ODE TO A SUMMER DAYDREAM

I would like to start by giving a shout out to the genius creators of the government of the United States of America. Wow! You don't hear that very often. What I mean is to say is, "Thank you!" to all those historic old guys who thought that public schools, libraries, and beautifully designed public parks were worth the investment. I used to be critical of all the stuff that doesn't get done in the US. But living in Buenos Aires has helped me appreciate all that we have at our disposal in the US. Infrastructure is something of a mirage around these parts.

A year and a half after my the start of my "third-world dunk tank" experience, I am aching to walk or bike to my local library. That's right, you heard me. I have surpassed the primal, culinary cravings (i.e. peanut butter, organic real milk). I no longer feel like killing for green chili. My longing for "home" has, however, taken on more profound (and more difficult, therefore, to combat) forms.

Like right now I would kill to be riding my red 1950's-style, one-speed bike through Denver's side streets in shorts and sandals… white, side-wall tires, hot sun, cool shade…on my way to the local library to check out every book, cd, and dvd product of my big heart's desire.

But I can't do that. I feel like I did in elementary school again…sitting at my cold desk, gray, vapid skies, doing math problems and dreaming about summer time.

My hemispherical jumping was planned badly. I moved to Argentina after winter in North America. And therefore I began the pattern of always seeming to be somewhere as it's getting colder. It's weird not to have a springtime for 18 months.

So this bike/library idea. For one thing, I can't fulfill my dream because it's pretty cold hear right now. Cold and gray.

Secondly, I don't have a bike. They are…guess what??...expensive. Like every other damn thing in Buenos Aires. Frankly, I don't know what I'd do with one even if I had one. I could ride it to the river but I wouldn't want to take it on any stretch of road. I'd be road kill in less than two minutes. Interacting with Buenos Aires traffic is like walking into a NASCAR free-for-all with the additional confusion of motorcycles, trains, buses and curbside peddlers.

To further complicate the situation, there is only one library (approx. 30 minutes by bus) from my house but you can't check out any books. You can go there and read books but you can't take them home with you. Well, that is at least how every porteño explains it to me. Although, strangely, not a single person I have ever spoken too has ever actually tried to check something out because no one I've spoken to has ever gone there. Ahhh…the library's borrowing privileges…the stuff of local legend.

Finally, I am certain that they don't have very many books in English and if they do, they most probably don't have the types of books I'm looking for in this particular daydream. I want a juicy "beach book" to read. I can read in Spanish but it's about as comfortable as that time I had to read Great Expectations over winter break in high school.

So instead of riding my bike to the library, I am writing about how much I want to do it, sitting in front of my computer, directly next to the heater, drinking mate, and wishing that it would do something other than be cold and gray. Rain. Snow. Pummel us again with hail. Do something so that I can be more content that I'm warm, inside, and dreaming again about summer.

THE FIRST TIME I HAD IT DELIVERED

Being a hard-headed American, I have resisted, up until this point, most of the services offered here in Argentina. Perhaps it is a semi-puritanical, cultural upbringing that forces me to desire to lug my groceries in a backpack or drag three weighty bags of laundry to the laundrymat. They don't really even have laundrymats here. We pay about $8 pesos a load and somebody washes, dries, and carefully folds our precious underwear and whatnot.

That part, the part when they wash my dirty clothes, that I don't like. I find stains to sometimes be very personal and something one does not want to share with the entire barrio. Plus I have come to believe that the owner of the lavanadería has an extensive internal catalog of stain-based gossip which she could use to pull down the entire neighborhood if she decided to use her powers for good instead of evil. It's surprising the power your run-of-the-mill butcher, fruitstand owner, newstand worker, or laundrymat madame has when it comes down to it. I won't go on but instead let you to your imaginations. Anyway, I miss doing laundry. I like doing laundry.

