Stories, people and panoramas from all over the world: First few days in BA

¡Hola from Buenos Aires, bienvenidos a todos!

So here I am, thousands of kilometers away from most of you, my left wrist in plaster (and my left arm slowly approaching half its normal size) but still in top form and enjoying every second of my day!

If you don't have time to read through all this article:

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Big news, I'm alive, in Buenos Aires, and jetlag is over.

Now, more details:

First impressions (and lessons):

1) It's super cold over here. We're approaching the end of winter and the weather during the first three days clearly reflected it: grey and freezing cold (between 5 and 15°C). Now we finally have some sun, but temperatures are still quite low. Apparently the city has experienced a massive heatwave a week ago, with temperatures getting into the 30+ °C (historical record for the season), but I missed that.

2) BA seems to offer so many hidden treasures! Architecturally speaking, it's a bit of mess, but anywhere in the centre you'll be able to find a building that reminds you of Paris, Madrid, or some Italian city, even if it is trapped between two sovietic-style blocks. The European influence is very strong in this city full of "emigrados". And it is cleaner than what I expected, even

if "Porteños" keep saying the opposite. Don't worry, I'll take some pictures so that you can see it by yourself.

3) Driving in Buenos Aires requires skills rarely seen on our side of the Atlantic. Traffic is very dense and drivers keep changing lanes to overtake each other, while remaning surprisingly calm and without much aggressivity. It would be fine if only cars drove that way, but bus drivers are even worse! And of course, using a flashing light is clearly not part of their habits.

4) The Argentinian way is quite chill. It'll take the time it needs, take it easy.

5) "Che Lulu", a clean and colourful guest house in Palermo Soho I could recommend, is apparently located next to many gay bars. To be honest, I haven't seen any, but at least you won't feel offended like me if one of the guests ask you if you are "straight" or not.

6) Money: Changing money here is quite a big deal. As you probably already know, the Argentinian economy is in a pretty bad shape at the moment. Inflation is very high: the official number is around 10%, but the true number seems closer to 30%, as the government loves cooking its economic indicators. For this reason, and because of a will to control capital flows in and out of the country (and probably for some other weird reasons that I have not figured out yet), there exist two different exchange rates in Argentina: the official one (currently around 5.7 pesos per USD) and the unofficial one (unofficial, but everyone knows and talks freely about it). To benefit from this unofficial (and better) rate, you got to go right in the centre of BA, in a pedestrian shopping street where you'll find some people spending their all day yelling "¡Cambio, cambio! ¡Euros, Dollares!". Once the rate agreed with them, most of the time the actual exchange takes place in a small and dark office, where you have the disturbing feeling to be dealing drugs with the mafia... But anyway, I got 11.6 pesos for my buck so it's definitely worth it. So bring a lot of cash if you plan to visit Argentina!

Oh, and by the way, they don't have a proper sign for "Pesos", they use the dollar sign ($), so don't get confused.

In terms of proper news, I am now sharing a flat with a Colombian girl, Diana (about 25-28 years old, works here in BA, a bit maniac when it comes to cleaning common rooms but otherwise very nice and extremely patient when I'm painfully trying to speak Spanish), and a French guy, Quentin, (comes from Tolosa, raised in Congo by a Polish father and a Moroccan mother, very nice and interesting 26 years old guy trying to start working in Argentina as an osteopath). The flat is on the 14th floor, opposite the zoo (I can probably throw food at the lions from my balcony, not sure I want to try though), and it only takes me 15 minutes to get to the office.

Yes, if you didn't know, I do work here, at least until mid-october. More about it in a future post.

I'll leave you with a picture of my small room: