Depressed, genuinely depressed, not because of the ordeal, the waiting, the frustration – no, depressed because I’ve just been reminded what Christmas is supposed to feel like, by tasting a sip of a Starbuck’s Toffee Nut Latte™ in Frankfurt airport. An American woman and two German ladies (all white) nearby are in frantic agreement over immigration and the nationalization of immigrants: “they sweep in and take our jobs” etc. Everywhere in this airport travelers are weeping, employees are shouting – and someone from Maintenance is doing laps on a bicycle while I sip Starbuck’s Christmas Cheer™. Is this the world you were dreaming of, Walt Disney? Look what we’ve become. I hope you’re turning in your grave/fridge.
The last few days, if nothing, have given me ample opportunity to witness something I have never seen before: the Germans in action, for better or worse. What is most surprising is their ability to communicate, their communication skills, which are truly woeful. No, that’s not fair: their communication abilities are entirely efficient. If they can’t help you, they won’t try. If you can’t ask the right question then you clearly don’t deserve the effort it takes into producing the right answer, or the answer itself. Not a word wasted. Efficient, and infuriating. In Buenos Aires, we queued for two hours to be told our flight would be delayed by six; in the end it was delayed by seven. Why, we were not told.
The flight was, surprisingly, incredibly painless. I hadn’t slept the night before and was out like a light. The plane was old enough not to have screens in the back of the seat in front of me, ridding me of a major distraction. The food offered looked exactly like economy class fare is supposed to look like but was actually very good. Everything about the trip itself reassured me that, on the continent, in civilization, all would be well. Lufthansa’s trans-atlantic crossing was the scene of my return to innocence and naivety as I left the New World and returned to the Old.
It was on the flight that I saw several further examples of German communication: often firm, always polite. When the food cart was being wheeled up the aisle in-flight, a woman tried to get past. The Valkyric attendant didn’t budge. The woman tried harder but Brunhilda stopped her with a staying hand and said, smiling brightly as one does to the deranged: “it weighs 90 kilos”… so good luck chum, she didn’t have to add.
When the plane crossed France I opened the window a crack and saw green below. Where was this snow that was causing so many people problems? And then I opened it fully and saw white. Everywhere was white. Endless fields, a la The Snowman, coated in white. And it was beautiful. From here one could appreciate the majesty of a world covered in a delicate spray of icing. This is Winter as seen in postcards, Narnia and Coca-Cola adverts. Two and a half decades of almost entirely snowless childhoods gave way to a squeal of delight that I kept deep inside but harkened to a part of me that had always dreamed and known that this is how the world should be.
All it took was our arrival in Frankfurt to remind me of how it actually is.
The 1st Officer started jabbering away on the speaker as we approached our descent, before stopping abruptly: “New information has been received!” he barked and promptly disappeared. The new information, it has to be said, was a surprise for all concerned: Frankfurt was closed. Like a shop or a bar. Except we were in a plane hovering above the airport, and couldn’t get in, which was the equivalent of being left out of a lock-in, only several hundred feet off the ground. I had already missed my connecting flight to Kuwait so I had absolutely no idea what would happen next when we arrived on the ground – it could only be a new adventure. We circled Frankfurt for a while, and I chatted nervously with the Swedish ball bearing salesman to my right, desperately trying not to look out of the window to my left – because there was nothing to see. Clouds swirled around and below us, small lights twinkling somewhere on the ground, impossible to tell at what distance. I have never been in a snowy landing before, and had no idea what to expect, but luckily my over-active imagination was providing me with some suitably disturbing thoughts.
After a while the plane descended. The window became covered in tiny icicle snowflakes, beautiful in their intricacy yet unnerving in their promise. Clutching my chair and by now talking utter gibberish to avoid the “OH MY GOD!!” thoughts running merry havoc in my brain, which I get every time a plane lands but were multiplied tenfold by the current situation, I occasionally glanced out. We had by now broken the snow clouds. The trees, unmistakably German snow-covered pines, grew closer and closer, the tires grunted below us, the buildings became bigger … and then we landed. And the landing was perfect, perhaps the best I’ve ever experienced. Smooth. No twisting and sliding at all. Spontaneous applause burst out around the cabin. Why? I thought. What has the pilot done? The plane is designed to land; he is employed to land it. Just because he does it every day normally with the minimum amount of fuss, why should he be applauded when he does it when it’s difficult? I realized that I was tired, angry, unsure of what was going to happen next, and that the plane was full of Argentines, who sometimes clap when they don’t know what else to do, and always applaud landings.
A semi-elderly Russian gent got up straight away; a torch beam shot out from the Valkyrie to my right: “Sir! You must please sit down!” came the command across the cabin. The man continued, oblivious, and another beam shot out like a bullet. Caught in the headlights, the Russian gave in and meekly sat down like a chastened schoolboy.
When we eventually got onto the ground, everything was chaos. Nobody had the first idea of what was going on. This was the end of Day Two of a continent-wide natural disaster, not volcanic ash but snow, possibly the most pathetic and debilitating natural disaster since the former, and nobody in ‘busy international hub’ Frankfurt had a clue about what was happening. We wandered hallways, sometimes in packs, sometimes alone, occasionally snatching at pieces of information that we thought, we believed, assumed was useful, because it came from someone in a uniform, but nobody was useful, nobody had the answer we were looking for and the uniforms were empty, devoid of authority.
Where can I get my bag from? I asked. “Yes, you must get your bag,” nodded the woman of African descent in a Lufthansa uniform. From where? “I do not know,” she shook her head, mournfully. An Israeli man had found an attendant that spoke his language – were they fighting or agreeing? Easily could’ve been either.
And nobody cared.
I’ve just crossed the Atlantic and I don’t speak German. “Um…would you like a medal?” No, I’d like a flight, my bag and a shower, in the order. “You can share a shower; you’ll never see your bag again; I can’t help you with your flight.” What level of Hell have we been flown into?
I started to follow an American tour guide, partly because there was a chance he’d know or be able to find something out and partly because I needed a Mother Goose. He was utterly useless, but he was wearing a pretty red jacked so at a pinch he could pass for Santa Clause; my brain was really very tired.
After some false starts down cavernous and deserted hallways, we found a queue. A queue! That most international of symbols! If people are queuing, there must be a reason – there must be something at the end. A pot of gold; a flight; a Kit-Kat. Whatever. So I joined the back with Mother Goose/Santa Clause. However, a well-coiffeured and impeccably dressed little German whose eyes darted and mouth rattled as if he’d just taken a line of speed was decimating the queue from the back with a clipboard.
“You!” he barked at three tall blond lads. “Going to Norway? Go to Gate 67B this instant. Your flight will be taking off shortly.” The three Scandinavians hadn’t really registered what had hit them but off they scurried.
“You!”
“Yes?” I offered meekly.
“Where you going?”
“Kuwait.”
“Ha. No, you’re not.” I blinked at this response, unsure as to how to react. Is this German customer service?
Mother Clause started to remonstrate with this communications guru in what seemed to be a jokey way for our benefit (not in front of the kids, darling) but was layered with vicious meaning:
Mother Clause: Ha ha, wouldn’t it be nice if you told us what was going on.
Communications Guru: Ha ha, wouldn’t it be nice if you got off my back, rolled into a cave and died, ha ha.
MC: Ha ha, leak me some information, think of yourself as Julian Assange for Frankfurt airpot, ha ha.
CG: Ha ha, look where Julian Assange is now, accused of rape and locked up on the behest of the Americans, he’s lucky he’s not in Guantanamo, ha ha.
MC: Ha ha, go **** your ******, ha ha.
CG: Ha ha, I would do but I was busy finishing up with your…
And so on.
