Change is a real issue here in Argentina. No, not political change or social reform, we're talking plata, money, or moneda, even centavos. Nobody in this city wants to keep change on hand or even give it up if thy've got it. There's even an ad campaign telling people to spend if for christ's sake. For example, the taxi driver would rather curse you and take LESS money than the meter says, rather than give you any friggin' change. Its weird. Buisnesses are often NOT prepared to give it up either. Often they'd rather not have you buy something. What the !@##$%% is that all about? There's a Pharmacity (that's a chain drug store) that I've quit going to because they never seem able to give you any change. More than a few times I have opted to not go out for the evening because it was too late for the subte (metro), to cold or rainy to wait for the bus and though I had money, I knew I couldn't get a taxi driver to break a 50 Peso note for me. My friend "P" (who is loaded) walked all the home, some 30 odd blocks at 5 AM, to Recoletta one night because he also knew he couldn't find a taxi driver to break a 50, nevermind a 100. I had a Taxi driver the other night that couldn't give me change on a 10! That's just plain old unpreparedness. It's crazy. Do ya wanna make living or what? There are a few businesses that consistently have change on hand and I make it a priority to shop there for that reason. Incidentally, same as in the states, one of them is an Asian-immigrant owned grocery store right by my house. AND, they're open a LOT!
  |  related link

---

You know you're in Argentina when you've been out dancing Tango until 5 in the morning and you set your alarm in time to roll over click on the remote and watch the "match" at 10AM. To be fair, it IS the World Cup. However, I can't remember the last time I made the effort to go to a Super Bowl party. Obviously I am NOT a die hard sports fan of any kind, though I did play soccer in junior-high which gives me a slightly bigger appreciation for that game. But, by and large, "sports fans" REALLY annoy me. People who are that fanatical about watching somebody else do something really confound me. And I don't drink beer, so... In college I was fortunate enough to watch Barry Sanders plow through whatever offensive or defensive line we were decimating before he want on to get signed by the Detroit Lions and to date, that still stands as the most exciting sports I've ever watched. My other problem is that I hate to see anybody lose.... You can understand my problem right? I mean, real sports fans LOVE to see their opponent annihilated, humiliated, eviscerated in every imaginable way. You know, just like in ancient Rome ! In fact American footbal almost always makes me think of the Coliseum. So much gear. Huge huge 280lbs worth of pummeling. Its no wonder that so many players leave the field on a stretcher. I know I know, SOMEBODY HAS to lose. Okay, so I like to at least see a fair fight. However much I may want a team to win, I can't stand to see a slaughter. At some place in the point spread I cannot help but start rooting for the underdog. Right now the underdog is the goalie for Serbia/Montenegro who is taking a severe ass kicking and will probably be out of endorsements after today's game. Argentina has just butchered their opponents 6-0. The upside of a slaughter is that the coach can often put somebody in the game that maybe doesn't get a chance to play as often, which may have just occured though I'm not positive. A player on the sidelines (Messi) throughout most of the game got to score the final goal (I think...I blinked) just seconds before time ran out. Firecrackers, car horns, gunshots and general mayhem ensuing. What can you say...sportsfans? I will probably have a crick in my neck due to writing this while simultaneously watching the game. Almost an impossible feat. One of the many differences between American football and what the rest of the world terms as football is that it moves so much faster. You really can't afford to go the the 'loo" or you might actually miss something. Time outs are shorter. There's no time to go to the loo, grab a cerveza and call your Mom all the while waiting for the team to make it to the 10 yard line. Even writing this I risk missing the crucial pass that will set up the next goal. Its not even like basketball, which is the other extreme and such a high scoring game that its no big deal if you miss a goal, there could be 75 more that game. Now I know it sounds like I might actually WATCH sports but I REALLY don't. In the states, I marvel at the amount of information, names, teams, etc that I have in my head considering I only might see something on TV if its on in a house I'm visiting and I don't want to be rude. I have been to a few professional baseball games and did make it a point to watch the Red Sox win their first World Series since 1910. They hadn't won since just before my Grand Father was born and he took me to Fenway Park when I was 6 or so. After the game last year I called him to chat and had him explain " the curse of the baby" . Oh! It is a testimony to the bloody marketing and popularity and omnipresence of sports that I know these things. And if you really don't believe me, there's this: for me the best part about watching soccer vs. American football is...the guys are just hotter!
  |  related link

