Skip to main content

Day 0: mensajes de la terminal

"Everyone passed the first punctuality test," exclaimed Profe. Levin, as the last of our entourage arrived in front of Tom Bradley at 8:29am. With our luggage in tow, we made our way to the Latam ticketing counter where we were immediately ushered to two agents who promptly printed out our boarding passes. I've heard that you shouldn't say "It's quiet" in a hospital emergency room for fear of opening the door to misfortune, and so I had a similar suspicion as we made our way through security without much rigmarole. "What a quiet Saturday at LAX," I noted, and indeed, we were fast to pass our bodies and bags through the security x-ray scanners. 

Happily, we're now seated at our gate, with a comfortable amount of time before we board our first flight. As spring turns to summer here, we'll travel through time and across space towards another autumn, winter rearing its frigid head in Argentina soon enough. 

And now, messages from the terminal (overheard at Gate 134):

"Could I quickly check something on my phone--I want to see when the Portugal/Spain game starts."

"Look what the cat dragged in."

"Do you want to split a pizza?"

"Uhhhhhhh......"

"Santi lost his shoe!"


At the gate!

Comments

Rcaragher said…
Looks like you're all settled in and comfy at LAX. From summer to winter in 14 hours- only to return to Pasadena days before the summer solstice. Also love the "Heard in the Panthers' Lair" comments.

Popular posts from this blog

day 2: finally in Argentina!

Finally arriving at the Buenos Aires airport at 3:00 am, our hotel at 4:30 am, and waking up at 9:45 am (some of us), our long awaited trip finally begun. We walked to the pizza place, Las Cuartetas, had some trouble first ordering in Spanish, and tried to down five whole deep dish pizzas. pizzas galore!  four hours of sleep, no problem.  Very cheesy, very dense, and very hard to keep eating. After leaving two whole pizzas left and feeling extremely bad about it, we walked down to the metro for our first Argentinian subway ride. We spotted a girl with her notes looking quite fretful and Profe. Levin wished her good luck, teaching us a valuable lesson about being nosy in a good way. We met Mariana, the director of the travel agency Lunfarda, who took us around the city and spoke to us about the history. First we went to a church, Basilica Nuestra Señora del Pilar, where Mariana talked about the European immigration and influence in Buenos Aires, including aspects like architect...

Day 5: Los Porteños!

On Thursday, we started our day with a swift breakfast in the hotel and a short walk to the Casa Rosada--workplace of the Argentinian president--where we began a scavenger hunt that was organized by an Argentinian travel company that we have been working with so far on this trip.  As we split into groups (los carpinchos, los chocotortas, y los empanadas), we began to walk around the city and complete tasks along the way. These challenges often included talking to friendly strangers or organized actors and asking many questions regarding the daily lives of Argentinians. For example, we asked an actor (our previous tour guide Fernando) and other locals (pedestrians, workers, police officers, etc.) questions about Argentinian football. In turn they taught us facts like how fans of the team River Plate are called “Los millionarios” (the millionaires) because their home stadium, which is el estadio mas monumental of South America, is located in a wealthy neighborhood. In addition, we we...

Day 1:the good, the bad, and the "Is this really our gate?"

Through red eyes and heavy eyelids, our Poly Panthers have kept their good spirits. We have seen five different sets of passengers come and go, flying off to Madrid, Cusco, Paris, and other beloved cities, while we patiently wait for our final destination. We're set to leave for Buenos Aires by 8:25pm. Of course, we can ignore the ill-fortune I welcomed yesterday. As Profe likes to say, "we'll turn these lemons into lemonade." Naps, snacks, a soccer match, and sharing facts kept us busy during our fifteen-hour layover. Jaunts up and down Lake Avenue surely prepared our Panthers for languid walks around Lima's International terminal, where they even had the chance to catch the Portugal-Spain soccer game--Nico commented, "40 years old, and Ronaldo is still winning championships." Of course, occasionally, the boredom prompted some silly requests: "Is it okay if we play Hide-and-Seek around the terminal?"  Parents, not to worry, students have been ...