Frond Farewells

When I first arrived at my home-in-Parana-for-a-month, the first thing I noticed was a large fern and palm growing together in a small garden in a small courtyard between the garage and house.

"http://helenkayos.blogspot.com/2009/03/back-to-frond.html"

My immediate reaction was, "Hey! That's a koru!" which was interesting because in New Zealand, fern plants don't leap out at me, grabbing my attention, demanding patriotic recognition - such as this fern-in-Parana did every time I passed it. I guess it's not until you leave New Zealand that you realise what it is that tweaks your sense of national identity.



You can imagine how this logo below grabbed my eye at new shopping complex at Santa Fe, over or under the river. (There is a tunnel that goes under the river between the two cities). It's a sports shop, particularly rugby, it appears. Find the koru here.


On my last day with my Parana family, the fern frond had unfolded and was now stretched out and ready start growing its leafy bits. Such is the metaphor of my language learning experience in Argentina!

(From Wikipedia) The koru is the Māori name given to the new unfurling fern frond and symbolises new life, growth, strength and peace. It is an integral symbol in Māori carving and tattoos. Koru can also refer to bone carvings. Those generally take the shape of the uncurling fern plant. When bone is worn on the skin, it changes colour as oil is absorbed. The Māori took this to symbolise that the spirit of the person was inhabiting the pendant.

When someone gives a pendant to someone else, it is the custom that they wear it for a time so that part of their spirit is given as well. (Take note those of you who received a pendant from me).

Check out the link below which will take you to Google Images for more examples of koru.

"http://images.google.com/images?hl=EN&q=koru+symbol&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2&aq=f&oq="

So, anyway, I'm now back in New Zealand, trying to catch up on sleep and schoolwork and with friends and family to give out the prezzies (regalitos) I bought for them in Argentina. I also want to account for the last few days in Argentina as there were some pretty special moments which need remembering.

On Thursday, my English class with Gabriela started with farewell pastries and my cultural contribution of Vegemite on crackers. One person commented that it was a bit like caviar which I could honestly say that I understood his comparison. (A long long time ago, on a training college trip to Noumea, I was at event where crackers topped by a dark substance were being handed around. Oh how quaint, I thought, somewhat naively, Vegemite on crackers. Eventually I found out that a small amount of caviar had been completely wasted on my uneducated palate.)

After morning classes, I went shopping with AFS contact and STEP teacher Gabriela who took me to get a beautiful stainless steel bracelet resized for me. It was a gift from Mariela and Gabriela, along with some fabulous Argentine music CDs and some children's songs CDS in Spanish. This was wonderful as I'd been so confused by the range available in the music shop that I couldn't make any decisions myself. (I am writing this with the "Los Nocheros" CD playing in the background and it's just soooooooo reminding me of Argentina!).

Many of the shops in Parana are quite small and boutique-like and I wonder how they can all survive with so many other little shops selling similar products. To get into the jeweller's you had to knock on the door and be allowed in. I think there might have been a few shops like this in Parana and probably elsewhere. Melisa and I went into a reasonably large shop that sold beautiful leatherware and likewise we had to knock on the door for it to be unlocked.

Family member Melisa has her own shop, and celebrated her fifth anniversary by having the shop repainted and some refitting done over Easter. She sells gorgeous clothes which can all be mixed and matched.(Labels: Silenzio, Yagmour, Ver & Taal Equipe) Her shop is called "Mia" and is at 25 de junio 83, Parana, Entre Rios. Phone 0343 4217141. (25 de junio 83 is actually the name of the road.)I bought some tops for me for winter and a few prezzies which will remain undescribed as the recipients don't know about these yet. I also bought some fun coloured socks which were very cosy to wear on the plane- and I wish I had bought more. If you are in Parana you should go and shop there as the clothes are lovely and so is Melisa. She also keeps a large jar of lollies (candy) under the counter so ask for one next time you are in her shop.


Thursday night was my last Spanish lesson with Peter and Adriana and I had to read out my homework, in Spanish, which was to describe the typical characteristics of Argentine men and women. Somewhat limited by vocabulary and extensive research opportunities I came up with:

Argentine men are pleasant and handsome. They like sports, especially football and basketball. They like asado also. Argentine women are very beautiful and thin. They like perfumes and shoes and they love shopping.

Adriana advised that Argentine women also love buying handbags! We also learned the "pretorito pluscuamperfecto tense" i.e. When I arrived at my home, Mariano had prepared the asado. (see previous post,"We'll Meat Again"). A very helpful tense when you want to find something has already been done by the time you get home. Which was quite useful, because by the time I did get home, cousin Mariano was indeed lovingly and skilfully preparing the asado for Daniel's birthday and family gathering.
Peter, the AFS student from Iowa, me and Adriana - evidence that Argentine women are indeed thin and beautiful. Peter is the only other English-as-a-first-language speaker I met the entire time I was at Parana, and even then we found it difficult understanding each other.

