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July 28, 2007

DOH!

Shawn and I were deeply saddened today when we went to see The Simpsons Movie, and were told that at the time we wanted to see it, it was dubbed into Spanish, not in the original English with Spanish subtitles. We were devastated to learn that we cannot see it anywhere in Buenos Aires with subtitles. Every single showing is dubbed in Spanish.

We looked to see about Mexico, and it appears it will only be dubbed and not subtitled there as well.

I'm crushed. BOO! Shame on you Cinépolíis for not screening animated films in their original laguages!

Posted by crispy at 10:30 PM | Comments (5)

July 26, 2007

Random Weirdness: Buenos Aires

Do I really need to write a preliminary disclaimer about 'weird' being relative? You are all intellegent, educated readers, right? I'm not going to belabor that point. Let me just dive into some things that seem strange to me, a middle-aged gringo that has had some experience in Mexico.

The majority of ground coffee in supermarkets comes with sugar already mixed into it. 'Super Cabrales' is the only brand I've been able to find that doesn't.

Fur is in here. True, it seems to be the mark of a woman more, um, advanced in her years, but you can't swing a dead rabbit without hitting someone in a stole, wrap or pom pom scarf.

Hellmann's mayonnaise has mustard in it here. I don't have a jar from Mexico or the US handy at the moment, so maybe it comes in the versions in those countries. I never noticed it there, but the version sold in Argentina has an obvious taste and tint of mustard. That label also produces something called salsa golf that is mayonnaise and ketchup mixed together, and a line of spicy ketchup.

There are domestic whiskeys here, but they're all Scotches. One can find Jack Daniels and Jim Beam here, but they're like like USD $6.50 a shot. I've seen Jameson, but not Bushmills.

When you buy tickets to see a movie here, you get to select your seat assignments.

Courdoroy is hot here. Maybe it's a winter thing. You know, like flip-flops are a summer thing.

Coffee here always comes with little cookies called masas and tends to be something that you would have as a snack or as dessert. When I order coffee and a sandwich here, they think it's crazy. They always verify, "You want coffee...and a sandwich? At the same time?" (Inevitably, they bring the coffee out with the little cookies and won't serve the food until I finish the coffee and cookies.)

Mullets are fashionable here. Okay, let me rephrase that. People actually have mullets here. A lot of people.

People pronounce the 'll' ('elle' double L) consonant like "juh" (in English). So when they talk about tortilla, they pronounce it as "tor-TEE-juh." Here, 'tortilla' refers to the Spanish tortilla; the other, North American kind does not exist here.

Restaurants offer side orders (called porciónes) of vegetables here, like they do at old-school joints in the United States.

A lot of people are multi-lingual here. One sees and hears a lot of other languages in this city - French, German, Italian (but even the Spanish sounds like Italian here), English, (Brazilian) Portugese.

Kitchens don't open until 8 pm at the earliest. Most people don't seem to eat dinner until 10 pm at the earliest. Most places here close at midnight, although a fair number are open until 2 pm. A handful are open until 5 am.

Posted by crispy at 07:16 AM | Comments (2)

July 20, 2007

Friendship Day

Today, 20 July, is 'Friendship Day' in Argentina ('el Día de Amistad'). We were informed of this at the meeting of the English-speaking group, when one of the members advised me to make any intended dinner reservations a few days in advance. He told me that the holiday is relatively new, but it is growing in popularity, being celebrated with friends getting together to go out for dinner. Apparently it is even more popular than he knows, because even following his advice and trying to book in advance, I could not get a reservation for tonight.

The porteño that told us about the holiday is under the impression that Argentina originated this holiday, and that other countries around the world think it is so interesting that they are copying Argentina. Perhaps the idea of celebrating it on 20 July is an Argentine idea; it is the same day as the first moon landing in 1969, but nobody here seems to know if that is mere coincidence or intentional. Yet the truth is that in 1935, the United States Congress proclaimed the first Sunday of August as the National Friendship Day, and it has been celebrated as such there every year since. Of course, that does not mean that anyone knows that in the US, but supposedly, it's on the books.

Maybe the Argentines were the first to actually celebrate a Friendship Day. I suppose that should give them some claim to fame. It is only a social holiday though; everyone still has to go to work.

