all that argy bargy - parte I

Hey blog-o-sphere!

It's been awhile coming - I needed to give the big bad world a chance to show me its teeth before I could write about how scary/sharp they are - but this is big post number one from the other side of the world!

I guess I'll attempt some sort of chronology for the sake of ease, starting with my arrival at Ezeiza Airport in Buenos Aires. In spite of my fatigue after what I consider in some ways having been spastic in time (an idea attributable to Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five - 'Billy Pilgrim is spastic in time') I was determined to maintain my sense of independence and definitely delay inevitable feelings of 'oh-shit-I-can-barely-speak-this-insane-form-of-Spanish'. So I marched up the arrivals hall, suitcase in tow feeling very purposeful, looking for a bank to change money.

I couldn't find one so I marched back down the arrivals hall, attempting to look as purposeful as I didn't feel while the nerves inside me fought the cool inside me. I found a stall to do so and successfully changed my precious Australian dollars (at that stage the best Spanish interaction I'd had) before heading up to a kiosk to buy water and a newspaper. I did the latter on the advice of my well-traveled older brother so as not to look like a tourist, though that tactic only works when you don't leave the bloody thing on the counter.

So I hurried up to a phone booth and called my host mother to inform her I had arrived and would see her at her house soon - assuming I wasn't smuggled into a prostitution ring upon stepping outside of the airport. One of my first thoughts as I stepped out into fair, and fairly windy, Buenos Aires was something along the lines of 'GOOD GOD I WANT A CIGARETTE.'
I was recovering from a chest and lung infection, and on antibiotics, and had only a week before been warned by two doctors that quitting was paramount to not dropping dead anytime soon so I had to fight that urge. I spotted a cab (a radio taxi - for reasons of security it is strongly advised here not to use any others) and asked in what was apparently shithole Spanish to go to Recoleta, a wealthy suburb close to the city. The driver I approached didn't look threatening though after a confusing swap of customers and cabs I ended up in a cab with a young guy in a puffy jacket who seemed very nice - but who probably saw in me easy money.
I say that because in my fatigued, fresh-off-the-plane state, I had asked if it would cost 'one hundred dollars' to get there. I'd read in Lonely Planet on the plane that the cab should cost around ARG$100 from the airport to most parts of the city but what they hadn't mentioned was the paramount importance of using the word peso instead of dollar. This cabbie was savvy and didn't think twice about turning on the meter nor clarifying that for me. He took what I said as 'I'll pay you USD$100 to this address in Recoleta' and stuck with it. In hindsight, he was a little too flattering about my Spanish as well as very generous with his cigarettes but I was just looking forward to being within private property, safe and sound. So I coughed up ARG$400 for a ride which should have cost no more than ARG$100 - and in case you're not into keeping up-to-date with South American currencies and their exchange rate, ARG$400 is, at this moment, AUD$103.416. So I got swindled.

Anyway, being that nearly two months has passed since I started this post I can say I have, thanks to that shitty and expensive experience, not been swindled quite that much since. Sure, some cab drivers like to take elongated routes when they think I don't know the area but that's okay because a) I'm too shy to tell them I know that they are taking me a long way and b) they might not actually be doing that anyway because, except main roads, streets here are one way and sometimes you can go two or three blocks before finding a street that runs the way you want it to and c) one time I complained in English to my brother that the guy was taking us a long way before asking him why he didn't use another street that I thought would have been quicker and was told, 'I understood, and because the street you are thinking of doesn't run two-ways until much further down the road', and d) for me it's usually only the difference between $3-10 dollars, something I feel I can afford, for reasons I will outline shortly.

Since then, I have mastered public transport, mostly for reasons of cheapness. By 'mastered' I mean I know one subway (here called the subte, literally 'under you') line and use it often, but also know which buses to take to go to the few destinations I frequent and have been forcing myself into this sort of thing to 'be like the locals'.

And this is nearly a perfect segue to inform my (few) readers, who similar to me - white, middle-class Australians aka unwittingly privileged members of the developed world - are white, middle-class Australians who probably have never really had to pay much thought to just how 'white' we are (in inverted apostrophes because the term, in this context, seeks to encapsulate all the characteristics I just named in varying degrees throughout the following).

