Merry Christmas From The Gauchos!!!

We would like to take this opportunity to wish you all warm and happy Christmas. If you can, spend it with your families. We can't and at times like this one we learn to appreciate the presence of the people we care about most in the world. This goes out to all of our families in Poland and Hungary, our moms and dads, who - although it's hard for them - never, even for a second stopped us from chasing our dreams and fully supported us all the way. This goes out to my brother Michal, who - I am sure - does what he can to substitute me while I'm away.

This also goes out to all of you, people that we met in Budapest or any other part of the world - our friends. Especially in my case, having such a fantastic crowd around me for so many years was like having another family. We shared many great moments and in times of doubt we could always count on all of you. We miss you all like mad, but we're sure to see you soon.

We wish you to have the faith in your dreams and the courage to fulfill them. Dare to raise the level for yourselves every time. We wish you to have the patience when things don't turn out as you planned and tolerance not to blame others for digging holes under you. Remember that every failure is a lesson bound to make you stronger and wiser. Remember that everything happens for a reason. We wish you all to achieve your goals, whether it is to become successful, famous or simply a better person. To all those who want to make the world a better place to live we send extra strength, we hope it will guide you along the righteous path, please remember that no one is truly evil, and even your worst enemies were kids one day. We wish you lots of love, because in the end all that's left of us are memories in the hearts of those who loved us. Whatever you do and wherever you are don't forget where you come from and who you met along your way.

Sending all the love from World's End,

Niki & Marcin a.k.a. The Gauchos

Uruguay: Grilled Hungarians, Los Santos and Sexy Underwear.

Hola locos!

Yesterday we returned from our little trip to Uruguay. We didn't have much time, because we both work and can only use the 2 free days a week that we have. Either way Niki did a splendid job planning the trip (and moaning about me not helping her :)), an effort worth of the attention of the most advanced logistics companies. We took a ferry from Buenos Aires across the Rio de la Plata to Colonia de Sacramento, then a quick transfer to Montevideo and another bus to Piriapolis, which was our destination. Niki didn't sleep the night before our trip, because we had to leave very early in the morning and she still had to do one late night show for Telemedia, which left her pretty much no options whatsoever. We drank a quick coffee and off we went. The ride to Colonia is only 50 minutes with a ferry, then some 2 hours to Montevideo and a bit more than an hour to Piriapolis. Our dream would have been to go to Punta Del Diablo, but it's too far out north, we didn't have time for that.

Anyway Piriapolis is a cool little town on the southern coast of Uruguay. Niki found a small hostel for us to crash there for one night. It's still very early into the season so it was almost empty (except for one American dude and a Polish chick that we never met). We also had luck with the weather - it was very hot while we were day, it only got a bit worse the next day when we were leaving anyway.  

It was great to get out of Buenos Aires, my first time ever since we arrived here. It felt like just about time to lay around on a beach and scorch our skin in the mid-day sun. And so we did. Uruguay is a bit more expensive than Argentina, but as we found out later the salaries are not necesarily higher. As one old man told us: 'it's always been this way'. I didn't get deeper into that.

Curious thing that day was, that already when we arrived we noticed a huge smoke in the middle of the town, but we thought that it must be under control since no one showed any sign of interest. It was only until some 5 hours later that the Bomberos (firemen) woke up from their siesta and pulled out all their heavy water artillery, driving in a frenzy to the site in question and spilling impressive amounts of water on their way. At that time we were comfortably seated in a nearby bar, sipping on cold beer, watching the spectacle with growing astonishment, as soon helicopters joined in. I guess the pilots must have been a bit excited about their assignment as at times, they descended towards the sea to refill the water tank, but then hurried right away, probably thinking that it's already full. In my humble opinion it was far from it, but then again perhaps that's why I don't reinforce the ranks of Uruguayan Bomberos.

The next day we had a plan to rent some bikes and cycle out of town to some more natural beach. We ate a quick breakfast (how long can you eat bread with butter, eh?) and went to the city to rent the bikes. The bikes, as expected, were of the commonly known 'playera' brand (read: plashera). For some strange reason they enjoy a cult status in both Argentina and Uruguay (I assume it's no different in other countries on South America), and even though the name suggests that they're suitable for riding even in loose sands of a beach, they sink in just as nicely as any other bicycle. Mine hardly had any breaks too, but I enjoy a challenge :). We found a nice beach and continued to scorch our skins from where we abandoned this activity the day before. We fulfilled this task with great success, even today my back and face is completely red...

Around 4 o'clock we got on a bus back to Montevideo to spend our last night there. I must say that the city is quite nice. I would even say that perhaps it's more enjoyable than Buenos Aires, simply because it's smaller but then again, due to lack of time, we didn't explore it too much, especially it's outskirts. We visited the old town though and even went down to check out the sea. It's interesting that walking the streets of the old town you can see the sea in 3 directions. There are plenty of old buildings, and it would be a cool place to open a hostel, some of those buildings are in fact deserted. The hotel where we stayed was also an interesting one, situated in an old house, few blocks away from the old town. It gave me an impression of being in some movie about Cuba or another exotic place - high ceilings, minimum furniture and all of it quite old. Lots of people live in such hotels for months, I imagine... Some workers or bohemian travelers that don't identify themselves with the 'backpackers hostel' accommodation. 

During our walk through the city we saw a couple of eyebrow raising things. First of all we found a small shop that, according to it's information, sold religious stuff. A quick glance at the shopping window allowed us to discover that side by side with little figures of saints, the shop offered a variety of sexy tangas. The second thing we discovered was when we went to eat and in the menu we spotted a familiarly named dish called Hungaras. After an inquiry with the waiter we learned that it's a type of grilled sausage, very popular with Uruguayans. Is it possible that fame of Hungarian sausages reached Uruguay?  

Opinion Is Like An Ass. Everyone's Got One.

Hola boludos!

I guess we aren't as prolific about this little space lately as one might think, so first of all apologies (again) for not giving a sign of life for some time. It doesn't mean that there's not that much happening, I suppose it just means that we simply are lazy, but to justify this, we would say that we just work a lot.

