return of the mack

GO GAUCHOS!

i blog therefore i am...

So I am new to a lot of things: empanadas, speaking spanish, blogging to name a few. Apparently blogging is this powerful new media outlet. This weekend, through word of mouth alone, hundereds gathered in front of the planetarium in Buenos Aires for a giant pillow fight which was the result of an idea in San Francisco and some serious blogging by some serious bloggers with some serious blog clout. This level of blogging is unknown to me and, though I didn't attend the pillow war, because I have the spring sickness, the photo in the Buenos Aires Herald the next day made it look like fun. It was an impressive display of the power of the blog.

The next day I am catching up on the Independent and reading their interview with John Stewart who says...

Listen, everything is judged on its own merits. Some blogs earn credibility, some blogs become known for being a resting shop for Photoshop and paranoid theories. It’s like anything else: if you put it out in the public, it gets vetted and that’s the vetting process. Also, there are definitely places where people go to find their own points of view reinforced. Blogs makes that easier. But in the larger perspective, that comes to the fore ultimately as well.

And that night I watch an episode of CSI about blogging and flash mobs. I am learning all the time.

Needless to say I suddenly feel very old, out of touch, and drawn to run out and buy a Blackberry. I barely know how to turn on my iPod. I take comfort in having reformatted my MySpace page without blowing up my computer.

tipping the scales

Oh, California. I hear your call. Here I am, buckling down in Buenos Aires, preparing all my resistence for the 6 months of sweltering heat that I will have to endure as punishment for not being a big fan of my adopted country and government. Then suddenly, like peeling bells of joy, comes the news that Donald Rumsfeld was either given, or snatched his own walking papers. ¿Qué importa? Está caminando. And the dems are coming out strong like nothing ever happened. Was it all a bad dream? Have I been taking crazy pills for the last five years?

Had I known the American public had been eating their Wheaties for breakfast, maybe I wouldn't have committed to move to a killer new apartment and hunker down here for much longer. This news is thrilling, though not quite enough to send me running back to the US. Yet.

Why? It seems that the part of the US that still interests me most, Santa Barbara, despite knowing where it's political bread is buttered, is still as NUTSO as ever. And speaking of crazy pills, you'd think someone with Wendy McCaw's money would have someone on hand to stop her from making stupid, illegal decisions. No such luck. Apparently the NewsPress isn't happy with just taking a giant shit. They gotta get right in there and play with it too.

(Insert giant sigh here) This really is just getting silly.

I attach below the link to Melinda Burns' petition. Read, sign, CANCEL YOUR SUBSCRIPTIONS, and watch more BBC. In that order.

Petition to Reinstate Melinda Burns

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

To: All Media
From: The organized at SBNP

Today, the GCC-IBT filed an unfair labor practice charge with the National
Labor Relations Board in Los Angeles against the News- Press, challenging
the paper's retaliatory and unlawful discharge of Ms. Melinda Burns. Her
firing is perhaps the most extreme example to date of the continuing
campaign by the News-Press management to discourage and frustrate the
collective voice of its newsroom staff, so eloquently and clearly expressed
a month ago.

In a perverse if futile move intended to strike fear into its own newsroom,
the Santa Barbara News-Press late Friday fired Senior Writer Melinda Burns,
one of its most experienced, skilled and dedicated reporters in retaliation
for her prominence in the union campaign leading to an election victory on
September 27.

This latest example of vindictive and lawless labor relations at the
News-Press shows shocking disrespect for Burns's following and her sparkling
reputation in the Santa Barbara community, and for the sweat equity she has
earned over more than two decades of reporting.

It is transparently obvious that Ms. Burns was fired because of her
prominent public role - well-known to News-Press upper management - in
introducing the newsrooom staff to the Graphics Communications Conference of
the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (GCC-IBT) and then helping to
lead the campaign for union representation to an overwhelming victory, 33-6,
on September 27.

Ms. Burns, a graduate of Harvard University and USC, has been with the
News-Press for 21 years. During that time, she has won numerous prestigious
awards for her in-depth coverage of farmworkers, immigration, science and
the environment. Most recently, Ms. Burns took first place in the Best of
the West contest for immigration and minority affairs reporting, in
competition against newspapers of all sizes in 13 states.

In a May, 2005, article in the News-Press proudly reporting on her
achievement, her editor said, "Melinda's work demonstrates our commitment to
provide excellent local coverage that mirrors all of our county's
communities." In 2004, Ms. Burns was awarded a "Pinnacle of Excellence "
National Science Journalism Award by the American Association for the
Advancement of Science. In 2002, she received a Special Journalism Award
from the Santa Barbara League of Women Voters, honoring her for in-depth
reporting and high journalistic standards.

Over the years, Ms. Burns has obtained more than $30,000 in private and
state grants to carry out various investigative projects for the News-Press.
Most recently, she directed the "New Okies" photography exhibit that was on
view for eight months this year in Santa Barbara County, documenting the
plight of the Mixtec strawberry pickers in Santa Maria.

In filing an unfair labor practice charge today on behalf of Ms. Burns, the
GCC-IBT requests that the NLRB seek her reinstatement with full back pay and
promptly investigate and prosecute the News-Press for this latest violation
and the string of others that preceded it. In addition, the union asks the
Board to seek injunctive relief in the federal district court to compel the
News-Press to do what it disingenuously says in its press releases it will
do (but in reality does the opposite): that is, cooperate with the NLRB,
honor that agency's and this nation's labor laws and heed the
emphatically-declared mandate of its employees who wish to collectively
bargain with their employer for a fair employment contract.

even gauchitos get the blues

Since Paul is working on a story about gauchos for a certain, beloved small town rag we took off this weekend for the Día de la tradicción just 90 minutes north of Buenos Aires in sleepy San Antonio de Areco. We had a great day on Saturday sucking rare meat off the bones of freshly killed cow, watching the rodeo style events, and getting a better idea of modern gaucho culture and how it differs from the days of Martín Fierro.

Here are some timeless gaucho images to hold you over until there is more to read but I am sure Paul is working hard on all the sumptuous details as I type. We all need to get a little gaucho sometimes.

santa teresa

After one month of not seeing her, we finally found out that our friend Tere, the woman who cleans our house, is very, very ill. While we are unsure of some of the details, we do know that Tere is now at home recovering after some time in the hospital and several blood transfusions. We also understand that she will be in need of a bone marrow transplant in the near future.

To this end I am writing an appeal to my friends in Buenos Aires to give blood on Teresa’s behalf to help her with the transfusions, and other people in need. It’s free, it’s easy, and giving blood saves lives. Teresa is a lovely, hard-working Peruvian woman that we care about and we hope that you can help and forward the link to this blog to anyone and everyone that you know in the city.

Here are the details on giving blood:

The clinic is located in Belgrano at Ciudad de la Paz 810 (2 blocks from Subte Olleros). The clinic is open from 8am-noon on weekdays for donations. Should you choose to donate blood, you should take photo identification. If you would like to donate blood on Teresa’s behalf you should give them her name (Maria Teresa Rojas) and tell them that she was treated at Virrreyes Clinic.

Before giving blood you should be well hydrated and feel in good heath. Do not smoke or drink alcohol one hour before donating. Do not eat before going (in the morning) or ingest any liquids with fat (i.e. milk). It is super easy – get up, drink coffee without milk, cruise to the clinic, donate blood, and chow down some mediaslunas afterwards! The clinic is clean and professional, and the staff is nice and patient.

Things to know are that you can’t give blood if you have had piercings, acupuncture, or tattoos with one year. You can’t give blood if you use or have used any illegal drugs. You can’t give blood if you have had unprotected sex or sex with prostitutes. You can’t give blood if you have HIV or Hepatitis or sex with infected parties. After donation, your blood is tested for syphilis, hepatitis, HIV, etc and you will be notified of any positive test results so if you get an annual blood test you can do it while donating. Having traveled does not seem to affect giving blood. Yes, you get asked a lot of questions but service is fast and it should not take more than 1-2 hours of your life to save someone else’s.

If you have any questions – you can call the clinic 4666-9898.

Please help Teresa and others who need blood transfusions if you can. Your blood saves lives. Forward this link like wildfire and let’s start the revolution, people!

why you should jump ship

Most of you reading this blog from Santa Barbara already know that the NewsPress meltdown in our sleepy, little, beachside pueblito is like an intense episode of Dallas if JR Ewing was played by an inexplicably-masculine billionaire female. This stuff is seriously SOooOOOOOooOO juicy it has me salivating all over the newsprint from way down here.

Just when things seemed to be lowering to a distant simmer (can anyone say 'Lost' Season 2?!), the small town media meltdown is getting nasty again. YOU GO, Sue Ellen (played divinely by the Indy's one and only Nick Welsh)! Tell that bitch who's boss!

If you aren't paying attention... you really gotta start! Just a little tidbit from another Network TV Slut. I think fondly, during these times, of my former employer. Kareoke party at SoHo and we'll all sing, "I Will Survive"??

It's too damn hot

I know, I know. Less blogging more photos. I was prepared for the summertime Buenos Aires heat but I was prepared for it to hit in December. Little didn't I know it would hit in mid-October leaving life sweaty and opressive. In the meantime here are some photos of one of the cooler art forms of Buenos Aires - stencil art. Stencils are everywhere and range from political, to artsy, to just plain weird. They remain one of the most enjoyable reasons to trawl the streets of the BA even when it is 90 degrees and humid as hell itself.

booty call

It is no secret that the famous Latin machismo is alive and well in Buenos Aires. In a lot of ways, men, both young and old, rule this city. They dine alone and in large groups, spend hours over beers, and love, but oh how they love women. It seems that men are trained from birth to admire women and admire them out loud.