The dragging-it-to-and-fro part, this part I never particularly liked. For the first time ever, this very evening, after a year and a half of living here and "lugging it," I called to have my laundered goods delivered. Fifteen minutes later this kid is at my door with three bags of laundry, an empty bag for my dirty comforter (angry dog and peeing incident) and change for my $100 peso bill. And above all, service with a smile.

When I closed the door, I smiled widely as I realized the shear power I can weild with a single phone call while still living in Buenos Aires. And down here, it's all part of the normal service "package" so I don't even have to feel guilty about not doing it the old-fashioned, "puritanical" way. There's plenty of time for that in the future.

Last year I hated dulce de leche (national fetish item), morcilla (blood sausage, sometimes sweeted with dried oranges and honey), and fútbol, I soooo didn't understand why it was a national obsession. I've now changed my mind about all three. I find that I'm changing my mind about other things too... plastic surgery (after a certain point in one's life, and then, only subtley), driving rules (rules in general, for that matter), and living without very much money.

And dare I say it... I'm thinking about getting a maid.

What's happening to me? Is there a medical explanation for all this?

HAPPY ACCIDENTS

Expatriates are legendary for, when getting together in groups, lamenting their sad international culinary options in their current country of residence. Normally people miss the types of foods that are enjoyed in their native lands but not known of in other regions. Peanut butter tends to be a nationally worshipped, fatty treat in the US, but in other countries people think it’s rather weird to grind up peanuts and then smear the lumpy mess onto toast. Personally, I’ve overcome the peanut butter cravings. I have not, however, gotten over the deeply rooted desire to eat a wide array of international cuisine every week.

Capital Federal, the “central” district of the greater Buenos Aires area, boasts a population of just around 3 million people, I’ve heard. Greater Buenos Aires maxes out at about 13 million inhabitants. And so it may be surprising to learn that in such a large city with several prominent immigrant groups from all over the world (the Americas, Europe, Asia, the Middle East), why there are not more than five Mexican restaurants in town. (And all of them, I might add, are a far cry from anything I’ve ever eaten that was called “Mexican food” before coming to Argentina.)

When you consider the economic situation in Buenos Aires, it’s quite clear why ethic foods are not more popular. For one thing, buying exotic spices,sauces or ingredients is too costly for your average Argentine. Strictly following their local diet (red meat, white bread, potatoes, vegetables, fruits, sugary-yet-tasteless sweets, red wine, Coca cola, coffee, cigarettes) eating is a lot less expensive.

After living here for over a year and a half now, I am finding ways to accommodated both my pocket book and my serious cravings for ethic cuisine. For one, I discovered China Town. It is a mere two train stops from my house and they sell anything and almost everything I could find in any health food store in the US… and at cheap prices. I can buy wasabi, green curry paste, quinoa hamburgers, fresh tofu and bulk beans. I even bought molasses there last week. It’s called “melaza” in Spanish.

When Meghan craves the taste of Thailand, we now eat in. One happy accident I’ve had in my adventure abroad is that I have begun to learn how to cook all sorts of types of food I never even attempted to cook in the United States. I have no choice but to do so here. And so happily, my culinary know-how is growing exponentially.

Another happy accident is that Patricio has been completely open with trying all these new foods and has discovered that he loves them. Sure, I emotionally trained him. First, I cooked really good versions of food I already knew he liked. With this, I got him to trust me. Then I slowly but surely unleashed wilder and more spicy dishes. He’s still a wimp when it comes to spice but he loves to eat vegetables now. His family can’t believe it. Patricio goes on and on about my cooking and in the end, his family members agree to try stuff. Then his mom talks to the neighborhood about my “Asian Lettuce Wraps” and the barrio is starting to think that ethnic food might taste good. I think I may have unknowingly unleashed social change.

This is what I call the real “Chain of Foo-ood.”

The first two happy accidents were great but nothing but a prelude to the most important one of all: My forced Argentine lifestyle (due to economic reasons) has made me into an “earth friendly” global citizen. What could I mean by all of that hippy, Greenpeace nonsense?