But I looked at Mother Clause in light of this new information. He had no idea what was getting on and was getting in the way. This coiffeured coked-up Kraut (with a peculiarly South African English) had all the information I needed and was prepared to give it to me. I ditched the red-jacketed buffoon and started firing questions at Lufthansa’s finest.
1. What happened to my flight? “Cancelled.”
2. Where’s my bag? “You won’t see it for five days.”
3. Why not? “Because it’s being held where we wash our luggage carrying buses. Along with thousands of others. You think you’re in the shit, take a look around. You’re just a number, a statistic in a news story.”
4. So what do I do? “Take this voucher, get in a taxi, they’ll take you to this hotel. On the house. When you get there, call this hotline. They’ll re-book your flight. Good luck.”
He may have been an odious little prick, but I entirely appreciated his honesty: efficient, no-frills, take-it-or-leave-it communication. I took it, suddenly less angry, bewildered or confused than I had been when I got off the plane, and jumped into a cab.
The cold outside the plan was unreal. I had no clothes apart from what I was wearing, what I had been wearing since Friday night (amid those distant steaks and wine on a hot summer evening with friends in Latin America – had it only been two days?) and only had a coat. The snow was falling thick and fast, and was not attractive as it had been from the plane, but dirty and corrupted. I got into the taxi and zoomed into the night.
The driver was jovial and slightly chatty. I thought the hotel would be in Frankfurt itself but it was actually about 70km away, in a small town called Bingen. The snow was thick on and off the road, and several times the driver lost some control over the car and you could feel the tires sliding. Luckily this was happening to everyone so everybody on the road was aware and attentive to each other; considerate Germans.
The hotel was located at the far end of a pier in Bingen, a small industrial riverside town. The only guests in the hotel were stranded passengers, courtesy of Lufthansa. On the final approach to the hotel my taxi got stuck. Another taxi driver stopped and got out to push; after a while I got out as well to help, my Converse gently absorbing the snow caused by two days of solid snowfall. All to no avail. My driver got out and found a rubber sheet which he placed under a wheel to give it grip; the first time he started the car after this the sheet spun out from under the car and struck the assisting taxi driver on the shins. He hobbled off into the night, cursing. Someone came dashing out of the hotel with a shovel and got to work on the front wheels; at the same time, my driver got out and started spanking the back of the car with the rubber sheet to get the snow off. The sight was ridiculous beyond belief, like some sort of taxi-related bedroom game. Eventually, the taxi was freed and rolled off into the night.
The hotline to Lufthansa was engaged all evening. My hotel room looked disconcertingly like [the artist’s impression of] a cheap whore’s boudoir, right down to the plastic sheets. The ‘meal’ provided by the hotel and paid for by Lufthansa was disgusting and insufficient. I met some former US military lads (now civilian ‘contractors’ – euphemism for ‘hired killers’? One never knows…) on their way to Iraq or ‘Afghan’ via Kuwait, we started on the beers and Johnnie Walker, and that pretty much saw off the rest of the evening.
The next day I rose to a breakfast that was just like a boarding school Sunday breakfast – lavish, fantastic, excessive. I ate too much, but in my mind I justified it easily – after a night of watching BBC and CNN reports in which I had, as the Lufthansa man had predicted, become a number in a news story, when would I next be eating a meal like this again?
On the trip back to the airport, Germany was stunning. The countryside was lent an air of beauty by the snow that almost served to wash away my irritation at having been stuck and with little idea of how I would get out. But I was tired, and wanted to leave. This was my holiday. Frankfurt was just as crowded as it had been the day before, the people just as useless. But at least it wasn’t snowing anymore. I waited to get a new ticket, and suddenly everything was fine – flying out in the afternoon, with my bag. Success, at last.
Which was when I headed to Starbucks, took a long drag, and realized: this is Christmas, for everyone. The reason why this snow has caused so much chaos is that, at this time of year, people care in a way they simply don’t at other times. At this one point, on a hard day at the end of a hard year, we are all just trying to get home. I can’t believe it took me a sip of Starbucks to make me realize how important that is. What’s next? A sip of Coca-Cola and I’ll suddenly believe in Santa Clause again?
PS: It seems I was wrong – it isn’t just Maintenance that cycle about in Frankfurt airport, it’s everybody. Gotta love the Germans.
22/12/10
28/10/10
Nestor
Wednesday was a peculiar day. It was the day the National Census was carried out, so we all had the day off, provided we stayed at home all day waiting for the 'censista' to turn up. In order to ensure that everyone was in the right mental shape for the exertions, all bars and restaurants were shut at midnight on Tuesday. However, one or two bars worked out a cunning way of getting around this problem by holding private parties - it was illegal for a bar to be open, but there's no problem if it's a private party in somebody's 'house'. So that's where I was until 5 or 6 am on Wednesday. It felt like a Friday night, although it was a Tuesday.
I had set the next day aside for cooking and cleaning, but naturally woke up in the afternoon. What actually woke me was a call from a colleague informing me that Nestor had died. It is hard to accurately describe the thoughts that rushed colliding into my head at that precise moment. It felt like the suspension of reality, mixed with the coincidence that everybody in the city was at home to grieve in silence. My censista turned up shortly afterward to take my details. A sample of the questions: "Do you own a fridge? A laptop? A cellphone? A landline? Can you read and write?", in that order. The Census was also declared to be 'obligatory' but 'anonymous'; how any process can actually be both is beyond me.
After responding these questions, I went to the park to meet my friend Trevor, his girlfriend and their dog. I have never seen a space so devoid of mourners. Not one in sight. Nobody was wearing black; a lot of people were wearing barely anything at all. Music, sun, alcohol, dancing... Reality was clearly still suspended. And then I returned home, switched on the tv: the Casa Rosada, silent, deserted, and the only people walking in the Plaza de Mayo are Brazilian and/or Japanese tourists who haven't read or understood the news or participated in the Census and are bemused by the lack of people in the central square in a busy capital city. This changed, of course, over time, as people returned to the streets. But nothing was open until 8 pm, so that was when the mourning began in earnest.
The President declared three days of mourning; what that means is apparently not a national holiday until Monday, as we believed at first, but flags at half-mast and a lot of wearing black. Latin American heads of state have been rolling in over the last 24 hours. The talk in the streets and in the office is about what she will do next, whether she is strong enough politically or emotionally to run again in the elections next year, or whether it's time to step down and let somebody else take control. The next few weeks will be crucial in terms of defining her decision. Vultures/sharks are circling, depending on where one is standing. Regardless of personal opinions about the man himself, it is clear that, in the last decade, he has changed Argentina forever, and it is possible that in dying he has done exactly the same thing again. We shall see.
Palermo last night was full of life. I met up with a friend in a bar to watch part of the World Series, a sport I do not understand. In the packed bar, there was not one Argentine in sight. I wonder how many of them in there knew what was going on in the outside world. For them at least, reality was and is still suspended.
I had set the next day aside for cooking and cleaning, but naturally woke up in the afternoon. What actually woke me was a call from a colleague informing me that Nestor had died. It is hard to accurately describe the thoughts that rushed colliding into my head at that precise moment. It felt like the suspension of reality, mixed with the coincidence that everybody in the city was at home to grieve in silence. My censista turned up shortly afterward to take my details. A sample of the questions: "Do you own a fridge? A laptop? A cellphone? A landline? Can you read and write?", in that order. The Census was also declared to be 'obligatory' but 'anonymous'; how any process can actually be both is beyond me.
