Ultimas Noticias (Latest Headlines)

There has been a lot going on in Argentine politics this week, so I thought I'd write a little about it and offer my observations. 

First: The Kirchner administration, now in power, has advocated a much tougher stance on perpetrators of human rights abuses under the military junta. In the 30 years since its fall, different presidential administrations have gone back and forth on how to deal with the leadership of the junta. In addition to repealing a law that previously gave amnesty to anyone below a certain point on the chain of command, the Kirchners instated a "Day of Memory of Truth and Justice" holiday. The first one was this past Monday, the day after I returned from Chile. I decided to go walk around the Plaza de Mayo, where human rights groups were congregating. Though the day commemorates a tragedy I was surprised to find an almost festive atmosphere. People were grilling, dancing, shouting to each other. I was alone so only stayed long enough to walk around a bit, and then headed home. Over dinner, Nancy and I talked at length about the meaning of the day, and she had some really interesting observations. She noted that since the day came after the long weekend for Semana Santa, most people were treating it as a longer vacation and hence the gravity was lost. Christina Kirchner, the president of Argentina, hadn't even gone to the memorial service because she was still at her country house. The girls didn't have school and so were not being taught about WHY a day was necessary. I asked her if she thought, even though it was a holiday, a day was worthwhile because it makes the junta easier to talk about and brings things out in the open whereas if there were no memorial people would keep hiding it. Of course, she said, she just thought it was the wrong way to go about things. Turning a memorial for 30,000 people disappeared into an excuse to stay at the beach an extra day is insulting to their memory and not what such a memorial should be about. She also noted that, to instate a day 30 years later is very after the fact. The legacy of the junta is one of the sorest spots in Argentine society and divisions run deep. Although I agree with Nancy that such a holiday should be treated with more gravitas, something is better than nothing.

The second headline I wanted to talk about is the over-two-week farmers' strike that ended yesterday. In order to reduce the federal deficit caused by inflation, the Kirchner administration raised export tax on agricultural goods to 40% from 27%. After operating costs and allowing for inflation, that leaves almost nothing for the producer. Agriculture is Argentina's biggest industry, and this was the first time in history that all industries: meat, dairy, fruits and vegetables; and both management and workers, were completely in agreement and all stopped production. Many times in the past the workers have struck against management, or the dairy industry will have some problems, but never all at once. Fruit started going bad and some butchers ran out of meat (which, in a country of meat eaters, is a HUGE deal). Christina ignored them for about 10 days before giving an inflammatory speech and used the phrase "I will not give in to extortion." That just made things worse. Then, on Thursday, she adopted a more conciliatory tone in another speech, tensions lifted slightly, and negotiations began yesterday. Never before had I seen such an illustration of another division in Argentine society: porteños  (people who live in BsAs) and campesinos (people who live in the provinces and work on farms). The unfairness of the tax aside, the reaction of the Kirchner government to the concerns of their people was appalling. I only hope that with the negotiations a fairer deal can be found. 

Chile: the $35,000 peso manzana.

Last week we had a super long weekend for Easter, and my friends and I decided to take advantage of the time off and go to Chile. My grandmother spent years in Chile when she was younger, so it was high on my list of places to visit. Finding a convenient flight was difficult since it was such short notice, but we finally all found ones on Tuesday evening, meaning the only day of class I missed was Wednesday. Since our flight got into Santiago pretty late at night, the plan was to spend the night in Santiago before heading to Valparaiso. We would stay there for 2 nights and go back to Santiago for 2 nights, returning to Buenos Aires on Sunday.

 

Getting to the airport and onto our flight on Tuesday went off without a hitch, but we were glad to get to our hostel in Santiago. After a quick meal of the Chilean classic “pan as palta” which is a hot dog with guacamole on top, we went back to the hostel and got ready for out Chilean journey on Wednesday. We had plans to take the micro bus but didn’t know where the bus terminal in Santiago was or how often the buses left. Luckily, hostel personnel are always really friendly and knowledgeable about their area, and the owner was more than willing to help us. The bus terminal was only a quick metro ride away, and we got there quickly, but buying a bus ticket was a different story. The Santiago bus terminal is under construction, and we were sent to about three different counters before we found the right one. Then, after showing the woman the address of the hostel we wanted to go to, she told us that it wasn’t really in Valparaiso it was about an hour further out. Fine, as long as it was still on the beach. We bought round trip tickets and headed out. I’m going to rave again about micros because they are just that cool. Clean, comfortable, you usually get at least a coffee if not food, and my favorite part is that you can easily watch the world pass by. The Chilean landscape could not be more diferent than Argentina: it is mountainous and dry whereas Argentina is flat and green, but both are beautiful and unique. The trip to “Playa Ritoque” took about three hours. After taking a taxi to the hostel, I was speechless. The place was incredibly beautiful and completely undeveloped save for a few houses, our hostel and a restaurant set a little ways off the beach. We learned later that it is basically the only undeveloped coast in Chile, due to a copper plant’s railroad that goes basically right next to the beach. No one wants a beach house in which you have to cross railroad tracks to get to the beach, and good thing. After exploring a little and jumping up and down at our good luck, we spent the afternoon laying out on the dunes. In the evening we went into the town and bought amazing Chilean produce and pasta for dinner, and cooked for ourselves. Our hippie hostel owner, Ian, was an expatriate who has been living in Chile since 2002 because he disagrees with “everything the United States has come to stand for” and he “doesn’t want any part of it”. Needless to say, he was a little inflammatory but extremely interesting to talk to.  He made us a bonfire the first night and we all sat around drinking pisco sours, the traditional Chilean cocktail, and talking politics.