'The sun is shining! The weather is sweet..' and that's exactly what's happening here. Actually it gets hotter every day, even now, at 20:48 pm the temperature is around 27 C. I have a funny feeling that we're down for some suffering in the upcoming months as we don't have air condition in our flat.. The good thing is that we're in shadow more or less, so it's still cooler than outside. Everyone I know says that in from January it will be impossible to compute simple mathematical tasks, and it's not really due to the temperature but due to humidity that kicks in around that time.

To cut the long story short: we've been here for almost 3 months now, so I figure it's time for some honest opinions about life in Buenos Aires. I can say straight away that it's not as peachy as one might have thought (if there is such a person). I must say that it's kind of awkward for me, because when I come to think about it we had just unbelievable luck with the way things worked out for us - Niki's job, the flat, etc. However there's this strange thing about human nature, that no matter what we have, it always leaves us wanting for more. There's always something to complain about. Now, I don't want to be an ungrateful prick, but as I said, I will write honestly about the way we feel.  

Some of you asked me about the people here.

I have some Argentine friends still from Hungary, and if they are reading this I hope they don't get offended by what I am going to say, after all it's not my intention to hurt someone, but I do want to speak my mind directly and state my opinion. Please remember that it's an early opinion, that formed itself after only 3 months, but nevertheless it's an opinion and I wouldn't be honest with myself if I wrote something else. I hope it will change though..

I wouldn't say that I dislike Argentines, but there are definitely some things about them that annoy me, or - perhaps - I haven't come to understand them fully. First of all, after all this time we've been here we really don't have Argentine friends... and shoot me but I don't know why. I have some theories, though. As I go back in time and recall the first years of my stay in Hungary, I didn't have any Hungarian friends neither. It took some 2 years to 'break the spell'. For a long time I thought that Hungarians are just cold people, but I wouldn't be the first one to sign such a statement now. Now I think that it simply takes some time to understand the culture, learn the way people talk, and the way they tend to think. All in all it's a lengthy process and I can understand that it's not easy for a person to come from another corner of this planet and blend in straight away. 

The Argentine culture is a bit different. It's not that people here are cold, at least not at first sight. I would say they are reserved with outsiders. When you come here, the first thing you notice is that people are open, that they don't lurk in the corners and talk quietly for you not to overhear their precious secrets. They like to talk loud (just like Croatians.. hehe), shout even, and the way they talk Spanish has much more melody than in Spain, for instance. But when you're an outsider it all comes to a sudden halt. I consider myself to be a rather tolerant person and I always try to understand the differences, so I am not mad or disappointed at this, in fact in fuels my determination to 'break the spell', just as it happened in Hungary. The bottom line is that in a country that was built by immigrants, one can still be considered an outsider. Sure, people will be nice to you. You can go out and meet some folks in a bar and have a good chat with them, but that's it. Once the night comes to an end you both go your separate ways and there's no 'hey what's your phone number, we should do this again sometime'. Yes, I am generalizing, because there's no other way for me to show you the vibe that I feel is present here, the vibe that I feel when I am around Argentines. 

Niki tells me from time to time, that she's kind of disappointed about atmosphere in Telemedia here. In Hungary there's just a bunch of foreigners working there and although she's Hungarian she was always open with people coming from all over the world. She thought that it must be kind of hard for them to blend in - new workplace, new faces, people talking language that you can't really place, language that all in all is very difficult to learn. So she always tried to make it easier for them, take them to places, make them meet her friends and give them an opportunity to see life in Budapest from a perspective of a Hungarian. Hell, I can honestly say that it was the moment I met Niki that opened many doors for me. That was the moment I met many of you guys, who are my friends now. On the other hand, here it's different. There is no feeling of community, that sort of we're-all-in-the-same-boat vibe. To say the truth, as I was given a chance in Telemedia too, I felt like we aren't really welcomed there. Of course not from all the people, but still I felt like some strange species that everyone is looking at, wondering what am I doing there. No one really asks us out and most of the plans about going out are made without us taken into consideration. It's a little bit sad for us, but I am sure that once we've spent enough time here, it will change.

Another thing I noticed about Argentines is that they are always helpful. But don't get too excited yet. I realized after about 2 months here, that everyone would say that they were willing to help you. I met many people that offered their help and talked about possibilities, people they know and places they can get me in, but unfortunately it ends right there. When I was looking for a job, I met many people that wanted to help me find something more suitable to my abilities, so I sent my CV to a whole lot of them, but I never heard from them any more. After a while I stopped believing them. There's a good word for that here: 'chamullo'. It's not to say 'lie'. It rather means a harmless, little, white lie that doesn't really hurt anyone, it's just something meant to upgrade the reality as opposed to what it actually is. There's a similar phenomenon that I remember from Spain - if you're lost and ask for directions, no Spaniard will ever tell you that he/she doesn't know, instead they will tell you to the best of their abilities, which unfortunately often is quite wrong. They don't mean anything wrong, they actually do want to help you, but either because of their actual knowledge or their mentality, they can't and they won't admit it.

To end this on a lighter note: we are invited to a new year's party at a beach somewhere outside Buenos Aires by a girl who works with Niki - Cecilia. It seems like things are slowly changing :D 

Another thing that bothers us is that we really work a lot here. Most of the people work a lot in Buenos Aires. The working day ends around 20.00 and it is then that the subte is packed with people going home from their work. The problem with this is that we don't really have time to see anything in Buenos Aires, let alone Argentina, where you have to travel for a long time to get anywhere. This is especially valid for Niki's job as she has a quite weird schedule. Some days she has programs until 6 am and is the single person with the most shows per week. I can understand that she's the new one, and it's the freshmen who get screwed the most, but sometimes it's a bit over the top. I hope that it will change soon. On the other hand, I work 7 hours a day, which is still all right (if it wasn't for what I do), but this way we hardly ever see each other with Niki - she doesn't work during the day when I am at work, but when I come home, she has to go and do some shows and comes back when I am already asleep. There's not much we can do about it, the money Niki earns with Telemedia is incomparable to anything else. I still look for another job, as TM decided that I am 'too quiet' to handle this job (this is actually a subject I am not going to elaborate on at this point).

We plan to go to Uruguay next week. My visa expires around that time, and I have a choice either to pay to prolong it or just re-enter the country. The second option is better as at least I will finally get out of Buenos Aires, after 3 months of continuously being here.  

Be good and dress up warm! We'll be reporting to you shortly.

