The Argentinian Style - 5 Gestures you have to know before coming!
It’s been a few days since I arrived in Buenos Aires for my internship at Lunfarda and I’m only starting to learn about all the cultural differences- it’s the first time I live in a country that is that distinct from mine and, for me, the ways of the Argentines, and their coded body language are still kind of strange.
I’m on my way to the bus stop, not paying attention to where I positioned myself. Quickly, a slightly upset-looking person gives me the four-finger-to-one-thumb-pointing-upside-down-sign or as well known as “What do you think you are doing??” This is when I learned that it does not matter that Argentines are disorderly about everything else: the bus line -and its order- is sacred.
Quick side Note: You have to wave the bus down at a 45-degree angle arm to the body to stop it! Just telling you because on my first day of university here, I missed about five buses in a row running between the different bus stops until I got to understand that.
Entering the bus I get to tell the bus driver where I want to go. I’m still not sure how they determine the name of the bus stop here- I’m from a small village in Germany, and maybe that’s why. I know I’m headed for 2119 Don Pedro de Mendoza Avenue. I take a “wild guess” and I say Don Pedro, and I receive a head nod, sideways, so I say, Mendoza,..the driver still looks at me with a big question mark on his face. Last try before I pull out my google maps: “anywhere close to Rocha?” -aaand finally, we get to understand each other.
That doesn’t matter today though, because I’m going to Bolívar street and the bus is taking me straight without any confusion. I just wanted to prepare you for the kind of street-name-guessing that could face you. I’m happily searching for my place to stand in the bus trying to find a good handle to grab onto because now it comes as no surprise, that the bus driver is speeding through the streets as if it was a German autobahn mixed with a Samba- I’m exaggerating, but I feel this draws the picture pretty clearly,- buses are driving quickly in Buenos Aires.
Close to the San Telmo Markets, I get off the bus and I’m waiting for my bubbly, crazy, beautiful Argentinian friend Agus in front of the restaurant “ El Refuerzo”. To my surprise, she arrives with a friend she has just met on the way. I greet both of them with one kiss on the cheek. Not two, not three, not zero: one! Argentinians give each other one kiss on the cheek to greet one another. That counts for all people that are with the person that you know regardless of whether they are familiar to you or not. So prepare yourself!- if you ever go to an Argentinian party, you will kiss and you will be kissed a lot- on the cheek of course.
We enter the restaurant and as soon as the waiter leaves the menu, I start browsing. One plate catches my attention straight away: the menu of the day “Plato del Dia: Milanesa Napolitana”, my mouth starts watering. I’m starving and there is nothing better than a good old, crispy Milanesa topped with ham and cheese, and I’m getting it.
While sipping on a delicious, refreshing vermouth and eating my “Mila”, we talk about the latest up-to-date tittle-tattle, making jokes about my latest Argentinian food addictions. I end up asking Agus about why Argentinians like to put a lot of cheese on everything. Agus’ answer, one out of the Argentinian-gesture repertoire: launching her fingers from under her chin into an open palm, swiping the air with the hand. Official meaning: “how could I know??”. Agus: “But we loooove to put cheese on everything!”
Time is flying by like it always does with her- she is like a jumping energy ball that brings joy and smiles into everyone's life, and before I know it, three hours have passed by, and even if I don’t want to, it’s time to go. It’s time to order the bill. Now, the place is crowded with people wanting to eat their Sunday Merienda and I can see that the waiter is busy. To fasten it up and save the running waiter a way and me some time I raise my hand and imitate an air-made hand signature, which also translates into: “Can I get the check please?”
With the help of my Argentinian-gesture-knowledge and excellent service, the bill is paid in less than five minutes and we are heading out. Leaving for the bus with a kiss on the cheek for Agus, and a hug because I love her so much, which generally confuses people here, but not Agus: we have been friends for a long time.
Today, I decide to walk the way home. The colors of the sky in the early evening are incredible. I lose myself in the red-orangey-yellowish waves of the last sun rays sinking into the horizon, -a painting mirroring the sky in between the buildings of Buenos Aires. Taken back to reality by the cutting sound of siren-like beeping, I stop just in time before a car almost runs me over as it leaves its garage. While I’m still getting used to quitting daydreaming and stopping in time when I hear that siren so the car can leave the parking lot (a system implemented because the driver usually can’t see pedestrians on the sidewalk), I snap back into daydreaming looking at the vibrant colors of the sunset.
Later, passing by the city center I see people lining up in a 500-meter line for the bus but I already know now to go to the back of the line: Sundays are as busy as Mondays in Buenos Aires, millions of people enter and leave the capital every day by bus, and that is why -keep in mind- the line is sacred!
