my vacation from my vacation in Uruguay

So, as you can see from my previous posts (or perhaps not), I was having a very hard time and needed to take a vacation from my vacation before I got to the point of a total freak-out, needing to come home. Am I a complete wimp? I think I´m just doing what I think is necessary to help me get a handle on my new surroundings. BA was a complete shock and totally different than I had imagined, which was a great opportunity to live cheaply in the Paris of S. America. I´m finding out that not only is this a deceiving comparison but that it is also not cheap! For someone coming from NYC or England it would be a steal. But I am finding that it is at the same level of expense as Minneapolis, at least in the nice parts of town.

As for my therapeutic vacation, I am currently in Punta del Este, Uruguay. This town is nicknamed the St. Tropez of S. America, but as I have never been to St. Tropez I cannot compare and find it to be a mix of the Italian Riviera and Fort Lauderdale. This may sound like a strange mix, and normally I do not seek out resorty spots, but I absolutely love this place! Although it is filled with those typical white skyscrapers, the beaches have beautiful natural views, the food is amazing (I have finally found great salads that I´m not afraid to eat [e-coli worry-free] and fresh seafood), the Uruguayans are incredibly friendly, and of course the sunshine is not at all bad. It´s everything you could want for a touristy beach resort town. I also spent two days in Colonia, Uruguay before coming here. It was a quiet, charming little town that reminded me of a miniature San Miguel de Allende, but on the river (that looks like the ocean) rather than in the mountains. It was easy enough to get there via a one-hour ferry from BA and from there I took a four-hour bus ride to Punta del Este, which stopped in Montevideo for one hour. Both of these places were recommended by my family friend, Maria.

While I´ve been in Uruguay, I´ve been able to get my scattered self back together and think more clearly about the direction I want to take with my time in Argentina. In Colonia I spent a lot of time just relaxing by the river, feeling like it would not have been totally out of place if I had been in a wheelchair with a warm blanket over me, recovering from my shock. I know from experience that new things can be a bit scary at first (or even terrible, I was not at all happy upon arrival in Japan, I´m remembering), but in BA I was beginning to feel like the girl in the blair witch project in the scene where she is in the basement panicking. Yes, I was completely panicking. Simply walking around unfamiliar territory once it gets dark can be a bit scary and I´ve concluded that wearing my glasses might help as my night-vision is not the greatest.

So now that I´ve seen what BA is like, granted this had been on a very surface level, I´ve only been there a week and have spent most of that time walking around to put a visual map of the city in my head, I can begin addressing my needs and attempt to put together a structure that will hopefully make for a happy and productive time. In Villa Crespo I tried to do this, but being so far out (it took me an hour to get anywhere via walking, subte, bus) caused me to experience the vastness of the city on a level that was too much for me to handle. Not only that, but as I´m away I´m realizing it is not only important but crucial that I am somewhere near nature, and the only park near Diana´s house is what I can only compare to one huge circular parking lot with people jogging around the outskirts amongst traffic. I was also unable to sleep due to the all-night long traffic, noise that earplugs could not cover up. All in all, I was just unhappy where I was living and it mainly had to do with the location, as authentic of an experience it may have provided me, it was ultimately not the experience I wanted. I could go into all of the things that bothered me about the place and how Diana was beginning to get on my nerves, but I think to be fair I´ll leave that out.

So while I´ve been on my vacation from my vacation, I´ve also (sadly) spent quite a bit of time on the internet trying to figure out a new place to live. After a lot of searching and email exchanges, I found a very charming studio in Recoleta - the heart of the city. I found this one on craigslist, as I did the room in Villa Crespo, but this apartment is through an agency and it all seems more professional, I suppose. Maria made a point in one of our email exchanges (she has been putting a lot of effort into trying to help me get settled comfortably) that when you are in a foreign country you need to find a living situation that is similar to what you are used to or else it can be quite unpleasant. I was searching for something different than I was used to when I came here, but I think living in BA will be different enough for me and my little studio can be my santuary where I recharge. I have only seen pictures, but it overlooks a small garden and is supposed to be very quiet. It is also very close to all of the parks, and there are a handful of beautiful big parks in this part of BA. So anyway, I think after my needs are met of feeling secure and well-rested, things will start to run a bit more smoothly. It´s difficult to just overturn your life, mix everything up, and expect things to fall into place. The older I get, the better idea I have of what I need to make myself happy and when I don´t have those things it starts to feel like my brain is short-circuiting, unable to compute what it is taking in and in shock of what it is missing. But bottom line, I must have nature. And a quiet place to sleep.

Anyway, thanks for reading, if anyone is reading this. Time to go flake out on the beach for a while....