Because of many factors, Patricio and I are living a nice but very basic lifestyle here. I’ve talked about it in other entries (A Full Lecture on the Relative Cost of things and the Relative Cost Table) so I won’t go into it here. Patricio has a car that he bought years ago before their currency. These days a car is a luxury, or at least also used for work and only one per family. Our car runs off of natural gas and gasoline. Natural gas is really inexpensive down here, especially compared to what gasoline costs. We mostly run it on natural gas and so us plus about 25% to 30% of the population with cars own vehicles which run on natural gas. That’s 25% less gasoline-related by-products in the air.

When Pato’s not around and I am out and about, I either walk, take a bus, ride the train or subway, or hail a cab. With all the ride-sharing I’m doing, I’m unintentionally living a very ecologically-minded lifestyle.

What’s more, electricity costs quite a bit so I always remember to turn the lights off when I leave a room. Also, I telecommute for work so I am not expending energy to get two and from work.

I believe that just around 80% of the food and household products I buy are locally produced. I do splurge and buy several imported items when they don’t have any comparable local counterparts. For example, I buy only Argentine household cleaners, cleaning products, vegetables, fruits, meats, cheeses, eggs, grain products, linens, furniture, dishware, etc. I buy export items (or haul them here myself) when it comes to beauty and bath products and clothing. L’Oreal, Revlon, Maybelline, etc. are all considered “luxury products” and have kiosks in the mall with cute attendants who can answer all of your makeup needs. Remember, what costs five monetary units in the US costs 15 here. So I bring with me my “getting-closer-to-thirty-merits-expense-French-facial” creams and my wide array of higher-end (Tar-jay) cosmetics.

Also, I have brought most of the most expensive technological equipment with me as it is at least two times more costly, in dollars!, to buy the same items down here. When it comes down to it, I simply choose only shop in the United States. And I also chose to live on all the things I had from my unintentionally-over-consumptive life in the US. What can I say? There is more competition there and lots of sales and discounts so a person can live a pretty nice life style on not too much money if you can do it right in the States. In Argentina, it’s different. It’s like living in a high-inflation version of Tokyo. But this is more for another article, some other day.

Let me get to the point, my point is that I’m doing less harm to the earth buy not unintentionally consuming the resources it takes to eat grapes that are shipped or flown from Chile. And luckily, Argentine beef and wine and fruit and vegetable products are some of the most succulent and delicious things I’ve ever tasted. Everything tastes like it came from my very own garden… if I had one. The tomatoes are fresh and ripe because they were not harvested young and refrigerated to Safeway. They were driven in from the campo right to the fruit stand.

I guess all that makes up for the fact that by flying in an airplane more than 19 hours per year, I’m doing one of the worst things a person can do to the earth.

Why did I start thinking about all this? Well, the Happy Planet Index, published by the New Economics Foundation (their website is currently down), recently came out with some surprising results.

According to their site, the Happy Planet Index (a.k.a. HPI), “addresses the relative success or failure of countries in supporting good life for their citizens, whilst respecting the environmental resource limits upon which our lives depend.” And, “The Happy Planet Index (HPI) is an innovative new measure that shows the ecological efficiency with which human well-being is delivered.”

And this year’s winner is? “On a scale of 0 to 100 for the HPI, we have set a reasonable target of 83.5. This is based on attainable levels of life expectancy and well-being and a reasonably sized ecological footprint. Today, however, the highest HPI is only 68.2, scored by the Pacific archipelago of Vanuatu,” states their website.

Surely the lifestyle in Vanuatu, a tiny island nation in Oceania, doesn’t in any way resemble the lifestyle most of us have in the United States. Well, at least a lot of people around the world believe that we have a luxurious lifestyle in the United States. Per capita consumption rates for my country tend to illustrate this trend as well. My college sociology professor loved to spout statistics like, “An average American adult consumes the same amount of energy per year as does an African village of 20 people.”

