Mon 2237 So I finally got my Precious back in - touch wood - fully working order today about 1230 after being without it from mid afternoon on Friday. I'm going to try to write up the last few days from memory, I may not get it all done tonight but let's do what I can.
So on Thursday I got up about 9 and squashed (almost literally, due to the way I was having to wedge a bottle of water on top of the cable to put pressure on it to make a fractionally reliable connection) a few extra percent into the phone before checking out at 10; I wasn't quite sure what would happen but before I went down to the office someone called on the internal phone to say they were coming over. Fairly brief inspection and I got my 1k deposit back no fuss. Left my bag in their office and went off for a walk/lunch.
I actually had quite an enjoyable stroll. It was sunny, maybe too warm but not terrible. It perhaps helped that I felt no pressure to do anything "major" as I wanted to eat lunch and be back at flat rental office to collect bag by 1, as I had been told I need to be at station an hour before my 1430 train, tho the ticket said 45 mins. It maybe also helped that for better or worse I was out and about instead of squatting in flat desperately trying to get some charge into phone.
I popped my head into a few church-y places - didn't take photos inside in case not allowed and had phone actually off so no GPS trace, but not that it matters I did snap photos of outsides and the name plates. Probably been in some of them on prev visit TBH. There was an open-air exhibit of (prints, obviously) of some famous works from the Prado in the street and I looked at some of those. By chance walked past university museum and ended up going in; had a brief chat in Spanish with some of staff in tickety area (ARS20; I declined guided tour as only had an hour-ish but they gave me an English language spiral bound guide book) and had the place mostly to myself. Guards had to come and unlock rooms for me to get in, but they were all super helpful. Some pretty cool maps - Jim would have liked that, I think - and library was interesting and also saw through glass wall some historic science/techy stuff in adjoining Montserrat museum but didn't have time to go in there.
So I found a small restaurant (had actually spotted it earlier; I did OK navigating sans Google Maps, though of course had been around city a bit over last few days) and had a passable bife de cuadril and chips and back to office to get bag and on to train station, which seemed a stiffish hike with the bag but no big deal.
Amazingly large number of people waiting around in station - I had the train down as a tourist attraction in my head, but evidently not. Not that people on the train/waiting room seemed desperately poor (tho I was in the intermediate, probably pseudo-1st class coach on the train), I might *guess* the train is (opposite to UK) the slower but cheaper alternative to the bus. There was a big queue to get past the ticket inspection at the platform gates once that opened but no real problem; inspector obviously spoke tiny bit of English and saw the "Northern Ireland" bit on front of my passport and asked in Spanish if I was from NI; I was a bit taken aback but just said yes.
My pullman coach had 1+2 seating and I had been assigned a single seat, though sadly it was badly misaligned with the window and also my bit of window was very dirty, but don't think I missed out on too much in terms of scenery. Seat comfortable enough if not super plush. Arguably the cama seats on a bus are nicer, but the ride is a hell of a lot smoother on the train and you can stand up and walk around to stretch your legs - ignoring journey time I would say the train is a more comfortable option.
Coach was mostly full though a few spare seats scattered around. Did seem very Argentinian when a number of passengers pulled out flasks of hot water and the yerba mate cup things to make themselves a drink on their tray tables. We didn't get given any food or drink, incidentally, though there was a water dispenser with plastic cups at one end of the coach.
We left roughly on time, a few mins late at most.
Three or four hours out of Cordoba we stopped - I never found out why - for what I think was about an hour and a half in the middle of nowhere. There was a lot of water visible out of one side of train but no idea if that was normal or if there was perhaps some flooding. I was a bit edgy - and this flared up more later - not because I was in a rush per se as because I'd told the BA airbnb flat I'd be there at 1030 and I had no mobile data (nothing to do with conserving battery) to contact them if delays occurred. In hindsight I should prob have sprung for an Argentinian SIM even if the only "deals" I had seen cost a pound or two for a week's data; I think many give you unlimited whatsapp regardless and that is what you need for airbnb and I could in theory set my parents up on it too. But anyway.
We eventually started moving again and seeing we were moving reduced my edginess again. To conserve phone batt I was listening to music (which keeps screen off so is almost "free" ; the screen is the real drain) but not reading on phone, tho unlike bus I suspect it would be perfectly comfortable to read on train.
They turned the carriage lights off at something like 2230. I think I fell asleep maybe midnight-ish, perhaps a bit before. I know from timetable train stopped at some stations in middle of night and I may or may not have woken up once or twice at a station. I woke something like 8amish although I had that usual ultra-dry mouth feeling and also did the "I want to stay in my cocoon and not open eyes and drink water and check actual time and deal with shit" thing I get on long-distance overnight transport.
Long story short, we had another maybe half hour halt and (I burned some battery on GPS/GM) the last 50ishkm of straight line distance into BA took forever as we crawled through suburban lines or stood still for ages at a time. Was getting quite edgy re airbnb; about 11 I turned on wifi for second or third time on vague hope of an open network and somehow I managed to connect to an open-then-had-to-authenticate-via-web-page network which seemed to allow whatsapp data to pass without authenticating, I only realised as I had a WA message from airbnb host and was able to tell her what had happened and give a new ETA (I had overheard a staff member saying we'd be in in less than an hour hopefully) and she was cool about it and that took the edge off.
IIRC we finally got in (to San Martin, as mentioned on a sign at Cordoba stn, due to renovation works, not actually Retiro, which is a slight shame tho it's right next door, but would have been cool to arrive in Retiro) about 2.5 hours late, at midday.
