Dos puntos de vista

Alan Parker’s 1996 hit “Evita” was filmed at the Casa Rosada, or the Argentine Presidential Palace. That sporadically blonde mid drift-bearing chameleon of a woman who started out by rolling around in diamonds and singing about her virginity got to perform “Don’t Cry for Me Argentina” from the very balcony where the first lady would address her descamisados.

That same year, another film about the life of Evita was released. It was an Argentine production directed by Juan Carlos DeSanzo, starring the eminent portena actress Esther Goris. The balcony scenes for this film, entitled “Eva Peron,” were not shot at the Casa Rosada, rather from the main balcony of the Four Seasons Hotel.

Why did Madonna get the real deal, but not Esther? If you add an ‘r’ and subtract an ‘n’ from ‘Madonna’ you end up with ‘Maradona,’ but surely this similarity in spelling isn’t enough to give a foreign actress in a foreign film privilege over a home-grown actress in a home-grown, more historically accurate film? Of course not...

Libre de impuestos...

On June 20th, 1973, Juan Peron returned to Argentina after nearly twenty years of political exile in Francoist Spain. Two million people came to greet him at Ezeiza, an International Airport located just on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. From the podium where he was to speak, camouflaged gunmen of the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance (AAA) fired at the crowds, killing 13 people and wounding over 300.

When I arrived at this same airport, exactly 34 years and 4 days later, I was met with a different sort of ambush. Bleary-eyed and slightly disoriented from the long trip, I recovered my luggage and was on my way to customs when I abrubtly experienced the overwhelming dread of having taken a 17-hour flight to the QVC headquarters. A massive duty-free shopping hangar appeared out of nowhere, completely littered with signs of just reduced prices in American dollars on Channel, Dior, Ferragamo, Marlboro, and the other glitterati of the airport-shopping world. Seeing the masses of perfume-spritzing women and ballpoint pen selling men was unsettling, and made my first impression of Buenos Aires akin to something of a giant front lawn on which the world liquidated its empty opulence.

While I knew that this showy display was predominantly for tourists, I couldn't help but wonder what percentage Argentines could actually afford what was sold in these shops. I had been told that the average salary was 1200 pesos a month, or $400 U.S. dollars, which doesn't really allow for the luxury of a London Tie or even a 10-pound bag of skittles...

La llegada

June 25th 2007 Day 1, Buenos Aires:
NY to BA -

They crowded around the machine like 5 surgeons examining the infected gallbladder of an etherized patient.

“Now put your pin in,” said a man with a dubious airport employee identification tag hanging from his blue and gold plastic vest like a stray piece of spaghetti.

“I won’t look,” he demurred, as he remained riveted to the screen of the cajero automatico. The Chilean tourist in her late 20’s who was trying to take out money did as he said, while her fellow backpacker and the two travelers waiting in line behind her all intently looked on.

“Transaction denied, no remaining funds,” flashed across the Banco de la Nacion machine, which if it had a joystick instead of a touch pad, might have resembled an 80’s arcade version of a Pac-Man console.

“Try again,” said the vested employee, as the machine spat back the card and left it hanging in the entry slit like the tongue on a breathless dog.

Alarmed by the communal nature of this implicitly private activity, I approached a nearby police officer and asked if there was another machine that might have money in it. “Es que somos muy pobres,” he said, echoing the title of a short story by the Mexican writer, Juan Rulfo. He pointed an aimless finger towards another ATM machine hidden in a corner...