So how did the United States score? We scored an abysmal 28.8! We tied with Cote d'Ivoire and were sandwiched between Rwanda (28.3) on the low end and Lithuania (29.3) on the high end.

How could we possibly score so low as to be compared to the Happiness Index of someplace like Rwanda? Lithuania? Yes, yes, I hear the beaches are lovely this time of year but… what?!

Their site says that the HPI is calculated based on, “three separate indicators: ecological footprint, life-satisfaction and life expectancy.”

They define “ecological footprint” as being: “,,,how much land area is required to sustain a given population at present levels of consumption, technological development and resource efficiency, and is expressed in global-average hectares (gha). The largest component elements of Footprint are the land used to grow food, trees and biofuels, areas of ocean used for fishing, and ­ most importantly ­ the land required to support the plant life needed to absorb and sequester CO2 emissions from fossil fuels.

Why is this a big deal? Because, according to their site, “The same methodology can be used to calculate, in the same units, the Earth’s biocapacity,­ its biologically productive area. Currently, the biocapacity of the Earth is around 11.2 billion hectares or 1.8 global hectares per person in 2001 (assuming that no capacity is set aside for non-human species). In 2001, humanity’s demand on the biosphere ­ its global ecological footprint ­ was 13.7 billion global hectares, or 2.2 global hectares per person. At present, therefore, our Footprint exceeds our biocapacity by 0.4 global hectares per person, or 23 per cent. This means that the planet’s living stocks are being depleted faster than nature can regenerate them.” What it means is that there isn’t enough for everybody and that is only going to get worse in the future.

They define “life-satisfaction” using statistics and reports which measure the life satisfaction of different groups of people within each country and compare those with what the general public opinion is, how long people are living, etc. They say, “Satisfaction with life overall, tends to be generally stable since it reflects a summary of “judgments about feelings”. Whilst on the individual level, day-to-day changes in happiness are of interest, at a policy level it is overall satisfaction that gives the best indication of how groups of people are faring. If a majority of people in a country report dissatisfaction with their lives, this seems to be a reasonable indication that something is awry, either with government policy, with society, or with both.”

Finally, “life expectancy” was the last factor to be considered in calculating the HPI. Their site tells us that, “Life expectancy at birth is an estimate based on the prevailing conditions in the country, and is calculated through large-scale data collection of mortality rates at different ages.”

If Vanuatu did so well and the United States did so poorly, how did other countries fair? Below, you will find a sampling, based on continent. They are color coded to show you if they are higher or lower than the United States rated (28.8), Make your own conclusions.

Before you read on, I’ll say my peace for the day. I don’t think huge groups of immigrants would be trying to move to other countries (i.e. Argentina, the United States, several European nations.) if their lives in their own countries were so great. People don’t love to move away from all their family and friends for extended periods of time, generally speaking. I mean, I don’t like it, even if I’m doing it for a higher purpose. That being said, I believe the “ecological footprint” factor in this study can greatly affect the HPI. In looking at the figure it’s not to say that people in Syria are really happier than those living in Norway. But it does show us that the people in Norway aren’t any happier although they consume a lot more energy and goods than the people in Syria do.

Lastly I’d like to pose the rhetorical question: Isn’t it natural that people living in countries with colder climates have to consumer more goods in the form of clothing, housing, protective transportation (from the elements) and have to store food for the winter? Where does that factor into the study? Their ain’t no banana trees in Wisconsin.