Got Subte over to airbnb no problem, found it, buzzed and got let in. They told me a plumber would be coming to fix the hot water later but I didn't worry too much and esp given how nice they'd been about me turning up "late" I was even less inclined to make a fuss.
Arms hurting from typing so let's take a break. Remember it's now Friday about 1pm at this point.
2323 OK, let's write a bit more. Forgot to say that during that stop a few hrs into train journey went to use bog and misled by the man+woman icon on the sign at each end of the carriage I went into the women-only bog which was at my end; the actual cubicle did have a woman icon on but was confusing to have both icons on the one on the carriage end above the vestibule area. Was stopped by a guard as it happens. Contrary to stereotypes the women's toilet was actually nastier than the men's, tho both acceptable by train toilet standards.
Also watched a YT video (This Old Tony, FWIW) earlier tonight (Mon) about making your own gears with hobbyist kind of technology, and blown away by the overview of the theory behind the shape of the gear teeth and why the stereotypical "square tooth" cog is not used. I've had my attention drawn to the layers of detail and historical creativity in other areas before, but I hadn't previously thought about just how much experience and mathematics and engineering must have gone into developing the theory and practice of making such things.
Right, so back to Fri 1pmish. My battery management had seen me arrive at the flat with maybe 20-30% left, so after sending out an "I arrived" mail to parents and (sensibly) asking host (actually an admin for the couple who seem to own place, I think) to give me an e-mail address in case phone broke and didn't have whatsapp and (stupidly) not doing anything with it except put it in an email to myself (I should have written it on paper), I set out in quest of a mobile phone repair shop. Host/admin woman didn't have any personal recommendation but said there were lots on Corrientes, a nearby street. I also burned some phone batt trying to get some off Google (so I could see reviews) but had little luck given shops selling phones and accessories got mixed in with actual repair places, plus reviews massively mixed ("they ruined my phone" vs "really great service" ) I kind of decided to mostly wing it.
First place I tried said "all makes" over the door but turned my Blackberry down flat.
Second place didn't do repairs but recommended repair place next door. That was in a mostly residential-looking tower block, but it turned out on rather dubiously ringing the bell and expecting to find some dude smoking a joint on his couch to say "hey man, you got a phone needs fixing?" it actually turned out to be fitted up as a shop-cum-workshop. Woman at counter took my phone out to a bloke perched on balcony with loads of phones scattered round him - irrationally I feared it would get dropped off balcony (this was 7th floor IIRC) or he'd just toss it off after saying he couldn't fix it. I actually got quite a good "small craftsman" vibe from this place - tho they were closing for two weeks holiday on Mon and didn't work weekends, so seemed a potential problem but after an abortive effort to query the impact of this I decided not to worry about it and see what they said first - but after a few mins (I could see the guy tilting phone round and peering into socket etc) they said they couldn't do it. I didn't get or ask for an explanation so no idea if they couldn't/wouldn't do it full stop or if they simply couldn't do it that day and therefore no good given the upcoming two week holiday.
Was losing hope a bit at this point and wondering if I should just push on with the increasing amounts of pressure and babysitting the charge process. But I also thought that might cause damage to PCB or whatever and make an eventual repair more expensive or impossible.
I *think* I was on the verge of giving up when I saw what was the fourth place (maybe it was the fifth and I had another immediate rejection at a fourth) and went over. And the pink-haired tattooed young woman at the desk in the small kiosky place had a very brief poke/test and told me it would be 800. I thought she said 1800 for some reason so I stared a bit blankly while crunching the numbers, but especially as she said I'd be able to pick it up at 7/730 that night I said yes, and then had a pleasant surprise when she wrote out a bill for 800. Remember place in Cordoba had said 1000. I was also fairly impressed that she then went through checking everything else worked and filling in some paperwork. We did all this in Spanish but she evidently spoke pretty good English because eg I pointed out the scratch on screen (from Guatemala) - perhaps foolishly - to a) be honest so they wouldn't think they'd done it b) ensure they wouldn't take it upon themselves to replace the screen, and I didn't know the word for scratch and I think I said it in English or waffled round the idea and she just told me the word for "scratch" in Spanish ("rasguño"). It seems a sufficiently obscure word that I'm inclined to assume she's a fairly fluent English speaker, though I guess there's some chance she has an acquaintance with English terms particularly relevant to mobile phone repair and isn't as fluent as I'd guessed. (*Not* that this was a big operation which would train its staff in languages, but reminded as I write this - not at the time - of Rab's story about the Korean bank clerk who was completely fluent in "money-changing English", to the point of giving the impression of perfect command of the language, but otherwise spoke virtually no English at all.) She also clarified a few things in English IIRC as I dithered towards the end of the handover process; I think I was getting genuinely nervous at handing over phone (which is worth maybe 80-100 quid and yes there are silly psychological issues explored by every pop psychologist on the web and his dog about attachment to our phones, but there was also a more rational element to this which will touch on later) and it made me worry more about understanding what was said. But anyway, be it courtesy on her part or necessity, we did most of it in Spanish.
I had to go next door and get a photocopy of my self-made "ID" ; I offered to let her just hang on to the ID itself but she said it was the photocopy she needed. That cost me ARS2 and I had to leave the phone - which she had tested, I guess I could maybe have insisted on taking it with me but might have raised suspicions I'd switch it for another one - with no receipt which made me a bit edgier still but got it done OK. She also told me if I lost the receipt I couldn't have the phone back, no arguments. I'd hope I misunderstood or she was mildly exaggerating to make the point. So I left the phone there and went off for a walk, in a mixed state of elation at finding someone to fix it after unpromising start and same day at that and fear at the thought of it getting destroyed or lost or whatever.
Fingers hurting again so another break.
