Bahahaha, back to no plan.

Yes, you read that correctly.

We are moving back to my old blog, Um, so what is your plan?

Why? ‘Cause we’re back to not having one.

HoooooooRAY!

Sweet.

I found 50 pesos in the street today. Nice.

Se cortó la fucking luz

I’m from Portland, we practically pop out of the womb with a neon-color windbreaker in our hands. We’re used to it.

When it rains in Buenos Aires, though, even native Oregonians don’t know what to do. Public transportation has gone to shit. The semáforos don’t function. And people are going mad. This happens even in Palermo (aka Chetolandia, where we pay an arm and a leg to live in what we think is the zone that is cut off from the madness).

Wrong. A higher quotient of Gringos does not mean a higher chance of functionality in the zona. Oh well.

This shit is literally 4 blocks from my house:

Cray. Zay.

Anyway, now I am snug as a bug in Piacere with my eyes glued to TV9. Watching Argentine news is calming, for some reason. It’s…consistent.

What’s going on now?

A soccer game. And protests surrounded the power outage.

T.Y.P.I.C.A.L.

Love this city.

September/October in Buenos Aires

…has been out of control.

I haven’t updated–I’m really sorry about that. I’ve kinda been all over the place for a month or so. Here’s exactly what went down:

End of August-ish: Got the Bueno, entonces…blogging gig (check it out here).

Beginning of September (5th-ish): Gave my notice at the medical transcription company. Started looking on Craigslist for jobs.

Mid-September: Got a job teaching English–well, my name is appearing on a pretty high-traffic site, which gets it out there. Teaching hours went from 2 to 25 in like a week. Eeps.

Late-September: Found out I wanted to move. So I did.

Early-October: Moved in. Nothing worked. Typical.

Mid-October: Things sort of work, about half of the time. Now trying to install phone/internet. Wish me luck–I’ll need it.

Today: My day off. It shall be spent at Rapipago, the lavarropas, buying a fridge, and trying to install internet. Wahoo!

Maybe I Underestimate the Amount of Free Time I Have

Maybe, just maybe, I will be able to keep this blog up as well.

Or maybe I just wanted to post this:

INBANCABLE!

OMG. Too many blogs.

Okay, so only two. But if I can’t handle one, Christ, how can I handle two?

Check out Tara en Buenos Aires (yeah, I know, my creativity baffles me). It’s the other blog that I am being PAID to write.

Yeah, chances are you will see me writing more on that one. Whatever, money talks.

Buses, buses, buses

Last night was a good night.

I went out with my Yanqui ladies to share a picada and some bottles of wine at a place that had a descuento for women. The picada and wine were overpriced (it was Palermo, what did I expect?) but the company made up for it.

Unfortunately, getting to our little rendezvous took quite some time. Chacarita and Palermo are not that far from one another. Depending on where you are going (Palermo is huge) it should take about 20 to 30 min on a bus. Note the word “should”.

Now, I live near Corrientes, one of the biggest streets in Capital. There are a billion buses that go along this street, but I find it so frustrating that all of my friends live at the most difficult places to get to from my apartment. Honestly guys, please run it by me before you move someplace, because my convenience trumps all. Always.

Anyway, I ended up needing to take the 111, which is a good bus that goes through Chac, Palermo, Once, Centro, all the way to Puerto Madero.

I got ready. I went out to the corner where I catch the bus and waited. And waited. And waited. The 111 doesn’t go along Corrientes, so I was waiting on a semi-residential corner in the dark. I don’t really have a problem with it, but if I tolerate waiting, the bus should tolerate coming to pick me up. There were three buses that go to that stop: the 93, the 111, and the 176. There were four 93s and four 176s that passed me. No 111. So, after 25 minutes of waiting, I hop on the 93, which takes me to Ugarteche and Las Heras (sometimes). Thank God for ComoViajo, which gives you different options of how to get from Point A to Point B.

In the end, I did get there. I had to walk a bit more than I planned and it took longer than I had anticipated, but I got there. That’s sort of how buses are here. Sometimes I will get on a 111 and it will go down one street, and then I will get a 111 another day, and its a completely different route.

When I was in BA the first time,  I never rode a bus. No siree, it was all about taking a taxi or hopping on the Linea D (subway). And that was fine. The subway is a great way to travel during times where traffic is bad, but limiting yourself to just the subway and taxi, well, limits you. I see a lot more of the city on the bus, and it gets your nerves going a bit (asking for the ticket, finding a seat, getting off at the right stop, etc.) I now swear by buses. They may be unpredictable and a bit of a bumpy ride, but if you come to BA, its the cheapest tour/transportation method money can buy.

How do you afford your rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle?

When I describe how long I’ve been in Buenos Aires, it is a bit complicated. Two years? Five months? The thing is, I came to Buenos Aires for the first time at the end of 2006 for Christmas break after a semester at uni, and I ended up staying until June. I took Spanish classes at the University of Belgrano, hung out in Las Cañitas, and basically wandered through the city with my Yanqui friends in a quasi-drunken stupor most of the time. For us, it was like a 6-month Spring Break. Our Argentine friends were the guys we met at clubs and we were very, very content with our rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle. Clubbing, parties, lots of alcohol…what’s not to love?