 The next day we woke up relatively early and headed to the beach because we had made a horseback riding date at 3 in the afternoon. I was nervous because I have a deep seated fear of horses and hadn’t ridden one in over a decade. But, when in Rome… anyway. It was well worth my initial trepidation because the landscape was even more incredible from up high on horseback. The entire place was paradise. Some of my friends wanted to trot/gallop/generally go faster than me so I held back and made friends with our tour guide, a retired rugby player who threw out his back and now rides horses for a living (counterintuitive, no?) It was fun to talk with him, hear more about his rugby team, the Playa Ritoque community, and hear their plans for Easter. The whole community gets in on a huge Easter egg hunt. We traversed up and over dunes, across the beach and back for about three hours before heading back to the hostel. That night they opened the beach restaurant and we had a little “festichola.” It was good to meet some native Chileans and just hang out.

The next morning we got up early to head out. The plan was to take a bus to Valparaiso, and spend a few hours there sightseeing before traveling the rest of the way to Santiago. The first half of the plan went off without a hitch, but we hadn’t been in Valparaiso for more than an hour before my friend’s camera was stolen out of her hand. A street kid literally walked up, snatched it as she was taking a picture, and went running. Apparently we had wandered into a bad neighborhood, and with all our luggage we were easy targets. We spent the rest of our time in Valparaiso making a police report, and then got to Santiago as fast as we could. When we got to the hostel we crashed. The next day, after getting a map and directions from the desk guy at the hostel, we set off sightseeing in Santiago. It is beautiful but different than Buenos Aires. First, the geography: Santiago is mountainy and hilly while Buenos Aires is completely flat. The architecture as well is a lot more modern and concrete-based, while porteños love their flourishes and details and marble. We visited Saint Lucia’s Hill, the first settlement of Santiago, the Plaza de Armas (the Chilean version of the Plaza de Mayo) and Saint Christopher’s Hill. Saint Christophers Hill is so large there is a gondola that you take to get to the top, where there is a playground and a huge statue of the Virgin Mary. We walked around and waited for the sunset, taking lots of pictures and admiring the city. The next day some of my friends flights were early but four of us didn’t leave until 9 so we took advantage of our extra time to visit Pablo Neruda’s house. For non Latin American literature buffs, he is a famous Chilean poet who won the Nobel Prize for Literature and is one of my favorite authors. His house in Santiago served as a clandestine meeting point for him and his third wife while he was still married to his second wife. The place was incredible. He served as a foreign ambassador for Chile for many years so there were trinkets from all over the world. He loved the sea and desined the house to feel like a boat, so the dining room was long and narrow with a curved ceiling, and all the staircases were spiral.  I was so glad to have the opportunity to learn more about this fascinating poet. I posted one of his most famous poems, and its translation, below. After the house tour, since it was Easter, we treated ourselves to a big Easter lunch before heading to the airport and back to Buenos Aires. It was bittersweet to leave Chile because it had been such an amazing experience but every time I leave Buenos Aires coming back becomes more gratifying. I had missed by Buenos Aires querido.

Poem 20

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche. 

Escribir, por ejemplo: «La noche está estrellada, 
y tiritan, azules, los astros, a lo lejos.» 

El viento de la noche gira en el cielo y canta. 

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche. 
Yo la quise, y a veces ella también me quiso. 

En las noches como ésta la tuve entre mis brazos. 
La besé tantas veces bajo el cielo infinito. 

Ella me quiso, a veces yo también la quería. 
Cómo no haber amado sus grandes ojos fijos. 

Puedo escribir los versos más tristes esta noche. 
Pensar que no la tengo. Sentir que la he perdido. 

Oír la noche inmensa, más inmensa sin ella. 
Y el verso cae al alma como al pasto el rocío. 

Qué importa que mi amor no pudiera guardarla. 
La noche está estrellada y ella no está conmigo. 

Eso es todo. A lo lejos alguien canta. A lo lejos. 
Mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido. 

Como para acercarla mi mirada la busca. 
Mi corazón la busca, y ella no está conmigo. 

La misma noche que hace blanquear los mismos árboles. 
Nosotros, los de entonces, ya no somos los mismos. 

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero cuánto la quise. 
Mi voz buscaba el viento para tocar su oído. 

De otro. Será de otro. Como antes de mis besos. 
Su voz, su cuerpo claro. Sus ojos infinitos. 

