Griffin's blog

A couple weeks ago I was mad. It was building up over time, a little thing there and a little thing here. I mean, I was happy still but mad. I was mad at the people walking on the street that didn't walk with the same pace and efficiency as in New York. I was mad when the food would take an hour to get to our table and how we would all get our food at different times. I was mad that I didn't have a fan in my room here and that I would stay up all night tossing and turning, sweaty, and getting eaten by mosquitos. This grumpy discontent was building up in me the week before I was supposed to go on my Thanksgiving weekend trip to Chile, it was supposed to help, but then I had everything stolen on the way and that just acted as a catalyst to my anger. The weekend went by and I returned home to Buenos Aires from the countryside. Then a few days went by where I didn't have a computer. The library here at school doesn't have many books in English and all my books got stolen that weekend so there was a lot of idle time. There was a lot of time to think.
 
Then there was a switch that went off. I was going to be here in South America for three more weeks. I could either distance myself mentally from this place and root my thoughts in the future and home or I could take advantage of living down here and the different things it has to offer. I woke before school and it was a beautiful day. I took a shower and walked up stairs afterwards, and still wet I just laid down on my roof at 10 am before Spanish class. This is what I will miss about this place, but before I hadn't even been taking advantage of the summer here. I was living too much in my head and not enough in the place I was in. I could torture myself and count the days or I can live in my present moment to its fullest.
 
I even borrowed a friend's ipod and bought an audiobook on the power of living in the present moment. It explains how the past and future, and just time in general, are poisons. I think facebook even poisons us. I look at photos of my summer in New York  and photos of home and it makes me miss them. Missing seems healthy enough but longing can poison the present. We must not forget where we are living and that is the present.  I am laughing a little as I read this because this seems to be "profound realization" but really it was just a change in my mindset. I was going to be here 3 more weeks and if I didn't enjoy those final weeks the only person suffering is me. I couldn't let getting material things stolen turn into having my last few weeks here stolen in a way too. So now as I am wrapping up my last week here I want to end it eating dinner outside with friends, laying down in the parks, jumping into a swimming pool, and going to the outdoor markets. After all it is summer and before I know it I'll be heading back to a wintery New York and the South American summer will all be a distant memory I'll probably long for. This will be an exercise in staying in the present moment with whatever situation I have, because that is all you ever really do have. 

First of all I would definitely recommend this course to other students traveling abroad though I did prefer the class a Sense of Place because of the actual classroom experience and because an online class lacks a regular meeting it is difficult for procrastinators to keep up with the weekly posts. My advice KEEP UP because the work can pile up and overwhelm you. The work studying abroad I have found is more than back in New York. Your classes abroad will be smaller classes and have daily/weekly work that often more "collegey" classes in New York lack.
 
The most rewarding aspect of the experience here is the people, not necessarily the people in Buenos Aires though haha, but the people in the program. It is rare that in a university as big as New York we can get that small school experience but studying abroad allows just that. It is as someone else said on the blog, it is a bit like summer camp.
 
When I get home to the good old US of A I am not going to take the amazing variety of food we have, both in restaurants and the super market, for granted. I want to eat healthy again! I am also looking forward to the security the States has. When I am walking down the street I no longer have to watch over my shoulder as much and constantly worry about having a phone on me, though knock on wood because I don't want to jynx myself.
 
I think something that I could miss though when going home is the fact that here I can eat lunch at a cafe, or ride the subway, or walk on the street and NOT understand everyone's conversations around me. Sometimes it is nice not being able to understand all the gossip and gibberish around you. It is peaceful even among the commotion here.
 
Though the staff is much more helpful and friendly here than in New York there could be changes made to the program. First of all we all feel a little as if we are getting ripped off because it is cheaper to have NYU students down here than in New York but we are still paying full time tuition. Other programs seem to have trips that are paid for by the university which we don't have. We also have a VERY strict attendance policy that makes it difficult to travel sometimes. Sometimes we have to pay for the much more expensive ticket that leaves at a different time in the same day because we are not allowed to miss class. Then the attendance policy becomes an issue of spending more money too. It is also kind of annoying because they don't offer any courses towards my major or minor down here, or towards anyone’s it seems, so it makes it harder to really care about classes when you could be learning so much more outside the classroom traveling.
 
 

They call Buenos Aires the Paris of South America but it is more accurate as I have noted before that this is a city in South America that is striving for Paris but achieves neither Paris nor retains the kind of South American character you would likely expect. So forget everything you have heard about Buenos Aires, as with many places you travel, and go without expectations. You will find a country and people seeming to struggle to reach something. I went to Brasil and loved the vibe so much more. They are less stuck up, I guess in that way the Buenos Aires attitude is a bit like Paris.
 