It took some serious adjusting and constantly referring to my lunfardo dictionary to get used to being subject to a barrage of remarks in the city and to understand what was being said to me. Indeed the divorce rate is high in Argentina, and the infidelity rate even higher. Just the other day I was sitting in a locutorio as a middle-aged man was typing on an instant messenger to a scantily clad girl on a web cam while simultaneously assuring his wife at the other end of his cell phone that he would be home soon. How can you blame him? There’s just something about women that makes men do crazy things. Combine that with the springtime sun that will soon become oppressive, summertime swelter, and you have one hell of a horny city. Sex is big business here. Telos, or by-the-hour hotels are everywhere and range from seedy, back alley, dirt huts to Vegas-style masterpieces replete with vibrating beds and room service menus offering a variety of sex toys. Where else to take your lover when the wife is waiting for you at home?

I think booking my plane tickets home got me thinking about men and machismo in Buenos Aires. It is just luck that the Casa Rivadavia is beside the pancho stand where all the motorcyclists in Buenos Aires post up to drink beer and peep ass. I can barely get a foot out the door without an ay, mamita or mirá que cola or sos una bomba. It is so common to hear such things that I actually get offended these days if I don’t. Men indiscriminately holler, whistle, whisper, and whoop at women – young and old, fat and thin, gorgeous and missing teeth. The surprising thing is that it feels good and a great gauge these days for me to know when I absolutely, inarguably look like hell.

So I keep thinking about going back to Santa Barbara to visit in December, escaping the worst of miniskirt months in BA. I think about the men at the stores around the house and my neighbors who call me preciosa, linda, corazón, and querida. Somehow, when I wasn’t looking, I think maybe my self-esteem jumped a point or two. It will be strange to go back to a more reserved plane and people; a place where really I am just another brown-haired fat girl. I miss my family and friends so much but when I finally pack it in here, it’s the little things that I will miss. I guess I am starting to come around on the machismo… that’s all I am saying.

banda ancha blues

I am sharing the following in the name of timeless comedy. Anyone who has spent time in Argentina knows the woes of the banda ancha or high speed internet service. While Buenos Aires is modern and speedy, finding good, reliable internet in your home can be tougher than you think... just ask my boss.

Since moving to Argentina and working on a website, my life has been a complicated mix of WiFi cafes, shuffling my laptop to the hostel across the street, and locutorios - little stores with by the hour internet. Locutorios are absolutely everywhere, incredibly cheap at $1-2 pesos per hour, and generally pretty speedy. However, a couple of days ago, I learned the dark side of shared computers in Latin America.

In a huge rush, sending a quick IM, I ran from the locutorio leaving my MSN Messenger open. What ensued was apparently a bevvy of IMs to friends and former colleagues from a bored Argentine teenager. PRETTY HILARIOUS and not a bit sad. I have, countless times, used a shared computer at a locutorio when someone has left their IM open and, like a good citizen have closed it. NO MORE. I can't wait to find someone's open Messenger so that I can 'Pay it forward' next time. MWAHAHAHA.

In the meantime, here is a transcript between my friend Tanya and "me". If you received a similar IM, I ensure you that I haven't taken up speaking Spanglish nor have I started youching mi clitoris in public... yet. Could my life BE more rediculous?

As they say in the BA... disculpe las molestas. I will be more careful in future.

Start of Clare.. heart of darkness buffer: Fri Oct 13
10:53:45 2006
[10:44] Clare.. heart of darkness: hello biatc
[10:44] Clare.. heart of darkness: h
[10:44] Tanya: lol
[10:44] Clare.. heart of darkness: bitch
[10:44] Tanya: hi stinky
[10:44] Clare.. heart of darkness: jajaja
[10:45] Tanya: it's okay, i got the gist of it
[10:45] Tanya: how are you, my love?!
[10:45] Clare.. heart of darkness: I'M OK
[10:45] Clare.. heart of darkness: i'm horny rightnow....
[10:45] Tanya: oh my god
[10:45] Tanya: too much information
[10:45] Tanya: where is your man?
[10:47] Tanya: oh, you're just going to say "i'm horny right now" and then leave?
[10:47] Tanya: pervert
[10:47] Clare.. heart of darkness: no
[10:47] Clare.. heart of darkness: i'm youching mi clitoris..
[10:48] Clare.. heart of darkness: i'm sooo horny i don't now why!
[10:48] Tanya: i will reiterate
[10:48] Tanya: tmi
[10:48] Tanya: can't you have your boyfriend take care of that?
[10:48] Clare.. heart of darkness: i'm sooo horny i don't now why!
[10:49] Clare.. heart of darkness: n o i take care myself...
[10:49] Tanya: uh, did you leave your im on and now somebody else is writing?
[10:49] Tanya: i hope?
[10:50] Clare.. heart of darkness: mm nop
[10:51] Tanya: so this is what you are writing to tell me?
[10:51] Tanya: don't you have some deep thoughts on international travel that you can share?
[10:51] *** "Clare.. heart of darkness" signed off at Fri Oct 13 10:51:23 2006.
End of Clare.. heart of darkness buffer: Fri Oct 13 10:53:45 2006

going postal

Prior to meeting in the asswipe border town of La Quiaca and heading to Bolivia, Paul left weeks before me for the Argentine northwest. He informed me from the road that he had bought himself a woven piece of art and had it mailed to himself. I was spending a lot of time at home trying to organize laundry, packing, and logistics for leaving the house for a couple of weeks. I could be there in the mornings for the mail no problem. When it was bought, there was a $20 peso down payment and the rest of the $200 pesos would be due upon collection at my doorstep. Little did I know that my last few days in the city would be spent inside the post office.

The occasion of Paul’s gift to himself was no exception. Naturally, when the package arrived, our doorbell was on the fritz and, naturally, the postman didn’t leave the package with the doorman. Instead I got a note that I had missed the delivery and would have to collect the package in a different area of town. No problem. I take myself to nearby Montserrat’s post office where they tell me that I cannot collect the package until the next day.

When I return the next day I take a number and pull up a wall in the standing-room only waiting room. The middle aged gentleman to my left is testing the Kleenex capacity of his sleeve and I worry momentarily that the woman on my right has passed away until I see her chest rise and fall gently. They call number 62, so I check out how I am doing. My number says 03. Not looking good for me. Not to worry, I have my Soduku. 19 minutes later I finish my Soduku.

2 hours and 16 minutes later with my claim slip in hand, it is explained to me that I cannot pick up the package as it is addressed to one Pablo Rivas and not to me. I timidly explain that Pablo Rivas is partying in the Argentine North and may not plan to return. Not to worry, they tell me, I can pick up the package with my passport, faxed authorization from the aforementioned Paul Rivas, and a his passport – provided that he was my husband. When I countered with some dainty tidbits about how trying to get my “husband” to send a fax would be the equivalent of trying to force-feed broken glass to a regular person, they told me it wouldn’t be a problem as I had five days to get my shit together before they would ship the package back to its origin. With less than 48 hours until my 26-hour bus ride to La Quiaca, I started to get the stress sweats.

Within the hour I was on Gmail chat with Paul explaining the situation and trying not to chuck a virtual punch at him for not addressing the package to me and not himself. He told me where to find a copy of his passport and sent an email, in lieu of a fax saying that I was his wife and had his express permission to collect his mail for him. I printed the letter and returned to the house where I found a copy of every important document that Paul has – minus a copy of his passport. At this point I realize that it was pure luck that I found Paul online before and he was unlikely to go back to a computer for days. I switched to Defcom 5 and trudged back to the Internet. I had a fuzzy memory that Paul and I had emailed each other copies of our documents in cases of emergency. Thanks to the miracle that is Gmail, my email produced a copy of his passport.

The next day I was supposed to return to the post office with a fax, a copy of Paul’s passport and some money for the painting. I figured two out of three wasn’t bad. This fortuitous day I only had to wait 90 minutes to be attended. I had my coima on hand, you know, just in case. The man helping me says no way. You have a passport for Paul Rivas. The package is addressed to Pablo Rivas. Eso no sirve. Fucker. I explain that the names are the same and that Paul was just doing that to uncomplicated things for the esteemed Correo Argentino. He looks baffled but a kindly colleague steps in for me at this point telling him that what I am saying is not, in fact, a bold faced lie. Clearly, I am trying to bribe the wrong dude. The man helping me is pissed now; real pissed. This is my third visit in three days and he is trying to make it three for three with sending me away empty-handed.

He shrugs, resigned. Where is MY passport then? Fuck. I look at him blankly. That came from left field. He called my bluff and I am left baffled and pants-down. He can smell my fear. He grins. Oh yes, he explains, it is absolutely imperative that we have your identification on record also. I am rooting around in my Mary Poppins style purse. Wallet that weighs at least 20 pounds, gum, planner, fuzz, pens, hand sanitizer… hold on… Kleenex, half a candy bar, driver’s license?!?!?! No?! Shit. Ticket stub from movie, lighter, gloves, headphones, band aid… PASSPORT! PAASSSSSSSSSSPOOOOOOOORRRRRRT! I hold it triumphantly above my head and wave it around. I let out a giant Whew. People are staring. The attendant flounces off into the back room to look for the package and I stand at the counter with a shit-eating grin on my face. The other customers are split. Some elderly women smile warmly. I have won a battle for all of us. This story will become urban myth – the gringa who got her mail. The others scowl jealously, knowing all too well that they will be sent away when their turn comes. I breathe heavily and wait.

As I wait I sort out the $200 pesos that I will need to complete the transaction and get the fucker home. The man returns about a century later with the package and hands it over. I have it in my hands and he turns his back to me, walks back to his station, and calls the next customer in line. I look at him, utterly confused. Doesn’t he need the money? He notices me staring and gives me a snarky ¿Sí? What the hell am I still doing there? I turn tail and run. I feel only mildly guilty for ripping off the museum that Paul bought the painting from but in my heart I FEEL that I am really ripping off the Argentinean post office. And that feels good. And I don’t want to be around when they realize what has happened. So I just… run.