Higher HPI than the United States

HPI about equal to the United States (within 2 points)

Lower HPI than the United States

NORTH AMERICA

Mexico 54.4

Canada 39.8

CENTRAL AMERICA

Guatemala 61.7

Costa Rica 66.0

El Salvador 61.7

SOUTH AMERICA

Argentina 52.2

Chile 51.3

Uruguay 49.3

Brazil 48.6

Columbia 67.2

Peru 55.1

Bolivia 46.2

EUROPE

United Kingdom 40.3

France 36.4

Germany 43.8

Italy 48.3

Spain 43.0

Norway 39.2

Croatia 43.7

MIDDLE EAST

Palestine 52.6

Israel 39.1

Iraq (not on study)

Iran 47.2

Syria 43.2

ASIA

China 56.0

Russia 22.8

India 48.7

Japan 41.7

SOUTH PACIFIC

Australia 34.1

New Zealand 41.9

Papua New Guinea 44.8

AFRICA

Algeria 45.9

Nigeria 31.1

South Africa 27.8

Sudan 27.7

Egypt 41.6

A FULL LECTURE ON THE RELATIVE COST OF THINGS

A lot of fellow American expats in Baires (Buenos Aires) have commented on their blogs about Allen Salkin’s story, Expatriate Games published by the Washington Post in April. More than a couple have mentioned the improbability of me living on a mere $500 US dollars a month, the equivalent of around $1500 Argentine (or Argentinean) pesos.

I agree with them. It is improbable. What Allen Salkin failed to mention was the fact that my fiancé’s income pays for most of our bills down here. I’m the second income for now. As a single gal, there is no way I could live on $500 dollars a month in Buenos Aires, unless I was just really fond of eating gnocchi for every single meal of the day and living near the airport.

From my American perspective, Patricio and I are living with very little luxury. Eating most of our meals at home and spending little on entertainment, clothing, and other indulgences, we get by on about $4000 pesos per month. Part of that is due to the fact that every month something breaks, be it a pipe or the car or a tooth and that eats up about $500 pesos which is considered in that figure. From Patricio’s Argentinean perspective, we’re living pretty darn well which basically means we don’t have to eat gnocchi every day. But, I digress…

To really understand how relative cost works, you must bear in mind that in Argentina you earn and spend pesos and in the United States you earn and spend dollars. Currently the Argentine peso is equal to about $0.33 of the US currency. Put in another way, you must exchange roughly three Argentine pesos to get one US dollar. Continuing on with this logic, I should theoretically earn 66% less working in Argentina’s marketplace as compared to someone who works in the US. This also means I should be spending 66% less. At least, that is how is should function. But how does it really work down here?

Before I found out how to work “from the United States” in my virtual office with a high speed internet connection and an Internet phone (Voice-over IP, Vonage), I was looking for local jobs. I looked for jobs in fields I had some experience in: Real Estate, marketing, English, translation, writing. I didn’t look into food service because I didn’t want to stay up until four a.m. every day. I interviewed a bit. I even had an interview with a company to anchor their business video podcasts. (But I didn’t take it… I didn’t want to end up with stiff hair and a weird schedule like Jane Pauly.)

The worst of these jobs paid $900 pesos per month ($300 dollars) and the best were offering in upwards of $2000 pesos per month ($600 dollars). What an American has to understand is that if they are expecting to enter into the local labor market it’s really difficult bureaucratically (to be discussed in some other article) and one is not going to earn what one would in an normal job in the United States in units or in currency.

In a perfect world, Argentina’s labor situation would function in an equalaterally determined way. I just made that up and am not sure if it is legitimate "economic speak." I should probably explain what I mean. This is a fancy way to say that if I earn 66% less than someone does in another country, I should also be paying 66% less for goods and services. For a moment in time, Argentina existed at a first world status and their money went as far as the dollar and the euro. But that changed when their once strong currency fell in the devaluación of 2001. Most people lost everything. When the peso stablized later on, it settled at the where it is at today peso-to-dollar ration of 3:1. Good news for travelers means bad news for Argentina.

I decided to make a table so that I could acurately and dramatically represent the differences in the relative cost of living and working in Buenos Aires as it compares to Denver, Colorado. I am going to compare a common situation: the relative earning index. In Buenos Aires I can earn, in units, about half the amount of money I would for the same job in the US. Let’s say I went into marketing. Here I would make $1500 pesos per month (think 1,500 units or 18,000 MU per year). In the US, specifically the Denver marketplace, I could make $36,000 dollars (think 3,000 MU per month). I used get this salary myself as a Marketing Coordinator for a Denver-based start-up several years ago. Please keep that in mind when you look over the Relative Cost Table I recently made.

