Classes have officially started here...
I still haven't figured out my schedule completely because my art class (painting or photography) doesn't start for another 2 weeks... Other than that, I am taking a grammar class, a spanish listening/conversation class, 2 lit classes, and a non-credit nature painting class. My lit class at flacso is mainly focused on the city and we go on lots of fieldtrips to different places that were important to certain authors. Our first trip is next week and we have to bring our cameras and take pictures while we walk around the city. My other lit class is at IUNA, the art school. The atmosphere there is really relaxed and people are constantly playing music or dancing in the courtyard. In my classroom there were probably 20 desks for 40 students...My painting class is great. It's on the top floor of an old theatre with beautiful natural light (great for painting!) I didn't understand a lot of what my professor said but she basically set up a still life and said "paint it", which I understood, art is pretty universal. I also tried out a psychology class at UBA which is the public school here. That was an interesting experience! The building is completely unfinished with handmade posters covering every inch of the walls. The classroom had murals all over the walls and desks that were falling apart. The class was so interesting but there's no way I could pass it.
In general, classes here are fairly similar to classes at home except for a few differences. The biggest one of course is that everything's in spanish! haha. Lots of stuff goes over my head but I think that it's getting better...It's not unusual for a professor to arrive 20-30 minutes late to class and students walk in super late too and sometimes just leave to get food. In lots of classes there is a 10 minute break usually so that the professor can go smoke (if they don't just smoke in the class). We don't have any textbooks just huge photocopied readings that we have to buy from photocopy kioscs.
Other than trying out classes I haven't really done anything too interesting...This morning i went to finish my visa process which was surprisingly easy. It only took an hour and a half even though they told us to prepare to be there for several hours. Sunday after church, Kerri, Chelsea and I went to recoleta to see the famous cemetery and fair.
The weather here is getting so nice. Today it was 75 and beautiful. Because it was so nice and my class this afternoon was relatively close to me, I decided to walk. While I walked there I was thinking about how funny it was that a 30 minute walk now seems close to me even though at hope the farthest walk is maybe 7 minutes. Walking to class also seemed like an exciting novelty because I always have to take a subway or bus to get there.
Well...I should probably get back to the reading I am avoiding doing. Off to a good start...
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