I unwrap the package when I get home. It’s a pretty woven painting though not my taste. The mailing has totally bent it. Either that or an angry postal worker had his way with it in a dark corner of the mailing office. This, however, doesn’t matter to me. Every time I see the painting it rings out like a shining beacon of victory.

Hopefully previous blog posts, or a quick reading of Bad Times In Buenos Aires have made it clear that things move slowly here. Just two days ago, ironically, on another trip to the post office, an elderly gentleman greeted my sister Julie and I. I asked if he was in line. He replied, in Spanish, “Yes. I have been waiting here for ages. Make no mistake, girls, this is a great country but it is full of lazy fuckers that don’t want to do anything for you.” I smiled and nodded and he gave me a hearty suerte as he left. Wiser words I have not heard lately.

Poor, three-legged blog!

My blog really should just be taken out and shot just to put it out of its misery. There is just so much to say. The past couple of months have been filled with thrills and adventures, tears and laughter. Peeing in semi-public places, burst eardrums, hellacious bus rides full of cockroaches, having my heart broken, then put back together, flying like a bird with a paragliding champ, sleeping for a month in hostels, eating steak sandwiches like every day is my last on earth, becoming re-addicted to cigs and diet coke, whipping through books one a day, travelling from the tropical north to the farthest south you can go before jumping the boat to Antarctica, laughing to tears with Julie, and feeling very, very restless.


This link should take you to a small selection of photos from my trip with little Julie... around Argentina in 30 days.

bolivia me mata

When I recover from my "vacation" with Paul I will post the thoughts swimming around in my mind. For now, please feel free to check out our photos from our Tragicomedy in Bolivia, a rich and beautiful country and an unforgettable experience. The following link should take you.

click here

back in the sick of it

I totally hemorrhaged again when I got back from my trip with Lynn. It was total culture shock leaving Buenos Aires for the Northwestern Patagonia Countryside and it was worse culture shock coming home for two weeks. Shortly after Lynn arrived we decided that flying to Bariloche (Argentina’s skiing and chocolate capital) instead of taking the 25-hour bus ride. Lynn made a good point that since she was taking her entire vacation allotment for the year, she might as well not spend more than 2 complete days of it on a bus. It only took us a few hours to sweep in through the clouds to this weird no world where there is no dogshit or $10 peso sex acts and where the mountains and crystal clear lakes unfold all around you like some sort of sick heavenly joke. I spent the first 48 hours or so just in complete shock and awe at the idea of staying in a hostel, trying to speak English again, trying to make friends. I realized pretty fast that I had spent the last four months of my life in a full-body cringe, totally wound-up and scared all the time, constantly on edge, constantly exhausted and suspicious, and totally not myself. The idea of a relaxing vacation was just hard to adjust to I suppose.

Lynn and I shared an amazing experience in the short time that we spent in and around Bariloche. It occurred to me that I probably hadn’t spent that much time with Lynn since she began Medical School, or even before. It also became clear how different we have become and how much of her life I have missed. It was nice to get to know my sister again.

As far as where we were, there are no words. We teamed up with 2 other Americans for the Siete Lagos or Seven Lakes Route so that we could afford to rent a car and do the trip in a couple over a couple of days instead of the panicked 3 hour bus tour the brochures offer. After a few short hours in the car Sean, one of the other Americans, suggested that we were all experiencing serious “adjective deficiency” because after a while of your jaw dropping, gasped breathes, screaming wow, cooing, commenting on how, beautiful, charming, lovely, gorgeous, breathtaking, wonderful, magnificent, spectacular, incredible everything is, you just sort of run out of things to say. Combine that with the fact that at every bend in the road, things just get better, and you realize quickly that you might as well just keep your mouth shut and enjoy it.

It felt good to be out in the country, to have offensive smelling clothes. It felt good to hike for hours and be on a real bike. After the initial shock to the system, it did feel nice to meet people and speak in English and, for the first time in my life, be the better half of a barely-Spanish-speaking duo.

When I returned to the city I really had a hard time readjusting. Once again I was back in this world of honking horns and “kill or be killed” pedestrian walkways, of guys testing out their English on you by asking “Would you show me your pussy?” and just feeling really sorry for myself. Every time I want to throw up my hands and say that I hate it here I try to bite my tongue and remind myself that it is me and not this place. But it is hard.

I am about to finish my Spanish class at UBA – my test is next week, and still I often feel my Spanish is no better than the day I arrived. I have a hard time understanding the accent people and (naturally and understandably) people speak very quickly and impatiently. The other day I was in a giant, expensive, and touristy store buying something. The store clerk rang up my items then said something that I didn’t understand. I asked as politely as possible if she could repeat what she said more slowly. She rolled her eyes and told me, “No importa,” with a giant sigh. But it does matter to me. I wanted to cuss her out and run out of the store screaming that I would never shop in that shithole of a place anyway but I couldn’t think how to say that in Spanish. Naturally, I meekly bought my overpriced things and limped out into the street like a wounded puppy. I curse myself for not having thicker skin. Maybe on some level I am tougher than when I got here and when I return to Santa Barbara I will realize that I am practically a New Yorker by comparison. For now, the porteños continue to be able to crush me like a bug every day.

The winter is very erratic. For a while life in the city was extremely cold and I was wearing all my clothes at once and still coming home cold. The only way the Argentines survived the worst of the weather was the world cup fever that felt like an inferno striking a polar ice cap. It’s been 15 years since I lived in a country where the world cup mattered. And while it mattered in Scotland, it was mostly because everyone in Scotland was glued to their televisions to root against the English because the Scottish side never qualified for the cup. El Mundial, as it is called here, is inexplicable. There are televisions everywhere. There are televisions in kioskos and newsstands. Cafés and restaurants are standing room only. You can’t pass a conversation without someone talking about football or the Brazilians being putos. Children and grandparents are decked out in team colors. Oh, and the entire country is drunk.

After one of Argentina’s wins we walked to El Obelisco which is a few short blocks from our house and one of Buenos Aires’ most recognizable landmarks. It was reported the next day that hundreds of thousands of people were there. People were climbing on top of garbage trucks and thousands of cars honked their horns. Fireworks exploded all around and people drummed and danced and chanted cheers for the home team. It felt like being in the eye of a hurricane. While your own world is relatively calm, life explodes all around you.

Argentina is a crazy and lonely place. Anyone who wants to get a great sense of it should invest in Pico Iyer’s Falling Off the Map, which is a serious of essays on “Lonely Places”. He really gets to the heart of this strange place.

Paul headed up north yesterday. He will spend the next month stomping across the Northwest border towns that cuddle the Bolivian border. News from him will follow. Time permitting I will go and meet him in a couple of weeks before Mary and Roger descend into Argentina.

I can’t wait to see the folks. They could not be coming at a better time. Since leaving town I have missed 2 funerals, just found out I am missing a wedding, and no less than 3 nervous breakdowns. At these times I feel homesick. And I miss my friends. I do, however, know that what I am doing here is important; that I won’t see how much I have changed until I go home. I won’t see how much stronger and smarter I am until I confront my past life - which I'm sure will be unrecognizable. I can't imagine what I ever did with a Venti Latte from Starbucks anymore. This is something I have to remind myself of every day when I feel weak.

I am attaching a photo of Paul and I… in the eye of the Mundial hurricane.

por fin!

Por fin! My photos should be available by copy/pasting this link into your browser: http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=13pwlo8l.6k68vj1t&Uy=y0ix29&Upost_signin=Slideshow.jsp%3Fmode%3Dfromshare&Ux=0

Now that the painstaking uploading process is over, I am working on the writing.

Patagonia blues for Dave

I just arrived back in Buenos Aires, back to my Paul, after a couple of beautiful weeks in Patagonia. I now sit in a local WiFi cafe trying to upload these photos because they speak volumes more about the country than I could write. About 48 hours after arriving we were all used up and became completely adjective deficient to describe what we were seeing. When the photos upload, I will post them and write properly about our experiences.

Until then, anyone looking for a shot of inspiration should follow this link: http://www.independent.com/opinion/2006/05/david_odom_19522006.html

I learned while away that my dear friend, a love, a savior, a saint had died suddenly, peacefully, surrounded by friends and fans. It is hard to reconcile sadness with peaceful death, with a life so filled with love. I will never, ever forget Dave. I will never forgive myself for not being there to stand in line outside of his hospital door to tell him that I loved him and how much his friendship meant to me. We should all hope to have children so pure of heart and to grow to adults so loving. Dave's voice was one of the last I heard on my phone before our plane left. I will never delete that message. The above link is to an absolutely beautiful tribute to a great human being. Whether you knew Dave or not, check it out...

More from Patagonia soon.

inside out

March 20, 2006

She IS alive. Breathe easy. So maybe mopeds, foam, chariot races, and dogshit are not the ONLY things that can slow me down. The silence of my blog has been mainly due to the fact that a couple of weeks ago I was struck down with my first bout of proper South American jungle fever. In retrospect, I actually think it might have been a little impressive that it only took me a month to get properly flogged with dysentery but it ravaged me completely for three or four days and hence there was very little to report from here at the time. Now it feels that I have neglected the blog for so long that I will never have the time or energy to report everything so I am making a silent promise to get back into my in-depth coverage.

One fateful Thursday night I had a slice of pizza and a nice cold beer while Paul was teaching and went to bed happy as a little chappy. When I woke up in the middle of the night it felt like my intestines were going through a spin cycle and my body could not evacuate its contents fast enough (charming, I know). I had scheduled an interview on Friday for a teaching job and had to miss it. Paul, bless him, called them and told them I was ferociously ill and I rescheduled the appointment for Monday. When Monday rolled around I was still doubled over with stomach pain and hadn’t eaten since Thursday night so I promptly missed the second scheduled interview. Job prospect number one seemed to be down the tubes. I spent most of that weekend in bed watching BAD television and checking out the Oscars for the first time in a few years. Dolly Parton: Why, oh why?