Although I cherish my experience living down and I personally don't regret coming, mainly because without coming down here I would never have truly known what there was in store, I would not recommend Buenos Aires. I am not sure anyone in the program is completely enamored, even yelling out the question here in the computer lab as I write this everyone agrees they don't love the city and don't know anyone that entirely does. However the experience is a different story that people can admit to loving. 
 
It is also funny because as I am writing this I just got the email from you Steve mentioning that I had my blackberry was pickpocketed from me on the subway but that is by far the least of it. Within the first couple weeks here I was walking through the nicest part of Buenos Aires after eating lunch with a friend and there were tons of people around us but some guy came up behind me and tackled me then ripping my watch off my wrist and speeding away on a motorcycle his friend pulled up on. Everyone watched, as I did helpless. Then the other weekend I was going to Chile when on Thanksgiving night while on a layover in Mendoza (still in Argentina) my backpack with just about everything I have (my laptop, a friends laptop, 2 phones, visa, wallet, passport etc etc...) was taken from us while we were sitting down on a bench. An old man came up to us and asked us something in gibberish to confuse us while his younger partner in crime swiped our bag. You may think to yourself we should have been watching our stuff but we were and we were very alert but they are professionals and they will get you off guard for one moment. Consequently we couldn't go on our trip that weekend and our flights and hotels and everything were forfeited (not to mention the cost of replacing everything and then working on all my finals in the computer lab). This is not unique to me though. That same Thanksgiving night there was another British couple in the terminal that had the same thing happen to them and they had been traveling 9 months around the world. Argentina is filled with petty crime. Many of my friends have been in some way a victim to these problems. Many of them have had their cheap pay as you go cell phones stolen, cameras, purses at gunpoint, and cash. And the police won't do anything. I realized my backpack was stolen within about a minute and ran to the terminal police. They knew it happend with in two minutes of it happening and they just made me fill out paper work. This gives you a lost feeling down here, a feeling of being helpless. 
 
If you do decide to come to Buenos Aires, which I would also recommend more to someone with a fluency in Spanish, then it is nice to chose the homestay option. I am glad I picked the homestay but at times it is claustrophobic as you can't have your own space to hang out with friends on a mellow Sunday night. At other times it is stressful having to speak Spanish at an hour and a half long dinner after a brutal day. I think there is a choice of apartments next term so that would be the best option and give you the true experience of living in the city. At times homestays feel like regressing after having lived in your own apartment, without family rules, in New York.
 
I have one friend that came here thinking Buenos Aires was a beach town like Rio de Janiero. Pretty funny right? But it is nothing like that nor does it have in any way a laid back vibe, in my opinion. When we got here it was foggy, grey, and cold. If you do come bring jackets because remember it will be winter when you first get here! This city along with being grey when you first get here is dirty. The streets how ever don't clear up when the weather does. It feels like the city is left to crumble as the sidewalks are falling apart and the houses paint is peeling off.
 
If you do come down here then go to Brasil and Chile. Everyone that goes to Santiago likes it better than Buenos Aries. Oh also you know those colorful houses you see in pictures of Buenos Aires, those are like on one touristy block in a distant neighborhood. You probably won't see them more than once. The trees are beautiful though here and fill the city streets with life in Spring. Take time to find those secret little bars and restaurants that this city is full of, well however it can feel like you can exhaust the restaurant supply. There are a lot of restaurants but the food here to sum it up SUCKS!! There is little variety and bland flavor over all. You can't even buy any hot sauce at even the biggest super markets here.
 
Anyway I could go on and on but hope this helps a little and I hope you take this advice not as from a bitter American falling victim to third world pains but as from someone who has traveled all his life. The passport I just had stolen was almost filled and I have only had it for 5ish years. All the stamps in there were from travels I did without my parents too so this is not the kind of traveling flying 1st class or staying in 5 star hotels. Oh also another bit of adivce... the Spanish down here is WAYYY different from other Spanish and in my opinion much harder.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
I've grown very wary to trust anyone while traveling in Argentina (I honestly don't even trust the police here) but trust and comfort are different feelings. Some Argentineans have certainly comforted me. Probably most of all my host family here, and probably the person who has comforted me most in my host family is my host mother, well that's however excluding my host family's Bernese Mountain Dog named Pampa who comforts me by far the most. She comforts me because of her unconditional love and disregard for what language I speak so when I am sitting at the table and haven't spoke in a while and have no food to distract my self with I'll pet Pampa and a lot of the time talk to her to at least give the illusion I haven't been completely silent for the meal. It's not always like that at dinner but sometimes it is when I am really tired.
 