I was tempted to go have a semi-celebratory beer or two while I waited but I decided it would be prudent to be stone cold sober (rather than a lingering unit or two of alcohol in bloodstream; I wouldn't have been pissed or anything) when I went to pick phone up in case I needed to argue, and that maybe a beer *after* would be better anyway.
Tue 0104 Been slightly struggling to charge phone, don't think this is flaw in repair and as waffled before suspect some iffiness in other parts of charging chain anyway. Also not helped as spent most of day since got phone alternately waiting while it charged slowly (but "reliably" as charge connector fixed) then ending up running it down due to semi-necessary extended Skype with parents re some mildly shit but possibly resolved issued with my flat and whatsapp with airbnb hosts.
So prob not going to write much more now but maybe a bit. Plan is to be up not super late tomorrow and actually "go out" a bit more than I have lately for reasons which will be explained as I write up following days.
Anyway, Fri afternoon after dropping phone off I decided to walk down to that restaurant in San Telmo for steak+chips, having been looking forward to it at some points during past few weeks. I didn't have a map of BA but have a loose familiarity with some streets from other visits plus did know rough relative location of my flat to prev airbnb back in Jan. A bit that day and esp more explicitly on Sun I tried to apply some of the navigational concepts from my viewing of "bushcraft-ish" YT videos (escape bearing came to mind, tho modified for an urban environment) and to be super cautious about keeping my orientation (tho it helped that it's been very sunny so although tall buildings can hide sun (or confusingly reflect it) given the grid layout is pretty regular and north-south oriented it's relatively easy to "check" you are heading direction you think you are by seeing where the sun is; simply knowing sun is roughly north and (given it's afternoon) a bit west is enough combined with grid) as couldn't rely on GPS/GM if I got lost. Of course one extremely useful urban "escape bearing" is simply finding *any* Subte station which would allow me to get back to the ones near flat and then stumble around for a block or two until I hit on the right street.
Bit of a hike but got there without getting lost; also managed to find (half remember) the cheap shop for bottled fizzy water at Peru/Venezuela on way over and indulged in a cold bottle. When did get over to restaurant (have to try to spot its name if didn't already; possibly is Polo Bar but not at all sure) there were no free tables, but I went off for a wander for an hour (maybe during this time is when I found supermarket and had cold bottle of water actually) and when I went back there were some tables (it is only small) so got in and after few mins guy came and took order (I just said "bife con papas fritas" ; there is no menu as such tho board outside has some sort of list of cuts and prices but I haven't tried getting fancy) and the food was very good and very welcome. Very brief and slightly awkward "I said si even tho hadn't understood" chat with one of staff (owner?) as was eating. Due to no phone was staring at wine bottles and no-sound TV news above my table. Yes it is trite but yes it is true and a positive from this whole experience (speaking of whole wkend not just that Fri afternoon) that not having phone (on which I would have sat reading an ebook while waiting for food and prob while eating) did force me to "experience" being there a bit more, tho yes it was also a little bit dull.
Prob already said but while it's not exactly unfriendly the staff (there seem to be a few, poss vaguely familyish) in that restaurant are not exactly effusive, hence the few mins wait for someone to come take order etc. In a way I quite like the no-fuss attitude, though I can't help wondering if I am in fact viewed by them as the extremely annoying tourist who doesn't know how to behave. As usual I went up to counter to ask how much it was instead of trying to ask for a bill at my table, no idea if this *is* right but it sort of feels right there. Was 260 IIRC and think I may have made it 300 with tip after getting change for a 500. Bit OTT but I do like it there and plan to go back a few times during this stay and it is still pretty cheap IMO; the portion of chips wasn't huge but they were fairly good and the steak was both large and (to my unsophisticated palate) very good.
Afterwards walked back to flat; bladder was getting a bit full and tho I wasn't lost I kept anticipating the next street being mine for about the last 10 blocks or so and was mildly bursting by time got home and could have slash. Could maybe have popped into a cafe for coffee really just to use bog but didn't really want to, plus the social need to sit down and wait for coffee before using bog would have killed me.
Think I watched bit of stuff on (lucky for me there was one) smart TV in flat to fill in time between getting back and going out to pick up phone, tho maybe there wasn't *that* much time to fill, can't remember.
OK, I'm going to stop here again and continue this tomorrow, maybe tomorrow afternoon/evening or maybe in a coffee place (tho of course lesson learned is I should not be sitting on phone all the time) tomorrow during day. No point staying up all night grinding this out and lowering quality of writing even further. I have at least written up 1.5 days already tonight so a naive calculation suggests I will catch up to real time eventually. And with luck I'll have less time in flat needing to let phone charge in peace and unable to use it tomorrow so since I can't/don't want to be out "touristing" 24/7 I will probably be able to bash out quite a bit of blog in my downtime in flat instead of being "forced" to spend that time watching YT on smart TV for lack of alternatives. It's 0124 FWIW.
0142 Bed. Will just observe - perhaps getting ahead of myself in terms of this write-up - that while to some extent (not completely) this whole phone business has kind of "written off" 3.5 days of my time in BA (not that there hasn't been some fun/interesting stuff in that time), as the old saying has it "experience is cheap at any price" and while (as we will see as I write more) I probably wouldn't have been totally fucked had the phone repair failed, I was still in a pretty crappy situation because in hindsight I hadn't *quite* prepared properly/taken the risks seriously enough/realised exactly what the risks were. I will probably sit down and write a "well-structured" (as opposed to the usual "live journal" style of blog entry) post-mortem advice-givingy (no one will read this but me, but WTF) post once I get home about the whole experience, tho I may end up writing most of my current thoughts on the lessons learned in the course of bashing out next couple of days' worth of blog anyway. We'll see I guess.