There is something so horrible about being sick away from home. I think I’ve just spent so much of my life sick or in pain that at this point I am actually getting more and more intolerant. You’d think after no less than seven surgeries and thirteen spinal taps that a girl would be a tough little nugget and ready to tackle anything, but actually the opposite is true. When I stub my toe, I cry. When I get the flu I roll around in bed praying for death. When I have a cold I drug myself senseless with every crumby over-the-counter remedy that the FDA will allow. Pain and sickness are two things that I just absolutely cannot stand. I will not tolerate them, I can’t put up with them. I am sure I can be a little bit of a testy patient. Paul was patient with me for as long as possible and then I think kind of gave up feeling sorry for me and substituted that for the “suck it up, meat!” healing method. It was some tough times. Now I am feeling better and eating again and really I think I just had the best diet South America has to offer because I must have lost six pounds in a mere few days.

I do recommend keeping a doctor in your family because my lowest moment came in floods of tears on the phone with Doctor Lynnabelle talking me down from the ledge and assuring me that everything would be ok. She told me some things to pick up at the Pharmacy so I left the house on Sunday evening and staggered (quite literally) to the closest drug store. I was in a sickness haze, totally weakened from not eating, barely able to stand up and sweating feverishly when I realized I had two boxes in my hand one of which contained a laxative and the other containing a non-laxative and I had absolutely no idea which was which. I nearly cried. I was too exhausted to even try to ask the pharmacist for help. These are the moments when I want to be at home on my couch with my Mum’s lentil soup and a stack of DVD’s from Blockbuster. No such luck. One of the cool things about living in Microcentro is the buzz. I mean the streets are full of neon signs and absolutely teeming with people at all hours. But when you are sick as a dog, and stagger out of your house with people knocking into you and hustling you out of the way and the lights and sounds are just a sensory nightmare… things get a little more difficult. Anyway I have broken the sickness seal and will surely do better handling the pharmacy next time.

During my brush with death Paul went out to watch some of the Buenos Aires Tango Festival (which I managed to miss in its entirety) with Emil and Dayna, which he said was pretty fun. Carnival was raging on last week complete with drumming and (yes!) enough foam to blanket Texas. My Spanish class was coming up at UBA and Paul was gently harassing me to study for the placement test. I have been spending most of my time in the computer store working on a website translation. Three siblings own our apartment and one of the sisters has a boyfriend who works for a fancy stable and horse-breeding company. They have a Spanish website which they would like to be available in English as well. Paul was thinking how much to charge them for this service and I offered to do it for free. I figured we kind of owe them for helping us get shot of the agency fees for the apartment and all of that. Now I kind of think, “Good lord, what have I gotten myself into?!” So I have been hours and hours slogging through this translation, which is going more or less well but very, very slowly. I also run into difficulties with translations of horse-related words that I don’t even know in English and wouldn’t know unless I was a horse trainer, breeder, stable boy, etc. It’s tough but Paul is proofreading what I have done which will help. We even braved working on a section of it together and we both walked out relatively unscathed. Miracle! We got an email from Alexia yesterday thanking us for working on it. Her boyfriend apparently told her that he could not accept the work for free and instead we would be invited to an asado with them, which to me sounds a lot better than money right now.

Things are slowly starting to work. After a month of promises, the cleaning lady has finally arrived which is so groovy. Once a week the house is going to be cleaned and our laundry will be taken and changed for us. Such things are an amazing luxury for me who still struggles with not having a panic attack when buying stamps. We also finally got cable TV which I am struggling to avoid but it’s so difficult when the man comes to install it and the first thing you see when you switch it on is ‘The Office’ on BBC World. Yessssssssssssss. It was a blessing to have when I was feeling too sick and pathetic to better myself with reading. We are also allegedly getting Internet service in the apartment very soon and that will be the biggest luxury of all. Just think, I can wile away the hours downloading episodes of ‘Lost’ without dragging my computer around town. SWEET!

This entry is a little fractured. I spent a week in bed trying to recover and then a week that I really didn’t stop trying to make up for it. We went to a free concert by a famous Tango singer who won a Latin Grammy. Her name was Maria Volente and the intimate concert was so beautiful. We finally took a guided tour of the Teatro Colon which was so amazing that it was only mildly dampened for me by having to take the English tour with a bunch of American lobsters asking asinine questions almost endlessly.

The greatest event recently was a brief jaunt to Mar Del Plata which is a beach town 5 and a half hours South of Buenos Aires by bus. It is mainly a beach resort town and reminded me of my visit to Mazatlan in Mexico. The guidebook warned that from January to March the place is stowed with “sun frazzled porteños” and they really were not kidding. The beaches are beautiful and cascading and the reefs keep the waves pounding but the crowds are shoulder to shoulder. It didn’t bother me much at all. I spent a few hours of absolute bliss on the beach and tumbling around in the waves. I miss the beach. I miss swimming more than anything. I was so excited to bask and play in the water that I forgot to put sunscreen on my legs and after an hour of laying in the hot sand, emerged with a perfect Scottish, whitey, tomato-red sunburn that still hasn’t really stopped hurting. As well as some quality time in the sand, we walked a kilometer or so out of downtown Mar Del Plata to the port. We got there right at 5pm which was perfect time to watch the fishermen unloading their catch. The place reeked and the men were loud and colorful. I love fishing ports. As well as a giant statue of “Santa Domingo” (which is so big it must be visible from the moon), the port boasts a colony of sea lions, entirely male, which you can approach within a meter. Some even get so frisky that they cruise onto the sidewalk where the fisherman toss them a few pieces of the catch, if they are so lucky. Just past the boys are a collection of shipwrecks. Literally, half-submerged, rotten, half-boats many of which are half submerged as if being pulled slowly over the coarse of some years straight down to the depths of hell. This is clearly where the boats around here come to die. Anyway, they provided some great photo opportunities for this gringa.

This morning my class started and it seems like it will be very slow moving but extremely useful. I already felt pushed to speak more than I would usually dare and this, above all things, will be very, very good for me. I learned some cool words too which I have to get to writing down. I have been tentatively poking my resume out there for the Buenos Aires world to see but nothing interesting happening yet. I am still trudging through the website translation (hoping to finish as soon as possible) and may start tutoring a girl in English and helping her prepare her college application essays. Life is so sweet sometimes. I feel so great today. I have a class, I feel like I am learning a lot. I have a wonderful partner. Things feel good. There are moments of overwhelming, paralyizing fear, self-doubt, even self-hatred. I often feel lazy, fat, insignificant, stupid, and completely worthless but I’m not used to things happening so slowly when they happen so fast for others. I suppose a lot of those moments are because I want to learn Spanish NOW and I want to make friends NOW and I want to see all the art NOW and I want to read ten more books NOW. I need to relax and let things move slowly but, like I said, I’m not used to it and while I can be very patient with others, I am never, ever patient or understand with myself. So I have a good list of things to work on.

My friend Sarah arrived on Thursday. Sarah is a friend from High School that (by total coincidence) is also planning on living and working here for a time. I finally got to see her when we arrived home from Mar Del Plata. It was such a joy to see her and talk to her and feel that I have a friend close by. It’s also funny how in one moment I am assuring her that she will find her way around easily and the next moment I am feeling pangs of jealousy that she has already cast a web of new friends and experiences around herself. Maybe I have too and I just don’t feel it but I think these things have come much harder to me this time than they did in London or on other adventures. I want to be better at this so badly. I want to move in the world with a brave face and fearless spirit. I want to visit Thailand, Patagonia, Spain, Africa… and I want my feet to be more wandering. At any rate, I am so glad that Sarah is here and so settled in after a few short days.

I miss home sometimes. I miss tampons with applicators. I miss PG Tips. I miss Mexican Fresh burritos. I miss all burritos. Shit, at this point I miss Taco Bell. I miss my family and my cat. I miss the farmer’s market. I miss TiVo (oh GOD how I miss TiVo). I miss having friends around when I need them. I miss my friends who would drop by my apartment if they were in the neighborhood. I miss my apartment. I miss the smell of the granite in my parents’ new kitchen. I miss tripping over my dad’s shoes, which are never anywhere but right in front of the couch where someone is bound to trip on them. I miss calling my sister on speed dial whenever I laugh out loud at something. I miss laughing out loud. I miss having something to work very hard at. I miss feeling like I had a direction even though in Santa Barbara I equally had none. I miss Cadbury Eggs. I miss feeling confident. I miss feeling that I have purpose. I miss feeling that I’m not, but that I could be, working toward something wonderful. I miss the importance of people telling you that you are something when you feel like nothing. I miss the sunsets.

That being said, there are so many things that I already feel that I will miss about Buenos Aires when, and if, I leave. I am trying so hard to capture them and savor them while I am here. I am trying to convey here is this verbal outpour of nonsense that despite all the things I miss that there are real, true joys that are keeping me here.

More than anything I am sorry for the long silence for any who bother to look at this page.The photos are Paul wandering around the only photographable part of the Teatro Colon and all the wonders of Mar Del Plata that I described in haste. I hope you enjoy the photos and at least a little of the babble. You might even miss it when it’s gone.

straight neglecting my duties

February 27, 2006

I feel I’ve been neglecting my blog. I can’t figure out if it’s just a waning desire to sit and write or if, shock horror, I might actually be settling into things here. We are now a month into our journey, more or less. One down, eleven to go I suppose. But looking back on the last few days, there are certainly things that continue to shock me every day.

