From Bmore to BA

While the internet no longer works at the hostel I´m staying at (along with the toilets, lights, sinks, windows, and basically everything else short of the building structure), there really hasn´t been too much to write about this past week. I´m currently in the midst of the ¨job search,¨ but - like my daily routine - it seems to be going nowhere fast. I´ve tacked up advertisements all over the city, dropped resumes off at English teaching institutes, and even put an ad out in the classifieds section of the local paper…all pretty much for naught, it appears.

While it´d be easy to pin the problem on me, why would I do that. There a few problems, but they all relate back to this simple fact: my timing sucks. In a few weeks classes will be out, and most of the students will be working or on vacation (i.e. out of town). In addition, alot of businesses slow down too for the summer, because many of their employees head off for vacation to the beach or mountains for a month or so during the summer. While everybody still seems to be humoring me and takes my resume with a smile, I think the cold, hard, facts of life are telling me that I may just have to suck it up for the next few months and live even cheaper than I already am…until I can find some form of employment at the end of the summer, ala February or March.

Basically, my daily routine is the same: wake up when I feel like it, go wander around looking for work for a few hours, and then go somewhere I can enjoy myself - as long as its free. I went to 2 different parks 2 times each last week…the problem is, it´s hard to find english books, and when you do find them they ain´t cheap either! So basically, I find myself listening to Dark Side of the Moon on my iPod at least 3 times a day…but hey, at least it ain´t Ignition (Part II remix).

Aside from all of this, my days are pretty normal, and puncuated by the occasional Larry David-esque incident. Take for example, today, when I decided to drop by an outsourcing firm because I heard they hire native English speakers (I´m pretty most of the work involves arguing with people who haven´t paid their bills in the states - a pleasure, perhaps, but hey I´ve gotta eat too). So I´m sitting in the main waiting room, all dressed up in the finest apparel I could fit into the backpack I brought with me to Córdoba - a short sleeve, button down Henley I´ve had since high school and a north face backpack - sitting next to a local who looks like he stepped off Bear Stearns in Wall Street. After 30 minutes or so, everybody sitting in the waiting room gets called except for me. While they´re all nervously waiting behind the ¨caller¨ (possibly the interviewer), he starts off on me in rapid-fire spanish…with 20 people staring at me, and impatiently waiting for a response so that the ¨caller¨ can move them upstairs and get the damn interview over with already, I attempt to politely respond that I heard that there was work to be had here, and I´m interested in finding me some. After another minute or two of nervous prodding, he finally shakes his head and points me in the direction of the front desk, where I´m told I´ll need a work visa to even apply.

Another intersting time occured this past Saturday, after I paid a visit to the local equivalent of the JCC. I went to services Friday and met a few high school kids - hey man, I´ll take what I can get at this point, OK - who told me to come to this place called the Macabi Club the following day. So I show up there, do my part of wandering around aimlessly (which, by the way, traveling solo for the past two months I think I´ve perfected the art), and talk to a few people my age. A few of them seemed pretty cool, so hopefully we´ll go out sometime in the future. Anyway, after I leave this place, I get caught up in the crowd coming back from the Talleres - Belgrano soccer game, which is the biggest rivalry in Córdoba, second only to Boca-River in Buenos Aires. All I can say is I´m glad the shirt I was wearing wasn´t one of the colors of Belgrano (who won the game), because I was swept up into a wave of crazy Talleres fans…flags, chants and all. Seriously, these fans are crazy (or passionate, depending on how you look at it I suppose) - two of my friends were on a bus coming home from another game yesterday, and their bus got hit by a rock, shattering a window and sending a girl on the bus to the hospital. And that´s one of the better outcomes I´ve heard…Anyway, I wind up waiting two hours to finally catch a bus back to the center of town (usually just a 15 minute ride away), all the while watching the Talleres fans take over the streets of this nice, residential neighborhood. It really is kind of scary…we have big rivalries in the States, but honestly I think fan violence - outside of Columbus, Ohio - is pretty rare. Eventually I get on the bus and make it home, treated on the whole ride back by the singing, chanting, and banging by the last group of fans to leave. Man, it was an experience, and I wasn´t even at the game.

