Christmas cheer

So this was the most unique Christmas I´ve ever had. On Christmas Eve, Quique and I had a picnic at a small waterfall and spent the day swimming, jumping off rocks, eating incredibly juicy mangos and painting ourselves with the red mud. In the evening we listened to the Christmas CD mama sent me (I might have shed a tear or two), and then had an amazing dinner of a roasted pig (head intact), salads, asparagus pie, and these amazing beef rolls that his dad makes. The meat is soaked in milk for a long time then rolled up with peas and spices. It was really delicious. We counted down until midnight, then toasted with cider and danced around the living room while fireworks exploded outside. It was quite like New Years. Then they brought me a birthday cake and all sang feliz cumpleaños. It was so sweet! Earlier I had heard Quique yelling at his dog. Apparently the cake was hiding in his room and the dog got in and started licking the corner of it. I kept asking why he was mad at the dog and he wouldn´t tell me, but I laughed a lot about it later. Then we went out with his sister and her friends to a club and had some champagne. I didn´t get back until 4 in the morning (which is really early here, his sister got back at 9 am) and so we slept in through most of Chirstmas, but thats normal since we already opened all the presents at midnight. I opened my birthday presents and we spent the day lounging and playing madlibs. Then we went out to dinner at a nearby town and walked around afterwards, stopping by the casino. We decided to go in and spent 5 pesos (less then 2 dollars) and we won some then lost it all, of course. It was so creepy to see the people glued the machines just playing over and over, and if someone got up off one of the machines next to them, they would start putting coins in both machines! Yesterday we went to a wildlife sanctuary then to a place where the natives use fallen wood from the forest to create beautiful structures. We tried some artisan beer from Misiones and some special jam and dulce de leche. Then we went to the hummingbird garden and the woman tending it was so nice. She sat and talked to us, helping me identify all the hummingbirds as there were around 8 different kinds that frequented her garden. When she saw me looking for feathers, she got out a little box and dumped its contents into my book. It was about 20 hummingbird feathers! I couldn´t believe it, I was so excited! They are adorable. Two are simply extrodinary, a beautiful shiny copper color. I´ve been wanting to find a hummingbird feather for so long and now I have like 20. Most of them are black and white, from this one type of hummingbird, can´t remember its name. Those ones are probably easier to find then the darker colorful ones. Anyways, one other amazing thing about this place is how beautiful it is at night. You can see all the stars, its warm out, and the takataka come out. They are like fireflies but bigger and glow a bright green! They are pretty much the coolest thing ever and look like little fairies. Hope everyone is having wonderful holidays! I miss my family and hope they know that! I love you all!