Our apartment is half a block from the 18-lane Avenida 9 de Julio, as I mentioned before. It takes at least two rounds of green lights to cross, a hustle in your step, and an element of danger. Late last week as Paul and I were crossing we heard a giant screech, followed by a crash, followed by a body thrown forward between two cars. Giant screeches, crashed, honking horns, and the sound of twisted metal are really not so uncommon around here and only when the body appeared was it clear that this was not regulation. Turns out a moped driver lost control or something and rear-ended a car and was thrown forward from the moped onto the pavement with a slap. Within moments 9 de Julio is a mess of cars. A moment’s interruption of such an intricate traffic operation can cause hours of gridlock. The cars are honking, a policeman is on a cell phone, and cars are already backed up for blocks. I’m not sure if anyone has really, properly checked to see if the guy is ok but people keep walking, we wander slowly forward, and, within minutes, everyone is going back about their day. I have a hard time seeing people in pain and feeling helpless about it and I have trouble taking my eyes off the scene and I hope the young man is being taken care of. In the early days of my time in London, I finished a mean in fancy, upper-crust Knightsbridge and walk out of the restaurant just in time to witness a female body getting slammed by a car. Turns out an American tourist had forgot how easy it can be to look the wrong way while crossing the street in London and had practically jumped under the wheels of a car. It was her first night in the city. She had just checked into her hotel and was running out to go clubbing with her friends. I read the next day in the free newspaper on the Tube that she had died. I don’t think I’ll ever really get used to the pace of the city and I fear that if I ever did, then I might stop paying attention.

I haven’t cured cancer yet. Paul and I used to watch ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ and get endless hilarity from Larry David’s style. I guess he made enough money from Seinfeld that he never really had to work another day in his life and he spends his time on the show practically clowning himself for being such a lazy bum. In every show he’ll have an agenda like, “Today I have to go to the dry cleaners and then get the car wash” or he’ll say something like, “I can’t go to the movies on Thursday because I have to play golf.” Ummm… whaaaaaaaat? What kind of life is that? It’s like when I used to go spend my lunch hour wandering around downtown State Street and there were constantly people in all of these ludicrously expensive stores; people that seemed to me to be very little more than professional shoppers. What on earth could anyone have to do at Blue Bee on a Tuesday at 3pm? Get a job! These days I wake up thinking, “I have to go to the café, buy a newspaper, exchange money, and buy stamps.” It’s becoming almost unforgivable to live like this and make an occupation out of slowly draining my savings account.


I’ve been shamelessly watching every terrible American film I can get my hands on combined with a smattering of good ones. I came home after ‘Walk the Line’ and put all of Paul’s Johnny Cash on my iPod and he’s been my city soundtrack ever since. God bless ‘im. But when you can find a place where the tickets cost US$1.50 I’m hoping I’ll be doing more and feeling a little less guilty when my Spanish class starts. I found what seems like a great class at Universitad Buenos Aires and it’s far less expensive than any private Spanish instruction school. Emil’s girlfriend Dayna has also expressed interest in taking the same class so it would be nice to have an ally. I am thinking more and more of teaching English and I am going to start sending out resumes and seeing what happens. I really believe that I could do it. I don’t think Paul has spoken any Spanish with his students so apparently that shouldn’t be as much of a hinderance as I thought. Some of the people running school here seem to be seriously overpaid hacks. I think I’m going to try to find one of them to work for.

My friend Sarah is also flying into Buenos Aires mid-March for an adventure of her own. The prospect of having a friend in the city that I’ve known for years and years is very comforting and I’m excited about it. I’m also excited to relive all the fascination of arriving here through her eyes. I found out late last year that Sarah had made almost identical plans as I had and we spent the last few months accusing each other of total-idea-thievery. She’s a brave soul doing this on her own. I feel more confident every day here that I could do this on my own but I never would have believed that if it wasn’t for Paul. My sister (Dr. Lynnabelle) also has tickets for May. I’m so excited. Bring on the visitors. Lynn’s visit should also provide a good excuse for some serious Patagonia travel. I am chomping at the bit now. Every time I walk down a street in Buenos Aires that I’ve walked down before I just think of the continent unfolding before me that I’ve never seen and I’m dying to explore. I can’t wait until Lynn gets here. I am confident her wandering feet will take me cool places.

Friday finally brought some much-needed respite from the blistering summer heat in the form of gigantic, powerful, rain, thunder, and lightening storms. The extremity of the weather can be totally unreal. It reminded me a little of Hawaii where one minute everything is chill and the next minute you are drenched to the bone and it’s too late to even think about looking for shelter. It’s like Hawaii’s warm, tropical, rain too. But the weather has been far less painful for me (yes, the Scottish girl likes the rain) as a result of the scattered showers.

This weekend brought one of the greater moments in Buenos Aires. On Sunday Emil and Dayna came with us when we took the train out to the little “British” suburb of Hurlingham an hour out of the city. The train itself is a groovy experience as one of the kids in front of us spends the entire hour shooting crazy Carnival body foam out the window and there are no doors so if you decided to pack it in, doing so would be really convenient. We get to Hurlingham hungry and hot. We inquire more than once as to where the “Barrio Inglés” might be but either no one knows or no one wants to tell us – tough call. The English neighborhood is more of an afterthought though as what we are really looking for is the track where they have – no I am not kidding – CHARIOT RACES. The track is a walk and a half from the station and it’s becoming clear that there is absolutely nothing to see in Hurlingham. We are all getting shifty and trying to admit that this may have been a giant mistake. As soon as we get there, though, it’s clear we’re in the right place. I’ve never seen anything like this in my life. I have what my family calls a little bit of a “gambling problem” and have therefore never been allowed near a racetrack or the like, let alone one complete with CHARIOTS (yesss!!). Really, not enough can be said about the scene. It’s cool, perfect even. We get there about a half hour before the races begin and it only takes us 5 or 6 attempts at ordering and some serious waiting to get some amazingly tasty sausage sandwiches and some cold beer in the shade of the trees. Ahhhh… Sunday afternoon. We place our meager one or two peso bets and the races begin. We’re excited and cheering but when we are placing out bets hundred peso bills are being passed across the counter so for some it can be a serious business but with no minimum, it’s a small price to pay for some serious entertainment. Dayna is the first winner and gets one peso and forty centavos on a one peso bet. Emil is with me on how much better it would all be with the fever of serious money on the line but neither of us have any so we keep it calm. There are seven races and in the fifth race I put two pesos on El Piojo (The Louse) in honor of Paul’s friend in Mexico who’s nickname is El Piojo which is a word I love and a phenomenon that he’s been writing about in his book a matter of hours before. El Piojo comes up big and I collect 3 pesos and 20 centavos. SCORE! The sixth race is amazing. Around the last bend there is a giant cloud of dust and horses and limbs go flying. Only two drivers make it out (one of whom is mine so I feel a little guilty trying to see if he wins in the midst of all the chaos – but OBVY he doesn’t) and a couple of horses make it out without their chariots or riders and a giant mess of injuries and horse wrangling ensues. Everyone is glued to the mess and we decide we’ve had enough. As we are ambling towards the door we see one of the racers telling the paramedics that no one is seriously hurt at all so we are sure we’ve seen the best that chariot racing has to offer and take off back to the station. Really, if you hear of any chariot races near you – I recommend it. I’ve attached some photos so that you absolutely have to believe me.
Carnival has been raging on in the city. Every night there is a plethora of foamed up kids and music and drumming in the street around the corner. The Tango festival is in full swing at the moment so I’m sure we’ll be checking out some of that. Paul is working tirelessly on his book while I scour the papers for the latest lame American film to watch. Life is wonderful, juicy, and bizarre. I miss home and miss my cat but wonder often if my life in Santa Barbara was not just a fragment of my imagination. Am I actually getting used to things here? Whenever I think I might be, there is foam, moped accidents, chariot races, and, of course, dogshit to slow me down a little and remind me that I´m not in The Goodland anymore.

trudging on

February 21, 2006

Life trudges on. I feel a little paralyzed these days. I’m on three solid weeks of permanent vacation status and I can’t help but wonder if I might not have cured cancer or ended world hunger at this point. I think the hardest adjustment for me is just to not be working, to be wandering aimlessly, and to have absolutely no idea of a permanent agenda whatsoever.
My sister (Doctor Lynnabelle) assured me that there are lots of people in the world (including her) for whom a day without a schedule sounds like a small miracle. I know how lucky I am, I do. I just can’t help but feel a little anxious, not by being unemployed, but without the prospect of being employed in the near future. Life here continues to be weird and scary and wonderful and fresh and sometimes all of these things at the same time.
Last week I saw a taxi accident near our house. A younger taxi driver rear-ended an older gentleman who stopped his car in the middle of a tiny and gridlocked street rendering it totally unusable and unleashed all hell on the guy that hit him. What a scene. I couldn’t understand much but my limited Spanish allows no room for guesswork on words like puta and pandejo, which were about every second or third word. It was hilarious and suddenly clear to me that while drivers here have absolutely no concern over the sanctity of human life, they clearly understand the value of their cars. Weird? Crossing the street continues to be a daily adventure and always somewhat of a question mark whether or not I’ll make it out.

On Friday evening we went to our first real, actual, in the flesh, professional, Argentinean tango show. It only took us three weeks to figure it out but we did. We went to the tourist-ey but ever-chic Café Tortoni. Café Tortoni was established in 1858 and the place reeks of it. There are clipping of newspaper reports of Carlos Gardel singing there and the service is atrocious in the great style of all great places. I am no tango expect and maybe a year in this place will sophisticate me a little but as far as I could tell, the show was world class. There were two couples that danced (and a clear winner) but I think the highlight was a gentleman singing traditional tango songs – none of which I understood and all of which were really moving. The music was just lovely and the live band was great. It struck me for the first time how all tango music has a hint of sadness. Or maybe I have a hint of sadness. I read a blurb about the history of the dance in El Pinche Lonely Planet that says: “Though the exact origins can’t be pinpointed, the dance is thought to have started in Buenos Aires in the 1880’s. Legions of European immigrants, mostly lower-class men, arrived in the great village of Buenos Aires to seek their fortune in the new country. The settled on the capital’s arrables (fringes), but missing their motherlands and the women they left behind, they sought out cafes and bordellos to ease the loneliness. Here, the men mingled and danced with waitresses and prostitutes.” Suddenly it makes sense that the music as well as the dancing are raw, passionate, sexual, exotic, and never without a hint of sadness. The tango is everywhere here. The stereotypes are true, at least in the city. Every other music store is a tango-specific music store and tango music blares out of our neighbors’ windows, street kiosks, and marketplaces. Last night I stepped out of the darkness of the cinema and my path was blocked by a couple in khakis tangoing under the neon light of a Pizza house.

