Well we had an extremely full day today. We started the day off at the Habitat office in Buenos Aires and learned a lot about the overwhelming need here. Officially 30% of people in Argentina live below the poverty level, but the unofficial studies show that the number is closer to 50%! The "housing" we saw that many people live in are just mind boggling. 8% have multiple families living in one ROOM! The way that Habitat is structured here is that the families the qualify for the homes are actually in charge of the building of the home. I will share more on that through out the week. We also learned that the people in Buenos Aires are very anti-American, but that in Santa Fe, where we are working, there are a lot better feelings - a lot due to the fact that volunteers from America have helped out so much.
After a great lunch of empinadas, we headed for the central bus station where our chariot awaited to take us on our 6 hour trek to Santa Fe. Much to our happy surprise, the bus was very nice and the seats reclined a lot so it was prime nap time :) They even served everyone food on the ride. Here's a picture of our "ride" along with the food service:
As you can see, it was quite the tray of food :)
We finally arrived in Santa Fe and after a few missed turns we made it to our hotel - and NO I was not leading the group! We had to wait until the restaurants opened up again at 8 before we could head out to dinner, but it was worth the wait. We learned the hard way that the large pizzas were REALLY large.
So we are well fed and now ready for a good night's sleep. Tomorrow we will have three different houses the team will be working on all at different stages. The work boots, work gloves and safety glasses are ready to go. Calling it an early night, more to follow.
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