Making a House a Home

We took a boat across the Rio del Plata and from there a bus from Colonia to Montevideo. 

The inside of the boat

Once we arrived at the airport sized bus terminal, we took a taxi to the house. It was pretty surreal driving through the city. I looked around and knew nothing but knew that within the next few months, all of it would be familiar. When we finally arrived at our house, we got out of the taxi bug eyed and giddy. After traveling for a month, it is a weird feeling knowing that I am going to be in one spot for 5 months.

We rang the doorbell, extremely excited to get inside but there was no answer. We knocked, thinking the doorbell was broken but still, no answer. We didn’t know what to do at this point. We looked around at each other, trying to decide what to do. A minute later, the door opened. We awkwardly piled in the entry way for a few seconds when the girl said. Hi. We responded hi and stood there awkwardly for a little while longer. Finally, she offered to show us our rooms and the tension left. Alex and I are going to share a room close to the first floor.

Jeremy is staying in his own room above the kitchen. He has to climb up stairs of death to get up to his room. 

After we dropped our things off in our room, we returned to the kitchen to meet our host dad. He was extremely intimidating at first. He gave us a tour of the rest of the house and then we walked around outside for a little bit. We walked to the coast (6 blocks from the house) and back. 

After we returned, we ate dinner. After dinner, I went upstairs to unpack for the first time in a month and put my things away. 

I was called away by Eduardo, my host dad, to watch a movie with him. Jeremy was called over too. It was a good movie and fun to hang out.

We quickly learned the house rules and I am a fan of all of them: always speak in Spanish, wear shoes (seriously, I didn’t have any on one morning and I told Eduardo I didn’t want to wear any and he went into my room, got some and put them on my feet. Apparently, you catch a cold if you don’t wear shoes in the house because the floor is cold and dirty…), and everything is free to use or eat.

The next day, we woke up and ate breakfast. We were waiting for Alex to wake up but at 11, Eduardo got tired of that so we left without her. We took a walk around the city. He explained the major streets in our area and we also visited a few points of interest such as the Russian Embassy, which is a beautiful building nearby. 

When we returned, Alex was up and in the kitchen. We hung out for a while and then headed out for another walk. This time we stopped at his siblings’ apartment and went on the roof to get a look at the city.

We kind of just hung out for the rest of the day. That night, after dinner, Eduardo taught us a new game called the rabbit and the dogs.

Might be the best thing I've eaten here

The next day, the other girls and our host mom arrived around mid day. It was really great to meet them and we spend the afternoon hanging out and getting to know each other. In the afternoon, we took a ride to our University so we would know the walking route for the next day. After, we came back for a family meal and went to bed. I should mention, we have not had a conversation in English. We are only allowed to speak Spanish in the house .Eduardo calls English the barbarian language. He chastises us if he sees on us on our phone or computer too much. He said every time we use English, we are slowing our growth of Spanish. It is really great and really frustrating to only speak in Spanish. It’s nearly impossible to say exactly what I want to but I am learning exponentially. I consider us lucky though because other students that we have met are not required to speak Spanish all the time at home and I think they are at a definite disadvantage.

The next day we had orientation at our University. Eduardo drove us so we could see the walking route one more time. He stopped to show us this.

Eduardo wanted us to take a picture sitting on the bulls but when we went around the pond on the grass, an alarm went off, a dog ran at us, and a man came out and yelled at us. Then we saw the sign that said we wouldn't walk on the grass. Oops.

So then we settled for this picture instead, even though Eduardo wanted us to sit on the bulls anyways

 We mainly played get to know you games for the first half. The second half included a lot of information about the University and the city, Montevideo. After it was over, we headed back to the house to a lunch waiting for us at 2:30.

After lunch, we went to Antel, a cell phone company, to buy phones that work here. It took 3 hours but we finally got them. It was super cheap, like $20 for the phone and minutes. After this, we headed back home for a nap and then dinner at the usual time, 10. We have family dinners, which I really like. It is nice to be gathered around a table all together. 

After dinner, we had to put something on our phone because we all bought the same one. Laura took out some sparkly letters and insisted we all use them.

The next day we had another orientation. 

They don't have peanut butter in Uruguay, so I brought my own. I didn't have any for the first month of travel. It was amazing

Jeremy drove to school this morning because Eduardo randomly handed him the keys

This one was more focused on the classes we can take at the university and how the course work. For almost all of the classes, if I attend 75% of the classes, and have a Bueno Muy Bueno grade in the class (a C), I don’t have to take the final exam because I passed the class. (Yeah, I know). So I’m shooting to not have to take any of my finals which would be swwwwwwwwwwweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet. After our orientation, we went out to lunch with some students who have already been here a semester. The lunch was amazing. Melissa and I shared a dish that I forgot the name of (sorry, this is becoming a regular occurrence). 

Maya's mountain of food I forgot the name of

We got to split this delicious dulce de leche ice cream

It was fun hanging out and getting to know other students, especially ones who know the city already and how the University works.

Later that night, after an early dinner to accommodate our plans, we headed out for a murga. 

A murga is a satirical play about the politics in Uruguay. It is a part of the Carnival celebration and I’m really glad I got to see it. I couldn’t understand much of it but I was told that some Uruguayans don’t even understand it so that made me feel better. They sang most of the time which was nice because even though I couldn’t understand the words, I enjoyed the music. I also really enjoyed the costumes.

After the murgo, we went to Garrett’s house (one of the guy’s we went to lunch with) to hang out.  It was the 21^st birthday of one of the girls from America, went out to the bars to celebrate at 1. (No one was out because it was too early). We had to wait till 3 for the club to even open up before going in. We stayed till 3:45 and headed back home because the next night is the 21^st birthday of my roommate, Melissa and we are going to celebrate her’s as well. Everyone made fun of us for leaving so early. The locals stay out till 6 or 7 in the morning.