A Girl in the World

May 2010

Sometimes, we all need a small reminder…

May 26, 2010

… about What Matters Most (from The Purpose Driven Life)

Learning to love unselfishly is not an easy task. It runs counter to our self-centered nature. That’s why we’re given a lifetime to learn it. Relationships, not achievements or the acquisition of things, are what matters most in life. Love leaves a legacy. How you treated other people, not your wealth or accomplishments, is the most enduring impact you can leave on earth.

I have been at the bedside of many people in their final moments, when they stand on the edge of eternity, and I have never heard anyone say, “Bring me my diplomas! I want to look at them one more time. Show me my awards, my medals, that gold watch I was given.” When life on earth is ending, people don’t surround themselves with objects. What we want around us is people – people we love and have relationships with.

In our final moments we all realize that relationships are what life is all about. One of the ways God measures spiritual maturity is by the quality of your relationships. In heaven God won’t say, “tell me about your career, your bank account, and your hobbies.” Instead he will review how you treated other people, particularly those in need. When you transfer into eternity, you will leave everything else behind. All you’re taking with you is your character.

The importance of things can be measured by how much time we are willing to invest in them. The more time you give to something, the more you reveal its importance and value to you. If you want to know a person’s priorities, just look at how they use their time.

Time is your most precious gift because you only have a set amount of it. You can make more money, but you can’t make more time. When you give someone your time, you are giving them a portion of your life that you’ll never get back. Your time is your life. That is why the greatest gift you can give someone is your time. The essence of love is not what we think or do or provide for others, but how much we give of ourselves. It is focused attention. Love concentrates so intently on another that you forget yourself at that moment. Attention says, “I value you enough to give you my most precious asset – my time.” Whenever you give your time, you are making a sacrifice, and sacrifice is the essence of love. You can give without loving, but you can’t love without giving.

The Bible stresses repeatedly, it says, “whenever we have the opportunity, we should do good to everyone. Use every chance you have for doing good. Whenever you possibly can, do good to those who need it. Never tell your neighbor to wait until tomorrow if you can help them now.”

Why is now the best time to express love? Because you don’t know how long you will have the opportunity. Circumstances change. People die. Children grow up. You have no guarantee of tomorrow. If you want to express love, you had better do it now.

The best use of life is love. The best expression of love is time. The best time to love is now.

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Dusk in the city

May 19, 2010

There is a change a comin’ in bustling Buenos Aires. The days are a little shorter, the air a little crisper, the wind a refreshing coolness on the cheeks. It’s Autumn.  And wow, it’s beautiful.

Spanish classes run every weekday from 5.30 to 7.30 PM.  It’s a 40 minute walk to class from our flat and I do the entire roundtrip on foot.  I trek the equivalent of about 3.5 km each way and I love it.  The walk home in the evening has got to be one of my favourite moments of the day.
Tonight, the sun is a blazing pink and orange, the city is mad with traffic.  Streets are packed with pedestrians clamoring up from the subways or rushing home from work. Dogs are barking, kids are being rushed between after-school programs and home, restaurants are lighting candles, shop vendors are sweeping sidewalks.  There is a warm aroma of food roasting in the air.

At dusk, this city comes to life.  9 million people rushing to the heartbeat of another new evening, another ended day.  At dusk, work is swept aside to make way for family, for food, for friends.

It is absolutely breathtaking.

Crazy big cities have always done this to me.  New York, Cairo, London, Shanghai.  I’ve come to love the chaos, the sheer volume of people, the colours and the sounds. Somehow amidst the anarchy, I find peace.  I feel small, insignificant, humbled.  I feel a rhythm outside myself, a heartbeat, a drum.  There is so much life!

A young beggar, a suited business-man, a fruit vendor on the corner.  No matter who they are and what they do, we are all a part of this crazy, jumbled mess of a metropolitan.

Stepping back to watch the movement, to feel the rush of bodies and somehow float above the chaos and hear silence – it is an amazing feeling.  Everything somehow becomes one.  The colours blur.  The sirens, the honking, the barking of dogs.  The traffic, the breeze and the gorgeous blazing sunset that no one seems to notice. Everything becomes a rhythmic mess.  So beautiful.

