Today, I got an apartment and stepped in shit (right after I saved my father from doing that). We got up early to greet the maid - she was late of course. Larry says that punctuality is not a priority around here.
Oh! I didn't mention how screwed up the phone system is! So, from a landline, you can only call other landlines here - you cannot call a local cell phone from a landline - you can use a calling card which gives about an hour of time to Canada or call a local cell phone at a peso/minute - on a 10 peso international calling card. Canada can call my landline or cell phone but dial a whole shit ton of numbers i.e. 011-54-11 then 8 numbers or trying to call a cellphone here and putting a 15 in fron of it or a 11 or from Canada dropping the 15 or 11 and adding a 9! Thank god for Larry....are you confused yet? I sure am!
So the stupid cell phone we got has no number! It's been 4 days since we got it and when we went to a branch of the phone company, she said she couldn't help us and that we had to go back to the guy who sold us the phone at the kiosk. It's like he didn't submit any of my information and the contract he wrote up has no information on who he is, or where he is located; just a bunch of numbers with my signature on the bottom! So needless to say...did I sign a real contract? Or did I just sign a bunch of nothing?
Papa and I went to the real estate place on Nicaragua street - Che Palermo - to put a deposit down on the apartment in Palermo Viejo (that's the neighbourhood). It's pretty big and very nice - living room fully furnished, with couch, tv, table and 4 chairs, modern bathroom with jacuzzi jet tub, toilet with a bidee (as if I'd need one of those), bedroom with little bedside tables, and a king size bed and the kithen is pleasant and open with all proper appliances - oh, and it has a balcony that is the length of the living room and bedroom - absolutely huge! It was originally going for 800 USD/month but we talked the owner down to 750USD/month - just over 2800 pesos.
After we were in the rental place for awhile, we were starving and went to the first place we saw in my new "hood". It was called Chimm Churri I think...Papa had this weird salad as an appetizer that was pretty much shredded carrot and a couple hard boiled eggs - we felt sorry for the poor bastard that had to shred all that carrot - and my salad was a bunch of dried mixed lettuce. It's funny how three quarters of the music you hear in the background is in English, but I bet most people don't understand the words. After we were done (oh and when the men leave, Im swearing off bread - it's been present at every meal) we took a cab to Murillo (calle) where Papa was on a mission to buy a leather jacket. The amount of real leather and leather goods and furs is unbelievable! We only went into 3 stores. The first was a bit pricey and I tried on a number of red lamb's leather jackets - one had a rabbit and fox fur collar - holy cow (I mean lamb!) haha! The second store we browsed and the third Papa found one he liked which caught his eye because of a tiny, simple caramel stripe for half the price and they tailored it for him at no extra cost! While we were waiting for the tailoring, we had a cafe nearby in a family-owned restaurant. We also went exploring in a big supermercado (supermarket) nearby! Fresh vegetables and basic food are so inexpensive compared to back home - veggies for 2-3 pesos ( a dollar), bread for 89 centavos (30 cents), pasta for a dollar, wine for 4 dollars - it's crazy!
We got back to the apartment and were going to resolve the stupid cell phone issue but it was already after 7 and figured it wouldn't be open and I forgot my passport. We hit another bank machine and figured we can only take out 2000 pesos a day (not coinciding with the Canadian bank limits) so we can start hoarding them for Friday when I get my apt. We were going the wrong way down the street and bumped into the Wall Street Institute which specializes in language training so I'm taking them my resume tomorrow. We had dinner a Chico Campo at Austria and French, where people do not pick up after their dogs (hence the first statement at the beginning of this entry)! We had 2 steaks shared, salad, wine and fries for 20 bucks each! Crazy!
Happy eating!
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