So things have settled into a routine here with the beginning of my spanish class every weekday for 4 hours and my knowledge of this humongous city expanding every day. Things are gonna get turned upside down next week though as Im moving into an apartment (22nd floor, penthouse style) and we start real classes at my university. Variety is the spice of life though, and I think these two changes will be improvements on my current situations. Right now class is a mile and half walk from my homestay, and its a tought 30 minute walk weaving through the bustling streets. I'm pretty sure this is the most walking I've ever done-pretty sure I average 5 to 6 miles a day. Its all good though as the weather is usually perfect for walking and I've always enjoyed a nice long romp.

However, when the weather is bad it gets real bad here. Apparently, the drainage system in this city is not the best, and whenever it rains heavily the streets flood. This happened several times last week and there were pictures of people wading through waste deep water in the paper. I was lucky enough to be home the first time, but this past friday it happened again. We left class and were greeted with pouring rain and the streets flooded by water a foot deep. The cabs were backed up, and there was a 2 hour wait for one, so we decided to tough it out and trek through the rainstorm. It was quite the adventure, and it took Brenny and I 45 minutes to make it home. At one point we had to wade through water that was almost up to my knees. We made it home and miraculously my computer, which was in my backpack the whole time, survived. Some of the girls who live in the center of the city said it took them 3 hours to get home when it usually takes 30 because the subte was flooded and the buses barely movable.
Some pictures of the devastation wrought by the rain on BsAs.

Last sunday most of the group went to an open air flea market type thing that comes to the center of the city every sunday. It was pretty fun and interesting to see the assorted things for sale by the Argentinians. Items ranged from knives, to clothes, music to fresh squeezed orange juice, and everything in between. I bought an Easy Rider poster for 15 pesos, not really sure why but I liked the look of it and felt obligated to buy something. After that we went to China town for Chinese New Years, which was quite lackluster. I guess we shouldn't have expected much from a Chinatown in Argentina, but we were hoping to see dragons and fireworks but were instead treated to masses of people and vendors eagerly selling crap. We left and went to see El Secreto de sus Ojos, a really good Argentinian movie that's nominated for best foreign film. I recommend it to everyone who gets a chance, but watch it with subtitles so you can understand more than the 30% I did. All in all it was a pretty good sunday, but it was second to the one we had two days ago.