Presence.

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Lèche-vitrines

May 18, 2010

Translated to English, lèche-vitrines literally means lick the windows. This is the French phrase for window shopping (sometimes the French can be so brilliant I could almost forgive them for their snobbiness!). If window shopping is licking windows, then here, I’m slobbering all over the glass. And if I could fit the door into my mouth, I’d do it.

The shopping here is beautiful. BOOTIFUL. I’ve never seen shop windows so painstakingly dressed and pampered. Beautiful lighting, great colours and mannequins styled so trendily that you can’t help but stop and stare. It’s like unabashedly ogling a beautiful woman who’s made of plastic. Barring Bourdain-inspired food porn, I’ve never been so lustful. I actually lust after these mannequins. I desire the brown leather boots under the spotlight. I want to cuddle that soft, curvy, oversized shoulder bag. I am a bundle of greedy shopping angst.

It is ridiculous.

Figuring out where I’d like to be and what I’d like to be doing next is kind of like window shopping.  Actually, I’ve been lèche-vitrine-ing for the past year.  I packed up my oversized shopping bag, hit the road and ‘tried on’ a bunch of new things.  I wanted to see what else is out there.  And you know what? There is just so much world out there.

There is camping through Africa for a month and not killing your boyfriend in the process.  There is Italy in August, with grotesque amounts of gelato at breakfast, lunch and dinner.  There is Vancouver in the rain.  There is language school.  There is bumping into familiar faces and feeling all warm and fussy inside.  There is a chance meeting that turns into a business partnership.  There is web design, there is tango, there is photography.  There is the Vancouver Olympics and one of the most memorable moments of a nation’s history.  There is crying and laughter and hopefulness.  There is contract work, work for fun, work for play, no work at all and work every day.  There is fear.  There is excitement.  There is a vast and open sea.

If licking the window is a show of lust for clothing, bags and shoes, then this nomad life that both tests and inspires me must be the equivalent form of sample sale-ing life.  Try first, buy later.  It’s like life on consignment: swap out the old, in with the new, always with some option to change your mind.  A gap year on steroids.  An experiment in mobile living.  An answer to the itch that just won’t go away.

Licking the windows of life’s many shops has been trying at times.  Lusting after the next adventure, the change of scenery, the new challenge, it has all been an incredible way to discover all the possibilities out there.  But with the wanting, comes angst.  And angst, like during the teen years, comes with its combination of goods and bads.  Stimulation and exhaustion.  Fullness and emptiness.  Desire and fear.  The ying and the yang.

Trying to both build something for the long term and seek experiences in the now can leave one in a state of seeming limbo.  In between.  Sometimes the window shopping has been amazing, other times I just want to give my credit card to someone and just buy something already.

And I ask myself, Why haven’t I found that perfect next thing?  What am I waiting for?

Nothing.  I haven’t found the next permanent thing because it hasn’t come just yet.  And sometimes, in my search to find the next permanent thing, I lose sight of the ever changing now.  Presence.  It is so important to be present.  And the present isn’t such a bad place.

There is time, there is space, there is freedom.  There is here or there, for as long or as short as I want.  There is writing and photography, or none at all.  There are new projects and old projects.  And there is always an opportunity to learn, if I am open to seeing it.  Presence.  Present.  Both are blessings if we take the time to see.

So, while I’ve got the time, the freedom, the energy and the lust for peeking inside different windows and trying things on for a while, there’s no rush to make a big purchasing decision right now.  Window shopping is just fine.

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Adventures in foreign fooding

May 13, 2010

Juicy, bloody, fresh, soft, tender. The steak here in Argentina is to die for (so I’ve heard). I’m not a meat eater. I know, crazy right? I currently reside in the meat eating capital of the universe.  It seems a sin that my mouth refuses to water at the mere mention of lomo or entraña or bife de chorizo.  An average Argentinian eats approximately 155 pounds of beef each year (that’s like my boyfriend eating the equivalent of 1.3 me’s!).  Vegetarianism is definitely not cool here.  Actually, most people think it’s just plain silly.

