Exciting Time

These past few weeks have been exciting in Argentina. May 25 we celebrated Argentina's bicentennial. One of the huge streets (9 de Julio) in the middle of Buenos Aires was blocked off from Friday-Tuesday for the festivities. A big stage was in the middle of it all for concerts and other shows. There were different displays set up about various events in Argentina's history. It was very crowded - I heard there were over a million people there. It was awesome to see the excitement and the pride the Argentine's have for their country. I went downtown on May 24 and 25 - on May 24, the rest of the city was pretty quiet because everyone was at 9 de Julio. When I went back on May 25, I was planning to take advantage of everyone being at the festivities and enjoy other parts of the city without the crowd, but it wasn't as quiet that day. Public transit was free on May 25, which was nice, but also meant the buses, subte (subway), and trains were really crowded - on my way home on the train, I was in the middle of the train and couldn't reach a bar to hold on, but it was so crowded I didn't need to hold on.

Now, the World Cup has begun. I never realized how big the World Cup was until now. I don't even remember anything about the World Cup growing up - the first World Cup I remember was the last one in 2006 because I was studying in Spain that summer. There is so much excitement here that I can't help but be excited, too! Argentina had their first match this past Saturday. I was visiting a friend for her birthday and watched the game with her family. Right before the game started, they were actually drilling holes in the wall to hang a screen to project the game.

I'm at home watching Argentina play South Korea right now. My boss informed me yesterday that we were not going into work until after the match (which started at 8:30am here). Many of the kids at the comedor were planning to stay home from school this morning to watch the match even though the schools have big TVs and show the match instead of having class. The city literally shuts down during Argentina's matches. When I look out my window, there aren't any cars or people walking down the street right now - not normal for a weekday. Every time Argentina scores, I hear folks shooting off fireworks. When the match first started, there were cars in the streets and they all started honking their horns when Argentina scored their first goal. ¡Vamos Argentina!