Friday, December 31st, 2010

Joy and Steph spent New Years Eve in different places, which is a rarity on any day. Joy traveled with a local pastor's family up to a big New Years weekend/family reunion to spend quality time with them and get away from the city. Steph stayed in Córdoba to have dinner with one of our friend's families and then enjoyed a peaceful time with friends until about 7am on the 1st, during which time she also watched a replay of the balldrop in Times Square on YouTube.

Thursday, December 30th, 2010

Today we attempted to go to the pool again, but a storm started as soon as we got in so we spent the afternoon playing cards under the shelter. The storm's cold front forced us to go home and bake 2 types of cookies and have tea and mate for a few hours with some of our friends and housemates...it was rough :) God has been great and given us quite a few cooler afternoons recently!

Wednesday, December 29th, 2010

Tonight we had a few girls over for a girls' night at the house. We ate pizza, had girl talk, and sang very loud to amazing Whitney Houston and Celine Dion songs. Here's one of our roommates Sarah who helped us cut cheese with a string for the pizza beforehand....que maestra!

Tuesday, December 28th, 2010

Tonight Joy took a rest night while Steph went running and then afterwards (finally!) to see the huge lighted Christmas tree in Plaza España in the Centro. This Christmas tree is the largest in all of Argentina, if not in South America (still checking on those facts). It was still a little strange to be exploring a huge Christmas tree in 80 degree weather, but definitely helped a bit with the Christmas spirit.

Monday, December 27th, 2010

Today we received the first of the Christmas packages (several more of which would follow in the next week and a half)! Steph went and picked up a package from her mom that included Pretzel M+Ms and Resse's trees, among several other goodies. Nothing like a little Christmas treat from the US of A :)

Sunday, December 26th, 2010

Today we went to church, Steph stopped by the baptism of a friend's family, and we had friends over in the evening for what were supposed to be our Christmas mimosas (but we saw our roommates only briefly on Christmas Day) and watched "Prince of Persia" outside on our patio. It was a great Christmas weekend here in Córdoba!

Saturday, December 25th, 2010

Today was our first Christmas away from home! We brought it in typical Argentinian style with late night/early morning festivities, as shown above with our good friend, Cris. This was taken around 8:30 AM Christmas morning after celebrating her birthday together with friends. After some rest and talking with our families on skype, we also experienced the typical Christmas tradition of going to the pool! Here are some friends enjoying various leisurely activities at the pool on Christmas day. While we greatly missed friends and family, we had a great Christmas in Argentina and feel very blessed to be here!

Friday, December 24th, 2010

Merry Christmas Eve! After enjoying a wonderful and delicious dinner with our friend Nelson and his family, and setting off fireworks in the street til 2am, we meandered over to our friend Crix's birthday party, which started around 2am on a rooftop and didn't get over until 8:30am on Christmas morning! Here we are with the birthday girl "early" in the night...Happy Birthday, Crix!

Thursday, December 23rd, 2010

Today was our last day of a beautiful week spent in Buenos Aires with Lauren. We toured the cemetery at Recoleta where many very famous Argentinians are buried, lunched in Palermo and spent another few hours in Starbucks before saying goodbye to Lauren and waiting for our bus.

In Recoleta we crossed paths with 2 little sun cats, and then later a 3rd lying in the shadows.

Wednesday, December 22nd, 2010

Our final day at the beach, we decided to wake up around 5am to try and catch the sunrise on the beach. Due to some cloud cover the colors were minimal, but we did get to sleep a few hours afterwards. After more time at the beach, around town and spending a few nomadic hours in a plaza we grabbed dinner and spent some time taking reaction pictures and talking about life, home, friendship, and Trashley Hart (the missing piece of our friendship puzzle this week).

Tuesday, December 21st, 2010

Our first full day at Mar del Plata/the BEACH! We hit the beach in the morning, meandered around town in the afternoon, Joy and Steph got a run in along the water, and all 3 of us went out to a nice dinner (where we split a delicious SALMON sandwich on wheat bread), and enjoyed a little photo time in the restaurant :)

Monday, December 20th, 2010

An unexpected sickness hit our friend Lauren during the night and she woke up feeling awful and needing to spend the day in bed. Consequently, Joy and Steph spent the day meandering around Buenos Aires, taking jumping pictures ("Salta!" = "Jump!"), and spent several hours resting/napping in Starbucks. Thankfully Lauren felt a bit better by the evening and after a few more hours in Starbucks the 3 of us spent 4 hours sleeping at the bus station while waiting for our 2:45am bus to Mar del Plata. The 2:20am sign picture was taken in a mid-sleep stupor, as we were waking up to make our way out to the bus platform.

Sunday, December 19th, 2010

Today we took a daytrip out for a "Day in the Country" to San Antonio. We went to a beautiful ranch where we rode horses, ate asado, listened to an amazing Argentinian folklore singer and immersed ourself in the traditional gaucho culture.

Saturday, December 18th, 2010

Today we spent the morning touring the center of Argentine government, Casa Rosada (pictured above), lunching at Puerto Madera, and seeing our first Tango show with dessert in San Telmo in the evening.

Friday, December 17th, 2010

Today we arrived in Buenos Aires and met up with our good friend Lauren, who came to see us all the way from the US of A! We got started on our sightseeing right away, heading over to La Boca, a neighborhood known for colorful houses and tango. It's also the home of the stadium of the Boca Juniors soccer team, one of the favorite national club teams in Argentina. Steph was pretty excited the entire time inside, and ALMOST made it over this fence onto the actual field.

Thursday, December 16th, 2010

Today Joy and Steph left to spent more than a day outside Córdoba for the first time since arriving in September. Before leaving for Buenos Aires we met up with our friend Marianela for some Terere and good conversation....we will definitely miss her A LOT this summer!

