Merry Christmas Ya Filthy Animal

Well this Christmas has certainly been very different! Just like my birthday, it was my second one in a row away from home. Last year in South Korea it was really chilly and we were surrounded by friends and with everyone's efforts we managed to throw an amazing traditional English Christmas with the food and games and crackers.

This year, however, we learnt that the Argentinians celebrate it very differently. Their big event is on Christmas Eve. The family all get together and eat, and do a toast at midnight, then the younger people go out to party. Our lovely hosts, Antonio and Roxy invited us to join their celebrations with their family so we could get a taste for it.

Antonio's family were so lovely and welcoming and could all speak amazing English. This was handy as I'm still not feeling 100% confident with my Spanish and it meant that Nick could have some good conversations with the other boys. We ate a picnic style meal of sandwiches and salad, which was perfect for the hot sticky weeather.

Afterwards, Antonio's mum had bought us all a tub of ice cream with three different flavours. They were all labelled, but as she didn't know our names, she had called us 'She' and 'He', which we got referred to affectionately a couple of times throughout the night! I had a delicious mix of vanilla, chocolate and raspberry sorbet. Yum!

By that time, the clock was almost striking midnight, so we said salud and then opened some presents. Roxy and Antonio had kindly bought us each a gift, and Antonio's mum had two little packages for 'She'' and 'He' too! It was really thoughtful.

After the fireworks outside had died down, it was time to say good night to Antonio's little nephew, Pedrito, who had the biggest eyes and wasn't sure what to make of Nick, and Antonio's parents left too.

We sat out in the garden and relaxed and chatted into the early hours. Around 4 the buses started up again, so we walked through the streets, passing all the people partying in the parks and on the streets and got home for about 5:30.

Needless to say, we slept incredibly late today, so when we woke up we made lots of Skype calls and Nick went on the hunt for food! Pitta bread and cheese was our lunch! We researched a few bits, then went out for a wander. It was really weird to see the streets of Buenos Aires so spookily quiet. We could wander in the middle of the usually busy avenues without a car passing us!

We eventually found a restaurant that was open, I won't say too much but it was possibly the worst meal that we've had together. We ate to the sounds of 80s power ballards on VH1. It was so bad that we had to laugh!

So, looking for some Christmas Spirit, we bought some chocolate on the way home and watched Home Alone, which is what I fell asleep to last Christmas too.

So, that's another Christmas done and dusted! I hope that you all had a great one!!




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