Lizzy en Argentina: Making the Most of It All

I really can't believe that next weekend, my parents are coming to meet me in Córdoba. I have such vivid memories of the first couple weeks, when November felt like a million years away.

Time hasn't passed too fast, though-- or at least I feel like I've been present with it. It's just weird to finally be reaching a moment that I thought about lot.

One of the best things about these past couple weeks is that I've finally felt that I have made an impact and become part of the community of my school. Last Friday evening, I helped organize a taller (workshop) about education (specifically second/foreign language education) in the United States for the second year students. Originally the entire workshop was supposed to be in English, so I had prepared a true/false activity and some other information in English... and then the week of, they decided to do it half in Spanish. We kept the true/false in English, but the rest of the 3-hour workshop would be in Spanish.

That meant I would have to speak in Spanish about my Spanish-learning experience in front of a group of native speakers, and then field questions.

Weirdly, I wasn't as nervous as I thought I would be-- not nearly as nervous as I was 8 months ago when I had to give a 2-sentence introduction in Spanish that mostly just included my name and what college I attended.

I made plenty of mistakes, I'm sure, some that I was aware of and others I probably missed. But I think I communicated what I meant to communicate, and the students were all very kind about it.

Afterwards, the school principal and professors and students surprised me with a small gift, a book that they had signed. I don't think I was concerned much about what the gift was-- it just meant so much to me that they took that time to show their appreciation in that way. It reaffirmed that I had made an impact, that I was... one of them.

This evening was followed by an absolutely incredible long weekend in Mendoza-- possibly my favorite few days of travel here.

I met up with some of the coolest parents in the world (aside from my own) who were incredibly generous and made me feel so loved and taken care of. Plus we had some incredible meals and OMG FREE WINE TASTINGS ARE THE BEST. As a Californian whose dad regularly worked up in Napa, I've always had a preference for wine over beer. But, as the person who led our first wine tasting mentioned, there is something about being on vacation that makes all the wines taste even better. I think I've even getting a hang of the whole describing the wine thing... "Yes, it's bold with a smoky undertone... and this one is quite fruity, with hints of chocolate at the back of your mouth..." :P I kept thinking of that scene in The Parent Trap with Haley trying a sip of her mom's wine in England...

While in Mendoza, there were a few times that I ended up doing some translating... and I actually shocked myself with how comfortably I fit into the role! It felt really, really good to be able to facilitate conversation between people who didn't share a common language. There was one time that one of the wine cellar guides was attempting to tell us a little bit about the history of the winery and the wines, but she was struggling to find the words in English. I told her to continue in castellano (Spanish), and I related what she said to my friends. I was able to catch the details about the year that the winery was founded, the number of generations it had passed through the same family, when it had been sold, and I was able to ask clarifying questions in Spanish. It's a small interaction, but it's so satisfying to have those moments where I can see that my work here with the language has really been paying off.

So yeah. It's shaping up to be a pretty wonderful end to my time in Argentina. I'm already thinking about how I will need to continue to find opportunities to speak Spanish when I get back to the States. Now that I've had a taste of bilingual life, I don't want to go back... I love existing in both languages simultaneously. I hope to attend conversation groups, maybe sit in on some classes at SF State to brush up on advanced grammar, and I'm looking into the possibilities of a bilingual teaching career.

Pics from the week (there's a lot this time):