Sharing some photos with you my dear friends

Hello Guys,
This is Niki now! I thought I put some photos here from the past one month :)
This is here the view from our window:

And this is our street:



Lots of trees I like it a lot!

And here you have Plaza Serrano,which is a nice square full with bars and restaurant, but the intresting thing is that on the weekends from 3 pm to 8 pm it becomes a big market of indepentent designers, and almos all the bars become clothes shops. Take a look at it!

And the proof that Christan and Peter was here with us :) (And also Akos but I dont have photo of him)

And this is me and Ale making stupid photos before going out on one Friday (we are a bit drunk) :)

So thats it for today, I hope you'll enjoy the photos, lots of kisses!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Free Rice

Guys!

This is the best website I have seen in a very, very long time. Thanks to Joker for posting this:

FREE RICE

Everyone, go dig up your Webster's and help feed the world.

p.s. I am really ashamed to ask, but I've been trying to figure this out for and hour still no good idea, so I'll just ask straight: who is Joker?

edit: Zsuzsi :D Got ya!

Travelling Without Moving

Hi All!

Finally I have my day off! It felt like ages since last time..
Especially since my wonderful employer came up with yet another set of idiotic rules as to how we're supposed to do our job. You know, it's already busting my balls enough that I have to send
+500 "really creative messages" (read: lies) a day, and I really don't miss anyone making it harder for me. Just when I managed to make the workflow a bit more Marcin-friendly by creating a "fire and forget" list of the "most frequent moronic questions you ever imagined", triggered by the magic commands CTRL+C / CTRL+V (someone should fund a monument to the guy who invented it, provided that it's not Bill Gates, cuz nothing can save this guy in my eyes), now it appears that we are strictly forbidden to use copy/paste. That means that I have to type messages like "Hello there, I am Pisti, your personal psychic master and I will use the best of my powers to help you understand your life better! Text me your name and date of birth, so that I can connect to your aura." And I have to do it hundreds and hundreds times a day. Believe me. It's bloody frustrating.

Anyhow, hopefully I won't have to do it for much longer. In fact, by the time you've read this I will have returned from a job interview later today. Fingers crossed!

Two days ago it was the first time when I had a third degree encounter with the kafkesque absurd, that strikes randomly in many countries of South Amercia.. Apparently there was a serious clash of taxi and truck drivers with police. The drivers were protesting against the new bill, restricting conditions of obtaining a commercial driving licence. The protest erupted into violence and 22 were injured (don't worry only 5 protesters, the rest - policemen). If you feel like it, watch the video about the protest (spanish only):



Here you can read more about the background of the protest.

The consequences of the protest were the very reason why I call this situation an absurd, and - more importantly - a good lesson for the government of Capital Federal, as to why it is not advised to mess with the people, and better think twice before taking such step. In response to police violence, the taxi drivers announced a 24 hour strike. Soon the truck drivers joined, followed by bus drivers, and Subte and regional railways workers. That meant that the following day it would be virtually impossible to get anywhere unless you have a car / bike / rollerblades / skateboard. By midnight the strike was suspended, but before that my supervisors found themselves in a quite difficult situation, as the @#$%^& service must go on 24h, 365 days a year. So they started organizing us in groups, predefined by our locations and who has a car. Everyone in the office was running around in a frenzy, shouting explicit statements about the country they live in, and - occasionally - asking me whether we have such things where I come from. Well, I certailny cannot recall a situation when either Warsaw or Budapest was completely paralyzed, I kept saying. Here, on the other hand, it happens once a year on avarage, I heard in reply.

I was meaning to tell you more about the transportation system of Buenos Aires anyway, because it's quite fun. My personal favourite are buses, called "colectivos" here, or "bondis" if you prefer to use slang. I must say that the bus network here by far surpasses anything I have ever seen anywhere else, and this is to the simple reason that each line is operated and owned by a separate company. Due to that simple solution we have buses running 24/7, and there are many more of them than in any other city I lived in (although, sadly, this contributes to the heavy pollution of Buenos Aires). There is never a situation when you have to wait too long for a bus, actually sometimes you choose to stay 30 sec. more and get on the next bus, just to enjoy the comfort of having a sitting place. For most destinations within the city limits you pay 0.80 peso, with short distance trips costing 0.75 and the outskirts ventures 1.20, which is also the cheapest I have ever seen. Each line has different livery, and the colors are bright and vivid (you get to see rasta buses, like the 59 line we used to take when we lived in Olivos). The other curious thing is that you enter only through the front door (like in Spain for example), and the order of entering is determined by the time you arrived to the bus stop, meaning that passengers form a line to enter a bus. I was literarily shocked by this! On one hand living in Buenos Aires is a chaotic ride at 160 km/h, and on the other, you quietly form a line on a bus stop. Can you imagine it happening in Budapest? I actually can. And the transport system would benefit from it. Also, typically, the front row seats are reserved for those who are willing to entertain the bus drivers on the course of their ride. You must pay attention only when getting off - door opens at the avarage speed of 40km/h, thus giving you the proper momentum to continue your trip on foot. So, yeah, I love buses here! The only moment I hate them is when they stop next to our house, as the windows in the flat start to shake.. But I'll probably get used to it after a while, I don't have to much choice either way, do I?

Next on the line is Subte - Buenos Aires' subway (metro? foldalatti? tube?) system. All the lines are situated not so deep and that makes it similar to the Budapest foldalatti. The first line began operating in 1930', and I recon the cars we see nowadays sometimes still remember those days. Subte system is enthusiastically criticized by every living soul here, mostly due to the fact that the trains and cars are so old. There are six lines: A, B, C, D, E, F, and the recently opened H line, but I don't count it in as there are some problems with it. Either way I only had the pleasure of riding the D and B lines, I think I also tried out the C line once, but the rest take us to areas of Buenos Aires, where one has to "walk the walk, and talk the talk", so we pass on this for the time being. Good thing about Subte is that it is also cheap (0.70 peso to enter and you can ride as much as you want, as many lines as you want, provided that you don't exit, 'cause then you have to pay again), and it's easy to get it and get out, which is important to anyone, who thinks that humans were not designed to live underground (like me). And the best thing about Subte is that very often you get to see some shows on it, like short theatre pieces, music, comedy, acrobatics and magic. People receive this entertainment very warmly, cheer and clap, so very often, ride on subte can be quite an experience.