After responding these questions, I went to the park to meet my friend Trevor, his girlfriend and their dog. I have never seen a space so devoid of mourners. Not one in sight. Nobody was wearing black; a lot of people were wearing barely anything at all. Music, sun, alcohol, dancing... Reality was clearly still suspended. And then I returned home, switched on the tv: the Casa Rosada, silent, deserted, and the only people walking in the Plaza de Mayo are Brazilian and/or Japanese tourists who haven't read or understood the news or participated in the Census and are bemused by the lack of people in the central square in a busy capital city. This changed, of course, over time, as people returned to the streets. But nothing was open until 8 pm, so that was when the mourning began in earnest.
The President declared three days of mourning; what that means is apparently not a national holiday until Monday, as we believed at first, but flags at half-mast and a lot of wearing black. Latin American heads of state have been rolling in over the last 24 hours. The talk in the streets and in the office is about what she will do next, whether she is strong enough politically or emotionally to run again in the elections next year, or whether it's time to step down and let somebody else take control. The next few weeks will be crucial in terms of defining her decision. Vultures/sharks are circling, depending on where one is standing. Regardless of personal opinions about the man himself, it is clear that, in the last decade, he has changed Argentina forever, and it is possible that in dying he has done exactly the same thing again. We shall see.
Palermo last night was full of life. I met up with a friend in a bar to watch part of the World Series, a sport I do not understand. In the packed bar, there was not one Argentine in sight. I wonder how many of them in there knew what was going on in the outside world. For them at least, reality was and is still suspended.
10/9/10
People Power
As Buenos Aires approaches Spring, the weather is improving rapidly. This week has seen the temperature rarely drop below 20 degrees Celsius, remarkable when considering that officially until September 21st we are still in Winter. With the improved weather, certain unmistakably human and Argentine societal traits are becoming more apparent: girls are wearing fewer clothes, people are happier, and there are more mini-revolutions on the street on a daily basis. And, with the start of the new school and university term, several high schools and universities have been taken over by their students.
[Why doesn’t this happen in Blighty? Is it because we live in a police state where students are terrified of taking over classrooms for fear of being pelted by rubber bullets? No. And in the US, students don’t take over classrooms: they shoot each other. The Argentine version is long-term, non-violent and nationwide.]
Yesterday from the office I heard the explosions first. Mini-fireworks. Sounds like mortar fire. I looked out of the window with a weary sense of anticipation: who could it be today? The cooks? The teachers? The parents? One simply never knows. But no. It was a group of about ten people standing next to a yellow building, identified as a possible customs building, waving indecipherable flags and generally having a rather good time. It was hot, sunny – why not organize a protest?
The relentless grind of demonstration on demonstration on a daily basis is at first intriguing but quickly boring. The results are almost the same every time: nothing ever happens. I suppose the reason this doesn’t happen in the UK is that, while we exist in a democratic state and are all perfectly content to air our opinions and aware of our civil rights, protest just isn’t in our blood.
Blood.
Yesterday two events occurred to remind the people of this great city that reality, beyond the people power, is still there just behind the pantomime backdrop, waiting for its chance to re-establish the balance of power.
Someone was run over crossing the road. Or riding a bike; it wasn’t clear. What was apparent, and there for all the world to see, was the blood stain stretching from the middle of the wide and busy road all the way to the pavement. What had happened to this person was unknown; the outcome was all too evident.
And then a nightclub roof in Palermo collapsed last night. 50 people were dancing; two were killed, which isn’t really a bad return when compared with the Cromañon disaster. But it is bad enough, and real enough. Ours is a city that never sleeps.
[Why doesn’t this happen in Blighty? Is it because we live in a police state where students are terrified of taking over classrooms for fear of being pelted by rubber bullets? No. And in the US, students don’t take over classrooms: they shoot each other. The Argentine version is long-term, non-violent and nationwide.]
Yesterday from the office I heard the explosions first. Mini-fireworks. Sounds like mortar fire. I looked out of the window with a weary sense of anticipation: who could it be today? The cooks? The teachers? The parents? One simply never knows. But no. It was a group of about ten people standing next to a yellow building, identified as a possible customs building, waving indecipherable flags and generally having a rather good time. It was hot, sunny – why not organize a protest?
The relentless grind of demonstration on demonstration on a daily basis is at first intriguing but quickly boring. The results are almost the same every time: nothing ever happens. I suppose the reason this doesn’t happen in the UK is that, while we exist in a democratic state and are all perfectly content to air our opinions and aware of our civil rights, protest just isn’t in our blood.
Blood.
Yesterday two events occurred to remind the people of this great city that reality, beyond the people power, is still there just behind the pantomime backdrop, waiting for its chance to re-establish the balance of power.
Someone was run over crossing the road. Or riding a bike; it wasn’t clear. What was apparent, and there for all the world to see, was the blood stain stretching from the middle of the wide and busy road all the way to the pavement. What had happened to this person was unknown; the outcome was all too evident.
And then a nightclub roof in Palermo collapsed last night. 50 people were dancing; two were killed, which isn’t really a bad return when compared with the Cromañon disaster. But it is bad enough, and real enough. Ours is a city that never sleeps.
20/8/10
Wars
Working for a company that is seemingly constantly at war with the local national government, even though the war has lulled to a stage of infrequent skirmishes and faraway rumblings in the middle of the night, is an interesting experience. At the same time, the government has chosen to wage a separate and much more present war with a local media conglomerate. This war is a nasty and aggressive scrap, seeing the government wield weapons of conscience and reason, although sometimes these weapons can have contradictory results. This week’s surprise assault was no exception: the government yesterday informed one of the (if not the biggest) internet service provider, part of this media empire, that in 90 days it would cease to exist. The reason? It constitutes a monopoly. The impact of this monopoly-busting action, however, is likely to play into the hands of other monopolies, some local, others very foreign. Fibertel, it must be admitted, provide a lousy internet service, but as a result of this latest action, huge swathes of people, myself included, will have to find new internet providers, overloading the competition to the point where they may not be able to cope. But points have been scored, blood has been shed, the company promised legal action and the war rumbles on.
22/7/10
Schizo
A friend and colleague made an interesting observation in the office the other day. We were talking about how to react in different situations, and the difference between British people and Argentines in terms of how we approach things. From her experience of Brits, she saw that we had entirely different behavioural patterns depending on the situation that we were in: we behave differently at work to how we do at home, we don’t have the same way of treating our friends as our family, we act one way if we are at dinner and quite another if we are in a bar.
Surely the same is just as true of Argentines, I said, to which she agreed, but said that the contrast between how an Argentine reacts in different social situations is barely noticeable when compared to the entirely variable behaviour of a Brit. Her conclusion was that in order to maintain a healthy balance between so many different personalities, we have to be basically schizophrenic.
On the face of it, this seems like a facile observation made from the point of view of a country where psychoanalysis is the norm. I think that she is right, that this an aspect of our national identity, if one can be defined, because we exist in so many contrasting social environments that we have to be able to vary our approach to the realities that we encounter. Our upbringing, childhood, growing experiences and education all lead us to react to things differently - but this is a human trait, surely, not a British one. I think what stands us apart is that we entirely believe, have it written into our being, that our ability to successfully express ourselves and convey meaning is inextricably linked to accurately gauging different situations. Relating to different people in different environments is the goal. In order to achieve this, we sometimes can appear a little schizo.
Surely the same is just as true of Argentines, I said, to which she agreed, but said that the contrast between how an Argentine reacts in different social situations is barely noticeable when compared to the entirely variable behaviour of a Brit. Her conclusion was that in order to maintain a healthy balance between so many different personalities, we have to be basically schizophrenic.
On the face of it, this seems like a facile observation made from the point of view of a country where psychoanalysis is the norm. I think that she is right, that this an aspect of our national identity, if one can be defined, because we exist in so many contrasting social environments that we have to be able to vary our approach to the realities that we encounter. Our upbringing, childhood, growing experiences and education all lead us to react to things differently - but this is a human trait, surely, not a British one. I think what stands us apart is that we entirely believe, have it written into our being, that our ability to successfully express ourselves and convey meaning is inextricably linked to accurately gauging different situations. Relating to different people in different environments is the goal. In order to achieve this, we sometimes can appear a little schizo.