I knew my host mom would play into her maternal role from the moment I got to Buenos Aires. Within the first few days I got sick (I still don't know if it was the flu or food poisoning) and they had a stranger doing all the things sick people do in their house. At first I had a limited Spanish vocabulary but somehow I managed to get the point across that I was deathly ill and staying in bed for the next 2 days. She provided room service with 7up she insisted on running out and getting and apples that she first peeled the skin off of because she said it would be easier on my stomach. When I was mugged I told her and she was there as my own mother would be. She insisted on taking me to the police station to file a report herself instead of me going with the school. We sat in the station for a hour before she patiently helped me fill out forms and talk to the officers. She treats me more or less as if I was her own child, minus the reprimanding. She has made me feel comfortable in a city that is otherwise not so comfortable.
 
Of course the mother is kind of an expected place to find comfort but another more unexpected place I have found comfort in Buenos Aires is at my boxing gym. Every Tuesday and Thursday I go to the gym where my old boxing coach Juan Carlos and all the same guys are working out in the backyard roof area. Juan Carlos calls me by my last name loves it when I show up. It's an open gym time but I've gotten to know all the guys that work there. You get to know someone if you're punching them twice a week. It is a good sense of community here for me even though it is something I am not serious about and I didn't do it in NYC. I think they all know my name because I am the only American, there is one other British guy that shows up every once and a while too. They all love practicing their English with us. Also going there regularly makes me feel like I really live here because I have a daily routine. So you can find comfort in the most expected and unexpected of places.
 
 
 
 
 


 They say Argentina is just filled with Italians, speaking Spanish, trying to be French. They pride themselves on their meat, which from every one of my experiences thus far...sucks compared to a tender American steak. You see they don't take off the fat here and the usually always overcook it. They might try and claim their meat as a genius loci but it doesn't seem fitting for me. Something that gets closer to the genius loci which is very unique to this region of the world is Mate. The tango is pretty characteristic of Argentina, or Buenos Aires, but that certainly has a stick up it's ass unlike the more mellow and relaxed vibes of the neighboring Brasillian Bossa Nova and Samba. Again just the Argentines seeming more European. What all this culminates into is two things, that go in very different directions. The first is that the meat gives them asadas and the mate gives them mate circles. Asadas are bbq gatherings of friends where a sharing of meat and home are made. They are very social times to enjoy with friends and family. To have a mate is a similar, but quicker experience. Mate is a strong tea that is drunken out of a gourd with a metal straw and is high in caffeine and other stimulants. A mate is never really had alone. It is shared in circles like smoke circles where it is passed around as people share stories too. However again they are trying to be European and everyone seems to be favoring coffee recently. But what this really culminates into is a society of circles of friends difficult to penetrate. Of course you will be invited to a mate or asada because they love to be friendly but you'll never be an Argentine. So a country pumped up on steaks and stimulants creates a country on edge. Everyone stares in the streets, often times right into your eyes. You get the feeling that everyone is challenging you to a dual right there on the Avenida. Of course everyone says it's normal and that the staring should be ignored but it's hard to get used to. What this boils down to is that the Argentines seem angry. Angry they didn't quite succeed in being like the West. They seem to resent their South American residence.

When one thinks of the foremost Argentine writer they most likely think of Jorge Luis Borges, the intellectual, the metaphysical, however when reading Borges' work it is clear his writing is not limited to those topics of Argentina, or South American or even the Spanish-speaking world for that matter as his words are now translated around the world in dozens of languages. So what makes his work Argentine? Well it would seem the very fact he is from Argentina makes it Argentine. His collection of stories titled Labyrinths is broken into three categories, fictions, essays, and Parables. The fact is that, on the surface, the majority of his stories have little or nothing to do with his country Argentina. He writes about Greeks, Europeans, and abstract universal ideas, only the occasional word left in Spanish, untranslatable, is the readers reminder he is a Spanish thinker. However in his essay titled The Argentine Writer and Tradition he provides the reader with a new insight onto the very idea of an Argentine writer and how it can at times be hindering.