After Tortoni we walk down Corrientes again. I haven’t been there when the street hasn’t been abuzz. It seems to never stop. It also boast a restaurant called El Palacio de las Papas Fritas (The Palace of French Fries) – my own personal Mecca. I haven’t eaten there yet as I’m saving that experience for a rainy day. We cruise around checking out the sights and sounds (there’s a naked guy, a model Romeo and Juliet hanging from a second floor balcony, people selling mate cups. We stop in at a Heladería (ice cream store) and I order some lemon ice cream and the weirdest thing happens.

When I was a kid we took 2 family vacations to Yugoslavia (the former). We stayed in a little Alpine town called Bovec (spelling?) on the Italian border. As I was young (maybe 7 and then 9) I don’t remember much. I remember a restaurant that served the most humungous pizzas I’d ever seen in my life that we referred to as ‘wagon wheel’ pizzas. I remember my poor father literally pushing reluctant children up the sides of the most gorgeous mountains and being met with nothing but grumbles. I remember white water rafting and nearly drowning. I remember getting swept down the river and being saved by a naked man. The clearest thing I remember though is a little ice cream store in Bovec that had lemon ice cream – a delicacy I’d never encountered in Glasgow. I loved the stuff so much that I think I gorged myself on it every day on both of our trips to Yugoslavia. I’ve never tasted anything so divine either before or since – until Friday night on Corrientes in Buenos Aires. I feel like I’m nine years old. I feel like I’m back in a country that doesn’t exist anymore and that the airport we flew into was never bombed to bits. I feel like the heaven a nine year old feels when they taste the best ice cream of their little lives. So I’ve had 3 more helpings of lemon ice cream since Friday and I don’t think I’m going to quit any time soon. Amazing how the mind tricks.

On Saturday we take a bus an hour out of town to the ‘Feria de los Matadores’, which I believe is a weekly celebration during the summer. The streets of Matadores are filled with artisans selling maté cups, leather belts, bags, handmade clothes, cheeses, liquors, cakes, and every single kind of knick-knack you could stretch your mind around. On every corner there is a giant asado and the whole place smells like the best barbeque in the world. In the middle of it all is a giant stage with Argentinean folk music and dancing. Colorful dresses and songs fill the warm evening. Paul and I eat delicious tamales. They may be the best tamales in the world and I’m a heck of a tamale snob. Paul buys his first maté cup, a beautiful leather belt, three bottles of homemade Argentinean liquor, and declares himself ready to spend a year here having got all of his provisions.

When we get back to the house, Buenos Aires’ wimpy (but lively and loud) version of Brazilian Carnivál has set up shop (literally) in our back yard. It’s a risk you take when your closest cross street is one of the biggest avenues in the world. It’s also kind of fun to never, ever know what you’re coming to. We watch the chaos for a while which mainly consists of drumming and people shooting each other with aerosol foam cans. Good times.

We spent Sunday evening at a restaurant with Paul’s friend Emil and his girlfriend Dana. Emil is a character and it’s almost as fun hearing him talk about getting the meat sweats in Tuscany as it is listening to Paul talk about eating sheep burgers in Syria. Not quite, but almost. It’s still amazing to me that four people can sit around a table for hours and hours drinking wine and sherry, eating bread, pasta, rabbit, goat, and chicken until they have to roll themselves out and the bill for all four of us barely lumbers its way to 23 bucks. Take THAT SoHo, Ca Dario, Bouchon, Lucky’s, and anywhere else I can’t afford to eat in the SBar. Every day is Lilly’s Tacos day in Buenos Aires.

I have been trying to combat loneliness and feeling like a fish without a bicycle by indulging in simple pleasures. This morning I posted up at a café with WiFi and patiently nursed one café con leche until 2 episodes of ‘Lost’ were finished downloading. Yesterday I indulged in paying the most I’ve paid for absolutely anything here to a British bookseller for a book on Argentinean history, literature, and politics and Borges’ final work The Book of Sand, which I immediately took to the café where they claim he wrote it. I’ve seen more horrific American films than I care to recall in the last three weeks just for the sheer stupid pleasure of hearing people speak English for a couple of hours. There is a vet down the street where there are puppies in the window that I visit almost every day just to get my heart warmed a little. Then there are the times that I lose my ATM card, drop my computer, get horrible, hateful emails from Paul’s friend because I put a photo of George Bush on my blog that is a rendering by an Argentinean street artist. Things are up and down. It’s a weird and wonderful city. And, like I said, often all of these feelings come to me simultaneously.

Lost in Translation

February 17, 2006

So after I finished with Mark Salzman (three cheers for the lad!) I went back to Pico. Though it’s my second time through, I am struggling with his chapter on Multiculturalism. I was moving along at a snail’s pace and then suddenly something jumped off the page. He says, “Writers, of course, by their nature, draw upon the past – it is, almost literally, the inner savings account from which they draw their emotional capital.” I realized immediately my paralyzing problem in writing; the same problem I’d always faced. I have no savings account.

I had a therapist that used to ask me about traumatizing events from my past in order to open a dialogue about them. By traumatizing I mean both events that had a literal and lasting damaging effect on me and events that were milestones in my life both positively and negatively. By delving into such topics, I often found I remembered very little, if anything from my past. I remember almost nothing about moving from Scotland except waking up in the rental car on the way from LAX around Mussel Shoals and gazing at the lights and the ocean of my new home. This could just as easily have been a dream as a memory. Talking about Scotland, I remembered disturbingly little from my childhood. My therapist explained this away in typical but brilliant Jungian terms. If our early adolescence is shaping by a specific traumatizing event, we train our young psyches to fracture as a result of trauma, block out what’s happening almost at the moment it happens and we are left with mere fragments of events that may or may not be accurate. In these terms, I have no savings account to write from. Anything I’ve experienced that has been worth recording seems long gone from my mind. I remember only very bizarre and minor anecdotes and have forgotten largely the events themselves. I wish for them back.

I write now with urgency; a desperate immediacy to try to record what is happening to my psyche here before it slips away with other things that have been systematically eliminated from my memory. I try to remember for moments at a time the smell of peaches at the fruit stand down the street, the heaviness of my lungs when the bus rolls by pumping exhaust in my face, what the cobblestones look like when day fades to dusk. And I paradoxically feel just as afraid of remembering as forgetting. I can’t remember a thing about stepping off the plane in Buenos Aires. I cannot remember any of my first impressions of the city. Were we in a taxi? As far as my mind can tell, the transition never took place. I don’t want to lose everything else.

I have been thinking of the movie Lost In Translation and a friend mentioned it in an email the other day. There is a scene where Scarlett Johansson takes a train out of the city to a Buddhist temple and wanders around in silence just observing the world around her. In the background Air’s ‘Alone in Kyoto’ plays. I used to find it very touching to watch. Her experience is so transitory and lonely. And beautiful. Bill Murray asks her what she does and she replies, "I´m not sure yet, actually." Good call. Each morning when Paul goes away and I´m left contemplating my schedule, I wonder what I do. In honor of this film and in honor of Ryan Hernandez, I am including photos of my feet though they are not nearly as attractive as dear Scarlett’s.

Things continue to be a little easier. On Valentine’s Day: miracle after miracle. I found a little specialty food shop on Avenida Corrientes (the Buenos Aires equivalent of Broadway – complete with enough neon lights to light up the Western seaboard) that sold Tabasco sauce and thought it the perfect Valentine’s gift for Paul. A little piece of home and something spicy… like me! I walked all the way up Corrientes to the big mall (there is a RUSTY store inside – go figure) to watch El Secreto en la Montaña (Brokeback Mountain), which Paul refused to see with me. I walk out feeling very sad. Nothing will put me in a mood like people in love that can’t be together. I’m very touched by the film and very moved by the landscape. I feel very lucky to have love in my life.

A couple of days have passed and things violently go up and down. One minute I am depressed as hell. I have no friends. Waaa. I miss home. Waaa. I can’t talk to anyone except my boyfriend. Waaa. Who is too impatient to talk about it because it’s hard enough for him to see me miserable. Waaa. I’m not entirely sure that he wouldn’t rather I just checked out and went home so he could get busy living, chatting, chilling, and properly checking out Argentinean women and spend less time worried about me. Waaa.

The next minute things are good. I kick ASS at the FedEx place sending a package home. Yeah. I order coffee without getting laughed at. Yeah. I make a reservation at a restaurant. Yeah. I give a woman in the street directions. Yeah. I talk to the women at the Tabasco shop who wish me, ‘Buena suerte gringa’ and laugh with me instead of at me for once. Yeah. Sometimes I think this gig isn’t so bad.

But the HEAT, my GOD the heat. Paul comes home from his teacher’s training one day and announces that everyone in class agrees that this is the mildest summer for thirty years and he narrowly avoids a swift kick to the head. What do those assholes know? They’ve never survived winter in Scotland. I’m on a new program of trying to walk around in the morning, hiding in the apartment in the afternoon, venturing out again after dusk, and praying for it to be March when (allegedly) the weather is better. I’m melting, my god, I’m melting. Oh the humanity. I’ll tell you what people… it ain’t gonna be language barrier or petty domestic disagreements that run my ass out of town to Ushuaia. Dig?

