By FAR, the Single Most Interesting Thing in Buenos Aires

To me, by far the single most interesting thing in Buenos Aires these last years has been the presence of the Cartoneros. These are free-lance, or quasi-freelance recyclers, who comb through the city's trash looking for recyclables, in particular carton, or cardboard.

Before explaining any more, let me establish a little context, at least for me.

Years ago I read and loved a book by Paul Auster called In the Country of Last Things. This is perhaps his least-known and least-appreciated book. It's an imperfect book, a beginning writer's book, but it was very powerful for me. It described an unnamed city, clearly based on New York, in which civilized society for some unstated reason had collapsed. The narrative was about a woman who came to the city from overseas to look for her missing brother, but the narrative didn't matter really. What mattered was the description of a failed urban society. Nothing worked, there were no authorities, no transportation, no way to get accurate information about anything, etc. There were people who ran themselves to death as a type of suicide, training for the big day for months. But I remember most from the book was the importance of your shopping cart. Pretty much everyone had a shopping cart, in which you kept your live's belongings, and people combed through the detritus of the failed city looking for anything of any value. And there existed a trading class, who traded you things you didn't need for things you did need. I don't think there was any money, but I might be wrong.

Anyway, the Cartoneros remind me of that book, a sign of a post-apocalyptic breakdown of order. Except instead of shopping carts, the roam the city with these two-wheeled carts that seem like they were made for horses or donkeys -- a cart perched on two wheels, with two long poles that go forward that would be attached to a horse's tackle, but which instead the cartoneros grab with their hands.

Let me interrupt and mention that it's hard to get pictures of the cartoneros. Actually, it would be quite easy if I was a bit more rude, but you don't want to run around taking pictures of the poor people. Some might take offense, but more importantly, it just feels ugly. So, anyway, here is the best picture I have to show:

And these carts here are tiny, usually the carts these guys pull around are 2, 3, even 5 times the size of these little guys. And they pile 'em high.

The first time I noticed the cartoneros was two years ago, when I rode by bike downtown after midnight. I saw all these young guys going through the trash, flattening and piling up cardboard boxes. I noticed two things right away. First, these were mostly strong young guys, with probably a few women, and they were busting their butts. They weren't like old bums going through the trash, they were working. And second, they were organized. The people going through the trash back home for returnable bottles aren't organized, no way. But these people were working together, trying to increase efficiency. In a way it was impressive.

But they're still going through the trash, and in this way they can't help but remind me of the failed society in book In the Country of Last Things. Like there's nothing new to make, nothing productive to do, we just hope to live off of the refuse. Although, in the book it was the refuse of the previous, successful society. Here, it's the poor living off the refuse of the rich, of the functioning society of which they are not a part.

I just read a few short articles in spanish on the Cartoneros, and one of them said that in metropolitan Buenos Aires there are some 100,000 cartoneros, 60% of them working the center city, or Capital Federal. And whereas a few years ago, there were mostly young men doing it, these days you see lots of women, children, and whole families working together. This will break your heart sometimes, to see an unwashed little eight year old girl in prosperous downtown Buenos Aires breaking down and stacking up cardboard boxes all by herself. (Talk about dying to take a picture, this girl that I saw was on Florida Street, the pedestrian shopping thoroughfare, which is jammed at all hours with business people and people toting bags from all the stores. But I just couldn't be that much a voyeur, I just couldn't.)

One of the most interesting things about the Cartoneros is that a few years back they were sort of institutionalized, the government assisted them by arranging a train for them that ran into the main train station downtown at around 11 or 12 at night, then left around 5 or 6. This was called the Tren Blanca, the white train, and was specifically for cartoneros to haul their findings back out to the suburbs, where whoever buys their stuff picks it up from them. This train has recently been cancelled, which has led to some repercussions which I'll discuss in a minute.

But first, speaking of hauling, one of the most amazing things is how much stuff these guys, and women, and children, collect and haul around. They've got this giant white reinforced bags, which are more or less cylindrical and about 4-5 feet in diameter. And these they fill, mostly with stacked cardboard. Then they pile these bags in their carts and haul them around. And it's not just cardboard, it's bottles and metal, and really just anything that might be of value. Through out a heavy old toilet bowl, and probably some cartonero will put it on his card and somehow get it to the suburbs and hope to sell it for a dollar or two.