I received an amazing video from my brother, called "Poles in UK". I laughed my socks off!
Check it out:



Now I also decided that every week, I will share with you some cool stuff I found on the net, whether it is about South America or not, just so that you know what caught my eye lately. I encourage you all to do the same, simply because the idea of sharing is meant to work both ways, duh..

music:

Natty Combo
Karamelo Santo
Orquestra Jungla
Running Potatoes

films:

Lives Of Others
Reign Over Me (finally a good movie with Adam Sandler)
American Gangster (don't take it too seriously though, that guy was not as cool as in the movie)
1408
Sicko (although I find some parts a bit too far stretched)
El Polaquito (very good but extremely sad argentinian movie)

Ok, that's it for today!

Hugs and kisses from the gauchos!

Party, party...

Hey kids!

It's been a rough couple of days, because since we moved to the center of the city, there are more and more temptations with every bend. Plus Christian and Peter are here, and last night Akos flew in. To all those who have no idea who they are - they are former supervisors / colleagues of Niki from TeleMedia Hungary. They will be here for a couple of weeks, so we go out together every now and then (everyday) to eat something and discover argentinian wines.

Akos had been living in Argentina for some time before, so he basically knows every ins and outs here. No doubts it's useful to have him around. Plus he's an incredible party animal, just after landing in Budapest he droppen his stuff and came to meet us to go wild in the town. We went to a neighbourhood called Las Canitas, an area of couple of blocks loaded with clubs, pubs, restaurants and all sorts of other places that have devastating effects on our wallets. We ate a good meal, and drank some fine Malbec and Syrah wine, although due to the events that followed, I somehow cannot recall their names. Then we went for a drink to a nearby club and after that the party moved to a club called "Sunset", which is in Olivos. I have never visited the likes of "Home Club" in Budapest, but I figure it must be somthing of that sort, i.e. foam party with naked chicks bouncing up and down and in and out. Not my sort of party, that's for sure, so I left around 5 am. On November 17th there will be an open air Goa Gil banzai, so I think I'll go check that one out to listen to some decent music and shake my gluteal muscles. Curiously enough, it's also going to be in Olivos.

Niki stayed in the club with the guys, and gave no sign of life until 5 pm the following day, so I was upset like hell. She could have called... Anyway she's in one piece so that's a positive ending to the story.

Oh, I got my salary! I got it all in cash, so regardless of the fact that it's bad even for a joke (viccnek is rossz hehehe), I had to have eyes round my head on the way home. Next week a good part of these funds will suply the school where I intend to study.

Things that make me nostalgic lately.

Take care!

Guess what... Good News!

Hi everyone!

I've been trying to sit down and write some news for a couple of days now, and I finally got a moment, when Niki is not busting my balls for sitting in front of a computer all the time.

So finally, the good news: We got a flat!

Seriously. No joke!

I am sitting here now, sipping on apple juice (yeah... seriously, I'll get some beer later), listening to sweet, soothing music (Entheogenic, if someone is interested) and sharing this jolly good news, yay!! :)

I must also stress the fact, that we are two lucky lunatics. Perhaps - enter deity of choice - is looking down on us, with more compassion and understanding to our wacky ways, than we thought... Anyway, check out the photos. The flat has two rooms, and it's got everything we need. The best part is that we pay very little for it, but I won't tell you how much, because someone might want to google out this post, and come and take it away from us. The location couldn't be better. We live in a part of Palermo that is called Hollywood, just 3 blocks from Plaza Serrano, where we can enjoy a rather satisfying offer of bars. It's not as quiet as it was in Olivos, but it isn't very noisy neither and there is lots of green around - trees and parks so we like it a lot. Telemedia is just across the street, so it's convenient for Niki. Oh, I forgot to say that we got this flat thanks to them..











Yesterday, we went out with a friend of mine, Dawson, a guy who works with me at the company, whose name I will mercifully ommit. We went to Plaza Serrano for a couple of beers and later continued at home, drinking some rakija that Christian and Peter brought for Niki from Hungary. We played some guitar and although the original plan was to go out again, we were not able to execute the plan, as I got "a bit" tipsy, as usual.. Christian and Peter didn't join us because they went to see River vs. Defensor Sporting (although it was 0-0, the previous game was to credit of River who scored 2 goal on away game in Montevideo, so they advance to 1/2 finals of Copa Sudamericana), but today Peter has birthday, so we'll probably go somewhere out.

In the meantime I am trying to figure out what is the cheapest way to go and see the Iguazu Falls. It's about 1300 km from Buenos Aires, so it's not going to be easy. My parents are (hopefully) coming in February and we would like to make this trip together. I mean it's really IMPRESSIVE, everyone I met tells me that this view is simply unforgettable. I think the best way would be to rent a car, because this way we would be relatively independent and we would also have a chance to see other interesting things in the area of Misiones, you can read more about it here. As a side note, if you know the flick called "The Mission" with Robert De Niro, it was set in that area.

I guess, that's it for today. We'll keep in touch!

Kisses and hugs from the gauchos.

News Update

Hey everyone!

Sorry for not writing for a long time. This is partly due to the fact that nothing that much interesting occured recently, partly because we are rather busy, and partly because we figured that we'll stop sharing uncertain news as it brings us bad luck...

But we are alive, still fighting and not giving up. Honestly speaking we don't have much choice anymore as our flight back to europe left on monday, without us on board, so there's no turning back - it's either success or "mom, dad! send us some cash!".

We had a couple of outlooks for finding a flat recently, but since I am tired of posts like "looking for a flat" and especially "finding a flat", I decided not to share any good news until we have keys in our hand. Last week we found a really nice one-bedroom apartment in Palermo, with separate kitchen, furniture and fridge for around 900 peso/month, but then we had some misunderstandings with Telemedia. It appeared that when they say "we'll give you garantia" they mean something different, and it was just not good enough for the owner of that flat. You see what I mean? Then on Sunday we went to a grill party at Ale's sister's and met some people there. We had a chat with a bloke called Santiago, and when he heard that we find it rather difficult to find a flat, he proposed us to move in to the flat that he's renting, because he's got to find something closer to his workplace. That deal (would have) meant that we could get a two room apartment with furniture etc. for about a 1000 pesos, and wouldn't have to pay comission and deposit. That (would have been) sweet!! Two days later we were told that Santiago's brother was kicked out from his own apartment, and the situation got complicated. "Zonk!" again... Well, I understand that, you know. If such a situation affected my brother (btw - Happy Birthday, man!) I definitely would think of him first. Neither the less, we were pretty disappointed. Now there's yet another promise of a solution to our tiresome situation, but I simply dare not to speak about it on a public forum.

