Short, curly, black hairs...

There are some advantages of living on the bottom floor of a 10- story apartment building. If there is ever a fire, you are first to leave. Also, there's no buzzer system, so I have to manually open the door for people when they come/go - this would be very annoying if I didn't live on the bottom floor. I have two patios - one with a lovely plant, the other to hang all my laundry. Those are about the only good things... on the downside there isn't the greatest amount of natural light (it is ALWAYS night time), little critters (fire ants, cucarachas, spiders) tend to hang around the bottom floor, and whatever junk the people throw out their windows goes directly onto my patios... normally it is just cigarette butts, food wrappers - but yesterday someone threw a fun toy for Cholita to play with...

Close up...What do you think this is?

Perfectly cooked delicious homemade pizza can even be made with the world's worst oven

This is how you turn on my oven:
1. light a match
2. stick your hand into the gas chamber while simultaneously holding down the dial on the top of the stove
3. close your eyes otherwise the gas will burn them off
4. re-do steps 1-3 because the inflamed match is about to inflame your finger
5. "
6. Once the oven is lit (little flame) hold down the dial for 5 minutes and wait for the big flame
7. Repeat 1-5 because you take your hand off the dial prematurelyMy oven has two temperatures, FULL BLAST FLAMES and OFF. In the 4 months that I've lived in this apartment, I have only used the oven once and made a royal mess of a lasagna...but the other night I was in the mood for pizza so I thought I'd give it a shot...Success! Probably the best pizza I have had in months. This does not say much as pizza for porteños means soggy tasteless bread with mounds of cheese and extra grease toppings.
This pizza has fresh mozarella, basil, tomatoes and roasted red and yellow peppers. It's no deep dish from Piero's....

Argentine bank now grants loans to people who used to have a penis but now they don't

Here is this new television advertisement for Banco Provincia, a popular bank in Argentina starring a middle aged transgendered woman.

Kilos in Uruguay

A few weeks ago I took a short vacation to the beaches along the coast in Uruguay. Instead of posting pictures of the clear waters of the Atlantic, quaint fisherman villages, and beautiful countryside - I decided to show the important stuff: the food! My goal was to take a picture of everything that I ate - but unfortunately the extremely laid back attitude and slow service made it difficult to snap a shot before I inhaled the entire plate.

Mercado en Montevideo

Bife de chorizo con papas y verduras grilladas

Paella

Breakfast on the ocean

Shrimp al ajillo - this one was dangerous for my stomach...

Fried Calamari rrrrabas

Lube Center

Cholita

Cats are creepy. They are always up to no good.. biting, scratching, terrorizing, scheming. I never understood "cat" people... until I got my little Chola (Cholita). Who could resist an adorable little kitty?

Cholita Starring in Gremlins VI

Buenos Aires invaded

Here is a recent article written by the people at Gawker.com, "Buenos Aires Ruined by I-Bankers."
If you ever idly considered going to Buenos Aires to enjoy its humid subtropical climate, tango music, and world famous zoo, just forget it. The entire city is now populated by laid-off American bankers.

Apparently a visit to the Teatro Colon or a sightseeing stroll over to Pablo Neruda's old house is now indistinguishable from a night at Bar Martignetti. Spencer Morgan's weekly NYO profile of a quirkily enraging Manhattanite today introduces us to David Webb: former Goldman analyst, current chisel-jawed male model, Ivy League tennis star, and media party crashing friend of Neel Shah. David hopped on down to Buenos Aires for a couple weeks to just clear his head and shit, and what did he find? People exactly like himself:

"You'd start the day at a park and then run into five former bankers, and then you'd wind up at a bar and all of a sudden there would be 15 of them," Mr. Webb said. "Ex-bankers, ex-traders, Lehman guys, Bear guys, everyone. Guys that got screwed by their job and came to a place where everything was cheap. It's fuckin' beautiful and the sun was going down at 9:30."

If Juan Diaz de Solis would have known this was gonna happen back in 1516, he would have turned around and gone right back up the Rio de la Plata and left the whole mess to the native Charrua tribe. They hate bankers. (But they love male models!)
http://gawker.com/5164142/buenos-aires-ruined-by-i+bankers

In related news, this video was featured in a Clarin article (the most widely read newspaper) about "Stories of US Expats who Fled to Argentina because of the Economic Crisis" seems like a perfect accompaniment.
http://www.clarin.com/diario/2009/03/21/um/m-01881483.htm (in Spanish)

Hamburguesas

I'm really hungry for a nice juicy hamburger, I think I'll have a Barfy!

Crónica TV

My all time favorite channel, Crónica TV, is a 24/7 "news" channel that never fails to entertain. It's like Fox News teamed up with TMZ and the Jerry Springer Show to broadcast the latest breaking news complete with theme songs, racist jokes, inappropriate sound effects, graphic footage of accidents and of course, lots of partially nude females.

My favorite segment is "Estallo el Verano" where reporters go to popular summer hot spots in Argentina and interview the sunbathers asking them the most crucial questions like if they use sunscreen.





Here's another great example of how Cronica TV investigates the important issues. For those who don't speak Spanish, this is the gist of what's going on: The story is about how Chinese people are catching birds in the park and selling them. The reporter asks investigative questions like "Do you eat the birds?"



Finally, the last one I found is a bit bloody so I don't recommend this for those who have a weak stomach. Briefly, man on motorcycle gets in an accident, breaks his neck along with several other body parts, but still is able to give a full interview while lying on his back in the middle of the street.

"Oh! That's Argentina"

I came to BsAs in 2006 and was instantly drawn to Porteño culture. I wasn't so intrigued by the seductive dance of the tango, the thriving café culture, or the European influenced architecture - instead I was fascinated to find out more about the gripping questions that seemed essential to understanding Argentine society: How can Porteños shop so much on the salaries they make? Why has the mullet been a trendy hairstyle for both men and women for over 20 years? Why on earth are flower shops open 24 hours a day, but you can't find even an empanada past 2am?

My attempt to immerse myself into this culture left me more confused than ever as I have come to the conclusion that there is no rhyme or reason to this ridiculously magnificent country.

I had to find a way to document some of the daily occurrences that are unexplainable to anyone who has never traveled to this glorious place. Although "Blogs" are totally not my thing (yes, I just put the word blog in quotation marks) I found it's the only way to share the reasons why I love this South American country.


Photo of la Presidenta Cristina Kirchner with her lovely husband, (aka el penguino "the Penguin"), ex-Presidente Néstor.