My trip to Mendoza was also somewhat of a disaster. I still haven´t quite gotten used to using military time here, so when I mistaked 22:00 for 11:00, I was pretty upset when I realized that I missed my bus for Mendoza. Luckily the ticket booth was somewhat flexible, and gave me another ticket for 11:00, but the catch was that it was a semi-cama that stopped at ten thousand different places before it arrived to Mendoza. So my bus ride that should have been about 6 hours was 12 hours, but nevertheless, I survived and arrived at Mendoza at 10:00 in the morning.



As if I hadn´t been irresponsible enough, I lost my cell phone there within the 30 hours that I was there. When foreigners arrive, taxi cab drivers are in heaven. When I got into the second taxi I was ever in, in Mendoza, I got so frazzled when he demanded I give him another 20 peso, that I dropped my phone in the cab and jumped out. Bad idea.



Other than those two significantly irresponsible events, Mendoza was smooth sailing. It´s a very low key and scenic town/city. The city is also surrounded by a ton of outdoor activities in the mountains and in mines. The people are also very friendly and always welcoming turists. There is also an incredible restaraunt that overlooks the entire city and serves the best of Mendoza´s wine.



My home stay family was for the most part very nice. The mother had a bad experience with a previous American student in her house, which inevitably planted some preconceived feelings about Americans. However, when I asked her about it, she made a good point about young adults in America. She said that, in her opinion, young adults in America live on their own (during college and after) at an earlier age than most young adults in the world. So inevitably, they are less inclined to practice household rules and chores in contrast to other young adults around the world, which made a lot of sense to me. If anything, it makes me reevaluate myself and my own manners.

All this was accessible from the http://www.easygolanguages.com/">Spanish Language Program in Mendoza, Argentina