Random alert: Ralph in BsAs

Sometimes Google Alerts alerts me to the randomest things. I signed up to receive news in English with the search term "Buenos Aires" in order to read travel stories about my new home...and get the latest by English-speaking reporters with B.A. bylines. But sometimes off-the-wall press releases come through. Like today. This morning, I read "Fashion's number one, Ralph Lauren and his family visit Argentina and Uruguay" [sic -- though I want to at least add a comma]. The press release describes the journey a company called Curiocity put together for Ralph, Ricky, two sons, a business colleague and Lauren Bush, first niece to George (and somebody's novia?). Here's a prime tidbit:

The trip required more than fifty people on duty around the clock, including on-site personal hosts, guides, chauffeurs, renowned chef, maids, housekeeper and other in-house personnel, personal escorts, and security teams in each destination.

Destinations included their favorite restaurant in BsAs (La Cabrera) and some of their favorite shops (Felix, Cardón, De María -- [ed. aside: where/what is De María? I'm ignorant). The final gem was the web link at the bottom of the press release that leads to the personal blog of Curiocity's co-founder and "U.S. investor." There, I was treated to pics of Ralph enjoying New Year's Eve (see below) and more.

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Gringos, p54 of Clarín

On Thursday afternoon, a photographer and reporter from Clarín visited us here at GoodAirs HQ. The reason: an article on the city's bloggers. I was a little worried about my first interview in Spanish, but it turned out ok. (Ian had been on live radio here a couple of times, so if he was sweating, it was for his WSJ deadline, just 2 hours after the interview.) I mean, I don't think I was wildly misunderstood at any point, but the reporter did print that we arrived in marzo (pronounced: MAR-sso) when I tried to tell her we arrived in mayo (pronounced: MAH-sho). I'll work on that... One other mistake: My metric calculations are always way off. I meant NYC's SoHo and Hollywood are 5,000 KM apart, not 2,000. But these are minor mishaps. Nora got that we started a Lower East Side blog back in the day, and brought our habit of blogging here with us.

When I opened the newspaper today, and flipped way back to La Ciudad section, page 54, I saw the picture was kinda huge, with the caption "Gringos." Baby Henry Emiliano is not ID'd in the photo, but his name is explained in the text. Maybe this article, too, will pop up when the boy is googled in the future.
Photo: Clarín. One final note: See the big shining gold of the apostille'd birth certificate on Ian's desk? Yes, he's still tramitando (paperworking) his DNI. The documents are now at the translator's and we're closer to being a 3 DNI family...

[To read Clarín's "La mirada de dos recién llegados," you'll scroll down the page a little and look to the right column.]

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The Sincerest Form of Flattery

The Saltshakers en casa

It's always nice, as a foreign correspondent type, to be ahead of the local media. So it is with some minor pride that we note that today's La Nación profiles a slick new restaurant trend in Buenos Aires--hidden restaurants that can only be found, and entetered, by those in the know (Casa Saltshaker, above, is one). Not a bad story, I'd say. Especially considering it's more or less a copy (admittedly expanded) of a story of mine published in the New York Times on December 17.

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Crash control

Walking to the Always Club tonight, I passed a mass of flashing lights, uniformed policemen and a large sign that read: "Control de Alcoholemia." It was an impressive display. On calle J. L. Borges, every five cars or so, one was whistled at and waved over for an officer to check if the driver was drunk.

At the Club (I mean, gym), I saw a government-sponsored PSA on TV telling viewers never to pass into oncoming traffic on a blind curve. A worthwhile message, no doubt.

I read last weekend about the radar checks of drivers' speeds on the highways that take porteños to the most popular beaches this side of Uruguay. I hadn't even realized there was a speed limit here. In fact, in my 20 months in Argentina (7 of those with a car), I'd never once seen a car get a traffic ticket.

So, bravo for the highly visible, accident-prevention measures on the highways and here on the city streets. What next? Stopping motorcycles from running red lights? Ok. I don't mean to make light of any efforts to prevent the seemingly endless stream of horrific traffic accidents. A sincere 'bravo' is in order.

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Another Buenos Aires Stencil

Always a popular target...

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I'm expat woman

Caught in a moment of largesse, I signed up to be a mentor for a new site called Expat Women. Actually, I was kinda thrilled that I had just qualified to be a mentor because I had lived over 12 months in Argentina. (The site has since lowered the bar down to 6 months. But whatever.)

Today marks the official launch of www.expatwomen.com. The design--something evoking a bit of Barbie & Lifetime TV--is not totally to my taste, but the content (in English) is pretty impressive. Including me, Buenos Aires has 3 mentors--2 norteamericanas and 1 australiana--and we are pretty diverse trio. We are, collectively: professionals, students, travelers, volunteers, mothers and "free spirits." That's a lot of ground to cover for questions. So far, no emails to my new expat inbox. Just spam. I look forward to the first inquiry...

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You Could Have Fooled Me

Now, I may say this only because I have a young child, but it seems that every third woman in Buenos Aires is either pregnant or pushing around a pram. Evidently, this is not true at all. In fact, according to this La Nación article, it seems that Buenos Aires has downright European (i.e. no child allowed) birth rates.

Los últimos datos del Indec dan cuenta de que las parejas porteñas tienen frecuentemente un hijo, lo que coloca a la tasa global de fecundidad -la cantidad de chicos que tiene una mujer en su vida- en el 1,39 y lejos del 2,1 considerado necesario para un adecuado recambio poblacional en tiempos en los que la expectativa de vida es cada vez mayor. "De por sí, la Argentina es el país con menor natalidad en América latina -señaló el doctor Marcos Horton, vicepresidente de la Sociedad Argentina de Medicina Reproductiva (Samer)-.