---

Now I've heard them all. This last week, (on a Sat afternoon), I danced with a new guy. Immediate connection. Perfectly compatible body type, size, embrace, vocabulary, you name it. One of the 2 or 3 best connections to date, anywhere. Felt great from the word, "Go!"At the end of the first song we both step back and we're both like wow!, cool !and he says, " You dance GREAT!", and I'm like "no You dance GREAT!", Its really good. So we dance more that evening at Malcolm and La Viruta. The next night ,on Sunday night, I see him just as he's putting on his coat to leave. On Monday, at Malcolm I ask him if he's going to Canning afterwards and he says he doesn't know, but he does end up going. On neither of these 2 nights does he ask me to dance. He dances with a very unmade blase looking woman wearing dumpy blue jeans, who doesn't appear to be an amazing dancer either, for most of the night. At Canning he hangs out across the room appearing to be on the make with any one of several woman and still does not ask me to dance. I'm like, whatever, dude. I KNOW I'm not crazy, that this was not one-sided. I figure he's fucking with me now and/or he's seriously trying to get laid by one of these chicks . Fair enough. So on Tuesday at the practica, more of the same. At this point I don't know what to think.I start to doubt my senses, which I have a lot of faith in, or wonder if I weirded him out on some other personal level. But at the end of the practica, a lot of folks are going to get a bite and we're all standing around changing shoes, and shooting the shit. He walks up behind me, real familar and cozy and asks me something like " Che pasa?" I do not turn around to really face him but I say, "I don't know, che pasa contigo?" Over my shoulder I tell him I feel like we had a one night stand and now he's not talking to me. He thinks that is hilarious and then grabs my hand and starts talking about expectations. And at first I think he means, like I have some sort of "expectations", you know like men in the states are so weirded out by women with "EXPECTATIONS!" but No! He says , you know sometimes when you dance with someone and its really great and then you EXPECT that it will be the same the next time and most of the time it's not. He said he was going to wait until he'd almost forgotten how good it was dancing with me to ask me again.....hmmmmm. I KNOW it was really good for both of us (LOL) but this SOUNDS like absolute garbage. I walked away thinking, does he approach sex the same way.?And if so, do some men really think this way? I mean, I do understand what he's saying, but I'm such a hedonist. When I do something I like a lot, I wanna do it again and again and again. Lo mas pronto possible baby!
  |  related link

---

Friday night was the combination birthday and going away party for Maria and Paci who have been visiting here from Finland for several months. The party was at their place in San Telmo and it was a really nice scene. Maybe 50 people filtered in and out through the course of the evening. Very cool vibe. good food, good conversation etc., I spent the bulk of the evening talking with Benjamin whom I met almost immediately after walking in. He's a physicist working on his P.H.D. or the French equivelent. Though he freely admits, Tango has taken hold of his mind and will not let go. We talked at length about the number of foreigners so engrossed with Tango that they've left their jobs, homes, friends. etc., to come here and do what we're doing. We laughed at how many of us start out with,. " Well I just quit my job and..." The fact that I sold my house to come here seems to leave the Argentines, themselves, pretty speechless, but many of the other foreigners are pretty nonplussed. I think many of them are thinking about it on some level. At some point later in the evening Paci came asked if I would like to play a few songs. It seems a jam session had begun in the living room. I was very flattered since he's never heard me and I suppose it must have come up in passing at some point in our conversation and he just hung onto the info. Once again the audience here was awesome. In fact everybody came in and sat on floor and got really quiet and attentive as soon as I started to play. Argentina, or Buenos Aires rather, is a city that truly does appreciate its music and anybody who plays it well gets a lot of respect which is very very nice. And perhaps the fact that I am playing something other than Tango makes what I do even a little more of an anomaly. People are really into it. I think Austin is the only other city I've lived in that shows its genuine respect for its players to such a degree. This was my first opportunity to play for my Tango peers and that was very very cool. At 4 AM the last of us dribbled out into the rain and hailed a couple of Taxi's to catch the last few Tandas at Canning. After that it was coffee, more conversation and early morning pizza. I think I was finally tucked in around 8:00 AM. Ouch!
  |  related link

---

This last month has been some kind of watershed for me. I have been here since January and danced with a lot of people of varying degrees of ability only a very very few which have been substandard, (and you definitely remember who they are as to avoid that kind of train wreck again). However, seemingly overnight, (actually one week,) I acquired 3 new high level, regular dancing partners. YEEAAAA! I felt a little like the 101st monkey .It was like some collective unconscious finally overcame a number of leaders and finally I was in the game. I have spent much of the last 5 months working on my close embrace while many of the higher level skills I had in open embrace languished. Its not that there are no leaders here to lead them but it really does take a while to get in the loop. Let's face it there are a lot of good followers here. One of my new partners with whom I'm practicing with a lot outside of the milongas asked me how long I'd been here. When I told him since Jan. his eyes got big. Then he says, "Have you been coming to Malcolm on Mondays all this time?" And I was like, yea. Every monday. He shook his head and couldn't believe he'd never seen me. The bottom line is if you have nobody to dance with that can really help you show what you can do, you might as well be invisible to some people. There are a LOT of good people to watch. From my perspective, its fine though. However long it takes is however long it takes. And honestly my close embrace,.."embrace", needed tending to anyway. That was one of my goals in coming here. And it is questionable how much attention it would have gotten in any other scenario. Besides, it is extremely satisfying to dance with somebody really good, somebody you've wanted to dance with for a while, and surprise and them. Sigh.
  |  related link

---

Back

- Page Generated in 0.1231 seconds