So it’s no surprise that this city would be home to some amazing parillas (steakhouses), the kind that put any high-end steak house in San Francisco to shame.  Our favourites include Las Cabras, Don Julio and La Dorita.  They offer varied menus, great quality food and lively ambiance, all at reasonable prices.

At these places, I always manage to get a good chicken dish while stealing bites of steak here and there.  We have fantastic wine, a fresh salad and if there’s room, some form of postre with dulce de leche dripping from the spoon.

But sometimes, especially after gorging myself with food porn courtesy of Anthony Bourdain, the Asian in me just needs some rice damnit!  I want good ol’ glutenous rice!  So, by end of week when it’s time to decide where to go for a Friday evening date, we always manage to find our way into a trendy Asian/Arabic/Indian food joint.

If steak is Argentina’s greatest food asset, let’s just say that rice and anything to do with it is not.  Each time we go “foreign”, we get burned.  Bad.  Bereber’s Morroccan food got on the wrong plane between there and here, while picking up a few fancy lamps from Egypt and a colourful throw pillow along the way.  The restaurant is well decorated, but the food leaves much to be desired.

And don’t get me started on the sushi in this city!  Tuna rolls include canned tuna, cream cheese and something green that should taste like wasabi but does not.

So, when we entered a beautiful, candlelit place called Quibombo near Plaza Armenia in Palermo for a snack, I shouldn’t have expected much.  The menu touts all-natural Indian and Asian foods like mango lassi’s, falafel and chicken teriyaki.  The place is beautifully decorated, with plush cushions, low chairs, draping fabrics and well-placed candles.  In fact, because it was so aesthetically pleasing we couldn’t help but get excited about the food.

We ordered mango banana lassi’s, a falafel appetizer and maldioca chips and fries.  The servings were small but tasty.  The lassi didn’t taste like lassi at all, but at least it contained more milk than water.  I was impressed.  Considering our disappointing experiences with international cuisine, this place wasn’t so bad.  The boy thought otherwise.

He took one sip of the supposed lassi and made a face.  It’s like a bad milkshake!! he said.  When the little plates came, he couldn’t help but chuckle.  Tiny! his face said.  T.I.N.Y.  Ok fine, they were tiny but they were good.  Really good.

When the waiter came and asked how we liked everything, I replied with a smile.  The boy, on the other hand, had no problems telling him that the lassi tasted like a bad milkshake, that he couldn’t taste the mango, that the servings were small.  Ha.  The waiter apologized, cleared our table and came back with a discount on our drinks.  He apologized for our dissatisfaction.  How nice!

Needless to say, we enjoyed our afternoon snack.  A few hours of coffee talk in a beautiful room overlooking the cobblestone streets of Palermo was well worth the adventure.

The moral(s) of the story:

  1. When in Argentina, do like the Argentinians and stick to steak if you’re craving an excellent meal.
  2. Regardless of how the food tastes, restaurants here are just GORGEOUS.  Appreciate with your eyes as well as with your tongue.
  3. If you don’t like the food and the waiter asks what you thought at the end of the meal, speak your mind.  Help them improve.  Otherwise, it’s just useless bitching. =)

PS:  Through recommendations from a friend, we did find a beautiful English pub called Bangalore that has a small Indian restaurant upstairs.  The food is rich and creamy (although not very spicy), the space is small and intimate, and the atmosphere is great for a mellow Friday night.  I’d definitely recommend it.

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Congresso

May 11, 2010

As crazy as this city can be, it never ceases to amaze me just how beautiful some of the architecture is. We’ll be driving by some random neighbourhood and catch a glimpse of perfectly restored French colonial buildings.

These are from Plaza Congresso.

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ArgentinaQ22010-24

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Nunca Hicimos Amistades

May 10, 2010

Never did we make friendships

This is the welcome banner that would greet you as the opposing team when you enter La Bombonera (Boca Junior’s home stadium). Charming, arrogant, shameless. So sweetly Argentinian.

Last night we attended the last Boca Juniors home game until August. We didn’t stay in the sheltered tourist area, nor did we get numbered seats.  We came in through the piss dripping back stairwells of the standing-only section to sing and dance with a mass of people so passionate about their football, I couldn’t help but feel jealous.