My comparisons are made on the Denver’s relative cost of living. I should be comparing Buenos Aires prices to those of New York, London, Tokoyo because of the size and importance of Buenos Aires to the nation. To be truthful, I don’t know anything about New York pricing other than that it’s expensive. I’ve never been there. Please remember that New York is a lot more expensive but you don’t make a whole lot more to compensate for the expense. Buenos Aires should be considered on these terms.

Some information on the columns:

COLUMN 1:
ITEM - with detailed description
Here I talk about what types of products are commonly purchased and compare them with their US counterpart that has a lot in common with the Argentine product.

COLUMN 2:
COST IN AR PESOS - (1 peso = 1 MU)
I record the average acquisition cost of the item in Buenos Aires.

COLUMN 3:
RELATIVE COST – AR cost of item divided by gross monthly salary for Bs.As
“AR” is an abbreviation of “Argentina.” “Bs.As.” is a common acronym for Buenos Aires used by people here. By dividing the item’s cost by monthly earnings, I can demonstrate what percentage of an average monthly salary goes to buy the item. Below this percentage I also generally have tried to give the percentage as seen another way, for example, through buying quanity. You can see, instead, how much of the item you can buy with your gross monthly salary.

COLUMN 4:
COST IN US DOLLARS - (1 dollar = 1 MU)
I record the average acquisition cost of the item in Denver.

COLUMN 5:
RELATIVE COST –US cost of item divided by gross monthly salary for Denver
Just as I did for the Baires market, I have divided the local Denver cost of the item by the month’s gross earnings. And so the same goes for the primary and secondary examples as well.

COLUMN 6:
THE WIND CHILL FACTOR
This last column holds information on how much more expensive the Argentine price is in the end as compared to the local Denver final price. The wind chill factor seems emmense. Could it be true that the Argentine items are sometime 260% and sometime 1,080.00% more expensive than what the same items costs to your average American? Yes, the Wind Chill Factor is real. A cute t-shirt really cost 1,200.00% more to buy in Buenos Aires local than it does in to a Denverite.

And now some notes on the table in the previous post, the “Relative Cost Table:”

· “MU” means “monetary units” as they are the monetary units of pesos in Argentina and dollars in the United States.

· I tried to compare similar products. As I mentioned in the table, I haven’t been back to the US for a while so I have to make an educated guess on how much things cost in Denver now.

As you can see, living in Argentina is not cheaper than living in the US. Argentina is only cheaper if you are used to buying things with a more expensive foreign currency. All these writers who keep talking about what a bargain Argentina is think this way because they enter the market playing with more chips.

Truly, the pricing is only outrageous if one doesn’t know anything about money. The pricing in our country is based on the worldwide marketplace. And while our currency is not the strongest that it has been, we are still on the top of the food chain. Argentina, to an American buyer, is like an elk to a mountain lion—dinner and dessert.

Now I have to tell all of you wild, wonderful adventurers hoping to seek adventure in the land of beef and tango: If you think it’s going to be cheap, think again. Determine the amount of money you will need to save before you arrive or what have to keep you afloat before you finally find "gainful" employment. Please consider also how much you'll be able to make when finally get a job here too.

Finally, I’ll conclude all this rambling with a traveler's just wanted to put out the warning: To those fortunate few who can make a good living in dollars while living abroad or who are independently wealthy, let me just ask you that you please do not openly or loudly talk in street cafes or other public venues about how cheap everything is. A lot of locals don’t let on, but they speak some English. You are going to offend everyone around you if you intentionally or unintentionally rub a porteño’s face in the fact that for you, everything is so darn cheap. Chances are, your average person is just scratching out an existence.

