Welcome Back to the Southern Hemisphere: jueves

Touch down in BA. Pampas-lined runways. A new, blue stamp for the old, blue passport. Water and dulce de leche from a kiosk for the bus ride, and for the coins to board the bus in the first place. I’ve forgotten how I need to carry water everywhere with me in hot weather, how in India it was Priority Number One. The day is so brilliant even the airport’s graying infrastructure seems less prison, more kind of cheerful prison.

Bus 86 costs fifty cents and runs frequently, but nobody is allowed to get on the first bus that pulls up. It goes off to refuel in some magical unseen gasolineland (does it have to ask the airplanes to share?) and returns later, full of what it takes to take me into the center city. After two hours of crisscrossing the expressway, making slow forward progress. Bus 86 stops frequently, too.

The Argentines combine courtesy with perceptiveness and don’t hesitate to give up their seats the elderly or pregnant. I’ve very generously given up my seat to my travel backpack, who needs it more than I do. I’m perched on the edge of a narrow bit of black molded plastic, and though it requires some effort to keep my balance, as the bus gets more crowded and the afternoon gets more sweltery, I begin to doze off. Not the best state for a gringa carrying a couple thousand dollars of electronic equipment. I never worry about crime too much, no matter where in the world I am, which is perhaps why I once lost $400 cash in Kuala Lumpur. Sometimes I do have to remind myself not to do something I could look back on as stupid.

Traffic moves easily, except for a jam when we enter the city proper. I start to gauge how close we are to the Plaza de Mayo, the city’s symbolic heart and transportation center, by whether the shop signs are hand painted or not. As we go along, the ratio of plate glass surface area to number of goods behind the windows rises sharply. The Avenida we’re on becomes one-way in the other direction, and we’re diverted onto a parallel street that cuts through leafy residential neighborhoods. It all feels very intimate and human-scaled, so the first glimpse of the giant buildings that ring the wide open Plaza are thrilling. First indication that BA is the new Bohemia? A restaurant called Totem & Tabú.

For the wild price of thirty cents, the Subte takes me underground from one Plaza to another, from May to Italy, where I am greeted, absurdly, by not one but two swaying Barneys offering treats to the children who are coming to the zoo. I’m after not animals but plants, though in the Jardin Botanica I get both. There are more feral cats than horticultural specimens. Most important, there are plenty of shady park benches. I collapse on one and hang out among the bad statuary (Romulus and Remus suckling at the wolf’s teat; a cautionary orgy; nymphs and other creatures) for the rest of the afternoon. Still can’t doze, but I brush up on the guidebook and the map and the people-watching. In the brick house at the center of the park there’s an exhibit of maps: Carlos Thays’ plans for the municipal parks, including the very one I’m in. After several hours of public R & R I move along.

The street where I live, Thames, is pronounced in two syllables. Plane trees arc across the cobblestones to make a never-ending bower. Across from my building a new condominium development is wrapped in construction placards, with a street-level window that displays a model apartment. Catty-corner, the Maryland English School is enormous and bright red. Up the block the men spill out of the café onto the sidewalk while they watch fútbol.

The agent from the real estate company is punctual and a bit shy, but an adept translator. The owner of my apartment and her daughter catch on quickly that though I can’t say too much, I understand a lot. They’re demonstrative and thoughtful, making sure to show me every detail of anything that flips, clicks, or switches. They fuss over the remote control (the tv is mounted high on the wall facing slightly downward, as it would be in a hospital room), but after they leave I realize that only hot water is flowing from the taps. It’s the next day before I realize I can turn on the cold with a valve hidden behind the bidet, but I am immediately and unreasonably excited by the bidet.

And finally, finally, I can put my head down for a nap.