Tranquillo! Tranquillo!
Amidst this giant foreign city, in a bus overflowing with exhausted and overheated people, I recognize my own voice gasp, “tranquillo.” The bus slams on its brakes to a screeching halt narrowly missing a pedestrian. I look around distressed to see the other passengers left entirely un-phased. Suddenly it becomes apparent, I am not in Utah anymore.
Bienvenidos a Buenos Aires, Argentina!
People are talking, talking in a Castellano, a dialect of Spanish that sounds rather Italian. Words are uttered in long yet swift and emotional drawls – It’s beautiful. And so is the city. A perfect blend of Paris and New York with a Latino vibe have mixed to create a vibrant, green, and eclectic city. I immediately fall head over heels in love with Argentina and cannot even begin to imagine how hard leaving is going to be after this semester.
Each day after school, I wander the narrow streets of the city in hopes of discovering something new. Even when that has meant getting completely lost and engulfed in dread and anxiety, I have realized that it’s important to just keep moving forward. Adjusting to a new culture is stressful and hard, but if you don’t sweat the small stuff and just allow yourself to experience you’ll find an independence you never knew you had. In a way it’s reinventing everything that you have ever known to become a better person.
I once heard a quote by Yvon Chouinard the renowned outdoor businessman of Patagonia, he said, “ For me, when everything goes wrong, that’s when the adventure starts.” And I think I will just go from there, I’ll start by ordering blindly off a menu and seeing what I get (as seen as in the picture) and end with opening my heart to this city and letting my blonde-American self become a Porteño