 

 

We sat in these stands just a few feet up from where this video was taken. Total chaos.
Where does all of this feeling come from? How can grown men shout so hard, sing so beautifully, dance and jump and scream like I’ve never seen in North America or Europe?

 

Football is a mysterious thing.  Its lure and grandeur escaped us in Canada where all matter of sport and debauchery is centered around hockey.  I’d always wanted to attend a football match in South America but had heard how difficult it is to find good, local tickets.  We don’t do clean, tourist packages where you sit in a protected little box to watch the match as if it were on TV.  We wanted to be thick in the chaos, in the noise, with the musk of emotion around us.  So, when a friend mentioned a cheap, dodgy hostel offering available, we jumped on it.  It’s the kind of package probably monitored by la doce but organized by local folk (It’s a known fact that all ‘foreigner’ tickets are handled and sold by the Boca hooligans, referred to as la doce).  The ‘company’ who organized everything for us doesn’t have a website for ‘safety reasons’.  Ha.

We gathered at a pick-up point until a rickety old school bus blasting reggaeton music came barreling around the corner to take us to a parilla and beer jaunt in a conventillo near La Bombonera.  It’s like tailgating, Argentinian style.  Then we were walked into the stadium in large groups, were searched more thoroughly than at an airport security line and passed through side streets and back allies that looked like war zones.   Smoke, barricades and black-helmeted riot policemen at every corner.  Fun!

As game time approached, the beat of drums echoed in the nearby streets.  They have a band?!  I asked.  Yes, a marching band!, he answered sarcastically.

It was a band. Sort of. Actually, it was more like a mob 30,000 strong, jumping, chanting and screaming in tandem.  It was the most musically talented mob I’d ever seen and for a few short minutes at a time, when I could copy the words, I jumped, chanted and screamed with them.  I was a gringo local.  A gringo, but still local for a short time.

To feel the heartbeat of a rabid stadium, to hear it, to smell it – there is nothing more powerful.  Looking across the field at the ant-like figures of colour and sound, I felt moved.  It was no longer about the players down on that grass.  It was about the people.  A show for the people, by the people.  Families in their best blues and yellows gathering on a warm Sunday evening to cheer on a losing team.  Babies on their daddy’s shoulders.  Grandchildren, dads and granddads, three generations of men chanting, swearing and jumping all around us.  It was madness and beauty.

I wish I understood more what it all meant.  I was there, a part of the action, but still an outsider.  Football as foreign as the language. Somehow I understood early on that it isn’t just about scoring goals.  Even as we lost, the chanting and drums continued.  60,000 fans chanted and stood for 90 minutes. NINTEY MINUTES (I was completely knackered by half time)!  If that’s not loyalty, I don’t know what is.

And wow, I learned a whole slew of new Castellano!

Hijo de puta! Hijo de puta!

Dale, gordo! Puta! Puta madre!

and a little more sweetly, translated …

Boca my best friend
this tournament we are going to be with you
we support you with our heart
This tournament we are going to be champions
I don’t care that they say
what the others say
I follow you everywhere
I love you more and more

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An overwhelming love

May 9, 2010

The women in my family… are very good at swallowing disappointment and moving on. They have, it has always seemed to me, a sort of talent for changing form, enabling them to dissolve and then flow around the needs of their partners, or the needs of their children, or the needs of mere quotidian reality.  They adjust, adapt, glide, accept. They are mighty in their malleability, almost to the point of superhuman power.  I grew up watching a mother who became with every new day whatever that day required of her.  She produced gills when she needed gills, grew wings when the gills became obsolete, manifested ferocious speed when speed was required, and demonstrated epic patience in other more subtle circumstances.

- Elizabeth Gilbert, Committed

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A daughter’s life, by womb and blood and love, is bound inevitably to that of her mother’s.  The loftiest dreams and the deepest pains cross the thresholds of generation to ebb and flow between mother and daughter in a sea of endless tides.