Relative Cost Table

ITEM with detailed description	COST IN AR PESOS (1 peso = 1 M.U.)	RELATIVE COST AR cost of item divided by gross monthly salary for Bs.As.	COST IN US DOLLARS (1 dollar = 1 M.U.)	RELATIVE COST US cost of item divided by gross monthly salary for Denver	THE WIND CHILL FACTOR
DISH SOAP In Argentina I buy Magistral dish soap. It’s very concentrated and lasts along time. Most of the other soaps are useless. In the US even your middle-of-the-road Palmolive is a pretty good product. I am comparing the two in this example.	7.50 MU 750 ml of product	0.50% You can buy 200 bottles of soap with your monthly earnings.	3.00 MU 750 ml of product	0.10% You can buy 1,000 bottles of soap with your monthly earnings.	+500.00%
HAIRDRYER In Argentina I bought a Braun hairdryer with two speeds, and three heat settings. It was neither the cheapest nor the most expensive model at my local Carrefour (like Target). In the US I purchased an almost identical hairdryer, a Conair, at my local Target. I am comparing the two in this example.	135.00 MU	9.00% You can buy about 11 hairdryers with your monthly earnings.	25.00 MU	0.83% You can buy 120 hairdryers with your monthly earnings.	+1,083.33%
CUTE T-SHIRT In Argentina there are very few sales and very few discount options. Unfortunately, I can’t wait to buy my clothes during their after-winter and after-summer annual sales because they don’t make a lot of my size and there are quite a few tall foreigners to buy the small supply. So, I buy regular price normally. I like to shop on Avenida Santa Fe. I might go to Alto Palermo or around Plaza Serrano and all throughout Palermo Viejo and Palermo Hollywood to buy something really unique and fun. In the US I would do most of my shopping at cool second-hand stores like the Buffalo Exchange or other discount stores like T.J. Maxx or Nordstrom’s The Rack. I’m comparing a similar type of “cute” t-shirt that is decently made.	90.00 MU	6.00% You can buy 16 cute t-shirts with your monthly earnings and a scarf so you can look like all the other girls.	15.00 MU	0.50% You can buy 200 cute t-shirts with your monthly earnings… and a Orange Julius.	+1,200.00%
LOCAL PHONE SERVICE In Argentina you have to pay for each individual call you make. It’s even more expensive to call a cell phone than it is a land line. I’m basing this on our local phone bill of moderate use. Let’s say we use the phone 1.5 hours per day. A conservative guess would make that 45 hours per month. In the US we pay one price per month. I could use a local phone company but I’d probably keep using my Voice-over IP system (Vonage) and have unlimited calls in the US and several other countries for the price listed. These are the cheapest options available so they are equal on that level and are used in this comparison.	75.00 MU this per month cost is equal to about 1.67 MU per hour	5.00% You can talk just over 898 hours with your monthly earnings. There are 720 hour in a month of 30 days so that’s overtime.	25.00 MU	0.83% You can also essentially talk for an unlimited amount of time. (But why would you want to?)	+602.41%
CHEAP USED CAR In Argentina we already have a car (thank God!) but if we didn’t we’d probably buy a seven-year old car that works on both gasoline and natural gas. With seven years on it it’s likely to have high miles and some body damage. Let’s just say it’s the Citroen we already have. In the US I’d buy a similar car in a similar condition, like a Honda of some model or other. It wouldn’t have the additional feature of running on natural gas (but that’s only because it’s part of the marketplace here).	15,000.00 MU Houses and cars are sold in dollars in Argentina. It would cost $5,000.00 dollars to buy this car. You would probably have to come up with this in cash as there is very little bank lending. The upside is that houses and cars haven’t tended to depreciate here even in economic downturns. Unlike the US, the housing and car markets can’t go soft with foreclosures.	1,000.00% You have to save every penny for 10 months to buy this puppy.	5,000.00 MU You probably would need to buy this in cash but you might be able to finance or take a credit line out so it wouldn’t be such a burdensome one-time sum. The upside to paying a little bit of interest is that you can build and rebuild your credit this way.	167.00% You have to save every penny for about a month and three weeks to buy this hot rod (if it was even that expensive.)	+598.80%