Posted by crispy at 09:21 AM | Comments (2)

July 15, 2007

Copa América Final: Argentina vs. Brazil

We are lucky enough to be in Buenos Aires when the Argentine team has made it to the Copa América finals. The match, in which they face Brazil, begins at 18:05 local time (15:05 in Mexico, 13:05 in Los Angeles) today. If we can score a table, we'll be watching it at the restaurant across the street.

Posted by crispy at 09:45 AM | Comments (0)

July 14, 2007

How to Survive in Buenos Aires on $20 a Day

Don't come here, wait until the next economic crisis, or best yet, adjust your expectations appropriately.

We have been wondering where all the super-cheap stuff is we heard so much about from our friends that have visited Buenos Aires over the past couple of years. When we were planning our trip here, we heard fantastic tales of steak dinners for two complete with desert and a bottle of decent wine for under USD $15. Clothes, at a third of the cost of their equals in the United States, could be snapped up supposedly everywhere. One could even get a 10-day vacation package that includes a breast augmentation performed by world-class doctors cheaper than a weekend in Vegas! Ah, the promise of such deep discounts in a recovering economy beckons like an irresistable siren, especially if, as it does for us, his work schedule forces the traveler always to travel at peak times when the cost of getting to and from the destination is at its highest. He thinks, "Sure it will cost three months' salary to get there and back, but once I get there, staying there will cost practically nothing!"

Countries with an unstable economy can be cheap if one visits from another country where the economy is stronger, but unstable economies can fluctuate wildly. When travelers start to flock to a place in droves for its low prices, eventually there are enough tourists that the demand for goods and services become high, even if the demand for such things is low among those that live in the place. With high demand come higher prices, and if the economy is unstable and the cycle of inflation and recession does not happen smoothly, those high prices can come in dramatic spikes.

Last night we attended an English-speaking group in Belgrado. This is a group of porteños that get together to practice every week, and they often have visiting English-speakers dropping in to get tips about the city from the locals. We told them how much we liked their city, how beautiful we find it, how excellent the food is and how much nicer people seem to be than we had heard. Yet we also told them of our dismay that things are not as cheap as we had heard. They explained to us that yes, things used to be much cheaper, but inflation is on the rise. According to one of the group members, prices for everything have gone up about 30% since April.

That is quite a hefty jump, but that does not seem to be uncommon here. Deby Novitz, author of the TangoSpam blog says that inflation during the year of 2005 ran about 30%.

It should also be noted that these are not official figures. Official figures are supposed to look at a wide range of goods and services in the economy, whereas annecdotal reports tend to focus on the things people use on a regular basis. That often translates into a marked difference between what people see as a price jump at their local market or gas station and the numbers reported by official agencies that monitor the economy. The Buenos Aires Herald reported (6 July 2007) that 12-month inflation was 8.8% through the end of June, although the same article notes that critics of the present administration suggest that the politicians are tampering with the figures to make themselves look good.

In any case, porteños are being hit even harder than tourists who are, despite inflation, getting very good exchange rates. At present, the exchange rate for us is about 3.1:1, or ARS $3.10 to the dollar. Six months ago, it was ARS $3.06 to the dollar. One year ago on this date, it was ARS $3.08 to the dollar. Furthermore, compared to Europe and North America (including Mexico), the prices here are still cheap for a lot of things, especially things that you need on a daily basis.

Just like in Mexico, certain things are cheaper than they are elsewhere, and other things are more expensive. For example, in Mexico, the prices for electronics seem obscene to us, but the prices for produce are generally cheaper. It is when one starts looking for specific items that he tends to suffer sticker shock, and that is exactly what happened to me in Buenos Aires.

I needed to buy some shirts with long sleves when I came here because it is winter here and I could not find long-sleeve shirts in Mexico before we left. That was just as well, Shawn told me, because a student of his, upon hearing that we were going to Buenos Aires, advised him to buy clothes here because they are so much cheaper than they are in Mexico. I had to find a fat-clothes store in Buenos Aires, and through the help of the Internet, I did, before we even left Guadalajara.

