Today we went to exchange $500 for Pesos at a Casa de Cambio in Belgrano. Waiting in a long queue with locals waiting to buy dollars, we offered to exchange our crisp new $100 bills straight from our Uruguayan bank for their torn, tattered Pesos at a mid rate beneficial for both parties. The Argentinians all refused our offer, claiming the our Dollars were too “new” for their liking, and exhibited a preference to continue waiting in their queue to buy “old” Dollars at a worse rate. Once it was our turn at the exchange window, the Casa de Cambio refused to exchange our Dollars because my wife's Uruguayan passport and Cedula were apparently not sufficient proof of her legal status in Argentina, only the flimsy, white entry document/ receipt issue at the border, which we did not have with us, would suffice to prove our worthiness to exchange our foreign Dollars for their beloved Pesos . Dejected, we went home and were only able to exchange our rejected Dollars at the local “Chino” who apparently had no problem with either the newness of our Dollars or our documented immigration status.
From our experience, I learned several important lessons in Argentine Financial crisis management:
1. The Argentine in the street prefers to waste time waiting in a queue to overpay for an inferior product, rather than take any initiative to work for a mutual benefit.
2.Despite a grave and urgent need for Dollars by Argentina in the midst of a hard currency financial crisis, mindless bureaucracy still triumphs over common sense and logic.
3. There is no viable path to the “gradual reform” of the Argentine mindset of contagious mass panic, mistrust of his fellow Argentine, over reliance on stifling bureaucracy and an inability to compete in a world market of more entrepreneur minded peoples, if only epitomised by the local “Chino”.