RENT Patricio and I split the rent. We live in a cute two-bedroom in Nuñez which is about 15 minutes by train from downtown. Our rent is just a little cheaper than it would be in the heart of the city. We like it because it feels like a small town and we have a garden for our dog, Rocco. In Denver we´d probably rent the same kind of place.	450.00 MU This is divided by two because Pato plays half. Our rent is really 800.00 MU per month but I’m working in the cost of expenses. It’s normal for a renter to pay for electricity, phone, gas, water as well as other minor expenditures and repairs.	30.00% Ironically, in this way, rent becomes one of the only normal things in Bs.As. In the mortgage lending biz in the States they say that you should be able to afford 30.00% of your salary for your housing expense. Of course, renting should always come in at less than this percentage because they are considering that a mortgage on a house will cost more.	450.00 MU This is also divided by two for the example. I want to make sure to provide a point of comparison. I think that spending $900.00 in Denver would get you a lot of apartment.	15.00% This is what makes renting advantageous to young people in the States... it costs less than homeownership by a long shot! But if you do decide to buy… you can write the interest off your income tax! Great system.	+200.00%
ALL-PURPOSE VITAMINS In Argentina I splurge and buy Centrum vitamins. Regular, locally produced vitamins cost half as much. I will go ahead and use the cheaper vitamins in the comparison. I wouldn’t probably buy Centrum in the States with all the other options available. So, I’ll consider it a middle-of-the-road price for the US and use it in the comparison there.	15.00 MU For a bottle of 30 vitamins. Each vitamin cost 0.50 MU.	1.0% You can buy 100 bottles of vitamins with your monthly earnings.	7.00 MU For a bottle of 30 vitamins. Each vitamin costs about 0.23 MU.	0.23% You can buy 428 bottles of vitamins with your monthly earnings and some candy and a matinee ticket to the movies.	+434.78%
MCDONALD’S BIG MAC MEAL W/ MED FRIES AND A COKE Yes, to answer your question, I do eat McDonald’s occasionally. It’s scandalous for an American expat to do it but it’s a great hangover cure. Like everything else, the Golden Arches are also a lot more expensive here. They have specials on Monday’s through Wednesday’s. I think that the meal costs six pesos then. I’ll use the regular price in the example as well as the regular price in the US. Also, they do not offer super size options that commonly in Argentina. At least, it’s not considered an “up sell.” (Thank God!) They are also rather inflexible on changing condiments or adding “extras.” You can’t pay them to put extra sauce or a different one on a sundae. They cannot and will not do it. It’s strange and a little robot-like if you ask me.	8.75 MU It may be more expensive but the beef is incredible. I recommend ordering from the premium line... yummy.	0.58% You can buy 171 Big Mac meals and an apple pie with your monthly earnings, but I wouldn’t recommend doing it, gordo.	6.00 MU I haven’t been back to the US for a while so I’m approximating.	0.20% You can buy 500 Big Mac meals with your money. Next month you can buy the tombstone.	+290.00%
YOUR AVERAGE CD Let’s say I had wanted to buy a Rolling Stones in Argentina. I buy their Greatest Hits album at some music megastore on Avenida Florida in the heart of downtown Buenos Aires. In Denver I might buy it at any number of places on an outing and they’d all probably be priced almost the same. I’m going to say that I bought it at Twist & Shout.	35.00 MU I could buy a pirated copy on the street for a lot less but “Piratear es delito” so I never do. “Borrowing” from friends’ iTunes… another story.	2.30% You could buy almost 43 Rolling Stones albums with your monthly earnings.	15.00 MU Unless you went with the $0.01 option from the BMG days. Does BMG even still exist?	0.50% You could buy 200 Stones discs with your monthly earnings or maybe just buy Mick Jagger’s home address and phone number from a skeezy London street urchin/paparazzi informant.