We went there shortly after arriving, and it was the kind of place where you have a personal attendant that pulls items with no price tags down off of shelves from behind the counter when you ask to see them. Maybe that should have been a hint at what I'd end up paying, but at the time, I just figured that is how they do things here. I liked several things that they had, and I ended up buying several nice shirts, some ties, a sports jacket and some slacks. These were all things that I either needed for the trip (the shirts) or have not been able to find in Mexico (oversized sports coats and longer ties just for gordos). Then they handed me the credit card receipt to sign and I almost passed out. It was multiple thousands of Argentine pesos. To give you an example, the shirts ran from USD $80 to $150 each. They are all store brand shirts made in Argentina. They are not designer imports. Do not get me wrong. They are decent enough shirts (dress button-down, the most expensive claiming to be of "Egyptian thread"), but I know, having bought several over the years, that they would cost less in the United States. They would cost a whole lot less in Mexico. It certainly was not like what Shawn's student said about clothes costing one-third what they cost in Mexico.

It seems that there is a fat tax for finer men's clothing, but there might also be a tourist tax in the sense that, as a tourist, I was only able to find information on that one store, and perhaps there are others with much better prices that I might know about if I were a fat guy actually living here. One should also bear in mind that these are things I have not even been able to find in Guadalajara. It seems that there are a lot of things that are a trade-off like that; in Mexico, there are certain things we just cannot get that we have been able to find here. Is it worth paying a little more for greater selection? Yeah, I hate to have to admit that I'm this much of a consumer whore, but for me, yes, it is.

The problem is, one often hears amazing tales of unfathomable bargains in other countries. It is my experience that these should be taken with a grain of salt, for many different reasons. Prices go up. Economies fall and come roaring back. People forget to include other indirect costs when telling about their experiences. What constitutes good quality to one person is utter garbage to another. People have widely-differing priorities. The list of factors that can make a memorable cheap trip for one person an expensive waste of time to another are endless. Yet it is alluring, when considering a trip somewhere, to believe all the hype and convince oneself that, not is it only a sound financial choice to go there, but that one would be a complete idiot to not take advantage of such ridiculously good deals. The fact of the matter is, with travel, like with everything else, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

In closing, let me give you a few prices, converted for your convenience to US dollars, for things about town in Buenos Aires. Unless a location is stated, these prices are the going rates in multiple places about town.

Posted by crispy at 07:38 AM | Comments (0)

July 13, 2007

Calderón Sends Elite Forces to Terrorism Locations

The Boston Globe carried a story by Héctor Tobar today which reports that Mexican president Felipe Calderón is sending a 5000-soldier special forces brigade to protect strategic energy sites in the country, after a wake of terrorist activity by members of the Ejercito Popular Revolucionario (Popular Revolutionary Army). The attacks, which targeted three pipelines and a switching station in Guanajuato and Queretaro, were said to be in retaliation for the disappearance of two EPR members in Oaxaca last year.

read the full story

Posted by crispy at 09:15 AM | Comments (0)

July 11, 2007

Think Again

Time and travel give us new perspectives on our lives. Sometimes it is subtle, like realizing that at a certain point, all the signs have gone from saying "SPEED LIMIT" to "MAXIMUM SPEED." At other times, it will change your outlook on the world completely, like looking down one day and realizing they are your father's hands reaching forth from your arms to tie your father's shoes on your feet.

In our daily lives, the mind tries to assimilate everything it gathers into some world view that makes sense, and in doing so, fabricates illusory connections and divisions that are not really there. It is too complicated and requires too much effort to constantly discriminate the shades of difference that actually exist in nature. A line is drawn in the sand to divide 'same' from 'different,' and we start to sort things to one side or the other to make thinking about them easier. Once we have decided what the relationships are between things, we consider that job done. We move on to other taxing mental chores, acting like all those things will remain in stasis because we have clustered them into neat little packages.

We stay in the same place for a long time and we used to things being a certain way. Time passes slowly enough that we fail to notice all the slight changes that occur constantly. An ironic consequence of assuming such permanence develops where we tend to not see the things that are right in front of us every day. As David Byrne says in one of the best films of all time about man's (illusory?) relationship to place, True Stories:

When I first come to a place, I notice all the little details. I notice the way the sky looks. The color of white paper. The way people walk. Doorknobs. Everything. Then I get used to the place and I don't notice those things anymore. So only by forgetting can I see the place again as it really is.