My work is shit. Period.
I mostly survive by putting headphones on and entering my personal "happy bubble" until I can go home.

Niki is doing well at Telemedia, against all odds continously proving that she can do better than what the rest of her machoistic work environment might have thought of her beforehand.

Our little business project is also looking good. Just finished the basic presentation and some people might be interested in it, so now I'll develop it in more detail, meaning that I have to write a business plan. It's fun. Have you ever seen anything like it? See one here. I'm really looking forward to it... Either way it's going to take me some two months probably and then we'll be ready to move on to the development phase. We're looking at some 6 to 12 months until the launch date, that is if everything goes well and as we all know that it happens only in american movies.

Speaking of movies, see these:

- Grindhouse: Death Proof
- You.Kill.Me

and don't see this:

- Grindhouse: Planet Terror


Now for some sports news:

Poland lost to Hungary in their friendly encounter. What a f****** disgrace..! It's amusing to read what Hungarian press says and what Polish press says. Only for those who enjoy the benefits of speaking both languages though... English speaking press comments with somewhat less excitemet, as anticipated.

Either way, I think scoring the match's only goal from a penalty is not a reason to get excited. Imagine what would have happened if he missed... Now that would've been fun, no? :D All right I'm teasing you all Hungarians, I do love you! Congratulations for winning against Poland for the first time in 20 years. :)

In the meantime, Argentina rolled over Chile (2-0) in the South Africa 2010 World Cup Eliminations phase, and then walked over Venezuela (also 2-0).

More importantly River finished off Boca in the Superclasico (well done lads!) and is still competing in Copa Sudamericana, with next match on Oct.30 against Defensor Sporting from Uruguay.

Oh yea, I almost forgot that Poland won against Kazahstan (3 - 1) in the Euro 2008 eliminations, in a home match that saw a 1-0 lead for Kazahstan in the first quater, and a black-out and a hat-trick by Ebi Smolarek in the second quarter. The tickets were, curiously enough, the most expensive in Europe. Well done PZPN, if anyone is willing to shoot Listkiewicz, I volunteer to give assylum in Buenos Aires...

Also in the meantime, Polish politicians continue to happily throw shit at each other, in their last week before the parlament elections, and do so with little regard to what people really need. Hopefully someone will put the "evil twins" away...

So what's up with Gyurcsany? I have no patience to follow Hungarian politics after all this mess in Poland...

And the last, but not least, a small showcase of a neighbourhood in the center of Buenos Aires, called Villa 31. It's something similar to "favela" in Brasil, where people live without running water and central heating. Sorry, but I couldn't find anything in English.

Hugs and kisses from the gauchos!

Some new Photos

Photo Update

Tigre

Hey Guys, this is Niki writing now. Ah so dificult in english... So I just want to share with you my little trip to Tigre. Here you can find some information about the place
OK. So its really amazing, the river and than there are other rivers, and you can only go to the houses by boat. Beautiful old trees and old houses. The Godmother of Ale has a house there, a 100 year old house,the garden has really old trees,and also they have limon and orange trees.It is totally separated,we could only see the other houses on the other side of the river.There was also a shop,and we had to go shopping by a boat :) I really enjoyed it.We were also fishing,I catched a small fish :)And of course as we were four girls, all day long sunbathing....Marcin unfortunately couldnt come because he was working,but Im sure we will go together as well because Ale can get the keys to the house whenever she wants.We made lots of photos,but I dont have them yet because were made by the camera of another girl,but as soon I will have them I will put on the internet so you can all see :)
So it was a nice weekend,now Monday again,I will have my first show in telemedia tomorrow,hope will be good....
Lots of kisses to all of you

Couple of quick news

Hi!

Just a quick post, because I am helping Niki to cook some chicken.

First of all we want to thank all of you who posted comments on the blog and gave us a good injection of strength and faith. Really guys, every time we read things that you write to us we greet the day with a broad smile, so keep on doing it. Remember, that we are also interested in what's happening with you out there!

Things are starting to clarify, as Niki wrote in one of her comments :D She finally got the job in Telemedia, the contract is signed, and they are willing to help as much as they can with organizing the paperwork for her work permit. Also they want to help with finding the flat, meaning that the damn "garantia" is not our problem from now on. She's widely regarded as the saviour of Telemedia Argentina, the godsend from HQ in Hugary. This means that she'll have a bit of pressure from the others, but at least this would also provide some motivation.

I acually envy my girfriend for having a good job. I want it too!!!
So far I am working for a small "hush-hush" company that capitalizes on naivety of lost american teenagers (but not only). The company provides chat services in three areas: normal chat, love couch chat(as in "tell me your love problems and I'll tell you what to do) and psychic chat (as in "will I get together with Johnny from the 7th grade? He's so cute!"). I am doing the last one, which - I know - is hard to believe. I'm a psychic!!! ... maybe a psycho... I work 6 days a week / 6 hours a day, but it's going to change soon, so I will have a plus free day. Unfortunately I am not in the position to choose the free days myself. No way I can get Saturday and Sunday off. I am a bit pissed off at that, because I will not be able to see the long awaited Boca Juniors - River Plate derby in Saturday, and I will also miss the small field trip to Tigre, that the girls organized for tomorrow. Not to mention the salary, but whatever - I am still looking for something better.

In the meantime - and I don't know if I mentioned this before - I am using my relatively free time to work on a small business idea that we have with Niki and Ale. I will not reveal any details just yet, because too many things can still go wrong, but if it actually does work out - we'll be settled. For now we need to find someone who will invest some money (not some - A LOT!) into this idea. Actually there is such "someone" - we just have to convince him, that it'll work. And it will work, I know it - it works in Budapest, so here it'll work even better. Today I spent most of my day working on a presentation and writing to all sorts of companies we'll need later, just to get some idea of how things work here, and how much things cost.

Dear Mom and Dad, don't worry!
We are not into drug trafficking! :D
It's legal, I promise!

Thanks again for thinking of us and supporting us! You're the best!

Somewhere between

Shhhhhhh....