15/7/10
Gay Marriage
After a prolonged and sometimes fraught debate in the Senate, gay marriage is now all but legal in Argentina. Besides the arguments that this is a step forward for Argentina, now one of ten countries that has legalized same-sex marriage, and the only country in Latin America to have done so, the political power plays that have brought this about are also interesting, as pointed out today by The Economist.
On the one hand, CFK still has to prove that her party has power in an increasingly anti-K environment, and picking the controversial but well-supported same-sex marriage bill was a no-brainer: after the first marriages were approved by judges last year, this was always going to snowball into something bigger.
However, what I find more interesting is what this whole discussion says about the role of the Catholic Church in contemporary Argentine society; it really is in a bit of a muddle at the moment. An eroding institution at best, constantly beset by the charges that afflict Catholicism around the world, the Church is often forced to take unpopular and eventually damaging positions due to its very nature. The march of parents and their children to Congress on Tuesday, organized by the Church to demonstrate the integral family unit, came hot on the heels of violent proclamations of “the devil’s work” in Sunday masses. It also severely disrupted traffic, to the point where my taxi driver at the time dismissed them all as anti-human lunatics who should “burn in hell”.
So the Church picked the side it had to pick, and lost. Just. The vote was close, the arguments were tense; the result is undeniable. The fact is, the Church must have known it was always on to a loser, if not now then later, as it has always known ever since the debates about civil marriages, divorce, etc. A colleague today told me that he had read an article comparing the Church’s arguments against civil marriage, divorce and even female suffrage to the arguments employed recently against same-sex marriage, and said that, word-for-word, they were almost identical. Thus the Church, in what remains an officially and openly Catholic country, must face each fresh advance of progress with the same, weary acceptance of inevitability. The Church does not modernize. The Church does not debate. Therefore, the Church will always lose, bit by bit, until it is no more.
On the one hand, CFK still has to prove that her party has power in an increasingly anti-K environment, and picking the controversial but well-supported same-sex marriage bill was a no-brainer: after the first marriages were approved by judges last year, this was always going to snowball into something bigger.
However, what I find more interesting is what this whole discussion says about the role of the Catholic Church in contemporary Argentine society; it really is in a bit of a muddle at the moment. An eroding institution at best, constantly beset by the charges that afflict Catholicism around the world, the Church is often forced to take unpopular and eventually damaging positions due to its very nature. The march of parents and their children to Congress on Tuesday, organized by the Church to demonstrate the integral family unit, came hot on the heels of violent proclamations of “the devil’s work” in Sunday masses. It also severely disrupted traffic, to the point where my taxi driver at the time dismissed them all as anti-human lunatics who should “burn in hell”.
So the Church picked the side it had to pick, and lost. Just. The vote was close, the arguments were tense; the result is undeniable. The fact is, the Church must have known it was always on to a loser, if not now then later, as it has always known ever since the debates about civil marriages, divorce, etc. A colleague today told me that he had read an article comparing the Church’s arguments against civil marriage, divorce and even female suffrage to the arguments employed recently against same-sex marriage, and said that, word-for-word, they were almost identical. Thus the Church, in what remains an officially and openly Catholic country, must face each fresh advance of progress with the same, weary acceptance of inevitability. The Church does not modernize. The Church does not debate. Therefore, the Church will always lose, bit by bit, until it is no more.
14/7/10
Commute 2
A few months ago I posted an entry that talked about a puddle of vomit on a bus on the daily commute and how one unfortunate lady sat in the puddle without realising. To my surprise I found myself on the exact same bus both today and yesterday, and the stain of the long dried sick remained. It suddenly occurred to me this morning, after a fairly long evening in Boedo, that perhaps this was no accident – perhaps some unidentified soul, possibly the driver himself, was marking his territory. Or maybe all the buses have the same stain. Whatever the case, the familiarity of the stain, on the routine commute, made me feel quite at home on a journey that is often long and always tedious. My gratitude pours out to you, unknown vomiter.
8/6/10
Pigeons
Recently, when walking on Tres Sargentos on the way back to work from lunch, I saw an elderly scruffy man with a thick matted beard and a tweed blazer staring intently behind me, who caught my eye and started behaving shiftily, squirming in his seat and looking away. It took me a second to realize what he was doing, but I saw the pigeon on the seat behind me with a surprised look on its face and turned back just in time to see the old chap hiding the laser pen in his sleeve. I then noticed the crumbs around him – so he was luring the pigeons in, and then blinding them with a laser pen. Is that what this city needs? Blind pigeons?
3/6/10
Bicentenary
All is well here after a chaotic bicentenary weekend. The majority of the 9 de Julio has been blocked since this time last week and remains so, due to the mounting and subsequent dismounting of vast stages and television screens. The journey to and from work has been a nightmare as the poorly organised and under-developed public transport system took an unprecedented hit, more akin to a London commute than Buenos Aires is used to. Buses decided to take alternative routes without informing passengers, and if you caught one of those buses and tried to get on and/or remonstrate with the driver, you took your life in your hands. In short, the city wasn't really ready for the big week, and it showed.
The national government had a very public spat over the last week or so regarding the bicentennial celebrations with the city government, or Macri, to be more specific. Macri made a disparaging remark about Nestor, so CFK announced she wouldn't be attending the showpiece re-opening of the Teatro Colón on Monday night because Macri would be there; he responded with a polite but strongly worded letter lamenting the absence of the President; she responded with another letter claiming that she didn't want to cause Macri any 'mortificación personal' through her presence; he immediately responded with another letter etc etc etc. Childish politics, completely out of step with the celebratory context. I then learned that Macri and the anti-government supporters (eg the city of Buenos Aires) would be holding a closing ceremony in a cathedral in the city on the 25th, while Cristina would be holding hers in Lujan. It would have been interesting to see her inciting hatred against people like me LIVE, but I couldn’t.
However, I did make trips to the 9 de Julio on the evening of the 24th and the afternoon of the 25th. More than anything, it was a serious, once-in-a-lifetime event stretched over four days and five nights, and it would have been churlish not to have attended at least part of it. There was a huge parade on the 23rd, which my friend Trevor and his Argentine girlfriend Tami went to, and several massive open-air concerts were planned, but, this being Argentina, as soon as the parade had just passed its peak, the heavens opened and didn't stop thundering from about 4 pm til 7 am the following day. The 24th saw the opening of the Colón after three years of renovations, and I went with a few friends, all of them shorter than I, to see the open air dancing events and light shows. The 9 de Julio was heaving, and we had to push quite far in in order to get an elusive half-decent view for my companions, angering many patriotic souls by putting myself between them and their event. In the end, we could see little, arrived too late, and were left wandering the streets with all the other lost souls; eventually, I walked home.
The 25th was similar. We arrived in the Plaza de Mayo earlier and found it filled with a multitude of political groups and movements, each with their flags and all espousing the 'Viva Patria! Viva!' refrain with various tinges of anti-wealthy/anti-British sentiments. We slid away at some point and made our way to the 9 de Julio to see the stands: each province had provided a stand which encapsulated everything that was unique about their province. The idea was great, but the execution was poor: each stand had a queue of about 100 people waiting to get in, and spilled into the masses of people trudging up the road and pushing into each other. We couldn't even get close to a single one, so we tried the food stalls on the other side of the street, and found most of them to be shut, selling rubbish products or rammed with people. Once in this melee, we couldn't get out without fighting against the current. The current didn't like that one bit and fought back. Eventually we managed to find a way out through the backstreets.
