Milestones and mile markers: running with intention

Tomorrow morning I will wake up way too early to run way too many miles.

One year ago I woke up early and walked out the front door of our apartment building to watch the runners of the 2011 Buenos Aires Marathon pass by kilometer 4, only the first 10th of the full marathon. I had watched marathons before and they have always inspired me, but something about our move to Argentina and that rainy morning inspired me to finally go for it: to train for a full marathon like I had thought of on and off for several years since I ran my first 1/2 marathon.

Since the start of my marathon training, I knew I wanted to run it in honor of my parents. They have always encouraged me to be active since I was 5 when I joined my first soccer team in the city's original community soccer league that my dad co-founded. From walking, biking, swimming, hiking, running, playing soccer and basketball to working out with Jane Fonda and The Firm VHS tapes- even our super early morning family trips to the YMCA! -all of their encouragement and leading by example reinforced the importance of daily physical activity. For me being active felt good, kept me healthy, made me stronger, helped give me confidence, and taught me such important life and social skills. I feel so grateful that I learned the importance of being active so early on in my life.
Now that my dad is in the advanced stages of Parkinson's disease, I am especially aware that we never know how long our bodies will cooperate and give us their best. So now I push myself physically because I can... and because he can't. I run for my dad and to support his fight with Parkinson's. I run for my mom who supports my dad every single day as a caregiver and cheerleader of me and my efforts. When the going gets tough as the miles add up, I think of them and it helps keep me going.

Buenos Aires in bloom

Spring has definitely sprung here in Buenos Aires. Although if you are a native northerner like me, it pretty much feels more similar to summer in the Midwest than spring. The weather has been near perfect for the last few weeks: upper 70s-low 80s and sunny almost every day with cool evenings down in the 60s. The leaves, flowers and accompanying pollen are out in full force. I love the mix of trees and plants here- there are palm trees and tropical flowers next to types of trees that I would see back home.

My favorite tree is the Jacaranda. It has the most beautiful, vibrant violet colored flowers that brighten up the city. The only thing that could make this beauty even better would be if it smelled as good as it looks! As far as I can tell, the blossoms do not have any scent.

There are lots of other pretty things that I see on my walks/runs through the city:

Unfortunately, the one day I went to "El Rosedal" (a beautiful park nearby that has a gorgeous rose garden, lake, and walking paths) with my camera it was closed. This is as close as I could get to the roses before a guard blew a whistle at me and yelled something in Spanish.

The ants here seem much more ambitious and organized. They create what looks like a highway system of tracks to/from their nest. If this happens in parks in Chicago, I never noticed it before. Perhaps the grass is just shorter and more sparse here so it's easier to spot?

The purple fleck in the bottom right corner is an ant carrying a piece of a Jacaranda flower along one of the tracks to the colony. I thought my mom would enjoy my keen attention to nature and appreciate this detail about the ants! :)

 There are some beautiful, exotic flowers along the walkway to our building. The pink and red flowers remind me of Hawaii.

I almost forgot that today is Thanksgiving! Although it doesn't feel like typical Thanksgiving in the States, I am thankful for the warm, wonderful weather and beautiful surroundings in our new home!
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!

Our neighborhood

We live in Palermo, which is a very vague statement if you know much about Buenos Aires since Palermo is a huge neighborhood with lots of sub-neighborhoods. More specifically, we live in the part of Palermo that is closest to the rio de la plata and parks, near the zoo, botanic garden and Plaza Italia. Since I have been here I have not heard a Porteño/a use north/south/east/west once to describe location or direction. Instead, locations seem to be described by what's around them. This seems to make some sense since the vast majority of streets are not on a N/S/E/W grid.
I absolutely love our neighborhood! It's been perfect for us. Lots of park and green space close by. Plenty of cafes, shops, restaurants, etc. nearby but not the typical chaotic din of Buenos Aires roaring in the streets. We are close to Plaza Italia which is a major transportation hub and we are on one of the main streets of BA so it's pretty easy to get to where the kids live. Plus we have one of the city's fabulous heladerias (ice cream shops) less than a block away!
This is the view of the park across from our apartment:

This is where I typically run since the side streets can be dangerous. Cars definitely have the right of way here so you have to be careful, which can be difficult to do when you are running. So I just try to avoid the cars as much as possible.

The view of Avenida del Libertador, the street that our apartment is on:

 Crossing Libertador can be an adventure since it has 10+ lanes. The cars are just waiting to have a chance to try to run you over! ;)

The delicious and super close Volta heladeria: dangerous. I'm in love with their special $5 (peso) single flavor cone.

 The Evita Museum is super close for all of you who come to visit:

 There's lots of these school buses cruising the streets full of children jumping around unrestrained. I'm 99% sure these buses do not have seat belts. Seat belts definitely seem optional here.

 One of the many verdulerias in our neighborhood (vegetable and fruit stand). The produce has been SO good here! And on the whole, much cheaper than the states.

 A pretty boulevard that I love...

 My new favorite cafe: Voulezbar

 One of the many confiterias/panaderias close to our place. There are so many delicious treats in these bakeries. And the aroma of all the fresh baked treats is hard to resist.

 Another new favorite:

 New Garden is one of the many "dieteticas" sprinkled throughout the nighborhoods of BA. The name "dietetica" was mis-leading to me at first, but it essentially consists of gluten-free items, hard to find herbs, sweeteners and foods, lots of dried fruits and nuts and random other things including the closest version to brown sugar that I have found here (azucar rubia and azcuar negra).

A local fish shop where Fer can get sushi-grade fish for making sushi.

 There are many heladerias in BA: Volta, Persicco, and Freddo are the biggest chains and we have at least one location of each within 4-5 blocks of our apartment plus other smaller chains. Delicious ice cream is never far away!