I have a little over two months left in Uruguay and a lot of that time is already packed with super exciting plans! I found out that I’m leaving on or around June 3rd and I try not to talk about it too much with my host family or friends because obviously it makes me sad but in a way I’m also kind of excited. It’s the most bittersweet feeling ever. I have an embarrassingly long list of all the foods that I’m going to eat and what I’m going to do when I get home.
Anyway, February and March have been crazy fun and overall I’ve just had an incredible summer (sadly it’s starting to get cold again). It’s interesting to see as I write this that every week/weekend I go somewhere or do something new and I love it! I’m never stuck at home with nothing to do, which was a little bit of a problem in the beginning of my exchange. Now it’s like I have established friends and hobbies and stuff to do here.
I’m finally confident enough in my Spanish to say that I’m fluent. Just to be able to watch a movie in Spanish without subtitles, or have an in-depth conversation with someone is so cool! I’m proud of myself because it wasn’t as easy as I thought. I still have trouble speaking sometimes and there are still things that I don’t understand, but I’m just happy that I’ve gotten confident enough to speak without being scared that I’m saying something wrong.
So here’s what I’ve been up to in February and March:
After the YFU orientation I actually returned to Punta Del Este to stay with my bestie Becci again and also our friend Eli came along too and we basically just spent a week reading by the pool and going to cafes and playing cards for hours on end. We got together with a group of other exchange students from afs as well.
So for 40 days between February and March they celebrate Carnaval here. It really is what the movies make it look like, they have Murgas which are different groups of comedic and musical performers that you can go and watch, and they have desfiles which are the things you see in movies where a bunch of men play drums in rhythm with one another and a bunch of women dance and they also have floats and other performances sometimes. I am explaining it really bad but that’s basically what I’ve gathered from watching these things. (My host family doesn’t really like going to them because they think they are boring and sometimes they involve politics).
With my host family we rented a little house in Punta Del Diablo which is a little hippy town in Rocha and it’s on the beach. We stayed there for about a week and we also went to a place called Chuy which is the border between Uruguay and Brazil. They have a lot of shops and restaurants there and I tried a Brazilian dish called Bauru and a drink called Guarana and I also tried authentic acai! I also had a few caipirinhas with my host dad which is a brazilian drink with sugar and a lot of lime. Everything I tried was super delicious!
After this trip my host sister and I went to Paysandu again (I think it was like my 5th time going to Paysandu). We didn’t do much but it was a much needed time away from home and parents and all that. Since we didn’t really do much in the day and some of my friends were in town we went out to clubs two nights in a row and we saw an Uruguayan singer/DJ called Mozthaza.
Then in the beginning of March it had been a while since I saw my bestie Becci so she took the bus to come see me and we got pastries and ice cream and hung out and talked and we accidentally went to a place called Parque Rodo which was really pretty and we sat by the ocean and watched people skating at a skatepark (which is something we end up doing a lot for some reason).
Then I met a big group of afs exchange students that live in Montevideo who I didn’t know existed and it was great. I don’t think I could ever not get along with another exchange student, we are all just super cool. I also met two girls from Texas and it was the first time I’ve seen other people from the US in person and it was really weird. Somehow I ended up getting home from dinner at like two in the morning.
Then, this past weekend was Becci’s birthday and she had a giant party and I went and stayed with her for the weekend along with some other friends of ours and it was so fun. By far the funnest house party I’ve been to here. We also went out to the clubs two nights in a row which was kind of stupid because I got Covid.
That leads me to now, where I am currently in quarantine. I literally cried when I found out I was positive for Covid because I didn’t want to make my host family deal with that but everything turned out okay and I actually learned a lot from my quarantine experience. Needless to say I am so excited for tomorrow when I can finally leave the house! I don’t know where I will go but I’m getting out of here. From here until June I am going to enjoy living here as much as possible because I know the rest of the time is going to go by really fast.
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