Bariloche - Living in Paradise

miércoles 8 de agosto 2012

I’ve been in Bariloche now for 10 days.  This place is absolutely magical.

Picture a humongous lake.  Now in your mind, make it twice as humongous.  Then put mountains all around it.  Sprinkle a dusting of snow on the tops of those mountains.  Add some trees.  Add some more trees.  Last, build a quaint little town on the coast.  Bam. That’s where I’m living.

For the first handful of days, Luke (one of my TEFL classmates, who came here with me) and I were couch-surfing with this guy named Mario (30-year-old snowboarding engineer. Really cool lad).  During the day we went out looking for work/housing.  I had been browsing through this website (compartdepto.com.), which lists housing/people searching for roommates in Argentina, for a while.  One day we decided to go see a house that this couple (Walter and Miriam) had listed as having a room for rent.  They live in this really big, really gorgeous wooden house, on the lake, in la Peninsula de San Pedro.  The Peninsula is about 20km from el centro, but as soon as we saw the place, that didn’t really matter to Luke and me.  We still took a few days to think on it before giving them a definite answer (honestly I was concerned about how far it was from el centro, but in the end the pros won over that con).  But now we’re living with them—and what a good decision!  They are seriously some of the nicest people I have ever met.  And did I mention they’re both professional chefs?  Yeah, they’re both professional chefs. They also have three girls, who can be obnoxious sometimes but are really just adorable (you know how little kids can be).

Living in the Peninsula is absolutely amazing.  It is kind of annoying to go to/from el centro, but when I was living in Boedo in BA, the commute was just as long (or longer, traffic-pending) to get downtown.  But out here is like a taste of paradise.  It’s a runner’s dream.  And Walter has a mountain bike (a really nice one, mind you) that he lets us borrow whenever we want (like I said, nicest people ever). 

And every once in a while, Walter and Miriam host parties at their place.  Well, there was one Saturday night (our second night in the house)!  Luke and I helped bar-tend, serve food, prep, and clean and what-not (and we got small stipend—score!).  The party was complete with multi-colored lights, high-school-age DJs, and dancing—and it went on until 5:30 (which Walter said was relatively early)!  Talk about a warm welcome!

When we moved in Walter and Miriam told us that their house was our house, and that we would be treated as part of the family.  I definitely feel like that.  Not to mention the crazy amount of Spanish practice Luke and I are getting!  So as far as the housing situation goes—I’m quite satisfied.

Looking for work, on the other hand, has been a bit stressful.  The market is nothing like that in BA.  Most of the schools we’ve visited either A) don’t need teachers until March or B) are government-run, which means we need work visas in order to be hired (whoops).  I’ve been advertising for private lessons, and also looking for business English/marketing translation work opportunities.  So right now I’m kind of playing the waiting game.  I’m trying not to stress too much over it (I didn’t come to Argentina to be stressed all the time) and just hoping I’ll find something.  Although some prayers would be more than welcome!

One thing that IS slowly coming together is that it looks like I’ll be teaching English to members of the Peninsula community!  Walter and Miriam have been talking to their neighborhood and friends.  I’ll probably be teaching a group of children at level zero, a group who’ve had a little bit of English already, and probably a group of adults too.  So that’s cool!  They said I could give the lessons right out of their house.  The parents are meeting together and with me over the next couple of days, so hopefully we can start that up next week.  Yay!  It’s almost like I’ll be founding my own mini school :)

In the meantime, I have been keeping myself busy and entertained.  I’ve visited el museo de Patagonia, and el museo de chocolate.  (Umm did I mention Bariloche is the chocolate capital of Argentina?  Uh, yeah.  And it’s not overrated at all—it’s all really really delicious)  There’s a ski hill, Cerro Catedral, right next to town.  Haven’t made it there yet, but I plan to in the next week or so. 

I also visited a Bariloche church on Sunday night.  That was… an incredible experience.  First of all, I can’t believe how much I’ve grown in my Spanish.  I mean, I didn’t understand every word, but in general I got most everything.  It just felt really cool to be able to sing and talk about God in a different language, and it still produced the same powerful effects.  It was really moving.  Secondly, the church (it’s called La Roca Centro Cristiano) is just a really cool place.  Nice people, good fun vibe, good message that night.  AND I loved the music.  At times it seriously felt like I was at a Cru meeting back at Northern.  I even knew a lot of the songs—they were just translations!  We even sang Hanging By A Moment by Lighthouse (also known as Por un momento). 

And then—totally an act of God:  The next day I was walking through town, searching for places to drop off my résumé.  I popped into a tourism/excursions office, and who was working at the desk but one of the girls from church!  She remembered me and we chatted for a while.  She told me a little more about the church and some of the activities they do.  Saturday night they’re hosting a movie which I want to go to.  She also said she thinks there are plenty of people at the church who would want to learn English (bam!).  So I think I really want to try getting involved with this community.  I could grow spiritually, make friends, and potentially work too.  We’ll see!

As for the weather here, it’s really great.  It’s winter in Argentina, and since Bariloche is more south, I thought it would be colder.  And I mean, when there’s no sun, yes it’s cold.  But during the day, it’s always been sunny, and reaching the 50s.  Really great.  And there’s no snow on the ground.  There were patches here and there when we arrived.  As far as winters go, this is totally bearable.

So there’s a general overview of my time so far in Bariloche.  Today I biked for almost five hours—stopping at bus stops to put up more flyers and then once for café con leche and once for ice cream.  And it was a perfectly sunny day—couldn’t have asked for anything better!  What’s hopefully to come: starting English classes, snowboarding, and a day trip to El Bolson (a nearby village) with Walter and Luke.

I’ll post pictures… as soon as I find my camera cord…