People...

I don't know where to start.

There have certainly been some developments in our stay here. Definitely. A couple of things happened and they sort of changed the way we perceive things now.

On Friday we went to our first job interview, but before it happened I received a couple of phone calls, that - in fact - were caused by me sending some + 20 CV to various job offers, quite randomly to be honest... During the course of those phone calls I learned that yes - there IS work in Buenos Aires, but unfortunatly for us they all require us to have working permit etc.

And this is where things get complicated.

After calling up the Direction Nacional de Migraciones (no translation necessary, I believe) we found out that it is still possible to convert our tourist visas into ones that would allow us to work, but we would be obliged to present a couple of documents that are rather difficult to obtain at the moment. Namely, original birth certificate and some papers that would state that we have never had anything to do with bombings, manslaughter, theft, fraud, kidnapping, etc, which is in short: crime. All of these must be presented in original and officially translated to Spanish. This costs money (strangely enough - I actually have my birth certificate with me). But there's more. The only way to obtain a work permit here is to have a company that would employ us (here we go again... Catch 22 --> no work permit without work, and no work without work permit). We actually have to include a copy of a contract for 1 year minimum (so no bouncing around from one job to another - we don't like this) and some other papers provided by the company, which at the moment I don't care to detail. 

This doesn't look good.

We actually found a job where they don't ask us to be legal, but the problem here is that we would earn something around 100.000 HUF... Together. And this doesn't look good neither. Plus the job is shite. Nevertheless we kind of don't have many options so tomorrow we start and we'll just go with the flow and see what happens. Of course we're still sending CVs like mad.

The flat didn't work out neither, so we're still at Ale's. It's not as in "it didn't work out because we had bad luck", it's as in "it didn't work out because we changed our mind". By doing some simple math we came to conclusion that, although it would still be possible to cover the rent (850 pesos), not much more would be left for anything else. The problem here is that a few days ago we were so sure about taking that flat, that we payed 200 pesos to reserve it (today we were supposed to sign the contract). Now we are in the middle of a fight to get it back...

Instead we decided to stay put and see what happens with the previous flat. Alex is still there, painting it, and not in the prison so there should be a chance. We hope to know more this week as we really don't want to over use Ale's kindness towards us. As you can probably see there is a difference between paying 850 peso / month (plus extra 850 to the real estate) and paying 500 (with no extra charges).

This all brings us here. We are not quite sure where.

Somewhere between.

A piece of advise to all those who ever want to follow our steps. First of all: bring money and bring a lot if it. That is if you want to be secure. Buenos Aires is cheap in terms of food and stuff, but the salaries here don't look so great. Second of all: have some contacts. Even Argentinians say that contacts are everything here. At least have somewhere to stay at the beginning. Ale is literary our good angel!

Honestly this have been a couple of very mesmerizing days, quite difficult too. We had some down moments, when we were (are?) thinking whether it makes sense to stay here, work for peanuts and have just enough to keep us going or should we better go elsewhere, like Spain. But then I would have to abandon the idea of studying, at least for some time. It would also mean that we lost a terrible lot of money just to come here and flee in despair, which is not the idea I like best. I'd say we stay and fight, and most importantly be patient.

We have some two weeks to decide what's it going to be.

Finding a flat...

We just came back home from our little trip to the town...
Living far from the center has it's advantages (like it's safer... erm... sometimes at least) but the main disadvatage is having to sit on a bus for 1,5 hour one way.

Today we took our search for flat a bit more seriously and decided that guarantee or not, we'll just start calling all the offers that suit us price-wise and see what happens. 

Believe it or not, but the second ad we called was the jackpot!

Okay, it can always be better, however I don't think we are in a situation to be picky. So here is how it goes.

The flat is in the very center of the city, in a neighbourhood called Retiro, on a crossing of two major streets - Av. Santa Fe and Av. 9 de Julio (which by the way is the widest street I've seen in my life...). The main Subte intersection is just a few blocks away so we can conveniently get anywhere we want. Click here for a map of the city.

The flat itself is very small, but it has all the four walls, a ceiling and a floor and a 
couple of extras like bed, table and some chairs  which is always welcomed, right? It even has a balcony with a beautiful view to Buenos Aires' "backstage" (all the houses look good only from the front).

We are immensely happy right now, so probably we'll go out and get drunk somewhere tonight, which always carries some side effects, like meeting interesting people and ending up early in the morning talking jibberish, that we profoundly believe to be the most genuine thing produced by our brains in a long long time...

Since it's Thursday I believe that most of you are delivering a similiar performance, so remember to rise your glasses once or twice thinking of us!

Looking for a flat...

Yesterday - as I already mentioned - we went to check out our first apartment (at least potentially ours, right?). The flat belongs to Ale's mother's lawyer, at least in theory...
We met ith him in his office in the center and he explained us that the flat has one room, plus a separate kitchen and bathroom and is under renovation at the moment. There is no furniture and no fridge, so provisionally we bargained the deal down to 500 pesos plus the expenses (as we must buy the fridge, and we are poor etc. etc.), which is incredibly good. Constantino (the lawyer) called the guy who is renovating the place (Alex - Ukrainian) that we'd show up shortly and off we went.
The flat is situated in center, next to faculty of medicine (cool - lots of young people), and - as Constantino explained - next to one beutiful building that was transported there from Italy, piece by piece. Nevermind that for now (yes, it's beautiful allright...).
We got there, Alex met us downstairs and led the way. The flat is a bit dark and with no particular view (we don't consider a brick wall a view...) but since it will be painted and all it definitely has a potential, and - of course - the price makes it quite beautiful for us hehehe...

We merely managed to see everything when in one moment 3 old "senoras" barged inside, opened the eyes (and mouths) wide in surprised, took a deep breath and started shouting something that after a while managed to resemble "what are you doing here and who are you and where have you got the keys from?". So we started explaining that we just came here to have a look at the place, in case we want to rent it and that we were sent by the owner. Bad move. One of the "senoras" explained - in quite undiplomatic way - that she was the owner of the place and it is her heritage. Whatever. We wanted to say goodbye and leave as soon as possible, but other of the "senoras" accused us of various things (like stealing argentinian land, jobs, properties etc etc.) and ordered us to stay as she intended to call the police, due to "violencia de domicilio". So all of a sudden we were intruders... Wonderful. Me, Niki and poor Alex told her that we were leaving at the very moment and she should stop talking nonsense - after all we didn't rent the flat just yet, we merely came to see it, but in this case we were not quite likely to come back. And off we went...