 

Borges uses the another culture as an extremely effective tool for explaining the dangers of being a writer bound by nationalist thinking and cultural predispositions. “[The Koran] was written by Mohammed, and Mohammed, as an Arab, had no reason to know that camels were especially Arabian for him they were a part of reality, he had no reason to emphasize them; on the other hand, the first thing a falsifier, a tourist, an Arab nationalist would do is have a surfeit of camels, caravans of camels, on every page; but Mohammed, as an Arab, was unconcerned: he knew he could be an Arab with out camels. (181)” For the same reasons the Argentine poetry and prose should not be bound by Argentine traits and local Argentine color. This is a death trap. This seems to resonate though with the boundaries when being a travel writer. If you were born in the United States but wrote a book while traveling through Mongolia on horseback and that book is about the wanderings of the mind and abstract universal philosophical thinkings, you will still most likely be grouped and labeled a travel writer. This is the same way in which Borges must feel he can't escape being an Argentine writer. But he is an Argentine writer that won't talk about mate, dulce de leche, and gauchos but will talk about Greek philosophy, God, Kafka, and Bernard Shaw. Borges says his words are inherently Argentine, since he is an Argentine, and he does not have to decorate them with local color to remind people of that. He also wants to be regarded as an intellectual, and a force in the thinking of metaphysics separate from the fact that he is Argentine which proves difficult.

 

Once again this applies the travel writer but in another aspect. When writing about an exotic place with a culture different than your own it is difficult to pull away all the veils that are the obvious local colors and blatant cultural and or language differences and get down to the more metaphysical differences in a foreign cultures world view or thinking. These differences in thinking seem impossible to find because you will unavoidably bring biases of your own every time you try to examine them. In the position of the foreigner looking onto cultures its difficult to to note everything that seems to make up the local cultural color and noting that as significant. Sometimes it is interesting trying to distance a people from their culture and just look at them as human beings. “I do not know if it is necessary to say that the idea that a literature must define itself in terms of its national traits. (180)”

 

Borges close friend Xul Solar thought in a way similar to this as his art should have been considered more of an art of the world than just limited by the title of Argentina. Borges' store The Library of Babel reminds me of my visit to Solar's museum in two ways. First the story is written in a way that spiral staircases are leading you around a maze of the world library, or universe, and this reminds me of the Solar museum and some of Solars paintings. Its fascinating to so closely observe their influence on one another. And second ,is just the idea of Babel, and the universal language suggested in the title is like Solars imaginary language that he created for everyone in the world to communicate. The two thinkers both seem to constantly be stressing this importance of a universal understanding of one another in order to have a balanced world. He seems to be very interested in linguistics and how language can make shape our thinking. He says we mis-interpret each other, things are lost in translation. Which is ironic seeing how I am sitting here reading his translated stories. He uses a metaphor of a library of books in which every word is present but we still can't come up with the most basic answers to the questions who are we and where are we from. We search for this book of God that will make us omnipotent. It seems he is saying sometimes its better if things are left unwritten.

 

 

The other weekend I went to the Museo Xul Solar which is within walking distance from my house here in Buenos Aires, and was free admittance. First of all I'll let you know a little about Solar. He was primarily known for being an Argentine painter living from 1887-1963 but in reality he was so much more. He was an intellectual genius who was also the creator of a universal language, a game similar to chess and literary works. His paintings are abstract and made of brightly colored figures that are composed of shapes and faces. He had traveled throughout Europe as well during his life but always loved Buenos Aires and continued to return home to chat with other Argentine thinkers like Borges. Although he was happy and painted with bright colors his world view was depressing and he felt the world was hopeless and a lost cause in terms of world peace. He was also an avid astrologer who would depict the stars in his paintings. The painting above shows his hopeless attitude to the rest of the world as he depicts religious and social symbols divided by walls.

Although Solar was born in Tigre, a small town on the Buenos Aires river delta, he spent most of his time in his house in the city of Buenos Aires which has now been retrofitted and redesigned as a museum. Solar also studied as an architect and the museum is designed in a way to mirror the painting style of Solar. It is concrete with cascading light flooding in from the skylights. There are staircases winding around the building in an almost MC Escher way. The museum is full of little floors that complement the small format of his paintings. The museum is surprising as there are corners, staircases, and openings in the wall that make it feel like a maze.

They played peaceful meditative music in the museum and it's small scale was nice and there were very few people in there when I was so I was able to really walk around and meditate, not even just the art. His art is very worldly though, even depicting flags of the world, and it doesn't seem to have a huge Buenos Aires subject matter, similar to Borges, not surprising since they were such close friends. Hence it is difficult to say how Buenos Aires has affected and shaped his world view and paintings.

I also went out the other Saturday night for the la noche de museos here in Buenos Aires. All the museums and other attractions in Buenos Aires were open until 3 in the morning. However instead of going to a museum we decided to go to the city Zoo and do a free night tour. We were shocked to find the longest line I have ever seen. Families, kids, teenagers, and adults were all lined up to take advantage of the free zoo opportunity. It was fascinating seeing how a public event like this got such an enthusiastic response from the people. It made me wonder if this kind of a thing would be well received in New York. I have gone to free gallery openings in New York like the gallery nights in Chelsea but the crowd is often more what you would expect (wealthy manhattanites, art school kids, and maybe a few trying to get a free drink) and less mixed like here in Buenos Aires.  

