Buenos Aires, Argentina: Natalie

During my time in Buenos Aires, I have been living in a neighborhood called Recoleta. It is a beautiful neighborhood best known for its cemetery. It is filled with restaurants, a mall, parks, and so much more! This blog post will be a little virtual tour around the place I have called home for the past month. The image above is the church that the cemetery is associated with. It is a beautiful building inside and out, and is open for the public to see. Inside the cemetery is even more spectacular than the church! There is row after row of beautiful monuments celebrating the lives of many. It is a place of reverence and respect for the dead. The atmosphere of the cemetery is incredible and even after visiting it multiple times, I still appreciate its beauty each time I see it!  Another one of my favorite places in Recoleta is the Ateneo bookstore. In this building that used to be an old theater, books are sold and tourists are attracted to the structure of the...

I am now a little over one week into this adventure in Argentina. At first, it was quite overwhelming. The city is huge, and it took me a few days to get used to navigating through the city using the "subte" (subway) system here and coordinating bus routes as well. The language barrier was also a shock to me, but I have been learning so much every single day and have improved in my language skills already in the short amount of time that I have been here! Some of my favorite things about living in Buenos Aires so far is the closeness of everything. Everywhere I need or want to go is either a short walk or subway ride away. And with subway trips costing less than 30 cents, exploring is so easy to do here! I live in a neighborhood called Recoleta, home of the famous Recoleta cemetery. This has been one of my favorite tourist destinations so far. The massive cemetery is filled with elegant monuments to celebrate the lives of deceased loved ones. The atmosphere is one of respec...

Hello! As I embark on this journey abroad, I determined that the best way to keep track of my adventures and memories would be to blog about it. I am now exactly ONE WEEK away from departure and I could not be more excited! I recently found out with whom and where I will be staying and have been in contact with my future host mom. I feel much more comfortable with living in a nation that does not speak my primary language now that I have been able to talk to the person I will be living with. It is so nice to have these connections before leaving! I have also been able to contact another group of students that is already in Buenos Aires for the first session of the program. They have been able to provide me with some important things to pack and what to expect with the weather, classes, and overall atmosphere of Argentina. One of my biggest fears going into this adventure was not knowing a single person and being alone in a foreign country, but now that I have been in contact with not o...