And while I remember, though I didn't realise until I got phone back, not having it for over two days killed my 400-odd day Duolingo streak. But this is actually almost a good thing; it felt artificial (given you can buy a streak freeze for x lingots and I had something like 140x lingots, so if I was bloody-minded enough to simply go buy a new streak freeze every day I could have got to a maybe 550-ish day streak without spending a single extra minute studying a foreign language) but a certain semi-healthy/semi-unhealthy pride/compulsion kept me plugging away at it, and now I've lost it a) not through one of those inexplicable cases where Duolingo said I didn't train even though I'm sure I did b) through an "outage" which was absolutely not my fault (well, maybe I'm ultimately to blame due to eg charging phone in bed and breaking connector, but YKWIM - it's not like I just said "fuck it, I can't be arsed to deal with Duolingo today" for a couple of days in a row). I'm also quite pleased that while (and perhaps because) I had other semi-rational worries about phone being out of action/my possession, I did not even *think* about Duolingo and losing my streak until (as I say) I got it back, so at least I am clearly not particularly obsessed with this. And as I say, losing streak in this manner kind of takes the minor pain of maintaining my streak off my hands with no accompanying sense of guilt.
(I didn't know my Duolingo password so even had I been sufficiently obsessed I could not have gone and done it on the website from an internet cafe to keep my streak alive.)
Tue 2026 So let's pick the story up. Different woman on desk at phone repair place on Fri eve and she told me very nicely (Spanish) that they'd tried two ways to repair it and it hadn't worked, I could have it back if I wanted or they had a third part coming/had a third part but hadn't had time to try fitting it yet and if I wanted to leave it and come back tomorrow at midday there was a chance it would be fixed, and price would be the same (and had been told when dropped it off - I checked explicitly - it was no fix no fee). I actually didn't feel too disappointed at this, almost like hope was still alive, so I said I'd leave it with them.
I went out (probably after dropping receipt for phone back off at flat to guard against loss) for a bit of a walk round the area near flat with a view to a few quiet beers - this was Fri night, remember. I did not intend to stray very far given no fallback to GM but figured something local and not really a big night out would be OK.
Saw a few bars but either didn't show prices outside and/or looked a bit fancy or in one case did show price above bar and it was something like ARS150 (three quid in my head, though maybe more like 2.50 in reality) for a half litre of draught unicorn tears IPA. I wasn't that desperate. In the end I semi-stumbled on New Fama bar practically opposite my flat; a few people were dancing something semi-formal (ie in pairs, not ballroom or anything) in there and it had long thin layout from street which made me a tiny bit edgy but I think there were some acceptable prices shown outside so I went in. A handful of people in there, though this was maybe 8pm so v early by local standards. Dancing was just to jukebox and stopped at end of track.
I ordered a litre bottle of Quilmes Stout at the bar (for about 170 and maybe made it 190-200 with tip) - correctly or otherwise it didn't feel like a tab kind of place and I also didn't necessarily plan to be there late so I just paid straight away. Took my bottle and glass over to a table nearish to door and sat there (phoneless, remember) staring into space a bit and thinking and (when some people put music on) listening to jukebox a bit. Felt OK really most of the time.
Getting bit tired writing so take a break.
Was reading bit of The Honorary Consul on phone in bed last night (started it in Cordoba) and quite cool to see refs to Buenos Aires while I'm actually here, and also while my memories of Corrientes - supposedly the "inspiration" for the fictional town in the book - are reasonably fresh.
2048 Let's go on. Towards the end of my litre a drunk but amiable seeming guy seemed to be leaving the bar but tacked over towards me. He talked to me (all in Spanish) very reptetitively a bit and then ended up sitting back at bar. A bit later he sort of waved me over to the stool next to him - there was only a handful of people in at this point. I thought I'd take a punt and went over with my nearly finished litre. I nursed that like buggery - really wasn't sure I wanted to stay - and we had a conversation, which was 90% him repeating a few things and 10% me making stock responses and the odd genuine contribution. I could mostly understand him, which was a good sign. He was called Martin, he asked me my name many many times, he had a very good friend from England who had met his parents and now lived in Barcelona and showed me the same two photos of his friend and his friend's parents on holiday in Canada many many times. He also brought up the Malvinas but mainly to say (a sentiment I agree with) that friendships were more important than politics, and FWIW (I deliberately cultivate an ignorance on the matter so I can honestly plead ignorance if it ever matters) for whatever it may be worth, if true, told me an Englishman had discovered the islands. All this came up repeatedly.
He did slosh some of his ordinary Quilmes into my mostly empty glass, which I took as a friendly gesture.
