Αριθμός 10

Here in the Capital Federal, I find myself shifting, every few weeks, into new stages ('Etapas') of perception. My first 4 weeks in Buenos Aires – Etapa numero 1 – were marked by novelty, tranquility and the mild terror of the unfamiliar. Etapa numero 2 (weeks 4 through 8) was marked by acclimation, the comfort of routine and the spice of new friendship. My most recent Etapa (numero 3, week 8 through present) is marked by unconditional, glorifying love of Buenos Aires.

I am genuinely enamorada.

My most loyal reader-friends recognize that love of Buenos Aires is a recurrent theme woven throughout my blog posts. It's only of late, however, that I realize just how deeply I have fallen in love with this city. When I hold her in my mind, I feel in my heart the surging sensation of joy and bliss characteristic of any true enamorada. Like anyone who is in love, I see the object of my admiration with adoring eyes. I am quick to see BAires' beauty and even more quick to dismiss her faults.

Cada ciudad tiene su buena y su mala. ('Every city has its good and bad.')

Good. Bad. Ugly.

It’s really just a matter of perception.

Once upon a time, a wise friend pointed out that in the context of relationships we humans tend to systematically and discriminately select the details upon which we will focus. O sea, we choose which details of the person, object, or of the relationship itself, to focus on – good, bad or ugly.

Por ejemplo, when it comes to my mom (I’m using her as an example because, incidentally, she is sitting at this cafe with me, here in Buenos Aires, disfrutando a cappuccino and a book…!!) whenever I feel the stir of (appropriately) childlike frustration, I’ll remind myself to shift my focus away from the circumstance-induced triviality and towards the reasons I am so grateful that, by the divine graces of chance, she is the creature that gave me life. (Poetic digression: Life she gave me 25 years ago, guidance 22 years thereafter, and now, as I transition into my adulthood, she provides me with a unique blend of friendship occasionally punctuated by enlightened pedagogy. XO, Mom!) When I feel compelled to surrender to that familiar sense of frustration with her, or our relationship, I’ll force my focus – following some mental grappling – back towards gratitude and appreciation of her zest and spunk. Mucho mejor.

Please excuse my soliloquy. There’s a Point here, esteemed reader-friend. Promise.

A Point: Every person, every object, every relationship, has its good, its bad and its ugly. How we see the aggregate of goodness, badness and ugliness in a given person, object or relation – I believe – is a reflection of ourselves more than it is a reflection of the other. O sea, what we perceive in the other is dictated by the details on which we choose to focus.

I, in the fiel form of an enamorada, focus so intently on Buenos Aires’ good that I am often bewildered when confronted by her bad and ugly.

One piece of Buenos Aires’ bad that has me puzzled is the precariously complex social situation. Not a day passes in which I am not reminded – directly or incidentally – of the inseguridad. ‘La situacion esta mala.’ I feel ignorant, blind even, as daily I seek evidence of the 'bad.' Sure, I feel la inseguridad – that ubiquitous sense of mild-terror – but the bad… where is the bad?

Donde esta la mala?

I once wrote, 'Buenos Aires' streets are where her real magic is found.' Well, Buenos Aires' streets are also, so far as I can see, where la mala is found. La mala: Homeless people, asleep under meager plastic sheets, adorning storefronts and plazas; children and adults sprinkled throughout every barrio, shamelessly begging for monedas; unrelenting suspicion of taxi drivers and moto-scooter-ers; on trash-collection nights, people of nearly every age, rummaging through nearly every bag of trash, on nearly every block. The symptoms of poverty. And these are only the most obvious examples of la mala, that I perceive with my own eyes, on Buenos Aires’ streets. The worst of la mala, I can imagine, is not quite so obvious.

This coming Tuesday – 25 May 2010 – Argentina celebrates the Bicentenario, 200 years of independent statehood. In 200 years, Argentina has seen a lot of la mala: political instability and economic breakdown, a number of golpes de estado, and thousands of desaparecidos.

Yesterday I had the chance to observe, along with a group of fellow UBA students, the judicial taking-of-testimony for the ongoing ESMA (Escuela de Suboficiales de Mecánica de la Armada) trial. The ESMA trial is prosecuting top officials of Argentina’s 1976 to 1983 military dictatorship for harrowing human rights violations committed during their years of tenure. (It is uncontroverted fact that nearly 5000 innocent Argentine citizens were unlawfully detained, tortured and/or murdered at the ESMA facility during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship.)

One man testified on behalf of his mother and sister, both desaparecidas. When asked about his mother’s nature, he responded, through tears and overwhelmed by emotion: ‘Ella siempre me decia, cuando uno tiene la mirada limpia uno puede llegar a cualquier lado.' ('She always told me, when one has a clean perspective, one can arrive anywhere.') It is one etapa beyond ironic that someone with such a pure nature – someone that could offer such goodness of perspective – would be murdered at the hands of her own government.

The brave man's words – all of them – continue to haunt me 36 hours later. He concluded his testimony by stating: 'Solo quiero la verdad. Solo quiero justicia.'

Somewhere in Buenos Aires – I believe (I hope) – enveloped by the good, the bad and the ugly, la verdad and justicia exist.

The riddle remains: how and when will la verdad and justicia be revealed?


Like I said, I am bewildered when confronted with la mala of Buenos Aires (and Argentina, generally). It seems to me that the bad is so complex, so beyond what I can glean using my 5 senses of perception, almost out of reach, conceptually, for me as an extranjera.

My natural proclivity is to shift my focus away from la mala and back to la buena de BAires – the abundant art, the inspiring design, the epic dining, the barrios with souls of their own, the resilient people that day after day, in defiance of la mala, return to the streets to work, to play and to love – and retreat into the solace of a true enamorada.