Citizenship

For applying citizenship with criminal records I suggest you do it with legal assistance. It is possible but difficult.
You cannot stay here irregular with children, so, you have to get some kind of residency.
But having criminal records immigration might make it difficult. But, meanwhile, you citizenship case can advance and you can get citizenship before immigration reacts with a deportation orden.
 
I hear this talk about bribery all the time.

In Congo, bribery is common 24/7 in all walks of life. So I am pretty fluent in giving bribes to get day to day tasks done.

Here, been living in Argentina for almost 7 years - I have never encountered a situation where I was asked for a "bribe" either directly, indirectly or via a 3rd person!

A passive form of bribery very common in USA is "tipping" and if you don't tip, often a tip is demanded very aggresively in some states there. In 7 years here, I never remember a situation where anyone demanded a tip from here for services rendered.
I've been here for almost 10 years and have only encountered 2 times, personally, that I was in a situation where a bribe was or may have been a necessity. I started to write out the experiences but decided against it. No reason to self-incriminate. I've probably written about them before anyway.

I know a couple who were basically asked for a bribe in customs to get their belongings in under the 6 month residency limit and didn't pay and ended up getting their stuff stuck in storage for days and they ended up paying a bit of a bribe plus the storage fees incurred.

It's not rampant at civic levels between the public and officials, but it happens. The rampancy (at least formerly) was between people who "know" people who can get things done, and people who need things done. I have had seen it in person, not on a grand scale but at a business and personal level, and I won't say any more than that. I know that at least pre-Macri, anything that had to do with running a business, at least of any modest success, involved paying someone at sometime a bribe to keep the doors open, between police, health inspectors, fire inspectors, etc. As I understand it currently, business is much more difficult to do like that nowadays, as it was, and apparently encouraged, under the Kirchners but the people who would do this "facilitating" are finding it harder to find people in civil service to do the things they used to do.

I came in while Nestor was president and gradually saw how things were on that level as I know a number of people who have businesses in the city. That was just the way things were done, as far as I knew. And it either got more and more corrupt as we came towards the end of Cristina's final term, or I simply became more aware of it and how deep it went, and how easy it was to take advantage of if you knew someone, I don't know which.

As far as tips in the US, about the only thing I have ever tipped for (although an occasional cab ride or bellboy tip maybe but I wasn't a tourist in my own country and rarely had need for such services) would be food service. Waiters make a ridiculously low salary, and everyone knows it. In fact, the labor laws specifically allow for it, and the tax laws require that it be reported and taxed. The idea (as I'm betting you are aware ;) ) is that the actual service portion of your experience is subsidized by you, the customer, in order to give the waiter incentive to give good service. It's not a bribe at all, it is a business transaction, in the light of day. You are paying less for the food, ostensibly, than you would if the restaurant owner was subsidizing the waiter's salary as overhead; therefore a tip is a reasonable way for the client to express his support for good service, the amount according to the service received. I've left small or no tips for waiters in the US when I've gotten bad service. I couldn't care less if it bothers them. I pay a tip if I like the service.

Now, take waiters here. In my experience, I can go into a random restaurant with my wife and probably enjoy a decent experience. She's young, beautiful and the nicest person I've ever known in my life. She charms people when she smiles. And with a few exceptions, waiters here are male. If I'm coming in with friends, say for a table of 4 or maybe 6 for the first time, we will probably get not-so-good service. There will be all kinds of delays between getting menus, getting the order taken, waiting for the appetizers, getting the waiter's attention during the meal, waiting for the desert menu, getting the dessert, getting the table cleared off, getting the bill...and so on.

Some would say that's just the Argentine way; slow, untimely dinner, mixed results, no hurry, etc, etc. To an extent that is certainly true. But the pace should be set by the customer, not the waiter. And in fact, if I and my friends go to a place where we like the food but the service was questionable, and as long as the waiter was amiable, we'll tip the guy enough to get his attention. Somewhere between 5% and maybe 10%. After a couple of trips like that, all of the sudden we are old friends to the waiter and he's much more attentive, we get good advice on what to order and dinners go smoother, more at our pace and when we want it. To get good service I have to pay a tip.

Big difference I see there is that in the States the waiters are poorly paid on purpose to make them work for good service and let the client himself be the judge. Here, waiters belong to a union, are often nice, but others often arrogant and none are often very attentive, and they are paid reasonably well for that level of work. Everyone here enjoys strong labor laws and there is not as much incentive between that and a unionized salary to provide more service than you feel like at any given moment and one must at times at least pay a tip to get good service.

Which one would really be the bribe?

And I have been to many restaurants here, though admittedly most often the tourist restaurants, where the client is handed the bill and reminded vocally by the waiter or waitress that the amount does not include a tip.

Also, have you not been to parillas where there is a tip jar or plate out on the bar or divider wall, or on a stand, etc, to put a tip in for the parillero? They watch to see who puts a tip in there and if they remember you and you didn't tip, if you come back you might not enjoy your next cut of meat too much...
 
