Mate......ummmmmm

Bueno, entonces...ocho and the ritual of Mate.

Mate is something that confuses me as much as it confuses David, and this is one of the things I love about Bueno, entonces... it explains there confusing Argentine customs to me! Like David, when I first arrived and saw everyone, and I mean Everyone, supping a green herby liquid out of a small round cup, through a metal straw I thought; ‘surely that is some sort of drug?’ so it was with great eagerness that I accepted my first offer of Mate, thinking ‘what can it be!?’ only to be hit in the mouth by a scaldingly hot, bitter TEA. (Well, it’s not a tea per se, but near enough!) But the ritual of Mate is really interesting, and I like the way Jimena feels it is necessar to teach it to David, and his reaction is pretty similar to how mine was! It’s a lovely ritual, but I think i’ll stick with my agua sin gas por favor. The synonyms I have learnt for today’s class are going to be particularly useful, because I was getting abit bored of ‘no me gusta’- now I can say ‘Que asco!’ (how gross!) instead.

I am struggling with the irregular verbs...they are explained clearly, but I simply cannot remember them....mas practico!

Oh, and on a quick aside...I love the way typically English names are used in Spanish...well, not as names, but ‘Linda’ means beautiful, and ‘Barbara’ means great...how lovely!