 

 

 

We Affectionately call it Victor's but really I think it's called Parrillita, meaning little grill. The parrillia is a the typical Argentine grill stacked with typical Argentine food....meat. Chorizo, fatty steaks, blood sausage, and chicken breast are stacked on the low charcoal burning grill. I guess you could say it is a bit like the Argentine version of a taco shop or a dinner because they have it set up like a bar.

My friend had passed this particular parrilla everyday on his way from home to school. It is only a few blocks from the school building so it is perfect for grabbing a lunch between classes. The place's cinderblock buliding is painted blue and yellow, the colors of the infamous Boca futbol team, though the owner swears he's a River fan, Boca's rival. The owner is a very unhygienic and very horny, if you will, old man named Hugo Victor. We call him Victor even though he is always trying to tell us that is his middle name and no one calls him that. When we first dared to go into this place packed with construction workers and other blue collar locals, all men, we were thrown a few looks. We sat down at bar stools that had freed up at the bar and Victor threw out his greasy hand to me.

“The first blond in my parrillita and I have been here 15 years. Welcome my friend!”

 

Of course it was in spanish but we soon learned that Victor had an extensive English vocabulary consisting of Obama (usually when referring to the large dark blood sausage) and fucky-fucky again when referring to the chorizo sausages. The place is run by just him and one woman with a motherly demeanor who makes the salads (the other guys in the parrilla kill you if you order one though) and slides our soda water bottles and vino (mixed together) down the counter. Let's put it this way, two girls wanted to come with us one day, one was vegetarian and the other was a local Argentine. The vegetarian had nothing to eat and the Argentine didn't want anything to eat after seeing how fatty and unhygienic the place is. But we love it. It's the kind of place you can enjoy going alone, just sit at that bar, shoot the shit with Victor, and eat some meat. It would be a perfect place for a guy to go in a romantic comedy when he is having problems with his girlfriend and he needs to go talk to someone. It seems straight out of a Disney movie set. I can imagine it now the character venting to Victor in English while Victor doesn't understand a thing but nods saying si, si, si...fucky-fucky through his blacked teeth.

 

 

Last year about this time in November I was sitting in Nolita trying to decide which shearling-lined jacket to buy for my trip to Patagonia. The icelandic guy helping me in the store told me he had been to Patagonia for a few weeks once and he said I had to pick up a copy of Bruce Chatwin's, In Patagonia before I set off. So I stopped by the Barnes and Noble on the way home to grab one. I went to Chilean Patagonia to a national park called Torres del Paine. While I got started on the book last year I hadn't been able to finish it until this past weekend when I took another trip to Patagonia, this time, to the Argentine coast at Peninsula Valdez. It was a pretty remarkable place where the orcas would swim up on to the beach to grab a sun-bathing seal. But what really struck me was on the third day we went to a small Welsh village where they still speak Welsh. That was the Patagonia Chatwin describes. It reminded me of the way he constantly and meticulously is obsessed with the people of Patagonia and their stories and not just describing the vast humbling landscapes. It is not the kind of travel piece that takes the reader through the authors discovery of physical places as a parallel and effective self-discovery takes place. The book is unlike other travel writing in that it is comprised of the stories of the people and the myths that arise from them rather than the story of the author, Chatwin, himself. Which is suprising because I was in Patagonia I found it is such the humbling environment that sparks those kind of rambling thoughts seem to come from deeper and deeper in your sub-conscious. It truly has the capacity to change your outlook on the world around you. If I were not reading Chatwin I imagine would think very little of the people in Patagonia but would rather think about the lack of people hence his approach is very unique and unexpected. Though his physical wandering and wandering through the lives of those he finds would mirror the wandering of the mind while in Patagonia.

 

The book came up in a creative writing class discussion in Buenos Aires. Though I can't find any actually articles about the subject online my professor said Chatwin was accused of falsely representing the real characters he found along the way in his travels but when they went back to investigate they used his extremely detailed descriptions of their belongings and the places they lived to walk them through the characters lives. Everything was in its place as described. This is just yet another example of the intense detail with which he describes and observes the environment around him which makes it seem all the more interesting he would not lose himself in describing the natural environment around him. He does this very little as he would rather describe a family heirloom from Wales (a distant and removed place) than the mountains surrounding them. In a sense it makes you question the ideas of being present. Were the Welsh out of place or since they have been their since 1865 are they exactly where they are supposed to be and every much apart of the experience as the glaciers, orca whales, penguins, and towering Andes beyond the steppe. This brings us back to the idea that we are constantly comparing our travels to expectations. When something seems out of place it seems to lose its authenticity but really we must remember, as Chatwin shows us, these are the things that can contain the most interesting stories and unique unforgettable experiences of them all.