The rock of mom’s love has been my anchor in the storms of my life.  How then, on this Mother’s day weekend, do I give her thanks for all things immeasurable …

… for crying with me in my deepest pains of heartbreak; for hot teas at 2 AM, for answered phone calls during important work meetings, for instilling braveness as we packed boxes, emptied shelves, dusted away memories and started anew

… for sending me off with a smile and a tear, a pain in her heart for the distance between us, but with hope and excitement for the adventures ahead; adventures lived vicariously through daughter because mother didn’t have the chance

… for beautiful random cards in the mail, for hand written notes, for surprise pairs of shoes, for make-up, scarves and exercise balls, trinkets of love and thought

… for laughter that turned to tears; at sunset in Italy as we shared dreams and fears and heartbreak; in a bus careening down the coast, while the driver looked on distracted; at Starbucks next door, tears and coffee and tea

… for “hello” IMs from 6500 miles away, a “hello” that lifts the weight of the world, brings lightness, joy and goodness in an instant

… for dreaming bigger than me, for dreaming bigger things for me, for dreaming that all things good and desired are possible

… for her smile, the smile I’ve thankfully inherited

… for the joyful, patient, beautiful way that she has loved my dad; children learn what they live – we lived in a home full of love, faith and laughter

… for sharing with me the joys of sisterhood – the amazing beautiful love between women; her sisters have become my second mothers; their pains have become my pains, and my pains, theirs

… for teaching graciousness as guest, as host, as friend; a thank you note, a token gift, a bundle of flowers

… for time; always, there was time;  evening walks on the streets of northwest Calgary, during the sunsets of my youth;  conference calls at lunch breaks, London to San Francisco; homework and brainteasers, zoo field trips and candy stores, elementary through junior high

… for teaching strength, wisdom and courage so i can stand up for myself when needed, but always with a reminder to be soft, to forgive, to choose love

… for being a true superwoman: mother, friend, daughter, wife, career woman, kid (at heart) and glamma (to the Bear)

And yet, it’s not enough.  No note of love and thanks will ever be enough to measure the gratitude that I feel for the blessing of Mom’s role in my life.  But I’ve learned that love and gratitude are infinite, meant to be given away.  So on this weekend, in addition to giving thanks to mom, I’m going to give thanks to all the wonderful, amazing, beautiful women in my life, those who’ve been here as mother, friend and confidante.

Thank you Ma Beng, Ma Pei, Ma Beth for the Castelvi in you.  You are the strongest, most generous, most faithful, loving, forgiving women that I know.  I am blessed to share your name.

Thank you Grandma for the early and the late years, for all the moments I can’t remember and for all the moments that I do: home-cooked meals, lunches, love and support; thank you for being the true embodiment of generosity.

Thank you Tita Merle, Tita Norma, Tita Julie, Tita Susan for all things you did that turned my dad into the man he is today, for the unending support, even in the distance.

Thank you Auntie Grace for being my mom away from home during university; for the support, for listening, for always being there.

Thank you Auntie Josie for all that we shared in London and after; for bringing your simple, humble love to one of the harshest cities in the world and reminding me just how beautiful the presence of family can be.

Thank you to all the Tita’s and Mama’s that I didn’t mention, from Calgary, the PI and Vancouver.  For everything that you are as women that has made my time with you that much more special.

Happy Mother’s Day.

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How to be hoochie and get fit too

May 4, 2010

Gawd I love Latin America.  They just know how to prioritize all the important things in life.  Forget efficient governments, reliable laws and customer service.  There is passion, great food, tango, gratuitous shows of affection in public, and hoochierobics.

Hoochierobics!

After last night’s not-so-great Reggaeton classes, I figured Areo Interval would be more, you know, technical.  I’d imagined step aerobics with weights and tae-bo and whatever else areo intervals are all about.  Thankfully, I was wrong.

It’s like aerobics but sluttier.  You mambo, you salsa, you grind your ass right down to the floor.  Imagine this and this and this blasting so loud you can’t hear yourself think.  There are mirrors and hips and jiggling and sweat.  It’s aerobics on crack.

What a great way to spend an hour on a random Tuesday night.  Inappropriate dancing, taught by an instructor who inappropriately flirts with the all-female attendees, grinding, sweating, singing and cha-cha-cha-ing all in the name of good health.  Amen to Argentinian aerobics classes.

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Reggaeton

May 4, 2010

I’ve been toying with the idea of getting a gym membership lately and last night, I finally decided YES.  I’m not a gym person.  I can’t do treadmills and weights and elliptical machines all by myself.  The last time I did well at a gym was when I had a trainer.