So after a particularly depressing afternoon of lying on my bed sweating and hoping for death, Paul goes out to training. He comes home and announces victoriously that he has MADE FRIENDS FOR US! Turns out that another guy who speaks Spanish and teaches English for the same organization is a Brit with an American girlfriend who speaks no Spanish. Paul explains that he is an American with a British girlfriend who speaks no Spanish. They decide to be friends. Paul is smiling and so chuffed with himself that I feel guilty. He must be so relieved at the prospect of me having someone to speak to. He is worried so much less for himself than he is for me, bless him.

There are still incredible things about this city that blow my mind every day. I got a flat tire on my bike fixed with professional, speedy precision for 2 pesos (50 cents). I can get a big delicious cup of coffee with croissants for 3 pesos ($1). Generally, people seem more patient and friendly. Or is my Spanish improving? Or am I getting used to things?

It´s so funny how email has enabled the speediest of profundities. My friend Shane wrote me the most charming and profound email (which I hope he doesn´t mind me sharing in part). He writes with the perspective of spending a great deal of time in Brasil: it's funny how you begin to remember fondly americana you didn't give a shit about ever before in your life. like any - any - classic rock song that you happen to hear on the radio. *Sniff* you say to yourself, "Oh, Jack and Diane, you two crazy american kids doing the best you can." I laughed and laughed at that just because my GOD he´s so write that it shook my soul. The same morning that I read this Paul took off for class with a tumbler that was given to me by a coworker from UCSB. The tumbler is very cool and you can design the exterior with your own photos or art. My tumbler is covered with photos of friends and family and would fit a Starbucks Venti Latte inside. He comes home having been told how “American” it is to carry a giant mug. I was very much looking forward to coming to Buenos Aires to, if for no other reason, gain some perspective on Americanism, Americana, American culture and everything that defines anything about these things. So far my only insights seem to be that Jack and Diane sure were a couple of crazy kids and we sure do like big old cups. America continues to be a bigger concept that I can grasp at the moment.

Tonight I think we are going to see our first Tango show at the world-famous Café Tortoni on the Avenida de Mayo. I’m thinking of trying to find some cheap tango lessons. I’m getting pudgy as heck over here. Patrick Symmes writes, “It’s easy to grow fat in Buenos Aires,” and the guy’s not kidding. The meat and bread are out of this world. I am eating meat, bread, cheese almost exclusively mixed in with some desserts every once in a while. There is nothing better to do when you are trying to beat the heat than drug yourself senseless with food.

I have been busying myself this morning with taking pictures of the shapes of the apartment which I’ve been seeing a lot more of during the blazing sunshine hours. I hope they are enjoyable for those who like to see the world from a different angle.

a day for love

February 14, 2006

Happy Valentines Day to one and all. In Argentina this is el dia de los enamorados and for such a decidedly Catholic country there is decidedly less emphasis on Saint Valentine and decidedly more emphasis on the frenzied purchasing of chocolates and flowers. Buenos Aires is more like America every day.

On Friday Paul and I took an sweaty, half-hour bus ride from behind the Casa Rosada along the coast to Tierra Santa (the Holy Land), which proclaims itself “The World’s ONLY Religious Theme Park.” There are big wooden gates and a sign outside that states: VISITE JERUSALEN EN BUENOS AIRES TODO EL AÑO or Visit Jerusalem in Buenos Aires all year! Unbelievable. And not a little bit terrifying. It costs us US$3 and we’re in the park which is paved with sand, spattered with faux palm trees, and dotted with life-size statuettes of biblical times. Under the blazing summer sun in the city, I feel like I might as well be out in the desert of the Middle East.

So close your eyes. Picture Disneyland. Now subtract all the obvious fun like rollercoasters and rides. Now replace Mickey Mouse with Jesus. At this point you have got to be coming pretty close to the Tierra Santa Vibe. Walking around you can choose from the variety of shows. Don’t linger to long in “The Creation” or you’ll miss “The Resurrection” which involves and 18 meter Jesus emerging from a hilltop. Don’t worry too much about the view. The Resurrection of Jesus is visible no matter where you are in the park! Paul says that in some ways he’s always been curious to visit the real Holy Land but wasn’t excited about the prospect of never seeing Syria again after going to Israel. He’s pumped. Now he doesn’t have to bother. He’s seen it all for himself. He’s also excited about learning about the bible which I had to do both in public school and in church in Scotland. Chris Rock famously says of the GED: “You mean I can make up four years in 6 hours? Where to I sign up?!” I think Paul more than made up for 27 years of Religious Education in our few hours at Tierra Santa. In the spirit of Christianity, Tierra Santa lets you borrow cameras to use in the park – for free! When you leave you just get charged for the photos.

Highlights include: eating French fries next to a replica of the wailing wall, strolling the streets of Jerusalem where a life-size figure in flogging Jesus who is shackled to a Roman-style column (my lunch is not sitting well), hotdogs for sale next door to the mosque. I have included some photos but really you have to see the place to believe it. One of the last things we do is clamber to the top of the mountain where Jesus is resurrected. From here you can see that Tierra Santa is surrounded by an airport, a driving range, and a waterpark. Good times. I have added some photos to prove I was really in this place. Paul immediately went home and wrote an (brilliant) article about it and sent it off. Neither of us could properly digest the magnitude of what we had seen.
Outside waiting for the bus back into the city, my dad calls our cell phone just to say hello. The evening before I managed to trip on the phone cord and rip phone and cord out of the wall of the apartment rendering all totally useless. He says something about saying hello, “from the Good Land to the Holy Land” and I laugh for some time about it.

On Saturday we take the bikes for a spin down in Puerto Madero. Sandwiched between warehouses that have been converted into multi-million dollar apartment projects is a giant ecological reserve. We cruise around on the bikes. It’s a nice green departure from the city. There are people running, walking, biking, napping on benches, wading in the cocoa colored water on the coast, crisping up in the sun, and generally enjoying the summertime. In parts, the greenery and garden smell remind me of the tropical plants in Hawaii. The ecological reserve is a cool spot which will be made even cooler I’m sure when summer burns off and there are fewer people around. Outside the reserve we eat hamburgers (best hamburgers in the world) and watch a game of pick-up tennis. Paul says he’s never seen such a thing. All around there are markets, volleyball, tennis, bicycles, food stands, dancing, and music. Every door in the city unfolds into a marketplace. You could spend years here missing all the nooks and crannies of the place. It’s like at every turn there is a city within a city within a city like those Russian dolls.

We stroll Avenida Corrientes later with its Broadway lights and sounds. We eat dinner and a completely delicious and entirely deserted Korean restaurant. The place is very sad. We are the only customers. The food is not cheap but it’s pretty damn good. Is it a bad time? A bad day? The restaurant Bi Won will certainly not live long like this. The restaurant business seems a fickle one in Buenos Aires.

Sunday we strolled down to San Telmo just in time to see the markets closing down for the evening. It was a bummer to miss the bustling Sunday markets but San Telmo is a bevy of cool old building facades and streets folding over buildings that fold over hallways into a maze of back door things to see and do. We find a café with WiFi and I put it on my checklist to come and download ‘Lost’ episodes here. We find a British Pub that serves fish and chips. We have a seat in a park to take a look at a church with a rooftop like the Taj Majal and on one side and a group of Capoiera (sp?) dancers with drums and voices and on the other side of us we are listening to a man sing Bo Diddley in Spanish. The sounds of the city are pretty amazing. San Telmo is cool and begs to be explored further.

Yesterday we took the subway up to Chinatown. Chinatown in Buenos Aires is a couple of blocks of restaurants and Chinese shops. We had read in the Lonely Planet Buenos Aires that if you blink you could miss it, and they are not kidding. We head up there because the book says that it livens up for Chinese New Year and is worth checking out and goes on to state that Chinese New Year, 2006 will be observed on February 13th. When we get there, the place is dead. There are maybe 2 out of the 6 or 8 restaurants open and a few tables on the street selling Buddhas and those waving cat toys. Paul inquires about the festivities for Chinese New Years. They were two weeks ago. The book is now affectionately and exclusively referred to as, “el pinche Lonely Planet”.

It’s one of those days where I’m so hot and exhausted and drained that walking just feels like dragging a corpse around. I think that just every few days or so things build up to the point that I’m paralyzed by the weather. It seems equally difficult for Paul to be around me when I feel like that as it is for me to feel like that. A Scottish girl in South America is a completely unnatural thing. He tells me kindly that it is painful for him to move so slowly. Paul started training at one of the teaching academies this morning which will continue for the next week or so. He has a class to teach tonight directly after his training so I can spend the day at my own pace, without holding anyone back or being a burden and that feels good. As the summer melts away things will get easier I think.

When I was at my limit of fatigue and hunger and thirst, it was 7:30pm in Palermo Viejo (a ritzy, rhetro, cobblestoned neighborhood). 7:30 in the evening is just too early for dinner for a porteño with all the eateries around opening at 8 or 8:30. We stumble into Bar 6, the only place we find open and eat the best meal that the city has offered so far (empanadas are always excluded since they now fit their own category). We sit and talk for hours upstairs in a building that looks like an old airplane hanger that’s been remodeled into this chic, fancy bar. I get some of my life back just in time to go to bed and wake up at the crack of dawn to see Paul off to his teacher’s training.

So as I sit here writing this I am waiting for the cleaners who need to be let into the ultra-secure building. I was feeling nervous last night about more forced interaction but I stumbled my way through a conversation with Martín this morning (the son of the owner of our apartment) and successfully answered the doorbell to the delivery man when he arrived with a package for Paul. In seems insane to write this that these things would chill me with fear to my very core but it’s the truth. I am terrified to do things. Paul is constantly pushing me to do more but if we are together and I try to say something, he unconsciously talks over me so that whoever we’re talking to knows at least one of us speaks Spanish… properly. The intimidation level of tiny interactions has not melted yet. I am casually looking for informal Spanish classes and promising to study my Spanish book at least one hour per day. Paul says I am getting better at the 2 Spanish tenses that I know. Then he tells me there are 16 to learn. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck. There’s still a long road ahead. When I feel homesick though there are movies in English, instant messenger at the internet store, iced coffee in Palermo, and parents at the end of a phone. I know I’ll be fine so those of you with money on less than a month are going to be sorely disappointed.