The problem was that although *not* aggressive or particularly unpleasant (the worst things he did, which were hardly terrible, were to try to call his friend in Barcelona - it might have been 10pm or later by this point in BA, so early hours in Barcelona - on WhatApp and also repeatedly text message the bar owner, a chap called Bruno, on WA, for reasons I'm about to touch on), the (huge) barman (there was also a smaller young woman) - who was Venezuelan apparently - had been told by Bruno (and/or had decided himself anyway) not to serve my new friend any more. And he kept asking if he could have another beer, and texting Bruno to ask (Bruno did eventually turn up to work in his own bar maybe 11pm-midnight - I honestly can't remember exactly when I left, maybe between midnight and 1) if he could have one, and he was really very politely declined consistently. I would have quite liked another beer but while I'd have happily shared one with him, it was pretty evident this essential flouting of the "no more beer for Martin tonight" rule would not have gone down well, and I could hardly sit there and drink beer without sharing (esp after he'd given me some earlier), so after serious nursing of the beer Martin had given me I ordered a mineral water. I half hoped Martin would leave so I could get another beer - and it was getting livelier by this point too - but that evidently wasn't going to happen. He also showed me his pockets were empty and kept asking me (in that drunk no-short-term-memory way) to buy him a beer, and I kept explaining I'd be happy to another time when it was allowed and even offered to meet him there next evening, but that was no good. I don't know if he wanted me to give him money and then he'd have gone elsewhere and bought a beer or if he just wanted me to order one there for him (I repeatedly explained that wouldn't be allowed and even offered to ask the barman just in case it was allowed, though he never took me up on that offer) but while as I say I'd have been happy to buy him one that evidently wasn't acceptable and I wasn't really inclined to just give him say ARS100 (and end up pulling out my "wallet" and him seeing more cash). I do think he was a genuinely decent guy, just a bit drunk, but there you go.
I did get introduced by M to Bruno when he turned up but apart from a hello and a pseudo-fist-bump on the bar he didn't seem very friendly; maybe as Martin's "friend" I was a bit persona non grata.
I know I was there well past 11pm because I talked with M about bar opening times and told him in London we'd have been thrown out by now anyway.
So after I finished my mineral water I left, M said goodbye (stopping his repetitive begging for me to buy him a beer) in what seemed quite a friendly way and he didn't follow me out.
I would have liked another beer but as I said to myself when I got home a minute later it was maybe for the best, and in a way it wasn't an uninteresting night. Quite fun in a way, relatively sober/healthy and Spanish practice.
Tired again now so take another break from writing this.
Tue 2110 Although the sentiment is a bit backwards, a bit surprised to observe the tree just in front of me has big mottled coloured patches on its trunk which look like a kind of camouflage pattern.
Saw a slogan/ad in window of sportsy shop (I think) earlier - should perhaps have taken a photo. It said something like (in English?? really can't be sure) "Don't look back; you're not heading that way" . Usually these kind of ra-ra slogans leave me cold, especially when used to sell sportwear, but that was a new one on me and I sort of like it. I think it works in a kind of philosophical, "realistic" way, not just as a pseudo-aspirational message - it is what it is, you need to keep an eye on the road (so to speak) and not get distracted by stuff which is now behind you.
(This stuff should really be in the entry for tonight, but WTF. It's not important and it's clear from the timestamps I am writing this on Tue even if it was/were (?) important.)
Overhearing a few snatches of conversation and (pleasingly) understanding a few phrases but (meh) not all, suddenly thought of that Mark Twain comment in Life on Mississippi about how once a pilot learned to read the surface of the water they could never just enjoy looking at it like a normal person again. I would on the whole *like* to be so fluent I can understand all these overheard conversations, but OTOH I know sometimes back home when there's some species of arsehole mouthing off I sometimes think it would be really nice if I could just tune them out but I can't, and as a non-speaker of a language you get that ability for free when surrounded by speakers of that language. But as I say, I'd rather have the fluency, even with that downside.
2145 Nearly finished litre, feeling pleasantly meditative. I'm still not sure I've "cracked" BA - think have said before it always felt like there must be life somewhere at night but it eluded me - but it's feeling more comfortable than I expected. I'm also regarding Argentinian Spanish - rightly or wrongly - as less outlandish than I had in the past. It also - I'll be honest - has the appeal of being relatively cheap (though not Guatemalan levels, and everyone says their Spanish is purer) and the thought does cross my mind that I could at some point in future come and stay in BA for a month or two - if I can get a flat for sixteen quid a night or so that would be fine - and study Spanish, though it may be getting private tuition would be prohibitively expensive, I have no idea (but maybe it is somewhere I could get informal paid conversation classes with a student or other impecunious person, as I had hoped might be possible in Concepcion). This would certainly not be to the exclusion of the possibility of going back to Guatemala to study some more.
Exactly when and where and for how long depends of course in part on money. But I do feel really good that I'm not going back to the UK to resume full time work.
It occurs to me - prob said this before - I could end up speaking a Spanish analogous to the English of PG Wodehouse's chef Anatole - "fluent but mixed" was one description of it IIRC.
2213 OK, let's continue the tale of the phoneless period. So Saturday morning I woke up/got up with a certain nerviness. At some point - possibly a bit later, given I clean my teeth with bottled water (boiled rather than bought of late) - I discovered there was no water supply to flat, cold or hot. I knew hot was out but had asked explicitly and seen for myself there was cold on Fri, but not on Sat.
I went over to the phone shop and - it was shut. I returned a few times at intervals of 2-3h and it was shut every time. So maybe my Spanish was at fault and the woman Fri night told me to come back midday Mon or (and I *did* repeat IIRC "*tomorrow" at 12" without getting corrected) they lied or just randomly decided not to open on Sat even tho they normally do. I don't think I was told "come before 12" but I can't rule it out; it was maybe 1158 or 1205 when I got there so if they did for some reason open up til midday I could have missed them.
A bit disappointed and shaken up on thinking about not having my phone at that point, on which more below.
I don't think I did much this day (Sat). I think I got some sausages and hot dog buns and cooked for myself (couldn't cook anything much as couldn't wash up, of course). I thought I'd be clever and log on to airbnb (I had noted the pwd on paper in Cordoba as a disaster recovery precaution) from the smart TV in flat to report no water but - hahahhaha - airbnb "didn't recognise this device" and offered to send a text message (to my phone, which I didn't have, and as it happens the SIM/phone no in question has no roaming and was in my flat in London and wouldn't have worked here even if I had it) or an email (ditto) to verify my identity before letting me log in.