All in all the flat is okay, but if the situation is not clear we'd better steer away from it. At least for now.

Photos

Photos Update

News From World's End

Hi Everyone!

We haven't posted any news for a couple of days because the access to internet is really a pain in the ass. However, yesterday two "half brains" came to hook up internet at Ale's house, so now we'll be available more often. I write "half brains" because the two individuals who - in theory - should be network technicians have virtually no knowledge whatsoever so in the end me and Niki had to explain them why this whole business is not working ("do you know what is a fixed IP?" , "Si, si" - and he's going on looking helplessly on the screen... pff...). Either way now I know hy they walk around in pairs... :D.

Anyway we have internet now. Woohoooo! :))

So, let's see what's been happening with us for those couple of days we were offlline.

In my last post I said we were off to look for a flat right? ...Wrong. We didn't see any flats, but we read a lot about them haha... Basically getting a flat here is not so easy and this is to a couple of reasons.

First of all the property law here is full of holes so the people need to take some precautions in order not to get conned. Almost every landlord renting a flat asks for a guarantee, which means that we must find a person who will guarantee for us that we will pay and if we don't that person will pay for us. The guarantee has to  be an Argentinian and has to have a job, so we have a small problem here as no one will guarantee for us, since no one knows us that well. It is still possible to rent a flat without the guarantee but in such case te landlors will ask for rent many months in advance which - of course - we are not able to provide. What we are left with is looking for a flat through Ale's family and friends. In fact we are going to see a flat today around 3 o'clock (now.. really we are!). There is this lawyer of Ale's mother who is looking to rent a flat and he's willing to rent it to us. He actually has two flats in the center - one of 3 rooms for around a 1000 pesos and one of 1 room for not much cheaper so we still don't know what it's gonna be. We'll find out today.

Last week on Thursday we went out with some friends of Ale to a "punchi"... Punchi is a disco. It was a huge club in the middle of nowhere (at least for us) with all sorts of music, starting with some quasi reggae one-man-live-act and ending with tekkno and all. There were a couple of reasons we didn't like it that much: first of all there is too much people and one can hardly enjoy any dancing while others are dancing on one's feet; secondly the prices are very high (one small beer is 8 peso, while in a supermarket you pay 2 peso for a 1 liter) and last but not least it's hard to focus on the music when you have a gogo dancer's ass stuck right into your nose... Well, perhaps for some it is enjoyable, but I had to avoid looking in those directions as Niki was there with me :P. Either way we escaped pretty early which in the end was good, because we were not "dead" the next day and we went into the town on our own to explore a bit.

We went to a district called Palermo which is quite nice as there is lots of life there and it's very close to the center. Niki wanted to visit Telemedia to see if she can get a job over there. We managed to find the place, which was kind of a personal success for us - there is no sign indicating that we're at the right place. You just ring and then have to answer all sorts of stupid questions before you are allowed to get inside. Niki talked to someone and he told her that he'd get in touch next week as they always look for editors, so at the moment it looks good. I, personally, haven't started to look for jobs yet, but I have a couple of people looking them up for me 
hehehe. 

On saturday we went out again, but only in the neighbourhood. We just wanted to go for a quick beer, but since people here go out earliest at midnight it turned into an all-nighter. And we visited only two bars... Anyhow again we met some new people which produced a couple of interesting perspectives for me. Fernando (the one who explained me some of the political situation) and his pal Ernesto invited me to play football with them and their friends next week on Monday and made it specifically clear that no females are allowed on the field and that I would probably get home after 3 days, so I am looking forward to this. By the way, I already chose my colors (meaning football) and my team is RIVER, who subsequently reacted to my decision by loosing to Tigre (1-4) on Sunday, even though Fernando assured me that RIVER would win. Oh well... I hope they get their shit together!

I also met a guy called Santiago who is in need of a bass player for his reggae band, so it looks like I'd be back in the business soon. The only problem is that my bass is in Budapest...

Also on saturday, but before the evening banzai, Ale took us to La Boca (La Boca football team is the main rival of River, by the way). It's the old portside district of Buenos Aires, and one of the main turistic attractions with it's three streets where you can feel safe. The rest, especially during the night, is extremely dangerous so it's not advised to hang around there after dusk. Still, during the day there were lot's of people dancing tango in the streets and the houses are painted in bright colours, creating overall a pretty cool atmosphere.

            

After that we went over to San Telmo, which is close to La Boca. It's also a very nice district. We would actually like to live there but there are hardly any flats to rent there, and if there are any they are very expensive. San Telmo is an artist neighbourhood with narrow streets, small houses in colonial style and cool bars that are kept in their old form.

From San Telmo we moved to a nearby park to drink some mate.

When you come to Argentina, you'll notice people with these "bulbs" and thermoses, where they keep hot water. Lots of Argentinians drink mate all day and that's why they carry all this equipment with them all the time. How to prepare mate: put the mate herbs in the "bulb", but ther has to be lots of them like on the picture - the "bulb" actually contains more mate than water. Then slowly add hot water (not boiled). If you prefer to have mate a bit sweet, add some sugar but remember to do it before adding water. The first sips will be dusty - some people even spit it out, but later it will get better. Remember not to move the pipe (called "bombilla") around as it will get stuck. That's it!

On our way back we again had the problem of running out of change. That mean's that even if we have money (but no coins) we cannot get home by bus. It took us about an hour to change two pesos into two coins... Here's the fuller background on why this is happening:
There are simply not enough coins in Argentina. Most of the shops and Kiosks have a notice saying "no change". This may look funny but it isn't funny at all, when you cannot get home, you cannot take a bus, not because you don't have money, but because you cannot buy the stupid ticket because of the stupid coins. Newspapers already say that there is a black market in coin trade, meaning that some people sell coins on interest (100 pesos = 97 pesos in coins). So everyone is saving change like mad, on the contrary to Europe where everyone is trying to get rid of it. According to the government the situation will improve in the first months of next year when more coins will be released. One question remains: what the hell are we supposed to do until then??

All right, gotta go!

Cheers to y'all!

Politics

Couple of words about the political situation.

