You know, I was a bit anxious as to how christmas would go, and still am about new year's. Iguazú has a nasty habit of turning "the best party all year" into generally unimpressive, completely expected events. But, it was nice. So here's how it went down last night/this morning. To set up the background, imagine this. about every 30 seconds incredibly loud firecrackers, thrown by little kids are going off. All around my neighborhood, and probably Iguazú, there is music blasting from either the backs of cars, stores, or clubs. Not christmas music, but the usual cumbia (my least favorite), reggaeton, and electronica. On the riverside, about a mile away, there are fireworks going off occasionally, all of this generally setting the festive atmosphere. First, after my hostmom's infinite stress as to what everyone was going to wear, I rushed down to a local store; I had forgotted to buy my hostcousin a gift, so I decided a bottle of fernet would be a safe bet. The system with gifts was as follows: A few days beforehand, everyone in the family was given a slip of paper with someone else's name on it; that's who you get a gift for. So at about 9:30 or 10 christmas eve night, everyone went down to my hostgrandparent's house for a big dinner. On the walk over, my hostbrother Lucho informed me that we would be going out to hit up the clubs afterward; apparently christmas and new years are the best days in the year to do that, and some of the craziest. That is PERFECTLY ok with me. So, we get to my hostgrandparent's house, where a very long table is decorated beautifully with ornate glasses (one for pop/wine, and the other for sidra), color coordinated napkins, the special silverware, stuff like that. We start eating at about 11. The food was interesting. some (similar to) doubled eggs, some meat with a strange tan sauce over it, sopa paraguaya (similar to cornbread, except not as good), some misture of chicked, mayonaise, lettuce, and something else all in some...material, that you ate with a spoon, and also this big thing that was about 2 or 3 inches thick, cut like a cake, layered with several cheeses, vegetables, balogne, lettuce, and several other things. Potato salad, and finally kebabs, everything was served cold. All in all not bad, but I still strongly prefer american food. On the table there was copious amounts of red wine, seven up, fanta, some chocolaty, creamy, liquor, and a mixed drink containing vodka. My hostfamily made sure that my cup was never empty for long. At midnight, every toasted, with glasses of sidra (a sort of fruity, slightly alcoholic, argentinian holiday drink), and everyone cheerfully said "¡feliz navidad!" to everyone else. Then, we started opening presents. They were more or less all pretty small gifts, ranging from bottles of alcohol, clothes, champagne sets, mate things, stuff like that. I myself got a t-shirt, that said "cataratas del Iguazú" on it. After gift opening, everyone in the family said what they were thankful for, how much they loved everyone else, and how important and special each other family member was to them. There was a lot of crying, tears of love and joy, which for me, was something very different. In this christmas celebration, it was clear that there was a lot more importance on family, and valuing everyone in the family, than gifts. After about another hour or two of lounging and talking, at about 2am, my hostbrother, hostcousin, and I went out dancing. First, upon seeing that it was too early in the night for very many people to be at the clubs yet, we drove over to the costa nera (the "coast" of the riverside, a very elevated and generally beautiful place, where you have a view of the river about 300 feet below, and the coasts of paraguay and brazil, covered in rainforest). As soon as we got there, you could here music. There were hundreds of people, teens, girls dressed up to go out, guys the same, trunks of cars open, with HUGE speaker boxes blasting music, people throwing firecrackers, guys showing of motorbike tricks, stuff like that. We stuck around there for a few minutes, (we didn't stay, because, as my hostbrother put it, they were all "negros" (this use of the word having no correlation to skin color)). So, we headed back to the boliches. First, we spent a few hours at La Barranca, a club that is known for its electronica music, and brazillian population. It was alright, there was a band playing on the stage, and pretty decent music on the dance floors. Fun, but nothing special. We then decided to head to Cuba Libre, the club I usually go to, because my hostbrother told us he could get us in for free. Upon entering, we discovered that it was absolutely packed. As far as I'm concerned, this is great; I love being in a happenin' place people are packed like sardines on the dancefloor. But, this also unfortunately meant that at this point in the night, the security was making sure that only the most attractive and provocatively dressed girls got in for free, and entrance was 50 pesos. shit. So we milled around for a few minutes, thinking of ways to get in, but came up with nothing. We eventually decided to head over to a local bar instead. it was pretty cool, I mean as cool as nice bars get I guess. We chilled there until dawn, just talking and generally having a good time. When the bar closed, we just hung out by the car, with the trunk open, and music playing, as there was probably about 100 people just on that street doing the same thing. At about 7:30, we were driven back home. First, my hostbrother, hostcousin, and I talked and ate leftovers from dinner the day before. At 8:30 or 9, my hostbrother and I walked home, and I went to bed. Overall, a pretty fun, and certainly different christmas than those that I'm used to in the states.
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