Traveling is like a good dose of amnesia. It shakes you up and makes you forget, so that not only do you see a new place for the first time, but you see all the places you have been with new eyes.

This blog is supposed to be about Mexico, the place I have lived for the past year and a half. I admit, at times I have strayed into diatribes about the things that motivated me to leave the United States and how I have found things upon my occasional return trips there. I have also written about other Latin American countries, comparing and contrasting them to Mexico. If I were more goal-oriented, I might be very good at sticking to just talking about Mexico, but the fact is, I have a lot of strong opinions about other things too. I just cannot shut up about those things, and I do not like to deny myself.

I indulge in a lot of things I should not, and writing about other places when we travel, even if it has nothing to do with Mexico, is one of those things. For the next few weeks, I'm going to be in Buenos Aires, Argentina. and I'm going to write about it. Up to its old tricks, my mind is constantly comparing this place to both the United States and Mexico, in ways both favorable and not-so-nice. I cannot help it. That is just the way the mind works, and it is just the way I work to shoot my mouth off about what I think.

For those of you that might be considering moving to Mexico or some other Latin American country - maybe Argentina - you might find the 'Crispito Goes to Buenos Aires' articles informative about this slice of South America. For those of you who come here to read about Mexico, dammit...do not despair. This trip has already wiped my slate and made me notice things anew about Mexico, even though we are thousands of miles away from it.

Many people, especially in Latin America, think the Argentines are snooty wanna-be Europeans. One of my friends and former Spanish teachers tells the following joke:

Q: What is the most lucrative job in the world?
A: Buying Argentines for what they are worth and then selling them for what they think they're worth.

If you find that more true than humorous, you might want to tune back in around August 6, when we return to one of my favorite places: Mexico City.

Posted by crispy at 06:17 AM | Comments (0)

July 09, 2007

Christmas in July


freezing_shawn_BA.jpg
Shawn Keeping Warm, Buenos Aires

Those of you who know me know that I am not a big fan of cold weather and snow.

When we decided to spend Shawn's summer vacation in Buenos Aires, we knew that we were coming to the southern hemisphere during their winter, but we had heard that winter in Buenos Aires is like winter in Los Angeles. Having spent winter in Los Angeles, where the average daytime highs are in the upper 60s and the overnight lows are in the 50s, we figured that would be fine. In fact, after the unusually hot spring we had this year in Guadalajara, it would be a nice change.

As luck would have it, we arrived in Buenos Aires accompanied by a freakishly bitter cold snap Saturday, and wind chill temperatures have remained at freezing since we arrived. To top it off, it was snowing all day today.

For many of you, snow is not an unusual phenomenon for the winter. In some parts of Argentina, it is not uncommon either. However, today is the first time Buenos Aires has seen snow since 1918.

The story has made international news, and locally, television stations were covering it with no commercial interruptions as if it were a national disaster. Okay, so perhaps that negative perspective is all mine; looking across the street this afternoon, it seemed like everyone in the opposing building was captivated by the miracle of it all. The Associated Press reported thousands cheering in the streets and their image service had pictures of rejoicing couples making out in the snow. Of course, if Argentines are anything like Mexicans, it does not take much to elicit that behavior from them.

Far from being a miracle to us, it is a real nuisance. The apartment we rented for the month has two air conditioner/heater units, one in the bedroom and another in the living room. Luckily, the one in the bedroom works and keeps it quite toasty, but the one in the living room seems to have a broken heating element, because it does nothing but blow cold air. We have been trying to find ways to stay warm here, like spending hours lingering over dinner in the warm corner café or bundling up in multiple sweaters and coats and huddling together under blankets.

We have an "emergency" phone number and email address to contact the rental company in the event of problems like the busted heating element, but in a further twist that would amaze even Murphy, today was a national holiday here: Independence Day. I tried contacting the company multiple times before I realized this, with each message more desperate than the last. I hope that tomorrow we will hear back from them, but even if the cold weather results in a lot of "personal days" being taken from the office, the forecast calls for higher temperatures. They are predicting that tomorrow it will climb to a relatively tropical 50° F.

Posted by crispy at 09:09 PM | Comments (5)