Well, unfortunately that little Spring Break had to end. I had attempted to start a carrera in relaciones públicas at UB , but it was impossible to get any transfer credits accepted (I had about two years’ worth), so I ventured home to Merkuh to finish my undergraduate degree. I certainly don’t regret this, but I can say leaving Buenos Aires to go live in Portland was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.

Now that I look back, I lived in such a bubble. Pretty unaware of the Argentine lifestyle, as we were going out with the kids of diplomats and big guys in the oil industry. How the hell were we supposed to know that this wasn’t the norm? Well, in round two of my Buenos Aires experience, I live in Chacarita with a really cool guy from Neuquén who, to be honest, doesn’t do much. Arguably the chillest guy I have ever met. No English, whatsoever. He drinks more maté than I ever thought possible, has weird waking/sleeping hours (wakes at 5pm, sleeps at 6m), and basically spends most of his day boludeando on the computer. He studies once a week, and generally tends to miss his class if there is a Boca game on because he’s an hincha, or part of an hinchada.

By not really teaching me anything at all, he has taught me a ton. How to spend Sundays. How to make milanesas and empanadas. How to be content with who you are. When his mother and aunt came to visit, I had expected some sort of resentment or joke about how their 25-year-old son/nephew lives his life.

I was pleasantly surprised.

They could not stop smiling and laughing about what a great person he was. What a thought, to love a family member or friend just for for they are. Not for who they were or will be. Just for who they are as a person. It was beautiful.

Lesson #1 from Round #2 in Buenos Aires: To be content with who you are and what you have. To live simply and not ostentatiously. And how to afford a rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle? Well, when you find out you don’t need one, it’s no longer a question you worry about answering.

A New Beginning. Take 14,792.

Here we are again, Blogworld. Hello there. I believe we first became acquainted when I attempted a Xanga page, back in the early 2000s. Thank God that didn’t last long. What did I even have to blog about then? How much I hated wearing braces? About how Old Navy was the shit? At the time, I suppose I felt I was a pretty interesting individual, living in the burbs and going to the whitest school in America. Dating a Mormon. Hanging out after curfew. Yeah, pretty badass. Though, not quite good enough for a Xanga.

Not that things have changed drastically since then.Well, they have and they haven’t. I am still the same worry wart goody two shoes I have always been (sans the Mormon boyfriend, however). I have now accepted the fact that I am a mildly extraordinary person in an excessively extraordinary place. I figure that simply by virtue of the fact that I am in Buenos Aires, this blog will be somewhat interesting.

Buenos Aires (Capital Federal) is hands down the most awesome place I’ve ever been. As many of you know, I lived in New York City before this, but because I lived many of my teenage years outside of the States, I simply didn’t feel like I belonged there. NYC is great, don’t get me wrong. Where I lived in Harlem was fab-u-lous. Completely foreign from anything I’d ever seen, coming from Abercrombie & Fitchville on the other side of the country. I still didn’t feel like I belonged, though. And, no, it didn’t have anything to do with the fact that I was the minority–I love being the minority. I find I learn much more when noone understands me. So, it wasn’t Harlem that I didn’t like. It was necessarily the States that I didn’t like. I just…really loved Argentina.

Think about it this way: think back to the time where you hit puberty. Everyone was a bit uncomfortable, changing at different times. Weird smells, greasy faces, squeaky voices. They were an awkward few years. Eventually, however, everyone caught up. People were on the same page.

Now, imagine if you were constantly going through puberty, waiting impatiently for people to meet you on the same page. That’s sort of what it felt like for me in the US, I suppose. Waiting for things to start making sense. It wasn’t necessarily the people that got to me, but more the lifestyle. I just didn’t get it. And, I am not trying to be condescending or imply that I am on higher level in any way. I’m not. I’m a normal person with an abnormal intolerance to feeling uncomfortable.

Well, lucky for me, my parents were experiencing this neverending pubescence (I think it’s genetic) and had moved to BsAs. After graduating and working in the States for a bit, I moved here. Most people move to a foreign place after they retire, or when they at least deserve a sabbatical. Well, my dad always told me that your twenties was your decade to be poor. I figured I’d just be poor in a place that I love. So, with a little bit of money, lots of hope, and absolutely no idea of what I wanted to do, I bought my one-way ticket and ventured down here.

That was back in March. What am I doing today? Well, I live in Chacarita and work from home, editing medical transcriptions. Random, but I’m not complaining. In addition to work, I do lots of migraciones stuff (and never seem to get anywhere), watch way too much Argentine television, I am taking the TEFL online, and most importantly, I am taking care of my roommate’s pot plant while he is away.

So, there you have it friends. I am in Argentina. Doing my thing.

I am sure you, reader, are wondering what is going to be so terribly interesting about this blog? Yes, I realize that my life may not seem exceptionally interesting on the surface, but I assure you that it is. Sort of. Maybe if I start dating a Mormon again…