As we floated our way through the backstreets near the 9 de Julio, crowds of people drifted towards and around us clutching flags and marching in the direction we had just come. Their faces were etched with jubilation and determination, and they scowled at us tall whiteys as we passed. It was dreamlike. We obviously weren't supposed to be there, and people treated us as if we weren't there. A famous sindicalista walking in front of us was repeatedly stopped and saluted by the marching workers, but when we got close to him we could hear he was whingeing about the traffic to his companion. We found our way onto a packed subte train and made good our escape to the calm of Palermo.
The celebrations revealed something to me. In many senses, this was a celebration of what it really means to be Argentine: beyond the cultural exports of tango and folklore, football and Che Guevara, beef and wine, being Argentine means crying when you hear the national anthem, is about rejoicing in revolutions and overthrow, and inspiring deep-rooted passion and anger about injustices meted out on an unfortunate population. In this sense, I have never felt as un-Argentine as I did yesterday. Sure, I know most of the words to the national anthem. I love watching them play football. I opine freely about Argentine politics, culture, history, and literature, and claim a deeper knowledge than most about the country. I have a passport and a DNI. But I am not Argentine. The people on the streets yesterday feel something that I can only grasp at, pretend to. I know it, they know it, and when they look at me they know that I do not belong.
On Sunday night I was talking to some middle/upper-middle class Argentines, and they were horrified and disgusted by the amount of money that had been spent on the celebration which could have gone into much more worthy and needy causes, and also by the political grandstanding and manipulation by the ruling classes. Yesterday as I stood in the Plaza de Mayo waiting for my friends and watching flag-bearing groups march into the space, I thought how impressive it was to see so many young people who are politically motivated. My next thought was how naive I had been, and how manipulative and manipulated these people are. Then the Malvinas veterans marched by, there was a standing ovation, and I suddenly felt very British, well-dressed and alone at the wrong time. When we were in the crush on the 9 de Julio, an Argentine asked me whether I was an 'ingles bueno' or an 'ingles trucho' - the ingleses truchos have their own passports and separate queues at airports because 'they think they're special', apparently. Much of the celebration was really quite uncomfortable for me, and I'm glad it's over. Last night saw an incredible light show projected onto the Cabildo, and an official dinner with Lula, Chavez, Morales & Co. all in attendance. Cristina danced. Macri didn't. I was watching the final episode ever of Lost, all nationalism already a distant memory.
Apart from the football, of course. Monday saw the thrashing of Canada by Argentina at the same time as England tepidly dismissed Mexico, but at least England was playing a real team that had qualified for the World Cup while Argentina where basically playing against part-timers. The best part of the Argentina performance was the introduction to the national anthem, played quite brilliantly on the harmonica by an Argentine rock singer. Unless they get their act together, this Argentina team is going to have a harsh awakening in the World Cup, which will do nobody any good.
I think that's probably enough for now.
The national government had a very public spat over the last week or so regarding the bicentennial celebrations with the city government, or Macri, to be more specific. Macri made a disparaging remark about Nestor, so CFK announced she wouldn't be attending the showpiece re-opening of the Teatro Colón on Monday night because Macri would be there; he responded with a polite but strongly worded letter lamenting the absence of the President; she responded with another letter claiming that she didn't want to cause Macri any 'mortificación personal' through her presence; he immediately responded with another letter etc etc etc. Childish politics, completely out of step with the celebratory context. I then learned that Macri and the anti-government supporters (eg the city of Buenos Aires) would be holding a closing ceremony in a cathedral in the city on the 25th, while Cristina would be holding hers in Lujan. It would have been interesting to see her inciting hatred against people like me LIVE, but I couldn’t.
However, I did make trips to the 9 de Julio on the evening of the 24th and the afternoon of the 25th. More than anything, it was a serious, once-in-a-lifetime event stretched over four days and five nights, and it would have been churlish not to have attended at least part of it. There was a huge parade on the 23rd, which my friend Trevor and his Argentine girlfriend Tami went to, and several massive open-air concerts were planned, but, this being Argentina, as soon as the parade had just passed its peak, the heavens opened and didn't stop thundering from about 4 pm til 7 am the following day. The 24th saw the opening of the Colón after three years of renovations, and I went with a few friends, all of them shorter than I, to see the open air dancing events and light shows. The 9 de Julio was heaving, and we had to push quite far in in order to get an elusive half-decent view for my companions, angering many patriotic souls by putting myself between them and their event. In the end, we could see little, arrived too late, and were left wandering the streets with all the other lost souls; eventually, I walked home.
The 25th was similar. We arrived in the Plaza de Mayo earlier and found it filled with a multitude of political groups and movements, each with their flags and all espousing the 'Viva Patria! Viva!' refrain with various tinges of anti-wealthy/anti-British sentiments. We slid away at some point and made our way to the 9 de Julio to see the stands: each province had provided a stand which encapsulated everything that was unique about their province. The idea was great, but the execution was poor: each stand had a queue of about 100 people waiting to get in, and spilled into the masses of people trudging up the road and pushing into each other. We couldn't even get close to a single one, so we tried the food stalls on the other side of the street, and found most of them to be shut, selling rubbish products or rammed with people. Once in this melee, we couldn't get out without fighting against the current. The current didn't like that one bit and fought back. Eventually we managed to find a way out through the backstreets.
As we floated our way through the backstreets near the 9 de Julio, crowds of people drifted towards and around us clutching flags and marching in the direction we had just come. Their faces were etched with jubilation and determination, and they scowled at us tall whiteys as we passed. It was dreamlike. We obviously weren't supposed to be there, and people treated us as if we weren't there. A famous sindicalista walking in front of us was repeatedly stopped and saluted by the marching workers, but when we got close to him we could hear he was whingeing about the traffic to his companion. We found our way onto a packed subte train and made good our escape to the calm of Palermo.
The celebrations revealed something to me. In many senses, this was a celebration of what it really means to be Argentine: beyond the cultural exports of tango and folklore, football and Che Guevara, beef and wine, being Argentine means crying when you hear the national anthem, is about rejoicing in revolutions and overthrow, and inspiring deep-rooted passion and anger about injustices meted out on an unfortunate population. In this sense, I have never felt as un-Argentine as I did yesterday. Sure, I know most of the words to the national anthem. I love watching them play football. I opine freely about Argentine politics, culture, history, and literature, and claim a deeper knowledge than most about the country. I have a passport and a DNI. But I am not Argentine. The people on the streets yesterday feel something that I can only grasp at, pretend to. I know it, they know it, and when they look at me they know that I do not belong.
On Sunday night I was talking to some middle/upper-middle class Argentines, and they were horrified and disgusted by the amount of money that had been spent on the celebration which could have gone into much more worthy and needy causes, and also by the political grandstanding and manipulation by the ruling classes. Yesterday as I stood in the Plaza de Mayo waiting for my friends and watching flag-bearing groups march into the space, I thought how impressive it was to see so many young people who are politically motivated. My next thought was how naive I had been, and how manipulative and manipulated these people are. Then the Malvinas veterans marched by, there was a standing ovation, and I suddenly felt very British, well-dressed and alone at the wrong time. When we were in the crush on the 9 de Julio, an Argentine asked me whether I was an 'ingles bueno' or an 'ingles trucho' - the ingleses truchos have their own passports and separate queues at airports because 'they think they're special', apparently. Much of the celebration was really quite uncomfortable for me, and I'm glad it's over. Last night saw an incredible light show projected onto the Cabildo, and an official dinner with Lula, Chavez, Morales & Co. all in attendance. Cristina danced. Macri didn't. I was watching the final episode ever of Lost, all nationalism already a distant memory.