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero tal vez la quiero. 
Es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido. 

Porque en noches como ésta la tuve entre mis brazos, 
Mi alma no se contenta con haberla perdido. 

Aunque éste sea el último dolor que ella me causa, 
y éstos sean los últimos versos que yo le escribo.

Poem 20

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example, "The night is starry
and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance."

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is starry and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight tries to find her as though to bring her closer.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another's. She will be another's. As she was before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms,
my soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer,
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

There are actually a surprising amount of Irish pubs here in Buenos Aires, but that is besides the point of this blog post. Classes started last week, and everyone's been asking me how they went. So here you go:

My first one, on Tuesday, was "Argentina en Palabras," my class that follows modern Argentine history through literature. I was super excited for it because I have already taken History of Argentina at GW and wanted to get a different perspective. The class is at 12:30 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so Sailee and I met up at 12 for a cafe before class. We wanted to recap the night before, which had been our friend Laura's 21st birthday. No matter what country you're in, birthday nights call for recaps. We finished our coffees and headed to the first UCA building, where we had been told class was. Little did we know that classes are not usually in the first UCA building since it is where most administrative offices are. When we tried to climb the main staircase to the third floor, we were stopped by a security guard. Now, I have tried to avoid these security guards as much as possible because though they are rent-a-cops hired by the university to enforce the dress code and generally keep order, I have no interest in contact with any type of law enforcement during my time here. Except maybe to ask directions. Needless to say, when we were asked who we were and where we were going, and for our UCA IDs, and then told to turn around and go to the information desk, I was a little shaken. We went to the desk and she whipped out a list and asked us for our names. I thought, Great, a list, we're going on the list. Maybe of American exchange students who can't find their way around. Wrong, we were already there. Turns out it was the class roster, and we had to be swiped up a special elevator to where our class was. We have to check in, and get swiped up, every time we have class. 

Obviously this is not normal Argentine class procedure. The reason this particular class was in a restricted area of the school was because it is in the PEL program, the program that is geared toward exchange students though all the classes are held in Spanish. These classes apparently get the short end of the stick when being assigned rooms. 

My other class, the advanced Spanish one, is going to be great. I have already spoken more in that class than I think I did the entire intensive course. I am still trying out Political Science classes, they start this week so I'm going to my first one tonight. Wish me luck. 

Most of the girls from GW and I are going to Chile for Semana Santa since we have 5 days off from school!! We are spending 2 days in Valparaiso and 3 days in Santiago, coming back on Easter. Hope everyone is enjoying Spring Break!

Besoss,

N

Mar del Plata, or, Personal Revelations

On Saturday morning we left for Mar Del Plata, my first long trip outside of Buenos Aires. Since we had decided to enjoy a Friday night in Buenos Aires, I slept most of the way there. We were traveling by a miracle invention called “microbuses” which are huge coach buses that go pretty much everywhere and are really comfortable, so when I woke up we had arrived. To my dismay, it was gray and drizzly and would remain so for most of the time we were there. Not exactly beach weather. Mar Del Plata being a big city, however, we were able to find plenty of diversions to keep us busy. Highlights include:

-       Sailee and I getting lost on the colectivo the first day and traveling to the next town over, Santa Clara del Mar.

-       Wandering the plaza and finding a carousel.

-       The Museo del Mar, a marine science museum where we spent hours pretending to be little kids.

-       An Argentine traveling circus that was impressively sophisticated.

-       Two words: go karts.

-       My first casino experience. In my opinion, they are overrated.

-       An intense political discussion with some Argentines we met at the go kart place.

-       And finally, on the last day… THE BEACH.

After we got sunned out (I managed to get sunburned on the one sunny day), we ventured out to a sea lion reserve that my friend Laura had read about. This was arguably my favorite part of the trip.  The “reserve” was the port area of the city and among the docks filled with huge fishing and oil trawlers were hundreds of sleeping sealions. It was late afternoon, turning the water an insane lavender color and huge puffy clouds filled the sky. It was peaceful, beautiful and completely tranquil. I also have a confession to make: I hadn’t really wanted to go see the sea lions. I was tired at the end of what had been a fun if not relaxing vacation, and just wanted to go home and shower. But if I had, I would have missed out on what turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the trip. Standing there, I realized that a lot of the past month I have been focusing more on what is not here (i.e. my friends, family and everything familiar) than taking advantage of what is. Don’t get me wrong, Buenos Aires, and Argentina in general, are as great as I thought they would be but I am sure I have not fully rose to the challenge of being abroad. In other words, many times I have been stuck on the negative rather than the positive. Standing there, looking out at the ocean and the sea lions, I promised myself I am going to try and relax a little, and just have fun here.  Argentina is my home for 5 more months and I need to appreciate it for what it is rather than constantly compare it to home. This might sound obvious, but it took me 5 weeks and constant daily challenges to realize.

Hope everyone survived midterms...

Besos! 

N