My impression since childhood has always been that to get anything done in ARG, bribes of one form or another were routine, and no one cared. I know my dad several times greased the way for paperwork to get through the Depto de Policia regarding some passport issue, sometimes cash but also a few nice Mont Blanc pens and expensive French perfume as "thank you gifts".

And back earlier than that, during the 70s & 80's when we'd come over for summer/winter vacations, my grandfather routinely bribed his way through Ezeiza to do everything from being allowed to meet us at the bottom of the plane stairs on the tarmac, to not having our luggage inspected, to getting through the immigration lines in front of everyone else. Once he had our luggage taken off the plane special and brought out to our car without even going through the baggage claim(!). My grandfather was old school and a successful rancher back in the Peron era and knew his way around the people you needed to know and lines between what was legal and not were very blurred. It was just the normal way of things, especially during the dictatorship era.

I don't know how much things have changed since then, maybe it's just not as obviously open as it used to be.
 
I certainly appreciate everyone's feedback. Even the punctuation nazi's! I'm not sure if anyone has noticed but even some of the nicest school districts in the US have to deal with children bringing guns to school. This concerns me along with the huge heroin epidemic overtaking the US. Combine that with the daily bombardment of narcicism from the millenial generation(and their kids!) and I'm afraid I'm gonna wake up with two miniature gangster wannabees. I'm sure any parents on this site can appreciate where I'm coming from. As far as bribes go, I'm not into that. I prefer to keep it legitimate. It's just easier in the long run. Regarding that felony well it sure wasn't drug smuggling or murder, just an excessive bar fight. So remember kids, always wear the home teams jersey when going to a bar to watch "the game"! Thank you Steveinbsas, I'll read those links you posted over coffee. The other concern about the kids mother is unnecessary, she's no longer with us, past away 41/2 years ago. Last question then I'll tap out, if you woke up one day and had the means to relocate anywhere and do anything would you still be in Argentina? I'm hoping someone with kids will say yes because the US seems on the verge of major changes that I'd like to avoid. Thanx! And yes I purposely spelled it wrong!
 
narcissism from millennials' kids? Would they be in preschool still or am I already that old?

Also, to your question: I wake up every morning a free person with the ability to live in large parts of the world and I choose to stay in Argentina, as I have for the past 7 years.
 
I have been here since 1979 almost 38 years.I have had no children.,luckily,I believe.If I did have any I would have had to educate them well in private schools and then see them go back to the U:S: to make their working careers as many of my fiends with children had to do.
Simply put, here until the beginning of this year 2016 there really wasn't too much to make a real career out of unless you belonged to a cerain social strata.Even then the jobs weren't anything we would" write home about "
Now,however,Argentina ,if everyone pulls together,will soon begin to become what many people who came here hoped it would be, a country with a real economy and promising future.Maybe even for you and your children Mr Roth.
I always remind my Argie friends,"Remember Jorge Newbwery was from the U.S. too".
 
My family is from Paraguay. My wife and I brought three of her much younger sisters here for better schools. However, that is not an indication of how good Argentine schools are, but rather how bad Paraguayan schools are. Our girls are/were in middle-level Catholic schools. We've had traffic with three different schools, trying to find one that is reasonably good at teaching the children and we haven't found one yet. The latest is very highly rated and quite expensive. We managed to get a beca (a scholarship, but not really as we think about it - the sister in charge of the school liked our youngest and decided to give us a 50% discount). Problem is, this school believes in group work, which we didn't realize how strongly until her first trimester there in two different classes has bad grades because there are 5 groups and they are not allowed to do any work assigned in class outside the group and the kids in her group can't seem to get together to get their work done. First time we've encountered this or even heard of it in 8 years since our eldest came to live with us.

Usually the problem is teachers not giving a crap. Teaching Peronism in history class with the history teacher's eyes glazed over with adoration for Juan D or Evita. Telling the kids they should have listened when the teacher was giving a lecture when the student goes to ask for clarification or didn't understand something or needs help. Teaching half of what is actually on a test. Sending kids and their parents on wild goose chases trying to find books that teachers assign without even checking on the availability in the city (we've been three weeks now trying to find a book for one of our youngest's classes.) and so on.

And that's just our private schools, and not half of the idiocies we encounter. My wife has nieces and nephews in public schools and they are much worse!

I've raised three kids in the States, though it has been 10 years. If I had any way to bring our three girls (and two more and one more boy in Paraguay) to study in the States I would in a heartbeat. Our oldest, who is UADE at university, is working towards a interchange with a US school quite determinedly.

Don't believe all the self-hating propaganda in the States. Some of it is probably spot on, but at least when compared to what I've seen here and in Paraguay - well, people ought to get out and experience the difference. Just not with kids, in my opinion.
 
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