Apart from the football, of course. Monday saw the thrashing of Canada by Argentina at the same time as England tepidly dismissed Mexico, but at least England was playing a real team that had qualified for the World Cup while Argentina where basically playing against part-timers. The best part of the Argentina performance was the introduction to the national anthem, played quite brilliantly on the harmonica by an Argentine rock singer. Unless they get their act together, this Argentina team is going to have a harsh awakening in the World Cup, which will do nobody any good.
I think that's probably enough for now.
20/5/10
Taxi: Scientology
Barely one week later, taking a taxi on exactly the same route, I had an experience that would have been sinister if it weren’t so ridiculous. I often get into taxis without looking at them, as cars mean almost nothing to me, although bumper dents and scrapes are normally a good clear indicator to avoid. If I’d taken greater notice of the car, then I probably wouldn’t have got in. It was vintage, not in the classic car sense but in the ‘really-old-about-to-fall-to-bits’ sense. It’s true that the way that cars look from the outside say a lot about the owner, but it’s also true that in Buenos Aires almost none of the drivers actually own their taxis. Anyway, in I got.
No seatbelts, always a good sign. Not much of a door handle either. The little face precariously perched at just the right height peered through the rearview mirror at me. He was a owl-like, with thick glasses and a high-pitched voice; I think he was sitting on the Yellow Pages and that he had blocks attached to his shoes so he could reach the pedals.
“Eh? Where you going?” I gave him the address and he looked totally blank, whereupon I explained how to get there. He blinked a few times, smiled in satisfaction, and on we went.
He explained that he had only been driving for a few weeks, that he had been a victim of the financial crisis and its effect on US companies: he had worked as an IT technician, able to rid systems of bugs in a jiffy (or so he claimed), employed by a secretive US firm. Or he couldn’t remember their name. Anyway, one weekend they disappeared. On Friday, he’d bid them all goodnight and have a nice etc, and on Monday they had vanished without a trace. Recounting the tale, he lifted a gnarled, clenched fist in rage, but didn’t have the energy or the anger to pull it off.
I nodded in sympathy, and we drove on, him muttering about the fairness of life, the lack of justice in this world, and his grasp of the English language in the same breath. The English phrases would rise from his mire of disillusionment like bubbles in a viscous pool:
“something unintelligible stupid bankers something something scum of the world VERY NICE WEATHER, NO? something angry miserable souls WOULD YOU LIKE SOME TEA…” etc etc.
Finally, forced to stop by a traffic light, he asked me if I would like some computer assistance. I made polite noises, but he heard none of them, producing a flyer with his contact details, and then surprised me by asking, as he handed over the small square paper:
“Have you got any disorders? Any bad dreams, anxiety, anger issues?”
I blanked, with no idea what to say. He continued.
“Because if you have, I can get rid of them too. I’m a Scientologist, you see.”
I was left flabbergasted. Scientologist? I hadn’t been expecting that. I looked down at the paper he had just put in my hand and, sure enough, there it was. An entire list of his services. The top half of the square talked about his IT prowess and offered a 15% discount on your first ‘hard-drive purge’, while the entirety of the bottom half focused on his ability to cure all ailments through his Scientologist methods. Text space had obviously been an issue for the flyer, and the two halves had merged into each other somewhat, so the 15% off deal could equally be for ‘getting rid of unpleasant memories’ as well as ‘hard-drive purging’.
The rest of the taxi journey involved a spirited defence of Scientology, about how it wasn’t a cult but rather was a psychological practice essential for curing deep-rooted mental ailments. Or something. He started reeling off success cases as we neared home. The cases themselves were pretty harrowing, but having managed to get to a stage where I couldn’t take anything he said seriously, it was hard to fully engage with the dark tales he recounted me with. Not wishing to hurt his feelings, I got out one block early and wished him well in his multifaceted career before collapsing in incredulous giggles.
No seatbelts, always a good sign. Not much of a door handle either. The little face precariously perched at just the right height peered through the rearview mirror at me. He was a owl-like, with thick glasses and a high-pitched voice; I think he was sitting on the Yellow Pages and that he had blocks attached to his shoes so he could reach the pedals.
“Eh? Where you going?” I gave him the address and he looked totally blank, whereupon I explained how to get there. He blinked a few times, smiled in satisfaction, and on we went.
He explained that he had only been driving for a few weeks, that he had been a victim of the financial crisis and its effect on US companies: he had worked as an IT technician, able to rid systems of bugs in a jiffy (or so he claimed), employed by a secretive US firm. Or he couldn’t remember their name. Anyway, one weekend they disappeared. On Friday, he’d bid them all goodnight and have a nice etc, and on Monday they had vanished without a trace. Recounting the tale, he lifted a gnarled, clenched fist in rage, but didn’t have the energy or the anger to pull it off.
I nodded in sympathy, and we drove on, him muttering about the fairness of life, the lack of justice in this world, and his grasp of the English language in the same breath. The English phrases would rise from his mire of disillusionment like bubbles in a viscous pool:
“something unintelligible stupid bankers something something scum of the world VERY NICE WEATHER, NO? something angry miserable souls WOULD YOU LIKE SOME TEA…” etc etc.
Finally, forced to stop by a traffic light, he asked me if I would like some computer assistance. I made polite noises, but he heard none of them, producing a flyer with his contact details, and then surprised me by asking, as he handed over the small square paper:
“Have you got any disorders? Any bad dreams, anxiety, anger issues?”
I blanked, with no idea what to say. He continued.
“Because if you have, I can get rid of them too. I’m a Scientologist, you see.”
I was left flabbergasted. Scientologist? I hadn’t been expecting that. I looked down at the paper he had just put in my hand and, sure enough, there it was. An entire list of his services. The top half of the square talked about his IT prowess and offered a 15% discount on your first ‘hard-drive purge’, while the entirety of the bottom half focused on his ability to cure all ailments through his Scientologist methods. Text space had obviously been an issue for the flyer, and the two halves had merged into each other somewhat, so the 15% off deal could equally be for ‘getting rid of unpleasant memories’ as well as ‘hard-drive purging’.
The rest of the taxi journey involved a spirited defence of Scientology, about how it wasn’t a cult but rather was a psychological practice essential for curing deep-rooted mental ailments. Or something. He started reeling off success cases as we neared home. The cases themselves were pretty harrowing, but having managed to get to a stage where I couldn’t take anything he said seriously, it was hard to fully engage with the dark tales he recounted me with. Not wishing to hurt his feelings, I got out one block early and wished him well in his multifaceted career before collapsing in incredulous giggles.
12/4/10
Taxi: Gardel
Taxi drivers in Buenos Aires are a truly unique breed. It is often hard to sympathise with them because many feel that they charge extortionate prices and drive recklessly, but that is to ignore the thankless task of driving around the streets of this fair city, often in very similar patterns, over extended periods of times (10-hour shifts are a minimum), the majority earning money for the owners of their cars, rather than for themselves. Their only consistent company is the radio. Some of them react to this lifestyle by becoming withdrawn and dour, unwilling to talk to passengers and insulating themselves from the outside world on which they depend; others, however, take the opposite approach, believing that conversation is not only vital but necessary. For them, it is a means by which to keep sane; personally, I am happy to oblige.
Recently, however, I had two journeys which made me reconsider my willingness to enter into conversation with the drivers of these taxis. The journeys were on the same route, leaving my personal trainer, at the same time of day, within two days of each other. I shall attempt to recreate them as faithfully as possible below:
1. Gardel
Me: [gently shutting taxi passenger door and collapsing into sweaty mess on back seat] What a day.
Driver: Difficult day?
Me: Very.
Driver: Have you just been to the gym?
Me: Yes. It’s what I do to relax. I go to work, get frustrated, go to gym, burn out my aggression and leave calm.
Driver: I see. [Pause] I listen to music.
Me: To calm down?
