NATHAN RIX
Buenos Aires Columnist
As sharp mountains shadowed a crystal-clear bay behind our entire group, a photographer snapped a picture. Hardly any of us could resist some kind of dumbfounded utterance upon arrival in Ushuaia, Argentina, the southernmost city in the world.
“It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine,” said sophomore Paul Belva, echoing the lyrics of a familiar song by the band REM.
Home to the bay-city of Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego (The Island of Fire) was a small paradise for our group. If two days spent skiing at the base of the Andes, relaxing in soothing saunas and letting our hotel’s massage therapists practice their trade is not paradise, I’m not sure what is. Besides staying in the most luxurious hotel in Ushuaia, visits to maritime museums and an exclusive astronomy class introduced us to various nautical expeditions to Antarctica — a mere 500 miles south — as well as the unique position of stars in the celestial sky at the bottom of the world.
On most evenings, the Antarctic Ocean shimmered quietly in the moonlight, but on the night before our group left Ushuaia, the sea enjoyed a few visitors. Our group took advantage of what sophomore Kevin Diep called “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” and took a short swim in the near-freezing sea.
“It was there, we were there, and we knew what had to happen,” sophomore John Stevenson said.
Shivering in a towel after a quick dip, sophomore Justin Ibrahim said he felt like he had a thousand knives sticking into him.
Although the coldness eventually went away after a few hours, ecstatic memories like these are here to stay.
Our second educational field trip was the polar opposite of Ushuaia. We traveled to Salta and Jujuy in the northern desert regions of Argentina. We canvassed the well-known Mountain of Seven Colors and the Salinas Grandes, a seemingly endless collection of salt fields.
A high point was the Natural Theater outside of Salta. Upon exiting our bus, we heard faint, mellow voices leaking out of a mountainous crevice in a nearby rock formation. Sophomore Cathryn Tolon immediately surmised that a choir was singing inside. As our group approached the jagged entrance, the harmony of a few dozen voices slowly made students’ jaws drop. Tolon was correct. Inside of the theater sang a local choir arranged in a semicircle in the middle of a massive, circular rock formation. The sunlight from above seemed to amplify the beauty of their symphonic voices.
After their concert, our program director, Rafael Martinez De Sanzo, encouraged our group to share with the choir some of the songs from our devotionals. Taking advantage of another once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, we sang two worship songs: “Blessed Be Your Name” and “He is Wonderful.” By sharing our mutual love of music, our group experienced with the Argentine choir a moment of unity that transcended our cultural and linguistic differences.
From the glorious Ushuian mountaintops to our beloved Pepperdine annex in Buenos Aires, we have seen quite a bit of what Argentina offers the world. Our relationship with La Universidad de Catolica (UCA), the Argentine university with whom we are partners, has also grown. A few weeks ago at the “UCA Olympics,” a team of Pepperdine girls placed first in a soccer game against several Argentine teams.
Overall, the past months have been filled with studies and travel, and those experiences have certainly broadened our horizons and deepened our minds. And after the past eight weeks, some of us have even declared Argentina a second home.
11-03-2005