Who's wrong, me or the statistics bureau? You be the judge.

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Babies go Beatles!

Christmas shopping for our baby was kinda a joke. A 3-month old still swimming in delightful presents from friends and family is not in need of much. But I happened across a whole series of Argentine albums called "Babies go..." and I went for it. "Babies go Beatles" was my first choice, knowing the grandparents would enjoy too, though it was hard to turn away from "Babies go Queen" and "Babies go Guns-n-Roses." The shtick is this: Soothing, instrumental renditions of adults' favorite tunes. Or, as my album cover puts it: "The Four Fabulous' music arranged and adapted for babies." It's genius, if you ask me. Just try listening to the tunes of "Hey Jude," "Nowhere man," and "Yellow submarine" without singing along. And then, as I sing along, my baby basically laughs at me -- clearly enjoying himself at my expense.

I also picked up "Babies go Christmas" to get into the spirit. Full catalog available here.

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Building Boom Backlash

Yesterday, local Bloomberg writer Eliana Raszewski had an intriguing piece on a subject of constant conversation between us and our local, older Porteño neighbors: the downside of the building boom in Palermo (and other nabes) on the quality of life, and infrastructure, in the city. An extreme-but believable--example of what happens you put a residential tower in a neighborhood with services designed for two-storey houses:

Adriana Plodek, a housewife, said the basement of her apartment block was flooded in June. The laying of foundations for nearby towers had caused the water table to rise, she said.

Plodek and owners of the other apartments in her building had to buy four pumps that run 24 hours a day to draw water from the basement. This contributed to an increase in her monthly condominium charges to 320 pesos in October from 271 pesos a year earlier. Moving isn't an option because nobody would want to buy her apartment, she said.

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Punta Is Soooo Over, Part 2

As we noted on Wednesday, prices in Punta del Este have skyrocketed to the point that many Argentines can't afford it, and those locals (and foreigners) who can find it muy caro. Today's La Nación jumps on the meme with a piece that sports different statistics, but comes to the same conclusion: the place is hugely expensive this year. At the Conrad, 36% of the rooms are taken by Brazilians, 28% by Argentines and 11% by Mexicans. And the average tourist spend is $250USD (in Uruguay!). Even European tourists, here to enjoy the euro/peso divide, are feeling the bite:

Los suecos Jacob Ehrenkrone y su mujer, Louisa, alabaron el servicio pero criticaron los precios y la comida. “Comparado con Buenos Aires está muy caro. Y la comida no es gran cosa. No esperábamos pagar tanto, no se justifica”, sentenció.

Oh, my, god. Punta is, like, soooo overrrr.

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Lugares Para Comer Tranquilos

Just came across this one: by way of commenting on its existence, La Nación translated and republished the recent travel article on private clubs in Buenos Aires that I wrote for the New York Times. Got to love the article that keeps on giving.

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First Brasiloche, Now Paulista del Este

Today's Clarín included an interesting article about changes in this year's crowds in Punta del Este. It seems that Argentines are getting priced out of they former playground. Among the visitors to Punta this season, Argentines are the third cheapest with an average daily spend of $45 USD (behind Uruguayos and Chilenos who clock in $5 lower). Europeans (mostly Spaniards) drop $150/day. And Mexicans clock in at a cool $180. Perhaps the most interesting data in the "How Things Change" category? About 75% of Punta's hotel rooms are taken by Brazilians, says Héctor Araujo, president of the Centro de Hoteles.

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New Generation of Argy Filmmakers

The arrival of a new, young generation of Argentine filmmakers, many specializing is small, languid, personal tales, is far from a secret. Among other articles, in one Slate piece we noted in June, Meghan O'Rourke and James Surowiecki tried to come to terms with the boom via a weeklong trip to Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema (AKA the BAFICI). More recently, Jack Chang of McClatchy Newsapers summed up the boom in a nice trend piece. There's Enrique Piñeyro (above), whose documentary Fuerza aérea sociedad anónima famously helped take down the head of the Argentine air force; Lucrecia Martel, who helmed 2001's La Ciénaga, about a dissolute and creepy family in Salta, and 2004's La Niña santa about a, well, creepy and dissolute middle-aged doctor; and Daniel Burman, who directed Derecho de familia, Argentina's official submission to the 2007 Academy Awards for Foreign Language Film.

Of course, there's always the question of whether it's a good trend. "It's a flowering of young filmmakers who have won international influence with a cinema that is very independent. It's a very personal cinema, and it's creating excitement in the Argentine public. Before, there was prejudice among Argentines about even their own films. This movement is changing that," said actress Mercedes Moran, who starred in Martel's films. Not everyone agrees: "What 10 years ago was a breath of fresh, freeing air has become a rancid aroma of confinement," wrote Gustavo Noriega, editor of the Argentine film magazine El Amante Cine in a November piece titled "La tristeza de los niños ricos".

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Quique, Tres Meses

Not to brag, but he's still sorta cute. Here he is at the beach enjoying a shirt from his grandparents (or, rather, preparing to gnaw on a shirt from his grandparents) and enjoying his favorite sport--sleeping.

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Feliz Año Nuevo (Sin Granizo)!

After visiting Mar de las Pampas yet again for a relaxing--heck, almost catatonic--week, we're back at the helm of GoodAirs and ready to blog! You can imagine the relief we felt when, sitting at the beach and reading Clarín, we came across this article about an almost completed missile from the Instituto Civil de Tecnología Espacial (ICTE) that will, if all goes as planned, be shot into the atmosphere when the next granizo attack threatens Mendoza or San Juan (or perhaps Buenos Aires?). A pipe dream? Who knows, but it sure sounds good.

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