Feliz Cinco De Mayo Y Dia De Independencia!

Another year has flown by. Have I really been in Argentina for ten years?

Happy Cinco de Mayo to anyone who needs an excuse to start drinking at noon, regardless of how they feel about Mexico.

Yes, I know May 5th is not the official Dia de Independencia in Mexico. It's my day of independence from Mexico after living there for five years.

At this moment thirteen years ago today I set foot on Argentine soil for the first time.

I'm still here with no desire to live anywhere else.

At least not on my present budget (which hasn't changed since my arrival). 5787
 
I just remembered that today is also the ninth anniversary of the only time I was extorted by an "official" in Argentina...less than 30 minutes after my arrival at EZE.

The vet at EZE demanded $100 USD to allow my dog to enter Argentina with me.

It was actually a good thing as the customs official left me alone after seeing I was involved in a "serious discussion" with the vet.

When viewing scanned images, she had observed "metal" objects in my locked suitcases. She was going to ask me to open them but turned her attention to other arrivals instead.

The objects she saw were two small bronze sculptures (both "studies" for larger pieces) by Tom Bennett. If she had googled Bennett Sculpture she might have wanted to charge me duty even though I bought them on ebay for a fraction of the gallery price years earlier.

It actually took a couple months to "regret" bringing them, when my Argentine girlfriend threw them at me after she discovered I went to AFIP on my own to get a CDI.There was more damage to the fake wood-grain floor of the apartment I was renting than there was to me.

She didn't get really violent until I asked her to watch my dog while I went to Bariloche to look at property .
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Sounds like it's been a thrill a minute. And that's better?
 
Sounds like it's been a thrill a minute. And that's better?

My answer is yes, there have been thrilling moments since my arrival in Argentina and, yes, living in Argentina has been much better than living in Mexico.

My house in Mexico was invaded twice at night while I was in bed. I didn't hear or see the second intruder (who stole some new sheets and some canned food), but the first one actually entered my bedroom at five AM. I was fully dressed and he ran away when I jumped out of bed and shouted at him to get the F out of my house. He was probably about 5'6" and I'm 6'2".

About thirty minutes later he invaded another expat's house (high above mine) and actually fought with the owner, saying he would kill him with the knife he was holding. As they fought, the expat was able to turn the knife the attacker was holding and plunge it into his abdomen.

I could hear the screams of the expat's wife as it happened. By the time I got to their house the attacker had fled, leaving a trail of blood. l considedr myself incredibly fortunate that I was not on the receiving end of that knife a half hour earlier. I was equally happy that my friends were also unharmed.

Before my Argentine girlfriend threw the sculptures at me (which I mentioned in the post you quoted), I had not been the object of violence of any kind since high school

When I asked her to watch my dog while I went to Bariloche to look at property, her response was to smack me on the side of the head. This resulted in permanent hearing loss to my left ear.

Fortunately, prior to this (third and final) violent incident.she ordered me to get out of a taxi in calle Cordoba a block or two before reaching her office building. She didn't want anyone in her workplace to see that she had been with me for over two hours after telling her boss she was just going to the bank. We had been at the office of the lawyer that she insisted that I use to apply for temporary residency.

I still had to walk past her building to get to the Callo subte station to return to my apartment in Recoleta. Standing directly in front of her building was a beautiful young woman with a clipboard. She was conducting "sidewalk surveys for a nutritional supplement company.

To make a long story short, two months later (after I fled the apartment of my Argentine girlfriend for the last time) I called the woman I met in the street. She helped me get residency without the lawyer, then helped me through the process of buying an apartment, and then moved in with me.

I have no regrets whatsoever about my decision to live in Argentina instead of staying in Mexico and I have never been happier in my life than I am now, living at my present location. The noise level is never annoying (let alone intolerable), even though there is an outdoor local for "eventos" about 400 meters down the street from my house, and I can hardly ever hear my closest neighbors (200 meters behind me), either.

When I'm outside during the day I occasionally hear roosters in the distance, but I never hear them when I'm inside. That's a huge difference from the dozen or so fighting cocks crowing at each other 24/7 in their cages less than 40 meters from my bedroom window in Sayulita.

PS: Geog,graphically speaking, moving to Argentina in 2006 (after coming for two months for a look-see) is still the second best move I have made in my life.

Moving to Park City, Utah in 1975 (after buying a vacant lot on Main Street in 1973) is still the first. 5789
 
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My answer is yes, there have been thrilling moments since my arrival in Argentina and, yes, living in Argentina has been much better than living in Mexico.

My house in Mexico was invaded twice at night while I was in bed. I didn't hear or see the second intruder (who stole some new sheets and some canned food), but the first one actually entered my bedroom at five AM. I was fully dressed and he ran away when I jumped out of bed and shouted at him to get the F out of my house. He was probably about 5'6" and I'm 6'2".