I knew I "couldn't" log into my main e-mail (GMail) because it's 2FA and most 2FA methods hinge on my having my phone. I *did* have some reserve options - a *single* one-time 8 digit auth code I had a note of to let me log into GMail as a 2FA method, and *possibly* the option for the 2FA code to be phoned through to my parents' landline, and by being on eg Skype live they could potentially relay it to me. But given my flight details (especially the final complete about turn e-mail from Edelweiss with special check-in instructions) were all on GMail *only* and the one "guaranteed" login of the one-time 2FA code really should be saved for that, I was super reluctant to use it. My parents were - I thought, wasn't sure, though turned out to be correct - away visiting my brother, so couldn't take a call on their landline until Sun night, even if I had any way of getting in touch which I mostly didn't (short of going to a call centre and dialling a phone number, I did have various numbers memorised but the situation kind of wasn't that desperate and TBH I am not sure this possibility occurred to me until I wrote this just now; a lesson not to be quite so internet-centric there maybe).
I tried to create a new email account via smart TV browser (painful). I knew most would demand a phone number for authentication. Incidentally yes of course I still had the possibility of getting phone back working on Mon, but I wasn't super optimistic and the water situation plus worries about family needing to contact me re some possible crisis meant I started to think through strategies for dealing with this and worrying a bit.
Oh, and despite having that single one-time GMail 2FA auth code, I didn't feel too comfortable (YT survivalist video memory here: "two is one, one is none" as apparently lots of people say) relying on it because what if eg I log in with it and before I can get what I need out of the account or get some more codes, there's a fucking power cut/net outage in the internet cafe and when it comes back my login has expired.
I *did* managed to create an account with one webmail site and sent an email to parents. I suspected it would end up in spam, as even the company I was sending from accused me of sending spam and made me doing a turing test before sending. (I later found out the email didn't go into spam but Google Mail did flash up huge red social engineering warnings all over it; while it wasn't, this was actually semi smart as the content of the message - "it is your son, but not from his usual address" - is a classic bit of SE really.) But at least I got it out and felt I'd done something to try to reestablish communication.
Getting tired/pains from writing so let's stop again.
2321 Been noticing all night lots of no 60 buses going past with Tigre in list of destinations on front LED sign. Is this really the Tigre which takes an hour to get to by train? It's not the final destination either, which is - err, let me catch next bus, can't remember. I guess it's possible. It would be confusing if BA had an "inner" suburb called Tigre and that "outer" suburb/virtually adjoining nearby town of same name. [Thu 0033 - saw some 60s today, final dstn Escobar.]
Not feeling pissed or really lonely but perhaps due to swelling of custom and a huge group intruding on my personal space a bit (we're all sat outside) to one side and overhearing bits of very very mildly wanky conversation I have slightly lost the earlier thrill/meditative state. I *could* have another beer but although I'm trying not to worry excessively about overall consumption (just per night "don't get in a real state" consumption) this last week I see no reason to go nuts and have three litres tonight when I could go home semi-sober after two, have a soft drink and maybe some music, get up less hungover (plan for tomorrow is some ordering of walk to San Telmo, food at Polo Bar, modern art museum nearby (I hope ABTE is still there, loved that for its quirkiness), maybe Parque Lezama and a few afternoon pints at Bar Federal) and then maybe have a few beers tomorrow night or whatever. Generally try to avoid drinking in afternoon as it tends to render rest of day a little muzzy and awkward but 2-3 after substantial food should be fine and while it's not super cool or anything I do sort of like Bar Federal and think have been there a bit on my various visits to BA so it has a certain mildly comforting familiarity if that is true, and if it's false it must appeal for some other reason.
Genuinely love fact the outside here is heaving (and not all young people) but not raucous at half eleven on a Tuesday night. If only London could be like this - but fat fucking chance, it's social engineering and public health and NIMBY central.
2330 Got a moderately sized full glass left but bottle empty and given delays with bill and change will try to get bill next time waitress comes past.
This all really should be in the "BA Tue" post but WTF. It's not hard but not trivial (eg it isn't tabbed) to flip back and forth in Dropbox text editor on phone.
2332 Getting bill.
2335 Bill 340 as expected, handed over a 500 and assuming I get change will make it 380-400 depending on change (I half suspect they'll make it easier for me to give 400 but we'll see).
OK, got 160 back as 100+10+50 so will tip 50, maybe am being a bit manipulated but not too badly. Still got most of last glass and will try not to rush it, may use bar bog before I go, walk home not long but be nicer if not busting.
Reading few more pages of The Honorary Consul, note with interest (and also note it's fiction) that Dr Plarr flies down from pseudo-Corrientes to Buenos Aires every three months to visit his mother. He doesn't seem rich and while my memory is currently fuzzy as to when it is set (1950s-70s, it says), yes it is a fair distance but at that epoch I would half expect there to be a half-decent train service and flying to be very expensive. Quite possibly the novel is historically accurate in this regard, it's just a thought.
Oh, I forgot to say Martin told me he was 43 (if I misremember he was definitely first half of 40s, and fairly sure he said 43) and I told him my age, which may (as if alcohol wasn't enough) have made him feel friendly towards me.
2351 Beer done, slash and home. 50 note still on table so hope no one nicks it but WTF, prob be fine. Waitress had plenty of chance of take it and sure she knows local culture better than me.
Wed 0004 Home. Quite a few ppl on street and a few other bars open on short walk, felt v safe. Bog at BY was upstairs (nothing but bogs up there), two urinals and a cubicle with no seat, reassuringly down at heel really. May well go back there tho Fri night may need to be cautious re Sat midday lang exch and Sat night need to be checking in online with all my faculties at 11ish am. Never did see another 60 bus to note final dstn.