First of all, because I am white, and by my fashion sense (read: laziness which leads to jeans-and-a-t-shirt, something that isn't done quite so simply here) I am picked to be extranjera (foreign). Walking around the busy streets of Buenos Aires, if I am solo, means I am a target for men who call me 'beautiful' (the word's many manifestations in Spanish including but not limited to bonita, señorita, mina, linda) and ask me where I am going or harangue me in such a manner until I am out of earshot. Admittedly, at first, I felt complimented by this. I thought, 'I am the best looking foreigner here!' though this sentiment has changed over time. Firstly, because I can be on my way to or from the gym (one of the few destinations I have here in Buenos Aires), sweaty or in men's shorts (for the wrong soccer team, might I add.. Boca Juniors are one of the most popular teams here, though for many reasons I am sympathetic to River Plate. I mistakenly thought the shorts were of Argentina's colours, whoops) and still garner this kind of attention. I feel gross and sweaty and you are telling me I am the most beautiful girl? Get out. You are lying. This led me to suspect that it was merely the colour of my skin and the fact that I don't colour co-ordinate my outfits or wear ridiculously elaborate outfits to the gym aka that I am not from here, that garners such attention.

Secondly, because on more than one occasion it has been presumed I have a shit-tonne of money. By aforementioned cab drivers, by sales people in stores, by people I have met who are surprised when I evince that I am not a rich gringa. Basically, the feeling I get, is that because a) I am white, b) I am not from here and c) I am white, it is assumed I have a lot of money. The thing is, and I don't know how to make this at all obvious, that I worked my ass off to be here. I busted tables (see post below this one for an idea of how much it was shitty) and only drank 3 nights out of 7 to save the money to be here (a grand sacrifice, I am sure you, dear reader, will agree).

Thirdly, and this is the point I want to make most, because I am white and I am automatically assumed to have money has helped me realise that I do indeed come from a privileged position. First of all that I can travel, and that I could work myself to gather capital to do so in an economy that is currently faring super well, suggests this. Furthermore, that I have been given the opportunity to learn another language and am undertaking a university degree that requires this, and very much so recommends a semester abroad speaks of this. And perhaps it is for this reason - realising my privilege - that this is recommended. I always knew that I was lucky not to be a starving African baby, or that at birth I wasn't abandoned on some train tracks under a one-child policy, but I never really knew.

I'm not preaching, and I am going to finish this post shortly, by pointing out a parallel I wouldn't have realised from the suburbs of Canberra.

Argentina and Chile are nearing 'developed' status. This means something in economic terms, maybe says something about the politics, but basically it just means, that like the rest of the developed world, there is a small percentage of wealthy dudes that got a bit bigger. Maybe there are less people living in slums, maybe the gross capital (or something, I don't study economics) is a bit bigger than last year, but, to my understanding, because the circle of fat-cats here just got a bit bigger, these countries are a little bit closer to joining the 'developed' club. I'm not sure if membership is lifelong or if you wear the wrong sort of shoes to the annual do you are ejected, but I do know this. In every nation throughout the world, capitalist or not, there is a grand concentration wealth in a small percentage of the population. In America, something like 5% of the population has the most money and the greatest access to resources. Australia can't be too different.

In Chile, driving down an autopista (freeway), you compete with BMWs, Audis and Volkswagons who are zooming past small dwellings of subsistence. Here in Argentina, the autopistas are filled with both crappy, thirty year old antiquities that you would never see on the road in Australia as well as new model Audis, Porsches and Mercedes, but these autopistas separate the wealthy neighbourhoods that fit neatly and cleanly into the cityscape from the sprawling urban slums that are much bigger than those wealthier suburbs.

My point is, we have it lucky, but that's relative. If you live here and earn pesos, it's almost the same as earning dollars in terms of relative wealth, though things like Pringles and some other brands of potato chips cost more than cigarettes (score one, my diet. Sorry, lungs, you lose! Hips, you win!), but I guess in finishing I want to put it out there that, in spite of my skin colour, I am not so different to the people here. I benefit from a system that doesn't favour me in myself, but the position I was born into, much like the people I am taking the bus with, much like my cab driver, who according to many, is lucky to get the work.

I think this got a bit rambly because it's dark and my eyes are doing that 'my-surroundings-are-dark-but-the-computer-screen-is-really-bright thing' and also because I got distracted slash I can't lie, haven't written in months and feel like a shitty fledgling journalist, but do watch this space.
All that Argy Bargy, parte II coming soon, in a better and less rambly fashion. I might even map out what I want to say before I start, but who knows.