Speaking of sports, the other day I passed by a hat store, and it had the most random teams. Aside from the Tampa Bay Bucs (ugh) it even had Wisconsin! No Michigan or ND, but Wisconsin!

Anyway, please don´t let any of the aforementioned events lead you to believe I´m not still having an awesome time - I am, and I´m also just posting the more interesting events so as to keep everyone entertained at my expense. Everything is still nice down here, it´s just a little frustrating trying to settle in but really have nothing to show for it…not to mention doing nothing all day starts to get a little boring after awhile. If you don´t believe me, ask any of my friends…they all claim to have ¨jobs¨ but I still find 4 e-mails a day about people who say obscene names over airport P.A. systems in my inbox every day.

Take care,

Adam

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051114/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_kazakhstan_borat

Do you see what happens Larry!

Any illusions that I may have had regarding Argentina´s stability and civility - despite the fact that the mullet and that rattail are currently undergoing a resurgence akin to Indianapolis, Indiana, circa 1984 - have been smashed to bits, kind of like the McDonald´s in the center of Buenos Aires (3 blocks away from where I used to live). If you really don´t know what I´m talking about, then either you´ve been living under a rock for the past two days, you´re illiterate, or you work for Elliot Clark. It´s pretty crazy being here right now - aside from the huge anti-Bush rally going on in the center of Córdoba, all day the only thing on TV (aside from ¨Los Simpsons¨ and ¨That 70´s Show,¨ of course; please please note irony here) has been the huge organized opposition rally in Mar del Plata, and more importantly, the unscheduled anarchy that has left dozens of stores in flames or in shards.

It´s incredible to see person after person lob sticks and gas bombs into businesses - and not just U.S. ones. I´ve never seen anything like this. Even though the Summit has been going on for hours now, you´d never know - all they keep showing is the protests. The few times they do show the Summit, all they do is focus on W sweating it out and looking worried. On a more local note, when I passed by the McDonald´s today I literally saw 10 police officers standing guard, although ¨special ops¨ would probably be a more accurate description because regular police aren´t decked out in SWAT gear and don´t wear those cool berets.

I´m currently hanging out in my hostel in Córdoba, which, being down by the river (no sign of any vans) on the shady side of town feels eerily like a safe house…as I write, I can hear glass being smashed and police shots firing in the background on TV. Luckily, it doesn´t seem like anything too insane is going on in Córdoba, but Mar del Plata (and Buenos Aires, it´s looking like) is a whole different story. Even in this hostel half the people have fliers made up with ¨Bush the nazi¨ and all of that propaganda. I mean, I thought Europe was bad enough…but damn son, people really hate on this guy. Incredibly enough, everyone´s still being nice to me…but I haven´t yet tested the patience of the molotov-cocktail throwing-bandana-over-the-face guys running around the streets who seem to be enjoying a little bit of the ´ol ultraviolence.

The amazing part is that íf you traveled to Argentina on a normal day and only stayed a few weeks, you´d really think that everything is cool…I know I did. I guess I shouldn´t have doubted the locals though who warned me otherwise; it´s like there´s this simmering disdain for something (Bush, sexual frustration from having too many beautiful women, anything I don´t know!) bubbling under the surface, and it just exploded.

Maybe I´m a sick bastard, but I find all of this incredibly exciting. As fantastic as the political science program at the University of Michigan is - especially classes with Hanes Walton, probably the best college professor of all time, shit! - no amount of BS´ing in class can ever compare to experiencing the real the deal firsthand.

Latin America - too much!

Well it's been a week since I've been back in BA...my has time traveled fast. I've been staying with my friends Jordan and Sam - who have a really great apartment in one of the best parts of the city, ... [Continue reading this entry]