New Fama was open (it has been shut most times walked past during day) and a bit tempted to go in but had 2 litres (4 pints as I think of it, even tho I'm mostly metric) and decided not to. Don't want to go back to BY two days in a row so maybe tomorrow night I'll pop into NF - if it's open at midnight on Tue I'd assume it would be on Wed, and as long as I can resist giving him my number (endless WA calls) or going anywhere with him (which shouldn't be a big deal) wouldn't be too upset/be sort of cool to see Martin again, and if as is likely he isn't there I might sit at bar and see if anyone chats to me.
Not really pissed or anything but it's mildly late, let's have some soft drink (bought some on way back this afternoon and of course have - small - fridge as this is a flat) and a bit of music on headphones (I am pretty maxed out on YT lately, now I have phone again and have other entertainment options) and then bed. As said million times this should be on Tue entry but WTF.
Prob said before and it's not generally a huge issue but: given Argentina is apparently the Latin American country I fit most comfortably into racially and has a "night owl" culture which suits my personality it's a damn shame the Falklands situation lies like a (admittedly mostly unimportant in practice) landmine underneath the situation.
(I'm not saying the UK is in the wrong - as said earlier I cultivate ignorance and accept I would probably have a bias - either pro-UK or cultivatedly anti-UK - if I did study the issue. I'm not saying the UK is right either, ditto, and of course equally re Argentina. I'm just saying it's a damn shame the fucking issue exists. I did and really do like Chile but rationally or not my minor "being fucked over" concerns in Santiago have soured me a little, plus after my last chat with Cony I feel I a bit more racially distinct there - though not that much.)
Oh, the bill - which may have been mine to keep, don't know the custom - was still on table as left after going to bog but the 50 was gone. *Probably* waitress took it but I can't know. But I don't think I did anything wrong, I didn't sort change quick enough when handed to me - and don't like being pressured - and didn't fancy doing the Lord Bountiful routine and attracting waitress attention to deliberately hand her the 50. Also I do believe most people are mostly honest and I doubt most customers there - even tho it's cheap-ish it's not a total dive - are so hard up they'd feel morally justified nicking 50 off (effectively) the waitress. It's not like this was a couple of hundred quid left lying around or anything which might really tempt someone who is mostly honest.
Oh again, Martin told me (and showed me photos) he had a Bolivian wife and a step-daughter. Apparently she was in Bolivia that night, I don't know if this was temporary eg to visit family or they were separated - on the one hand a separation might explain why he was getting so pissed, on the other hand he was certainly not going on about how much he loved her or other stereotypical "newly separated guy" shit and on the gripping hand (and I said as much to him several times when he said he was drunk) I've been drunk, we've (mostly) all been drunk, if you don't go around fighting cos you're pissed where's the harm, and when I used to drink more I won't say I was happy happy but I didn't have a single stereotypical cause so I should probably not make shitty judgements about his possible situation. But I record what he told me about wife etc because it is something that happened.
I think he had met his wife and the English-Barcelona guy in Argentina. He - tho I put it partly down to drunkenness - told me he knew BA really well. Not nec a bad thing but I might *guess* he had not travelled much, perhaps not even within Argentina.
(Although I mostly haven't had access to a kettle, and using a few mouthfuls of bottled water to clean teeth has not generally been a massive sacrifice to the gods of paranoia, one effect of watching all those wilderness/survivalist videos on YT is I feel pretty comfortable consuming boiled tap water. Quite apart from the fact half my food even in restaurants is probably cooked or washed in tap water which is subsequently heated. BTW doesn't always taste great, but I am mostly convinced it's healthy. As prob waffled before, I am generally unparanoid here - would hate to be that guy who insists on no ice in drinks in case it's not purified water (tho as it happens I seldom seem to see any ice in drinks anyway IIRC) - but a personal quirk after some bad experiences drinking unfiltered tap water (I think; hard to ever be sure of cause) is I don't clean teeth with raw tap water if I can avoid it. Not sure this has ever actually fucked me over, but it's a cheap and semi-rational affectation.)
Wed 1710 At El Federal, let's bash a bit more out.
So later on Sat evening I spotted an internet cafe near repair shop (itself about three blocks from flat) and although the guy at the counter had never head of Skype (I even wrote it on a bit of paper I got off him in case my accent was the problem) the computer I used anyway did have it on (and you can use it on their web site nowadays anyway, it turns out). And my parents weren't online but I typed a load of crap out to them in the chat (mispunctuated as fuck due to an unfamiliar kbd layout, and I never did figure out how to type an @ sign) in the hope they'd see it later. (Subsequently found out they didn't but maybe they just never looked.) I explained about the new temp email address and asked them to look in spam if they couldn't see it.
Later back in flat I managed to see a response from them on smart TV. But when I tried to reply the mail website just said "An error occurred" . Oh, well, if an *error* has occurred, never mind. An error, you say? Wow! I logged out and in and nothing helped. But at least I knew they knew and they were OK.
Sun morning I could no longer log in to email on smart TV; they had decided my account had maybe been hacked/attempted to be hacked and demanded a phone number as well as my security question answer. So that line of comms bit the dust. I set up an
outlook.com acct via smart TV (painful) and it didn't ask for phone no, but when I had laboriously typed out a message (the smart TV did have a pseudo-kbd on back of remote which was not v good but a bit better than using onscreen kbd and direction pad to choose a letter at a time) and send it, it turned out I needed to provide a phone no before I could send e-mails. Arseholes for not being clear up front.