About thirty minutes later he invaded another expat's house (high above mine) and actually fought with the owner, saying he would kill him with the knife he was holding. As they fought, the expat was able to turn the knife the attacker was holding and plunge it into his abdomen.

I could hear the screams of the expat's wife as it happened. By the time I got to their house the attacker had fled, leaving a trail of blood. l considedr myself incredibly fortunate that I was not on the receiving end of that knife a half hour earlier. I was equally happy that my friends were also unharmed.

Before my Argentine girlfriend threw the sculptures at me (which I mentioned in the post you quoted), I had not been the object of violence of any kind since high school

When I asked her to watch my dog while I went to Bariloche to look at property, her response was to smack me on the side of the head. This resulted in permanent hearing loss to my left ear.

Fortunately, prior to this (third and final) violent incident.she ordered me to get out of a taxi in calle Cordoba a block or two before reaching her office building. She didn't want anyone in her workplace to see that she had been with me for over two hours after telling her boss she was just going to the bank. We had been at the office of the lawyer that she insisted that I use to apply for temporary residency.

I still had to walk past her building to get to the Callo subte station to return to my apartment in Recoleta. Standing directly in front of her building was a beautiful young woman with a clipboard. She was conducting "sidewalk surveys for a nutritional supplement company.

To make a long story short, two months later (after I fled the apartment of my Argentine girlfriend for the last time) I called the woman I met in the street. She helped me get residency without the lawyer, then helped me through the process of buying an apartment, and then moved in with me.

I have no regrets whatsoever about my decision to live in Argentina instead of staying in Mexico and I have never been happier in my life than I am now, living at my present location. The noise level is never annoying (let alone intolerable), even though there is an outdoor local for "eventos" about 400 meters down the street from my house, and I can hardly ever hear my closest neighbors (200 meters behind me), either.

When I'm outside during the day I occasionally hear roosters in the distance, but I never hear them when I'm inside. That's a huge difference from the dozen or so fighting cocks crowing at each other 24/7 in their cages less than 40 meters from my bedroom window in Sayulita.

PS: Geog,graphically speaking, moving to Argentina in 2006 (after coming for two months for a look-see) is still the second best move I have made in my life.

Moving to Park City, Utah in 1975 (after buying a vacant lot on Main Street in 1973) is still the first. View attachment 5789

How long did you stay with the clipboard lady?
Did she become violent while you were with her?
 
How long did you stay with the clipboard lady?
Did she become violent while you were with her?
Until I moved to my present location in 2010.
She was never violent.

She is the sweetest woman I have even known.
We're still friends and my door is always open.

And she isn't Argentine....5801

PS: She'll get a big laugh when I tell her she is now known as "the clipboard lady."
 
I am "celebrating" my arrival in Argentina fifteen years ago today and I'm happier than ever I made the move (especially to my present location in "el campo" almost eleven years ago where I am still "Going Galt in Argentina" as my signature used to read).

If I wasn't an Athiest, I would thank God for making me move to Argentina.

Instead, I'll thank Ayn Rand for making me an Athiest.

PS: I'm also still very grateful to the Argentine woman (in Sayulita, Mexico) who urged me to visit Buenos Aires before moving to Paris in 2006, especially after seeing what has happened to France (especially Paris) since then.
 
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I am "celebrating" my arrival in Argentina fifteen years ago today and I'm happier than ever I made the move (especially to my present location in "el campo" almost eleven years ago where I am still "Going Galt in Argentina" as my signature used to read).

If I wasn't an Athiest, I would thank God for making me move to Argentina.

Instead, I'll thank Ayn Rand for making me an Athiest.

PS: I'm also still very grateful to the Argentine woman (in Sayulita, Mexico) who urged me to visit Buenos Aires before moving to Paris in 2006, especially after seeing what has happened to France (especially Paris) since then.
Steven, I am very pleased for you.

Make it a very happy anniversary. It is a special day.

A word to all those who think about doing what you have done. "DO IT - MAKE IT HAPPEN - LIFE IS TOO SHORT to play it safe.
 
When adding the PS to my previous post, I acidentally omitted this:

I chatted (in whatsapp) with the (still sweet as ever) "clipboard lady" yesterday. Her response to the fact that it had been fifteen years was "OMG!!!"

That was the reason I then wrote:

"If I wasn't an Athiest, I would thank God for making me move to Argentina.

Instead, I'll thank Ayn Rand for making me an Athiest."

And I'll take the opportunity now to add thanks to the anit-Ayn Rand ranter who assumed that my use of the expresssion "Going Galt in Argentina" was an endorsment of anything she ever wrote and began showing us how shallow a man in his late 60's can be.

His conclusion was no more "justified" than anyone assuming I agreed with anything Horace Greely ever wrote when I followed his adive to "Go west young man." when I moved to Park City, Utah from Bloomington, Illinois in 1975.

Which I now regard as the second best move of my life.
 
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