 

 

Dean MacCannell's Staged Authenticity: Arrangements of Social Space in Tourist Settings states that tourism has developed to absorb some of the social functions of religion in a modern world. In this sense tourism allows a search for authenticity as the tourist uncovers and discovers. The reading sets up the dichotomy between the “front” and “back.” The front is the performance. We all put up a front to strangers or more literally but equally as right the front of a restaurant with its candle-lit white table cloths and silverware as opposed to its loud brightly lit messy kitchen with slang slinging immigrants. The physical fronts and backs only mirror the social divisions. The kitchen is obviously the back. If we allow strangers past our front we inherently let down boarders and boundaries which allow them access to a more intimate side and hence more authenticity. Understanding of how things work and run gives us satisfaction and understanding this “secret” is initiate. This is what we seek in our relationships with people around us and this is something that traveling allows us as we work to discover the authentic intimacy of a people or place.

 

They say Buenos Aires is the capital of a new movement in dining. It is centered around a new style of “restaurant” called puertos cerrados, or closed doors. While there are speakeasy type bars and stores popping up in cities around the world Buenos Aires is home to these special restaurants which can be found on weekend nights in the summer in peoples homes. Just this last weekend I went to a closed door restaurant. Dinner began at 9:30 and everyone had to come at the same time to have the same welcome drink as if you were really being hosted by a couple. The couple makes dinner with a little help from staff in their kitchen while you drink in their garden. You walk through the kitchen to get to your table which is set up a little like the last supper, family style. When you need to use the bathroom you will need to pass their sleeping baby and their mac in the home office. The bathroom has a footed shower tub to remind you that you are undeniably in someones home. This place is a bit of a stage 5 place, or a staged back region, a living museum to which visitors are allowed to peek. “It is a space for outsiders who are permitted to view details of the inner operation of a commercial, domestic, industrial or public institution. Apparently, entry into this space allows adults to recapture virginal sensations of discovery, or childlike feelings of being half in and half out of society, their faces pressed up against the glass.” The 16 spaces for dinner were filled with english speaking tourists eager for the fixed course of home-made dinner. The experience was very authentic and intimate because although they filled their house with tea-light candles and in sense to set the mood the setting itself had been created by them and the passion could be felt as well, and the fact that we were allowed in created a very secret yet intimate atmosphere as if you were a part of something.

 

But MacCannell's writing left me realizing we love this kind of staged authenticity. Maybe sometimes too much intimacy is uncomfortable. I also wonder whether he has considered the front and back of oneself and the discovering of that division. Traveling, even when you are not discovering the intimate side of another, can lead you to discover the back of yourself.




Here are three quotidian topics of Buenos Aires, Resturants, Cabs, Change:

 

Restaurants: There are lots of little things people will forget to tell you about living abroad and in Buenos Aires I am going to start with the restaurants. The first thing is that water does not come free. Drinking tap water at a restaurant no matter how cheap the restaurant is is as far as I can tell, unheard of in Buenos. This would make sense in a country where the drinking water is contaminated by old terra cotta plumbing like in Mexico and Brazil but in Buenos Aires the water is potable. In fact we drink water from the tap all the time in my homestay in Buenos Aires but it is impossible to order tap water. Last night I was stranded in Rio because my flight got cancelled back to Buenos. We were completely out of money. Our airline put us up in a hotel and got us complementary dinner and taxi which all seemed great until we got to the hotel and were so thirsty but couldn't get free water anywhere. We didn't want to dig into the mini bar where water was several dollars so we went to the kitchen where we asked for some agua libre. After a ruckus they finally just gave us some bottles for free after we told them we were thirsty and had no money left. Another thing about the restaurants in Buenos Aires are the napkins. These napkins can't absorb a single drop of water because they are wax paper. They are completely inefficient at their task and it boggles my mind why a culture would prefer them over paper napkins. They can't be more cost effective. I end up using 10 to do what a normal napkin could do with just one. I have looked it up and still haven't found much on the topic. All the restaurants in Brazil have toothpicks, I mean every single one. I heard a story where a trendy restaurant opened up in Rio and decided not to put out toothpicks, they were breaking the trend. Everyone threw fits at the restaurant until they were forced to have toothpicks available for the patrons. A restaurant without toothpicks was unheard of and not acceptable.