Paul stepped in a giant, steaming pile of dogshit yesterday. I tried not to laugh but it sort of slipped out. I don’t feel quite so alone anymore.

transitions

February 8, 2006

Days are starting to pass here now rather than hours. I’m in a strange transition where I wake up at home – or at least some concept of home – rather than each day in some strange place. It seems likely that we will stay in the apartment that we have for some time having struck some sort of deal with the owners so that we don’t have to pay the gringo agency fees. The Casa Rivadavia is a pretty little building. It’s quiet and safe and right in the heart of the city. It lies a just a short walk from the Plaza de Mayo and the Casa Rosada that Madonna made famous to Americans with her lecherous portrayal of Evita – an episode in cinema that most porteños would just as soon forget. From the outside it looks like nothing (an apartment building on a dirty street) and then the big, brown wooden doors swing open to tiled floors, beautiful facades and cozy little apartments. Each day I come home to a building that I’d imagined only, I suppose, in Venice or, if pushed, in the backstreets of Barcelona.

Paul is more and more at his writing now. I think that what makes a writer is nothing more than time and, in a way, money. Writing takes the self-discipline of an Olympian; a quality in Paul that I wish was transplantable. But, if you have that dedication, any schmuck can do it, really. How lucky we are to have been privileged with education and enough money to transplant ourselves to the opposite side of the equator for a while so that lines of latitude and time zones slip away. Shame on all who have been given these gifts and don’t come away with good stories to tell or, worse, the ability to tell them well.

Yesterday was a pequña hazaña (my new favorite castallano term). Our week-long search for bicycles ended in triumph. It’s much harder to find used bicycles in a big city than you’d think. Maybe it’s because the drivers of the colectivós are actually trying to collect diez puntos each time they railroad a bicyclist. My new city cruiser is called la banana (and you only get one guess why) and Paul’s has got to be the closest thing that Buenos Aires has to the Brown-Pride-Root-Beer-Rocket. We had to ride across town during rush hour to get them home from Palermo Viejo (muchos tiendas de ‘retro’) to Microcentro. Always half a block ahead is Paul sneaking around the front wheels of a bus and running red lights like an empanada delivery boy while I putter behind, my heart racing and feeling completely brilliant and lucky as all hell that I make it out alive. Life’s a little slower in Goleta. I hope soon to take la banana for a spin around the ecological reserve near preppy Puerto Madero.

A few nights ago we went to a free concert in one of the great parks in Palermo. The Buenos Aires Art Society (or some such governmental art body) sponsors this free event. Every porteño and his mother was there (take my word for it). Appartently they are all ga-ga for this guy… VINCENTITO! I’ve never heard of him but he must be quite famous because he has lots of adoring fans who will travel miles and sing loud and smoke the mota and listen to his concert for free. It was fun. He sang some American metal ballad in English and as soon as he’d stopped singing it I forgot what song it was. Paul couldn’t remember either. It was nice. The evening is the best time to go out and I’m going to have to work on the program of staying up later and getting up later. I’m still on the in-bed-by-nine-or-really-cranky-in-the-morning program. This is exactly the opposite of the B.A. lifestyle and just another glaring example of why the gringa doesn’t fit in.

Another great experience (can you smell the sarcasm) was the evening that Paul got a hankering for meat. I, being the romantic idealist that I am, got so excited that Paul…PAUL… would want to go out and eat and PAY for dinner that I let him order what he was telling me would be good. Ten minutes later I’m sitting next to a fat-spitting barbeque grill that is sitting on the table. Unidentifiable cuts of meat steaming and spattering away. No salad. No potatoes. No side dish. No beer. MEAT. I eat meat. I’d go so far as to say I love the stuff. But I spent the rest of the meal trying not to vomit on the table. As Paul said: File it under – failed experiences. Paradilla para 2. Needless to say we haven’t been to dinner since and next time I get the idea that my boyfriend is taking me to a nice, quiet, romantic meal I’m going to order the grain of salt that comes with it. When we left the restaurant Paul took heaps and heaps of leftover meat to a family sleeping on the street nearby. The woman starting devouring the food and throwing unidentifiable pieces of cow at her children before it had even properly exchanged hands. I got a nice reminder of what a disgusting snob I can be. As my mother says, “Things are never as good as they seem and they are never as bad as they seem.” I thought my boyfriend acting like a jerk was bad. I have a lot to learn… like I said.

Today Paul got what sounds like a great job teaching English. He will be teaching adult people who already speak English to pronounce and communicate better. His new supervisor told him that these people have a particular concern with phone etiquette and while the idea of Paul Rivas teaching anyone phone etiquette is so unthinkably ironic to me, maybe his students won’t know the difference. I feel a little jealous of the ease with which he is sinking into life here. I feel a little more every day like a housewife that neither cleans, nor cooks, nor gossips about her neighbors. I envy in Paul the ease with which he has found a job and a niche here and will try only to not become the dead weight here for that will surely get me cut loose. Not today, though. I will, at some point, I feel sure, struggle to find some sort of identity here that Paul has already found. When I feel those pangs of fear, stupidity, shame, I need to remember that I am here to learn. I need to ease up on resenting Paul because his Spanish education outweighs mine by over twelve years. We often need to ease up on each other.

Today was spent mostly walking alone while Paul was writing. I walked again out to Palermo and went so far as to order myself a café con leche which was going extremely well until the guy asked me something and one of the words wouldn’t come to me. I had no idea what he was saying. He says it over and over and over. Looking at me, expectantly. I’m raking my brain. It’s blank. He has my coffee. I don’t understand. We are at an impass. Finally, he thrusts the coffee and a plastic spoon in my hand and walks away. CUCHARA! SPOON. THAT was the word. SPOON! I wanted him to come back. I knew it now. I just bend my head, embarrassed and walked outside and threw the spoon into the street. FUCKING SPOON ruined my coffee and my bravery for a good few hours.

To add insult to injury, the next turn brought me directly into my first steaming pile of dogshit. I think I mentioned before that dogshit is absolutely everywhere in the city. There is a law against letting your dogs just go to town on the streets but is not enforced at all and dogshit is absolutely everywhere. I guess you could consider it lucky that it took me a full tell days to be ankle deep in the stuff. I spend the next few blocks scraping and scratching my shoes on the curb and trying not to cry while systematically checking to see if winking, blinking, snapping fingers, or clicking my heels together would take me straight home. WHY am I here again? Paul asked me this morning if I wanted to go home, probably because I’ve been acting like a cranky, PMSing asshole for the last few days. I considered it for a moment. How would it be any easier for me to be home pining for Argentina and Paul than to be here pining for home? I know I have to suck it up and things will get easier but…when?

I needed some culture and practically ran off the Subte to the Plaza de Mayo. Each Thursday the Madres de La Plaza de Mayo hold their protest at 3:30pm in the afternoon. Decades after the Dirty War, these dedicated mothers appear before the government, demanding answers and accountability for their sons that disappeared during that time. It’s really quite moving to see these women (and men), most of whom are now very old, clutching photos of long lost loved ones wanting nothing more than a little truth and justice. How hard it is to realize that they are years into this campaign, that they will probably never get any answers from anyone, that they have become a tourist attraction.

From the Plaza I walked along insane Calle Florida. Life has somehow brought me to Calle Florida each day. It’s a pedestrian only street so you get the feeling of being in gridlock without getting in a car. People walk a million miles an hour in and out of every store you could think of. There is the usual city street traffic of all kinds: musicians, performing artists, and tango dancers. Every third step someone is trying to thrust a flyer into your hand for an all-you-can-eat-buffet or a hooker or a discount phone card.

I stopped to chat with a young argentino who was passing out flyers covered with g-stringed women. He got my attention with, “Miss… miss… how do you say in English?” and pointing to the trash can. I tell him. He squints his eyes. Someone had told him it was a rubbish bin. I said don’t listen to the goddamned English gringos. You listen to this nice American girl. I’m telling you it’s a trash can. He starts rattling off to me. He works for a, “How do you say… whore house?”, he is nineteen, he wants improve his English. You are doing well, I tell him. He tells me the words that people have taught him in the street. “Getting jiggy with it. G’day mate. Let’s kick it. Whassap my nigga?” I’m laughing now. The kid’s charming. If I was a man looking for a good time, I’d go to his whorehouse for sure. He asks if we can get together and I can teach him some English. I say sure. I’m looking forward to the whorehouse castallano slang I can learn from him. You never know when that stuff will come in handy. His name is Italo. We’ll see…

I vacillate widely between total contentment in a new place and aching for home. Today is one of those days that I passed mostly pining for my mother and my cat. Two evenings ago we strolled along the sanitary, newly paved streets of Puerto Madero looking for restaurants and cafes that boasted WIFI (broadband internet) services and I chided myself a little for the small pang of excitement I felt over maybe having the ability to use my laptop to download missed episodes of ‘Lost’. What do I have to be homesick for when I can get epanadas 24 hours a day and a pack of cigarettes for US$1.00? I haven’t seen a Starbucks yet but there is a McDonald’s on every corner. Inside each McDonald’s is a McCafe that sells espresso and breakfast cakes and suddenly the reason for the Starbucks-free zone is clear. McCafe got here first. There is Chinese, German, British, Spanish, French and, least of all, Argentinean cuisine. With a cell phone, computer, a blog, email, and people that love me tracking where I go, am I every really gone? With all of these things attaching me lovingly to home, why do I feel so far away? Am I not really only present from wherever I log on?

I have attached some photos of the concert, the mothers, bicycles. Enjoy.