Checked repair shop once or twice but unsurprisingly wasn't open.
Let's have another break for typing this.
1727 OK, let's carry on. Since I knew parents wouldn't be home til 8-11pm their time and repair shop clearly not open, I had nothing to do til then. So I walked over - maybe midday-ish? - to San Telmo for lunch at Bar Polo and had a bit of a sit and muse and wander round the (busy; remember it was Sunday) Parque Lezama. While lingering worries re phone and esp flight check in in its absence remained, I did quite enjoy this little excursion, and being phoneless did perhaps make me engage more with the city than I otherwise would.
In BP a late-honeymooning twentiesish couple (English woman, Italian bloke) ended up sitting at table in front of me (it was quite busy, and it's small; I have tended to sit right against back wall lately) and having a multilingual English-Spanish-Italian conversation with a fiftyish (?) Argentinian couple at next table. Argentinian bloke said BP was one of the best places in BA, there were people who had gone there every Sun for the last ten years, it wasn't really a tourist place.
So that night the internet cafe had used before was shut but went for walk and found a few near by; I need to know one open Sun in case I have to do online checkin from net cafe not phone next Sun, esp at that point when thinking may never get phone working but even now if website decides to be arsey on phone or wifi goes down etc. The one I ultimately used gave me a computer with broken audio but I managed to have a rather painful text chat with parents via Skype. In all comms I had been stressing they should ask me questions to prove it was me and not someone impersonating me but this proved a bit difficult; I don't think they read enough thrillers. ;-) They did OKish in the end though.
Anyway, apart from some mildly worrying message from people in flat below mine everything was OK. (That issue got 99% resolved by Mon evening and don't propose to waffle more about it here, except to observe it was adding a background layer of worry.) I half signed in to GMail and it looked like GM *would* send a 2FA code to parents' landline phone no and having proved my identity my parents were willing to relay it, but I got paranoid. (Having someone break into my GM could cause a world of hurt in terms of identity theft potential.) I had typed my pwd into net cafe computer openly without any obfuscatory copy and paste, so I thought that if I got in and then eg got a bunch of new 2FA codes to use at will, in principle the net cafe knew both my password and all those 2FA codes. So having established there was *prob* a way to get into GMail without burning my sole offline 2FA 8digit code, I decided not to actually go ahead with it that night. If the phone didn't get repaired, I'd Skype parents again on Mon and sign into GMail from different net cafe using copy-and-paste to obfuscate the password to reduce chances of a single entity having both password and 2FA codes.
I think I had a few beers in on my own in flat on either Sat or Sun night, but didn't go out anywhere either night.
Oh, Skype *also* required 2FA via email as logging in from unfamiliar device but mercifully they had an option to waive this for 7 days. Really should drop them a mail praising this. Had this not been there I'd probably have been forced to fall back on a) (best option if only I had thought of it before doing this writeup) calling my parents via phone from a call centre and getting access that way somehow, eg perhaps talking them through logging into gmail on my behalf b) buying a cheap non-smart phone and Argentinian PAYG SIM so I could get a working new email address and use that to re-establish internet comms with family (eg I could use it to set up a new Skype account).
Getting tired so let's break off again.
1745 OK, so Monday morning the cold water miraculously started again. It did suck a bit not having any water but it wasn't terrible; it was mostly galling cos I couldn't get in touch to report it (surely airbnb shouldn't be so fucking anal about 2FA; maybe don't let me make new reservations, but would letting me message my host kill them?).
I went over to repair shop maybe 1230 and it was open. Even more miraculously, my phone was fixed. I gave it a brief test (imitating some of tests had seen pink-haired woman do when handed it in, eg recording and playing back video to check camera and mike and speaker) and it seemed OK. I happily handed over 800 (best sixteen quid I've ever spent, maybe, and probably cheaper than it would have been to get it fixed in UK) and was heading out as woman at desk (not pink haired one, she was only there first time) was talking to someone else, but she called me back and gave me the invoicey thing back after writing date on it and told me I had a 30 day guarantee.
Except for the "come back at midday Sat" when they don't open Sat bit (which *might* have been language issues on my side) pretty chuffed with service TBH. I used the headphone socket Mon eve and used USB OTG on Tue eve and both worked, so it appears to be working perfectly. I'll give it a few weeks but if no nasty surprises appear I'll go see if they're on GM and give them a good review.
Anyway, so I got my Precious and scuttled back to my lair^Wflat. It's maybe 1pm at this point.
Fingers/arms hurting so take another break.
1759 Final stretch, maybe. Batt was still about same as when took phone in (18%ish) so just in case it went tits up somehow I forwarded the critical flight check in emails to parents. I should probably have grabbed myself some more 2FA 8-digit codes at this point, but having forwarded mails I felt a bit more confident and didn't do that til Tue night IIRC - probably foolish really. I kept charging phone (slowly but reliably, as was using crappy white Cordoba cable most of day, from power bank) and then burning through the battery on comms with airbnb hosts and parents (mostly re flat below message though also re forwarded flight mails which kept going missing). Did keep periodically feeling amazingly happy I had got my phone back and was out of the shit.
Don't think I went out Mon night (or anywhere more exciting than phone shop/supermarket during day). Perhaps oddly Mon was easily the day which got most wiped out by phone-related stuff, tho I guess really it was flat-below stuff, even tho it was the day I had the phone back safe and sound and repaired almost the whole day.
Is that it? Maybe. Let's stop and I can always add more later if I remember anything else.
Wed 0045 Yeah, have read through this and while language is sometimes a bit ungrammatical it's broadly intelligible and seems to have all the key events in. I'll post it and I can always comment on forgotten things in later entries.