Wednesday, December 15th, 2010

We spent our free day at "Playa de los Hippies" (Hippie Beach), which is a 2 hour busride from Córdoba and then a 1 hour hike in from where the bus dropped us off. This beautiful place was more than worth the effort it took to get there...we enjoyed a virtually private white sand beach and water all morning and afternoon, swimming, playing frisbee in the water, picnicking, and getitng more than our share of sun.

Tuesday, December 14th, 2010

Tonight was our end-of-the-year party for English Talk and English Talk - Charla Espiritual. We had a choripaneada, cooking choripan (a typical latin american sausage) for everyone, hanging out with guitars and conversation, watching this video that Joy and I made with a slide show of photos from the year, and finishing with a late-night viewing of Toy Story 3...perhaps one of the greatest movies of 2010.

Monday, December 13th, 2010

Today, being Monday, Steph prepared a wonderful lunch for her housemates. Not only was the food delicious, but great conversation and laughs were had by all. Here's the proof-our housemates Heather and JD.

Sunday, December 12th, 2010

Tonight after Alpha we met up with some friends to play pool (which turned into an adventure too long to write about here) and ended up spending the evening at our new friend Sam's apartment in the centro. As we were walking to find a taxi, Steph, like many times, started to trip on the uneven sidewalk. However, unlike most times, this time she was unable to catch herself, and no one else realized what was happening until Steph had fallen face first onto the pavement. Thankfully her hands broke her fall, but she lied on the ground for several seconds in a fit of giggles. A concerned friend immediately asked "Are you okay?" and then almost as immediately "Where's the camera?"

The best part was that as all this was happening a taxi pulled up beside our group and the taxi driver was already calling the ambulance to come, until one of the guys assured him all was well and Steph would walk again.

Saturday, December 11th, 2010

Tonight was our last event of 2010 in Luz Urbana. We had a night of Young Folklore.....we didn't really know what that meant either before the event, but it turned out to be a spectacular night of performance music. With tango singers, percussion instruments that the audience got to play, and original and cover songs, the night was a success.

Friday, December 10th, 2010

Happy Birthday, Nati! Tonight we celebrated the birthday of 2 friends - Natalin (pictured here) and Mely. It was also Joy's mom's birthday.....Happy Birthday, Mrs. Meeder/Mom!

Thursday, December 9th, 2010

Today we had our last official English Talk: Charla Espiritual of 2010 in Bar Classics. Prompt here: "Be Goofy." Diego and Javier's supposed goofiness? Questionable. Until 2011!

Wednesday, December 8th, 2010

Today we took advantage of a local holiday and went with friends to the river in a town about 2 hours outside of Córdoba capital called Cosquín. It was so refreshing to get out of the city, breathe some fresh air and see a body of water! We definitely plan to go back again. (Photo courtesy of Heather).

Tuesday, December 7th, 2010

Today at English Talk we decided to be festive and have a Christmas theme! One of our starting games to get everyone in the Christmas spirit involved dividing into two teams and having a times race to wrap one team member into the prettiest, most creative Christmas gift. Nico, one of our English Talk regulars, won it for his team with the display above. Hard to compete with the English Talk sign.

Monday, December 6th, 2010

Tonight the Gospel Kids choir came to perform at Luz Urbana. This group of 5 to 14 year olds sang with huge voices and incredible passion, and awed the crowd.

Sunday, December 5th, 2010

Today at the Alpha Course we talked about Mary, Jesus's mom. Her trusting response to the angel about Jesus still amazes us. And even crazier is that she was probably just 14 or 15 years old! We decided to show y'all a couple pics of us at that age just to emphasize how young it really is! We're not sure we could have handled the news of being mother of the Messiah, but we're glad Mary did it well.

Saturday, December 4th, 2010

Today we had the privilege of celebrating our dear friend, Noe's, birthday! Noe was one of our first friends here and is such an amazing, sweet girl. So it's no surprise that she has a ton of people who love her a lot. Here's Noe on the left with a couple of friends who love her "un monton".

Friday, December 3rd, 2010

After a productive Friday and our weekly Luz Urbana planning meeting, we headed across the river to celebrate the graduation of one of our friends Ezequiel, who just received his degree to teach Physical Education. We enjoyed some food, friends, and of course, time with Jose, who makes up the other piece of our "Circle of Trust".

Thursday, December 2nd, 2010

After our first of three mornings battling the immigration office process to renew our visas, we enjoyed the afternoon with friends in El Parque Sarmiento. However, unlike most of our relaxing afternoons in the park, today we had the chance to go to the Amusement Park within the park thanks to tickets from our friend, Nelson. In this particular picture, we are truly embracing this "flying" ride by singing songs about flying. Since we sang more than one (there are, in fact, a whole host of "flying" songs), it will remain a mystery as to which song we were singing at this moment. But our bet would be "I Believe I Can Fly."

Wednesday, December 1st, 2010

Today marked the first night that Steph slept alone in her room since leaving the US of A. Her two roommates, Sarah and Sharayah, and the rest of our housemates left for Buenos Aires today in order to visit and help the OM Buenos Aires team, as well as renew their visas by passing into Uruguay. Due to logistical issues and some miscommunication, Steph and Joy stayed in Córdoba to renew their visas in the city. While we were sad to miss out on an exciting excursion, we were relieved to have some extra space and quiet in the house. And I'm sure Sarah and Sharayah enjoyed some nights free from sleep-talking from Steph, as well. (For those who didn't know, Steph is a big sleep-talker. She's even expanded her skill to include talking in Spanish!)