Cabs: Whistling is rude. When I went to a futbol game the fans would whistle at the other team as a sign of disrespect. Being from New York City I have whistled at a few cabs here in Buenos and basically gotten their version of the finger where they flick there fingers out from under their chin. Being from NYC we are all so used to cabs screeching to a halt when we put out our hand. They are eager to get customers however for some reason in Buenos the cab drivers are not so eager. In fact they often ignore me when I throw out my hand to signal them. At first I thought it was just a case of bad peripheral vision but then I realized they defiantly saw me and just chose not to pick me up.

Change: Argentina is a country that lacks change. ATMS dispense 100 peso bills, roughly $25, but its difficult to use them anywhere. When you get into a cab you have to first ask if they have change. I have literally had to buy a bouquet of flowers and a magazine from a pharmacy to get change for a cab driver as he waited outside. Even at nice restaurants they won't accept 100 peso bills. This is a huge problem. You have to spend money to get change, basically buy change in some cases.

 

 

In my opinion language not only opens doors to travel and communicate around the world but it also, equally as important, opens doors in the mind. Like Botton's idea that looking out of a train window can conjure up a thought process that would otherwise have remained dormant had you just been standing not moving. Language too, with its new words, phrases, and even ideas, it seems can bring about an emotional shift with in the brain. As your world view begins to change with the understanding of a new language you will undoubtedly follow. Unfortunately I don't think I have quite reached this epiphanic moment in my understanding of a language but I think the culture of a place can certainly rub off on you in other ways of communicating. Her in Buenos Aires I have to feel more with my body and take things in with my senses to understand instead of just using my mind to listen to words and comprehend. I watch the eyes of my family at dinner, their body language and even feel tension in the air or I know when someone is feeling anxious or worried or sad even though they responded to my question of “how are you” or “every thing good” with a “bien”. Sometimes I'm to blame too. I say bien even if I am not because I just don't or can't go into how I feel so I'll rub it off. This can in a way inhibit my familial bonds because we can't talk about how we feel to each other. Feelings are one of the most difficult things to express in any language, especially a foreign one.

Another interesting observation I have found while living in Buenos Aires is the phenomenon of subtitles. I finally know enough Spanish, or have just reached that point like from going from being a senior in high school, when you think you know everything, to being a freshman in college and realizing you really know nothing. I haven't decided which is more correct but regardless when there are english words being spoken in an American movie or on TV and those spanish subtitles come on the screen down below I am constantly distracted because they more often than not seem to be mis-translated, at least in a literal sense. But I am realizing more and more that maybe the translator wasn't stupid. Maybe they have some deeper understanding of the spanish language and how it is received by spanish speakers. Different words have different effects on people. As one of my local professors says about translating it needs to be done for effect, not word for word.

Overall I am curious to see what happens to me as I deepen my understanding of spanish, but will I ever know if it is the language or the culture that changes me while I am down here or as we are seeming to find, the two are inseparable. But for know as Flaubert said I feel a bit like tackling Spanish can too be summed up in ...shit. 


Everyone has that ah ha moment when learning the layout of a new city. This more often than not happens when you, in a sense, connect the dots. In the beginning the places you go in the city are all just dots on a map, destinations. You get to them by cab, subway or the best way walking, but regardless they are distinct. These ah ha moments happen when you suddenly on your way to one of those destinations you stubble upon a previous destination. Your brain quickly rewrites your spatial understanding of where you are on a map. When talking about Buenos Aires (though it could just as easily apply to any city) Argentine author Sergio Chejfe compares wayfinding in a new city as reading. The best way to read is to walk through the streets, take in the information, and feel and understand not only the palces themselves but equally important the spaces between the places. This way of wayfinding also allows one to write the city. The city is written in the mind in a unique ever changing way. It is your city as you find it. This is a constant process that can happen in your hometown even. A map is an organized representation of a city. It is rich in information but is not on an intimate human scale. Looking at a map it is interesting to notice everything seems so easy to get to, seeing the world from that birds eye view. It won't tell you about the traffic, or what you'll encounter on your way. It is only distance. Imagine for a moment maps were like the weather. Say for instance it may be 69 degrees out but the “feels like” is all the way down to 50 degrees. That will factor in the wind chill, maybe the sun, the humidity. What if maps said this stretch of highway is 143 miles however it feels like only 80 miles (you won't hit traffic and the scenery is in such a way that makes you forget you're driving, straight roads). That is what you have to feel for yourself. Also getting to a destination more than once in different ways, say take public transportation once and walk the next, can exponentially improve your spatial understanding of those spaces between places. Walking around Buenos Aires I have had a pretty good sense of direction however right after getting here I hoped on my skateboard and rode around the city. I almost immediately got lost because of the faster pace. I couldn't stop and get a sense of where I was. The city to me looked like a row of parked cars passing by. I guess direction has to be absorbed. Thank god though that Buenos Aires has some sort of waterfront that makes wayfinding so much easier. I get disoriented and often claustrophobic in a way when I visit land locked and flat cities.  