All of this working from home and taking long walks by the park has been great but my energy levels have been low low low lately. So, I’ve decided to gym it.

Let me just say that Reggaeton dance classes are great.  But you know what I realized?  Reggaeton is actually only *really* great when you’re drunk in some bar in the middle of Lisbon with 4 of your closest girl friends.  Reggaeton at 9 PM on a Monday night while completely sober is SO NOT the same experience. At all.

I think I’ll stick to plain ol’ vanilla aerobics on weeknights.

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Lessons in customer service

May 3, 2010

Argentina is known for its beautiful people and delicious steaks.  Thailand is known for it’s pristine beaches and top-notch customer service.  Thailand and steaks don’t fit.  And neither do Argentina and top-notch customer service.  That’s because there is none.

Ok, I’m joking.  Of course there’s customer service in Argentina.  Restauranteurs, shop owners, security guards, teachers and cabbies – we’ve met some of the sweetest.  But in general, it’s hard to find quality, feel-good, they’ve-gone-above-and-beyond customer service here.

Whether it’s the help centre for a mobile, internet or telephone company, people just don’t seem to care.  You call, someone answers and if the question is standard, you get a standard, canned-response reply.  But if the question you have requires an answer that isn’t in the books, don’t expect to problem-solve through it together.  Most of the time, the person on the other side of the line will just hang up.

Yes.  Hang up.  It is crazy.

We’ve met various entrepreneurs from the expat community here and time and time again, they say that the biggest opportunities locally lie in improving the customer experience.  It’s just bad.

You call a manufacturer about possibly sourcing goods from his shop and you don’t hear back for weeks (if at all).  It boggles my mind that companies don’t value the fact that I’m an interested, willing customer, ready to give my money for a good or service they provide.  Why are they not tripping over themselves to serve me and serve me well?  The spoilt North American consumer in me just can’t understand it.  It’s backward economics.

But a closer look reveals something different.  It’s economics, yes, but not necessarily backwards.

Because salaries here are so low (minimum wage is 1800 pesos a month, which translates to about $450 USD) and opportunities for advancement are virtually non-existent, it’s hard to command above-and-beyond performance in low to mid-wage jobs.  We’ve heard of cases where telecentre workers are told that they should average 90 seconds per call.  There are no customer satisfaction metrics, no recorded calls, no CRM systems tracking past queries.  Just you and the stopwatch.

But of course, what else would you expect from a place where inflation runs rampant, where economic stability changes with the seasons, where cost cutting and cash are king.

Manufacturers don’t hold inventory, which means they aren’t tripping over themselves to sell it.  They’ll make it on demand, but only if fully paid.  This means it’s more profitable to maintain current relationships than go after leads that may yield zero or low volume business.

There is no concept of credit here. Inflation fluctuates so frequently that some restaurants don’t print prices on their menus – you have to ask.

Here, the economic stability that we take for granted in places like North America and Europe does not exist.  This is why come pay day, people line up at Cambio shops to change pesos to dollars.  Better to keep savings in cold, hard Benjamins than to risk investing pesos in banks.

And so, in a place where financial stability for the average person is dependent more on the political and economic policies in place at any given time than on personal effort, priorities shift.  Instead of focusing on career advancement, promotions and innovation in the workplace, people focus on more tangible, controllable benefits: family, friends and leisure time.  People don’t live to work.  They live to live.

They live to live.  And it is obvious.  On Sundays, businesses are closed, families crowd the parks, coffee shops are packed, subways and buses are empty.  Meals are 3-hour long marathons of storytelling, laughter and shared time.  Friends see each other weekly, not monthly.  People get to know their neighbours.

I won’t take back my opinion that customer service here is bad.  It can definitely be improved.  But there is so much more to it than just that.  There are larger forces at work here – political, economic, historical – that help explain the workings of a place.

For me, it’s all been a long lesson on perspective.  Give your best, in everything, regardless of what reward systems are in place.  Don’t take for granted functioning, (mostly) efficient governments. Treasure the softer, lovelier, immeasurable goodness of family, friends and leisure time in your life.

Live to live.

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