Driver: Yes. Do you like music?
Me: Yes.
Driver: Do you like tango?
Me: [lies] I love tango.
Driver: Excellent! Who is you favourite singer?
Me: [still lying] Er…Gardel?
Driver: The champ! He’s the best! What’s you favourite of his work?
Me: [scratching around desperately and unable to come up with anything apart from}…er…Por Una Cabeza?
Driver: A great song. Well, sir, it’s your lucky day. [Winds up all windows] You are about to receive a private performance of Por Una Cabeza. Just sit back and enjoy.
[Proceeds to sing at the top of his voice to me via the rearview mirror. A frozen nervous smile steals across my face. The driver expertly navigates his way through traffic lights, avoiding pedestrians, singing all the while. The glass reverberates with the sound. My ears hurt.]
5 minutes pass.
Driver: That was good, no?
Me: [applauding gently] Yes. Very pleasant. I’m sad that it’s over.
Driver: Not to worry – I’ve got another one for you!
[Continues singing Gira Gira, followed by Mi Buenos Aires Querida, until we reach destination. I depart, ears ringing.]
To be continued.
Recently, however, I had two journeys which made me reconsider my willingness to enter into conversation with the drivers of these taxis. The journeys were on the same route, leaving my personal trainer, at the same time of day, within two days of each other. I shall attempt to recreate them as faithfully as possible below:
1. Gardel
Me: [gently shutting taxi passenger door and collapsing into sweaty mess on back seat] What a day.
Driver: Difficult day?
Me: Very.
Driver: Have you just been to the gym?
Me: Yes. It’s what I do to relax. I go to work, get frustrated, go to gym, burn out my aggression and leave calm.
Driver: I see. [Pause] I listen to music.
Me: To calm down?
Driver: Yes. Do you like music?
Me: Yes.
Driver: Do you like tango?
Me: [lies] I love tango.
Driver: Excellent! Who is you favourite singer?
Me: [still lying] Er…Gardel?
Driver: The champ! He’s the best! What’s you favourite of his work?
Me: [scratching around desperately and unable to come up with anything apart from}…er…Por Una Cabeza?
Driver: A great song. Well, sir, it’s your lucky day. [Winds up all windows] You are about to receive a private performance of Por Una Cabeza. Just sit back and enjoy.
[Proceeds to sing at the top of his voice to me via the rearview mirror. A frozen nervous smile steals across my face. The driver expertly navigates his way through traffic lights, avoiding pedestrians, singing all the while. The glass reverberates with the sound. My ears hurt.]
5 minutes pass.
Driver: That was good, no?
Me: [applauding gently] Yes. Very pleasant. I’m sad that it’s over.
Driver: Not to worry – I’ve got another one for you!
[Continues singing Gira Gira, followed by Mi Buenos Aires Querida, until we reach destination. I depart, ears ringing.]
To be continued.
12/2/10
Daily Commute
Yesterday I was running late. The buses simply were not coming; eventually two turned up at the same time, one full to the brim, the other half-empty. Naturally, I jumped on the half-empty one. Just past the ticket machine were two seats that are normally filled, with priority for pregnant women and the elderly, but more commonly taken by impatient commuters. I saw my chance at the empty seats, and then looked down. The floor next to the two seats was covered with a thin yet noticeable spread of fairly recent vomit.
Disgusted, I stood in the space, and watched as at every stop, fresh passengers went through the same experience as I. Their weary faces contemplating the day at work would briefly light up at the thought of a free seat, then instantly switch to disgust when they saw the pool of vomit. Thus, the two seats remained free for quite some time, and I imagine that all of us tried gamely to ignore the colourful spatter in the corner.
Finally, a short, slightly elderly woman got on. She had thick glasses but was walking with confidence; she saw the empty seats, and took her chance, plumping herself down, albeit in a side-saddle-esque stance. The silent shockwaves of incredulity rippled along the bus, as those of us who knew could not believe that this woman had sat on the seat, sacrificing her dignity in favour of half an hour of comfort before work. There are stronger people than I on this bus, we all concluded, silently in unison.
Then an older man got on. He, it was obvious, could not determine what lay before him within half a yard, so it was understandable that he would move to sit down on the accursed seats. He made to sit down, which was when I expected the woman to get up and give him her seat. Instead, she slid her legs along to the next seat, and was now sitting firmly in the middle of the puddle.
Instantly all became clear: she had no idea she was sitting in the mess. Horrified, it was now the duty of the other passengers to inform her that this was the case, and yet none of us had the guts, until finally a woman got up to offer either of the pair her seats. The two politely declined, pointing out that they were already comfortable, whereupon the poor lady had to inform them, with exemplary manners, that they were in fact sitting in a puddle of sick. The two rose instantly, the man less conscientious than the woman, who looked sad, as if once more her eyes had let her down. I felt nothing but pity for the lady.
It was then that I looked up and saw the Prophet walking in the road next to the window.
Disgusted, I stood in the space, and watched as at every stop, fresh passengers went through the same experience as I. Their weary faces contemplating the day at work would briefly light up at the thought of a free seat, then instantly switch to disgust when they saw the pool of vomit. Thus, the two seats remained free for quite some time, and I imagine that all of us tried gamely to ignore the colourful spatter in the corner.
Finally, a short, slightly elderly woman got on. She had thick glasses but was walking with confidence; she saw the empty seats, and took her chance, plumping herself down, albeit in a side-saddle-esque stance. The silent shockwaves of incredulity rippled along the bus, as those of us who knew could not believe that this woman had sat on the seat, sacrificing her dignity in favour of half an hour of comfort before work. There are stronger people than I on this bus, we all concluded, silently in unison.
Then an older man got on. He, it was obvious, could not determine what lay before him within half a yard, so it was understandable that he would move to sit down on the accursed seats. He made to sit down, which was when I expected the woman to get up and give him her seat. Instead, she slid her legs along to the next seat, and was now sitting firmly in the middle of the puddle.
Instantly all became clear: she had no idea she was sitting in the mess. Horrified, it was now the duty of the other passengers to inform her that this was the case, and yet none of us had the guts, until finally a woman got up to offer either of the pair her seats. The two politely declined, pointing out that they were already comfortable, whereupon the poor lady had to inform them, with exemplary manners, that they were in fact sitting in a puddle of sick. The two rose instantly, the man less conscientious than the woman, who looked sad, as if once more her eyes had let her down. I felt nothing but pity for the lady.
It was then that I looked up and saw the Prophet walking in the road next to the window.
25/1/10
Bianchi
Woke up early on Saturday to play 6-a-side football with Argentines at 11am after listening to K’naan’s truly inspiring Wavin Flag. Having already played a few weeks previously, I knew what to expect, but the others didn’t. The pitch is inside; the turf is great, fake grass with fake specks of mud, but there is what appears to be a corrugated iron roof, turning the pitch into an oven. We played for an hour and forty minutes; most players had taken their tops off after the first five minutes.
Trudging back past beautiful houses in Barrio Parque, we passed an older gent wiping his windscreen, topless. As I still had my River shirt on, he pointed at it and exclaimed in French. At our nonplussed expressions he switched to Spanish, where it became clear that he was ‘puteando’ me for wearing a River shirt. The man in question, of course, was none other than Carlos Bianchi himself. Probably the most revered man in Argentine football, after Maradona, of course. Sworn at by a legend. Saturday afternoons don’t get better than that.
21/1/10
The Prophet
The Prophet floats through the streets of the big city at his own speed. His movement, his rhythm, is totally detached from the rush of traffic and people around him. He exists on another plane, considers things with calm eyes as he pads softly, always barefoot. His skin is a mud brown, sometimes black; it is hard to tell whether he has always been this colour or if years of living on the street have made him this way. His age is totally unknown.
