Bienvenido a Buenos Aires!

(Originally 'posted' on 12/14/08)

Hola!

Well, I’ve made it to Argentina safely, and so far, so good. It has still not yet set in that this is my new home, as I’ve been a bit of a transient for the last few months, but I imagine that once I start taking classes, I’ll have some kind of ‘aha’ moment when it kicks in and I say to myself, “wow, I’m living in Buenos Aires.”

My apartment is a nice little 1-bedroom on the first floor (primer piso) of a 3 story walkup – ground floor translates to ‘planta baja’ in Spanish, and I was originally concerned that I’d be on the ground floor, which Is not the case. The superintendant lives down the hall, and he was very friendly when I arrived, and despite his limited English – I mean, I didn’t come here to teach people English, I came to learn Spanish – he was able to ‘show’ me the apartment, all in Spanish. Woo hoo! The ‘landlord/agency’ I reserved the apartment with sent a representative to take my rent and deposit and execute my lease. As per usual, I didn’t bother reading much of it, but glanced at a few dates/numbers to make sure the general meeting was accurate, which it was. Oh, and it was in Spanish, haha, so I can say that I have now executed my first real estate transaction in Argentina, in Spanish.

It was a beautiful afternoon, with temperatures in the 20’s (I’m going to have to quickly get used to the metric system, along with Celcius/centigrade measurements), which translates to the 80’s, as it’s the summer here now – the seasons are opposite of those in the northern hemisphere, and the climate is quite temperate. Summers reach the 90’s and winters dip down to the 40’s, but it rarely snows (infact, it snowed last year fin Buenos Aires for the first time in 30 years). I can’t really complain about leaving NYC in the winter and landing here in the summer.

My next order of business was to get myself somewhat situated, so I started to unpack some of my things and get my ‘technology’ set up. I am obviously all squared away with the internet, but my mobile phone (312 351 4510) does not work yet, as I need to get in touch with AT&T to figure out how to make it work... That said, the US landline I have (312 698 8748) is not up and running either, as I need to find a power converter for the plug. The adapter I bought for the laptops does not provide the right charge to the phone’s plug, so that is my next order of business. I definitely feel a bit naked without a phone right now, but I do have a ‘local’ phone in the apartment, but I cannot call other ‘local’ mobile phones here in Argentina without a prepaid calling card, so I’ll figure out how to do that in the coming days. Welcome to living abroad, right?

After I got all hooked up to the internet, I got an invitation from a friend down here to attend the championship of the Argentina Polo Cup, which is an event I attended last year, but only for matches earlier in the tournament. He swung by my apartment with a few of his friends, including a few Americans, so we all shared a few empanadas and got to know eachother. My apartment is in a neighborhood called Palermo Viejo, which is a lot like Lincoln Park meets SoHo, so I’ll get to know it well over the next few weeks before packing up and heading to the next apartment (I’m not really thinking too far ahead just yet). Plaza Serrano, which is just 6 blocks away, is the center of activity for the area, with bars, restaurants, boutiques, fairs, etc, so I’ll probably venture around this afternoon and see what a Sunday is like in the neighborhood.

For those of you who haven’t seen a polo match, it’s quickly becoming my new favorite sport – the power and grace of the horses, along with the control and skill of the players are pretty amazing in concert. From a more ‘economic’ perspective, polo tends to be the sport of the wealthy, as it obviously takes great resources to maintain the horses and the requirements of the team. There are basically 3 tournaments each year prior to the Cup, and many of the most elite teams (those that made it to the quarterfinals) are family-owned, with several brothers playing on the team – part of the wealthy elite’s status is to have a polo team comprised of sons (there’s actually a team I saw last year that was made up of four brothers). I’ll spare you all the rules, but there are basically 8 chacas (like an inning) that last 7 minutes (I think) each, and there are 4 players on each team, with 3 referees. Each team typically has between 8 and 10 horses, which can be substituted on the fly – it’s like changing equipment, but only you change your horse. Yesterday’s match was less about offense, as the two teams met last year in the final as well, but it ended up going to a sudden death, 9th chaca. We were seated amongst fans of the team that ended up winning, whom I tried to strike up conversations in Spanish about the rules, but the guy I was sitting next to kept deferring to his son/nephew to get me answers in English. He understood that my Spanish wasn’t great, but appreciated my efforts and we ended up having a ‘basic’ chat in Spanish about Buenos Aires, school, etc. Once the match ended, we (the collective gang of friends) hit up the Chandon (an Argentine winery) tent for some good old fashioned victory celebrations, with champagne, of course... One thing to mention about polo fans is probably worth discussing, at least for my own good – the people are beautiful!!! This likely is tied to the economic well-being of the fanbase, as people, in general, were pretty put together (in speaking with several young ladies over the course of the nite, I was informed that I did not stand out as a foreigner, but my ‘local’ friends did – this may have been on purpose) - it was like being at the Kentucky Derby, though I cannot cite first-hand references because I’ve never been. As a friend of mine said, Argentine’s don’t realize they’ve won the genetic lottery!

At some point in the evening, with a likely combination of a general lack of sleep and lots of champagne making me quite a bit done (las brujas fue a mi cabeza), I called it a nite and ventured back to my apartment. I have to imagine it was early, by my standards as of late, but I woke up feeling pretty chipper and certainly pretty well rested. My head was hurting a little bit, but not from las brujas – speaking, or trying to speak, Spanish all nite was taxing, but I was hanging in there and was able to converse.

So, that was my first day, what a way to start this adventure!

I’m going to try and keep a log of my days down here, maybe with a blog of some kind, and will be taking pictures like an Asian tourist in Manhattan, so I will be sure to keep everyone up to speed on my experiences. And, with luck, I’ll be a fluent speaker in no time!!

Ok, it’s time for me to finish my unpacking and venture out of this apartment and get myself some food! Tengo mucho hambre!!

Ciao,
Adam