in to celebrate her birthday. Coincidentally, she and I have the same birthday, so her parents invited me out to dinner as well for a birthday celebration. We went to a great steak (Keyvan: read steak, I even have pictures to prove it!) restaurant in Puerto Madero. Gaby's dad even bought us roses to celebrate our birthdays :)

Note the half cow I have on my plate. Needless to say I didn't eat all of it, but it's good for dramatic effect :)

Here we have Gaby's wonderful parents.

And here we have Gaby's cousin Marcela and her friend Andrea.



Birthday girls :)



And here we have Gaby's sister Rosa, me, and Gaby.

Birthday roses :)

After dinner, we walked along the promenade in Puerto Madero.

Easter was pretty uneventful. First I headed to the San Telmo antiques market with the girls from my apartment. I took a little video of an awesome tango orchestra which you can see here.

After San Telmo, I went over to Aunt Graciela's house for lunch because I was having serious family withdrawals. After a late lunch, Carmen and I went to see Paris Je T'aime, a surprisingly un-French movie all about Paris-- quite good though.

On Monday, I celebrated my 23rd birthday with a trip to the gym, a film about the history of soul music in the U.S. which is currently in Buenos Aires as part of the international film festival, and a trip to the ice cream shop.

Hope you're having a great week!

First Tuesday Hip Hop Night

So one of Abhay's friends, Charles, was promoting a hip hop club last night, so I thought it would be fun to bring some of the girls from my house. We were told to be there at 11:30, but unfortunately we arrived "late" at 12:30 to find that there was no one in the club except for us. Haha, oh well, I guess the club needs a little more buzz. It was still fun though-- we made friends with the bartender and with the DJ, who is coincidentally from Berkeley, and had a great time. AND I finally have some pictures of the people I live with.

Here we have Pia, Zarina, and Paty.



Here's me and my roommate Gaby.

Leslie being ridiculous :)



And here we have the first picture of Chulie, another Fulbrighter :)

Buenos Aires Design Exhibition

So I spent some of yesterday wandering around La Rural (a large exhibition center quite close to my old apartment.) The show featured furniture, men's and women's clothing, jewelry, shoes, etc. I was excited to see what up and coming Argentine designers were doing. I have to be honest-- I was not that impressed. I felt like I'd seen a lot of the "innovative" designs before-- a lot of shark tooth motifs in jewelry, I swear this girl literally just reproduced the Chloe Paddington bag, some minimalist furniture, a few throwbacks to the 60's, eh. Well it was fun to have a look around and I did take some photos for ya'll to see. Bear with me, some of these came out sideways and I can't figure out how to put them right side up :)

One cool thing that I learned about at the exhibition was a company called "Tom's Shoes," which was founded by a man who had been in Argentina and wanted to do something to alleviate the rampant poverty here. The shoes he sells are modeled after shoes that everyone wears here. Check out the site, it's pretty cool: http://www.tomsshoes.com/

And finally... I had lunch with Abhay and we wandered around his new neighborhood. This picture is for Munchie because I saw it and totally thought of you :)

My address!

I finally have a physical address--woot! For the next couple of months, if you care to send me anything, you can send it here:

Leslie Hernandez
c/o Casa Aliaga
Paraná 1190 3º H
1018 Capital Federal
Buenos Aires, Argentina
C1018ADD

Have a great day!