I found Botton's writing to be very relatable and his method of delivery where he incorporates places and other peoples' thoughts is very effective. Everything really seemed to have that theme of anticipation and expectations, “expectations of a place formulated from a handful of images”. We see that image in an travel ad can make us drop everything in our eyes in search of that, in a sense in search of Paradise. But as Botton touches on, as we get to that beach in the ad and see that view it is not perfect, “I awoke to my Caribbean dawn though there was a lot more beneath those brisk words than that”. It is no more perfect than home in a sense. You still have the same problems, you're tired, your stomach is unsettled and you lost your bags. The ad didn't tell you this would happen. Perfection is diluted. When you are getting ready to go on a trip somewhere you might check out the pictures of the hotel on the website or flip through a guide book with some pictures. You formulate your idea of how this place will be when you get there and even how you will feel in those places. However these images are someone else's interpretation of a place. Then once you leave you will have you're own mental snapshots or even real photographs of your trip, but regardless you can only remember the trip in snapshots. Paradise can in fact be found. When you have those few overwhelming moments where everything seems to be perfect that is paradise. You will know these moments because you will create a snapshot in your mind. Paradise is stumbled upon as I think was pretty well said in the movie “The Beach”, “And me, I still believe in paradise. But now at least I know it's not some place you can look for, 'cause it's not where you go. It's how you feel for a moment in your life when you're a part of something, and if you find that moment... it lasts forever..”. Those moments you can remember in your mind as snapshots are paradise.
 

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When I fly I love to listen to The Kinks song “This Time Tomorrow”

 

This time tomorrow where will we be


On a spaceship somewhere sailing across an empty sea


This time tomorrow what will we know


Well we still be here watching an in-flight movie show

 

It embodies that romantic notion of travel and far off distant places. You can litterally sit on a place and in the time it takes to watch a few movies you can go from having coffee in SOHO to having tea in the sahara that same day, not even this time tomorrow.

 

People think I am a little crazy but I think FedEx is kind of a romantic concept. You know how you can have a package, something in your hand in New York and the next day it will be in someone else's mailbox in Tokyo.

 

It is so true that when you are sort of mindlessly traveling, flying, sitting on a train, or in a car (you have to be watching the world though outside your window) you can really dig into your brain and find thoughts that you couldn't otherwise. Maybe that is why growing up driving California I just had so much more time to think than I do now living in the city, whether that be NYC or BsAs.  
Photo below...Flying above SF...Me

 

Hola, my name is Griffin and I'm studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina. What was my reason for choosing Buenos Aires? Well it seems to be the best balance of exotic and I am a Junior at NYU and am actually at CAS but I took a Sense of Place and hence I am using up my last 2 credits out of CAS to take another one of Steve's classes. My major is Environmental Studies with a minor in Psychology. Nothing abroad really pertains directly to my studies but I am really just abroad for the experience and hopefully to learn Spanish. I am taking Spanish classes, a creative writing class, and a class on Latin American studies while I am here. I am also living in a homestay so I can further immerse myself and force myself to speak Spanish. They are a really cool family with a four story townhouse that is amazing and right in the heart of the city and that certainly wouldn't exist in New York. The family has a 12 year old boy, 22 year old twin boy and girl and a 24 year old guy, oh and I can't forget the big Bernese Mountain Dog Pampa. I am hoping I can make some Argentine friends and not just stick to expats and students because that is obviously the easy way out. Already on my flight down I sat next to an Argentine independent film maker who said he would take me around the city and show me his favorite spots the tourists can't find.

I am originally from Carmel, California. A small coastal town about 2 hours south of San Francisco. The last 2 years or so living in New York have been amazing but it took some getting used to. The first year I was just ready to leave the cold and go back to the beach at home but by sophomore year I loved the gritty city and finally felt it was really becoming my home and this past summer I stayed in the city the whole time only going home for a couple of days at the end. It feels as though as soon as I got settled in and found the New York that I can call mine I get uprooted and sent down thousands of miles away to South America, so leaving was bittersweet but regardless I am excited for what the semester here will have in store, especially for all the travel that I'm planning on doing. 

my photo