It's not much different than anywhere else, meaning that the politicians don't give a jackshit about the people who brought them to power and are always occupied with stealing as much as they can. So nothing new here.

Ale's friend Fernando threw some light on the peculiarities of Argentinian politics last night. The funny thing is that effectively there is only one party here that counts, or - to be more specific - has any chance of getting into the congress. It's called JUSTICIANISMO or PERONISM

More about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justicialismo .
and here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justicialist_Party

Of course there are some other parties but they have virtually no chance to get their share of this country as Justicianistas have been having a firm grip on everything here for much too long. Curious thing about the party is that it consists of 3 fractions, namely left wing, center and right wing. This results in a mess that is particularily visible whenever there is any debate between the politicians, as left wing Justicianista is throwing shit on right wing Justicianista and vice versa. The president of Argentina is from the left wing. His name is Nestor Kirchner.

The above information is merely what I managed to understand last night from Fernando so it might be less acurate than the present situation really is.

That's about it for today. We're going to look for a flat later on and it's not an easy task. I will get back to this topic another day.

Cheers,

Marcinito and Nikita

News From World's End

Yo kids!

We arrived! :D



Damn, all of a sudden I have no idea what to write and where to start, so the best I came up with is to start at the beginning (duh...)

As most of you know we flew from Vienna, and Niki's father took us there with his girlfriend Eva. The trip was okay and the check-in clerk from Iberia could not understand how come we speak spanish... Well, not all the world speaks english just yet (this is particularily valid for Spanish as they speak their own language only).

After three hours we arrived to Madrid where - after minor communications break down - Elisa and Jorge picked us up and transfered us securily to their sweet nest in hmmm... what was it? "Tres Campos" I believe... So many thanks to them for taking us in :D

The next day in the morning they took us back to the airport. Man.. This airport is huge. They actually have a small underground train that takes the passengers to the terminal and then you still have to walk for another 20 minutes to find the right gate. Middle finger in the air to the authors of the magnificent idea of offering wireless internet for like 5 euros / 30 minutes. WE ARE POOR PEOPLE FROM EX-COMMUNIST COUNTRIES!!! Now is it our fault we were born on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain and our governments dedicade most of their efforts to stuffing their own pockets instead of making our lives easier?!

Nevermind.

The next chapter consisted of 12 hours on the plane to Buenos Aires. The pilots had good sense of humour to show us live feed from the plane's tail as we approach the drakest clouds I ever seen in my life. The good thing about it was that when it started shaking we could make sure that the plane is actually still in one piece.

We even got food and drinks on the plane. I took a good use of free bevies (as usual) as the only way I can sit on my ass with the knees up my throat is when I am promptly drunk.

When we arrived in Buenos Aires we got a free sample of Argentinian beaurocracy, specifically how they make everything much more complicated than it should be. We spent half an hour in a queue to the passport control, because it works on a variation of "draw-a-number-and-wait-for-your-turn" scheme. We survived. And we even discovered that no one had lost our luggage and nothing is missing.

Alejandra (shortly "Ale") was waiting for us with her sister Gabi and a little fella Feliks. We jumped in the car and headed off from the airport. It was raining as hell (it's the end of the winter here). Buenos Aires is so big that even those who live here (like Ale) loose their way, but two nice policemen helped us out. So after all these adventures we arrived to Ale's place where we spent the next couple of hours drinking beer and entartaining Feliks.

Today we went into the city for the first time. Unfortunately I cannot upload any pictures just yet, so sorry about that. Either way this really is a different world. Ale lives in the so called "provincia", an outskirt of Buenos Aires, so we planned to use a train to get to the center but it burned down somewhere on the way to our station (sic!), so we jumped on the bus instead. The tricky thing is that you need change to get on the bus and we had only notes. Now, no one will break your money unless you buy something... But Ale managed to solve this minor difficulty.
The bus took us from the provincia called "Olivos" to the center in about 45 minutes which according to Ale is really fast. On the way I learned that to make a driving licence in Argentina one doesn't have to learn how to drive as it will all come out during the exam, and the exam itself costs circa 50 pesos, which is less than 20 bucks. So what we're looking at is that Marcinito will be a happy owner of an argentinian driving licence if need be. At the moment I just don't have what to drive and maybe it's better, because it really shows in the traffic that the people here just know HOW to drive, but never heard of any traffic rules.

The center of Buenos Aires is really huge and full of people. We only walked on two streets and still it took us some 2 hours. On the way we bought sim cards for our phones, but we were also informed that there is no way we can text home... well.. unless it's Spain. Sms use is restricted to within Argentina (plus Spain) - don't ask me why. So we called home which probably didn't leave much credit on our phones and it took me some 5 tries to finally reach my parents... and they still couldn't hear me right.

It's really a pity that I cannot show you any photos we took today - it would show much more than my dodgy writings. Particularily the metro (called "Subte") looks quite impressive as it most probably remembers times from before my birth and the Subte workers are on strike today (and every now and then). It doesn't mean that they don't work... They work and they let all the people in for free so we really support the strike of the Subtle workers now :D I wish they could be on strike more often. We also saw something about 4 different demonstrations today, all of which consisting of not more than 50 people, and we still don't know what is it they are demonstrating against. There will be elections here soon, so I figure this kind of activity is about to escalate. Anyhow the demonstrants don't seem to have any permissions to demonstarte and they do so in the middle of the traffic, stopping it effectively for the time being.


Now we are back to Olivos, drinking mate at the house of Ale's parents who try to throw some light on the situation here. We need to find a place to live (more importantly in a neighbourhood were we won't get killed and robbed after dark) and some jobs, but the moods are good so there's nothing to worry about just yet.

Kisses and hugs from marcinito and nikita!!!

P.S. For my parents (and anyone who's rich enough to call me here...) my phone number is 0054 11 15 586 702 21. Now, no one here is sure if this is correct... Another version suggests to skip the "11". For the time being this is all I've got but I'll try to work on it a bit more.

Intro

Yo pipol!!!! :D

So this is it.

We are officially gone to the end of the world...

However, we decided that we'll still invade your lives from time to time and let you know what's up with us. We hope to have regular access to internet, but if you notice that there are no news from us for a long time, please organize a rescue mission...

Make sure to comment on all the post so that we know what's up with you.

Cheers and wish us luck. We'll need it!

marcinito and nikita