His only clothes are a tattered pair of shorts and, occasionally, a tattered black dustbin liner cloak, wrapped around his neck and trailing in his wake. His hair is gloriously unkempt, but never seems to grow; his beard is similarly matted into a single shape. He is extremely muscular, not thin like the addicts or victims, but lithe, seemingly athletic. He is always smiling, the smile of a man at peace, but his eyes, though calm, often dart to take in a new sight or sound.
Sometimes he eats: I have seen him eat out of a dustbin before. He has none of the social awkwardness that accompanies some people of the street when they search for their food among the refuse of others, more a collected, discerning examination of all that is on offer before carefully choosing today’s meal – half an old pizza, or the bones from a steakhouse. Others dive shamefully into corners to consume their scraps, but he remains where he is, chewing thoughtfully, apparently oblivious to the world around him.
It is rare to see the Prophet in the same place twice within a short space of time. Sometimes one can see him several times in the same week, walking purposefully up towards Palermo or sheltering on a doorstep in the middle of the night, but I have found that one can go for weeks without seeing him. Indeed, I often find myself looking out of a taxi window at night at the empty streets spattered intermittently with semi-horrific scenes of the city after hours, hoping to see his frame pounding intently onwards. I feel that seeing him at that time of night will give me hope; consequently, I never do.
The times when I remember having seen the Prophet have always been moments when my mind has been totally preoccupied with problems, from the mundane work-related issues, to thoughts concerning the nature of who I am as a young adult and what my future will hold.
Once, I was walking around the block near where I work, with a colleague, and a most hideous wind and rain started to swirl and blow. The stinging rain came from all directions. We were furious, gesticulating angry about some ingrate at work who had driven us to rage. As we turned the corner next to the bank, still swearing at this invisible enemy, we stumbled upon the Prophet sheltering in an alcove. The wind blew his hair and his body was soaked, but he stood, as if he had been waiting for us. And he smiled. The smile reminded me of how futile and pathetic our anger was, and mine instantly subsided. I felt entirely at peace, or at least as we walked the square block I felt a beatific calm. One sight of this man and his smile had been enough to free me from my anger, albeit briefly.
It will be obvious, even to the most casual observer, that this city and everybody in it is in a terrible hurry to get somewhere rather than where they are – we are all late, even if we do not quite know what for, and we know it. There is never enough time. This is why the Prophet is crucial. His existence reminds us of what it means to be human, of what it means to be free of all the self-imposed obligations of this mad cap society. He is a constant example of both how lucky and how trapped we are. He is truth. I don’t even know his real name.
His only clothes are a tattered pair of shorts and, occasionally, a tattered black dustbin liner cloak, wrapped around his neck and trailing in his wake. His hair is gloriously unkempt, but never seems to grow; his beard is similarly matted into a single shape. He is extremely muscular, not thin like the addicts or victims, but lithe, seemingly athletic. He is always smiling, the smile of a man at peace, but his eyes, though calm, often dart to take in a new sight or sound.
Sometimes he eats: I have seen him eat out of a dustbin before. He has none of the social awkwardness that accompanies some people of the street when they search for their food among the refuse of others, more a collected, discerning examination of all that is on offer before carefully choosing today’s meal – half an old pizza, or the bones from a steakhouse. Others dive shamefully into corners to consume their scraps, but he remains where he is, chewing thoughtfully, apparently oblivious to the world around him.
It is rare to see the Prophet in the same place twice within a short space of time. Sometimes one can see him several times in the same week, walking purposefully up towards Palermo or sheltering on a doorstep in the middle of the night, but I have found that one can go for weeks without seeing him. Indeed, I often find myself looking out of a taxi window at night at the empty streets spattered intermittently with semi-horrific scenes of the city after hours, hoping to see his frame pounding intently onwards. I feel that seeing him at that time of night will give me hope; consequently, I never do.
The times when I remember having seen the Prophet have always been moments when my mind has been totally preoccupied with problems, from the mundane work-related issues, to thoughts concerning the nature of who I am as a young adult and what my future will hold.
Once, I was walking around the block near where I work, with a colleague, and a most hideous wind and rain started to swirl and blow. The stinging rain came from all directions. We were furious, gesticulating angry about some ingrate at work who had driven us to rage. As we turned the corner next to the bank, still swearing at this invisible enemy, we stumbled upon the Prophet sheltering in an alcove. The wind blew his hair and his body was soaked, but he stood, as if he had been waiting for us. And he smiled. The smile reminded me of how futile and pathetic our anger was, and mine instantly subsided. I felt entirely at peace, or at least as we walked the square block I felt a beatific calm. One sight of this man and his smile had been enough to free me from my anger, albeit briefly.
It will be obvious, even to the most casual observer, that this city and everybody in it is in a terrible hurry to get somewhere rather than where they are – we are all late, even if we do not quite know what for, and we know it. There is never enough time. This is why the Prophet is crucial. His existence reminds us of what it means to be human, of what it means to be free of all the self-imposed obligations of this mad cap society. He is a constant example of both how lucky and how trapped we are. He is truth. I don’t even know his real name.
19/1/10
The Greatest Show on Earth...
...as everybody with access to ESPN/Fox knows, will be the World Cup this June in South Africa. Despite the concerns of many pessimists, myself included, concerned with the danger and expenses involved in staging an international tournament in the country, I have started to get excited about it and cannot wait for June.
However, the warm-up event for many of us is of course the Africa Cup of Nations 2010. Held in Angola, and already splashed across the news for the disastrous shooting of the Togo team bus (and subsequent shameful disqualification of the team from the tournament), the Africa Cup of Nations is reaching the knockout stages, sometimes lurching haphazardly onwards, but occasionally showing what a delight football at this level is.
There are very few prima donnas. Goalkeepers are never where they are supposed to be. Strikers shoot from halfway, and sometimes score. Players from muslim countries celebrate goals by bowing their heads in prayer to kiss the turf, while players from other countries simply double front-flip in front of the adoring crowd. The manager is often left stranded on the side of the pitch, shaking his head in disbelief as his team self-destruct (the opening game is a good example of this) or stupefied with glee as another improbable goal rolls into the back of the net. The underdogs always stand a chance; the favourites never win.
Having said the above, both yesterday's 0-0 draw between Angola and Algeria which saw both teams go through but which the Algerians admitted to be only playing for a draw, followed by the insipid and unconvincing 1-0 win by Ghana over Burkina Faso, have slightly taken the shine off a tournament that was regaining some stability after the unfortunate start. Let's hope that the next round can produce matches more like this and this.
However, the warm-up event for many of us is of course the Africa Cup of Nations 2010. Held in Angola, and already splashed across the news for the disastrous shooting of the Togo team bus (and subsequent shameful disqualification of the team from the tournament), the Africa Cup of Nations is reaching the knockout stages, sometimes lurching haphazardly onwards, but occasionally showing what a delight football at this level is.
There are very few prima donnas. Goalkeepers are never where they are supposed to be. Strikers shoot from halfway, and sometimes score. Players from muslim countries celebrate goals by bowing their heads in prayer to kiss the turf, while players from other countries simply double front-flip in front of the adoring crowd. The manager is often left stranded on the side of the pitch, shaking his head in disbelief as his team self-destruct (the opening game is a good example of this) or stupefied with glee as another improbable goal rolls into the back of the net. The underdogs always stand a chance; the favourites never win.
Having said the above, both yesterday's 0-0 draw between Angola and Algeria which saw both teams go through but which the Algerians admitted to be only playing for a draw, followed by the insipid and unconvincing 1-0 win by Ghana over Burkina Faso, have slightly taken the shine off a tournament that was regaining some stability after the unfortunate start. Let's hope that the next round can produce matches more like this and this.
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