So I got on the plane to Buenos Aires no problem, chatted to a lovely Italian woman on the plane, and then the shock began. Not culture shock per say, but shock as realisation hit that the service of Emirates and Singapore Airlines is NOT the norm.
First of all, I am cancelling my vegetarian option for my return flight. They forgot about me, it was vegan and so no brownie and then the gnocchi was so disgusting and tasteless that I barely could eat it (only did because I was hungry).
Second of all, no individual movie screens (god I´m sounding spoilt right now), and for anyone who knows me, knows that this was the thing that I was looking forward to the most. On the whole 12 hour flight, they played one film that I was asleep in during the beginning and so didn´t watch, but couldn´t have really watched it anyway, because the screen was on such a weird angle. Anyway, so it was an extremely boring 12 hours, filled with intermittent naps and book reading.
Got to the airport and got out without a hitch. It was a bit of a shock to see everyone (customs, McDonald´s staff etc) wearing the mask for swine flu protection, but I was let in no problem. By this stage I had made a little posse. There was Laura the Italian on my flight who knew a bit of Spanish, and there was Matthias, the German-Kiwi musiciain from Christchurch. The three of us helped each other out.
I had gotten money out no problem, but getting it changed down for the bus as the bus only dispensed 100 peso notes (about $NZD45) was an absolute nightmare. Apparently Argentina is in a coin crisis, and no shop would change it. Finally got it and on to the bus we stepped. Two hours later, I made it to this really lovely hostel called sandanzas (www.sandanzas.com.ar) where they all said ¨You took the bus? You must be mad!" But it did only cost me 88c NZD so I was happy to spend 2 hours of my time watching the world go by out the window.
So far, my first impression is that it is BIG, and noisy. Tomorrow after a good night´s sleep, I will find interesting things to tell you although I know you find my lack of change and lack of movies and lack of good food riveting...
