Noventa Centavos?

The gatitas up for adoption that I'm going to see tomorrow!! =)

Today we ventured into el barrio de chino (chinatown), which was pretty much the same as any other Chinatown - a lot of cheap crap. We even found a biombo being used in a store, but apparently it hailed all the way from Taiwan, and the owner wasn't ready to part with it. We did come across the cheapest peanut butter in the country, but apparently it tastes like peanut sauce, rather than peanut butter. We bought it anyway (the only other peanut butter is the mini-jar of Skippy, for about $13). The Chinese market also had nazi-branded barbeque sauce, super cheap sushi, and delicious eggrolls.

We walked a bit to get there since we opted to get off the bus when someone vomited on the floor (just like the p2p, except at 5pm). The bus system is extensive, with a million buses going anywhere you need to go in the city. All you have to do is use your guia "t" - the transportation bible - and carry lots of monedas (coins). However, coins are a rare commodity here. They are impossible to get, but necessary to use the bus. There may be a mafia hoarding the coins from the buses and selling them back at a higher rate. No se.

The other monetary struggle is that you can only get 100 peso notes from the atm, but most places "don't have change" for 100 pesos (about 33 dollars). A store must have change for this! Kind of like the realtors who expected us to pay for an apartment in dollars when the atms only give money in pesos. The money system is obviously quirky, to put it nicely.


Here is a quote from Julie's blog, describing our apartment search with an example of what ads looked like:

"45 years old building, newly recycled department with two environments ubicated in Palermo. Full equipment for six passengers this department has a lot of luminosity. Just five blocks away from Bosque Palermo (like Central Park in New York), a big park full of trees, green very nice for run. $1600 USD"

My favorite part is "ubicated" - the word ubicado in spanish means located, but ubicated is a brand new word to those of us familiar with the english language.

Anyway, we are sipping on 8 peso wine (by far not the cheapest wine you can find) getting ready to check out the nightlife here.

Chau (spanish version of ciao, and how you say goodbye, accompanied by a kiss on the cheek)