On Friday I didn't go to school at all and spent the morning shopping, visiting the cathedral and the Escuela Normal with Melisa.(see previous posts). In the evening I went to Carmen's for a STEP teachers' get-together. When family member Alejandro asked me what I had done on Friday night, (apart from me totally misunderstanding him and regaling him with what I was going to be doing on Saturday night) I eventually was able to reply with, “ There were 8 women teachers from STEP sitting around the table discussing diets and then we ate pizza and cake.” So once again, the similarities between Argentina and New Zealand are greater than the differences. (Note for Chrisssy-the-previous-AFS-MoE-teacher-in-Parana-from-NZ…that was at Carmen’s home where you, of course, stayed last year, and the evidence of which you have already found on Yolanda’s Facebook.)

Empanadas - jamon y queso (ham and cheese) and usually in a semicircle shape. These ones were really cute and, as always, very nice to eat.

Carmen and pizza.

Chocolate and dulce de leche cake... with frosting.There are some serious calories attached to this cake.

On Saturday morning I packed my bags and prepared to go home. In the afternoon I went with Melisa to her Rikudim (Israeli folk dance) class- which was great to watch and to listen to also, and then I went with Mirta to pick up the cakes for the evening party. Mirta drove and I held one large high cake-with-very-soft-icing-whipped-into-peaks on my lap and helped another torte balance on the top of the dashboard. If she stopped suddenly or turned a corner too tightly - I would be wearing cake, literally. Both cakes had white frosting made with egg white and sugar. It looks like an uncooked pavlova mixture and is pretty rich to eat, as is any self-respecting cake in Argentina.

That Saturday night I had two parties to attend. The first one was at Roxana's from STEP and this was one of my "Tests" where I organised the taxis to and from there myself. Roxana has the most gorgeous home with lots of colours and pictures and interesting things on the wall (with one new addition now, from NZ). It reminded me of a fairy-tale cottage on the inside. We had a whole range of delightful nibbly bits and exquisite sandwiches, each coming out one at a time rather than all the food on the table at once. Roxana's daughter had also made the most beautiful cake too, a piece of which I took with me because I just couldn't keep up with all the eating required.

The guests

Round one of the nibbly bits.

Then I rang and got another taxi to take me back to my home for my very last night and another party with friends of Daniel and Mirta for Daniels' birthday... and more food, including more fabulous desserts with dulce de leche and a particularly nice lemon cheesescake. Some of the people I had already met but I bravely introduced myself to others and was able to maintain a reasonable level of conversation. Thank goodness for interesting family and friends! Over the course of a month, because I was repeating the same information on my family and friends to many different people, I acquired a reasonable level of fluency in this area. People would often comment on how well I was speaking Castellano and then, when we moved onto another area of conversation, I was often lost and unable to contribute.

There was more food, and inevitably, more cakes. See below:


The lemon cheesecake, made by one of the guests, Mirta's famous bread pudding dessert, the dulce de leche torte and below, yet another cake with frosting:

The party continued with most of the men at the table singing Argentine songs, all of which were unknown to me yet all instantly recognisable as Argentine. Several took turns to play the guitar and it was a wonderful way to end my last night in Argentina. My contribution was, (with the guitar) to sing one verse each of Tu Tira Mai, Po Kare Kare Ana and Po Ata Rau (Now is the Hour), which were well received and made me feel very relieved that I could contribute on a cultural equivalent.

In keeping with any self-respecting South American party, I finally got to bed at about 4am the next day.

A Few Final Random Observations:

- When having everyday conversations with people overseas, it is a good idea to know the current price of petrol, the average price of houses, the price of meat (of considerable importance in Argentina), and a few other supermarket staple foods for comparison. I wished I had taken a supermarket docket with me.

- Having the weather, time and NZ dollar value compared to the American dollar and Argentine peso "gadgets" on the desktop of my computer was always interesting and meant I could easily give accurate and simple information about NZ when needed.

- Houses (in Parana and probably many other places in Argentina) on the outside can often be just plain walls right on the footpath, with perhaps a closed shutter or two and then a main door, or double doors - but no hint as to what lies behind them. But sometimes the door opens into a courtyard with rooms off to the sides, or a huge open sunny room with skylights or a delightful cosy home. There are not nearly as many windows as NZ houses (weather and security reasons I guess, and most windows have shutters and certainly few houses are on sections surrounded by grass and garden. Security is very obvious and most homes have bars or some other added form of security around any accessible entrance to the house.

- Most houses have some form of security alarm. Some houses have a perimeter alarm also which can be on all day or night while you are still inside the house. You just need to know which windows are connected to the alarm!

- When there are a lot of couples at a party, it seems inevitable that the men will sit in one area discussing men’s business and the women will gather in another area discussing women’s business. Another universal truth!

- Farms in Argentina have huge round haybales similar to NZ. Fields are huge and were probably for cropping as I never saw any cows or other bovine evidence between Parana and Buenos Aires although there were miles and miles of fields. It's not to say they weren't there.

- What we in NZ would call left-overs or "bubble and squeak" in Argentina it is known as "ropa vieja" or "old clothes" . What asado you don't eat on one night will taste even better the next day for lunch.

- The combined adventures of Veronica-from-Wellington and me, from our homes in Argentina to New Zealand are worthy of their own final post, which could probably also be my final post my intrepid exploration of language learning in Argentina.

Watch this space.