Last year I saw an amazing thing walking home from downtown late one night. On Avenida Cordoba, there was a flat bed truck parked, and there were a bunch of Cartoneros around, and there were bunches of these white bags filled to the brim lining the side of the street. Clearly this was a meeting place for these people, a place where they transfer their goods to the truck to take them out of the city. I watched discreetly for a bit, and I saw how it took four or five big strong guys to lift these giant bags up onto the flatbed truck. These things were heavy. And they must have had a dozen or so that they were piling up there.

And just two nights ago I saw a similar thing, but the truck was already loaded up, and the Cartoneros were in back with the stuff, headed home. There must have been 12 or 15 people all crammed on top of all these bags and boxes and what-not in the back of a big truck. (The truck the other day had sides, which no doubt made it safer to ride in. But it didn't have a back, so it wasn't that safe!)

Oh, I've got one other photo of Cartoneros, this one of two guys working outside my window breaking down and stacking boxes. You can see the big white bag, though they've just barely started to fill it. These bags get big -- 4-5 feet in diameter, 4-5 feet high.

I don't know where these guys' cart is. Something a little unusual here.

Oh, and an amazing thing, is that sometimes you see big Cartonero carts actually being pulled by horses. Here in the big city, almost as urban as New York, horse-drawn carts going around picking up valuable trash.

Like I said, seems like a sign of some kind of fundamental breakdown. But then, people always do what they have to to survive, and people have done much, much worse, and are no doubt today doing much much worse in many places. It's just the juxtaposition of fancy buenos aires with sixty thousand garbage pickers that makes it so eerie.

Last word for now on the Cartoneros. The good thing about them is that for the most part I don't worry about getting robbed by them. These people are working. They know it would be much easier and more lucrative to rob people, but they're just not doing that. So I give these guys tons of credit for busting their butt and doing more than an honest day's labor for incredibly little money. Last year I read an estimate that said Cartoneros make about a hundred bucks a month. That would be 25 bucks a week. Five bucks a day. Not pretty, not pretty at all.

I will write more on this soon. Right now it's past three and I think this post is getting a little disorganized. More later.

Turns Out I'm Not All That Into Cafe Culture

In describing the lifestyle here in Buenos Aires to people back in the states, I would frequently say that they have a "cafe culture" here. And this is pretty much true, at least among the upper and middle classes. There are lots of cafes and restaurants with sidewalk seating, and people seem to spend lots of time hanging out at these places.

And to everyone in stressed-out New York, this just sounds fantastic. Less work, more hanging out in cafes! Sounds great -- in theory.

But on this trip, maybe since I've got more time on my hands since I'm not working at all, I'm starting to see just how much sitting around people do. And it's a lot. So this is my realization -- Argentinians are really, really good at sitting around. I've shared this realization with my argentinian friends, three or four of them, and they all laugh and say, yup, we are truly experts at sitting around.

There are definitely nice aspects to this. No one is in a hurry, no one gets impatient. This is really nice, make no mistake.

But, funny, the cafe lifestyle, all that sitting around, it kind of drives me crazy. I'm very patient, I don't get worked up when the line is delayed at a store or anything, but I can't just sit at a table for hour after hour gabbing. I need to be a little more active.

People don't just sit around in cafes and restaurants -- they sit around all over the place. Walk down any street during the day long enough and you will see a group of people, usually men or teen-age boys, sitting on the sidewalk or the curb. They've got some sodas, some chips maybe, but they look like they've been there a half hour, and look like they'll be there another half hour. Maybe they're taking a break from some kind of job? Or else just teenagers with nothing to do? But I see this all the time.

And my neighbors, they are truly experts at sitting around. I know because we both have these nice sizable terraces, stacked on top of each other. And when I'm outside or have the door open, I can hear every word they say down there. And, man, do they sit around a lot. Granted, they have a baby, so they can't be out all that much. But they have friends over in the afternoon and evenings, and on Sundays they frequently have the whole extended family over, cramming six or eight or more people onto this terrace, and then spending five, six, eight hours out there sitting around yapping. I was just amazed.

But then I find out that Sunday is family day. Much as they do in Spain, here almost everyone spends all day Sunday with their family. Like, at the family house, or at somebody's house. All day. This is really, really nice -- god bless 'em. I totally believe in the extended family, I think the loss of the extended family in the US is what has made us all so incredibly neurotic. (I could pontificate on this, but I won't -- if you're interested in my thoughts, ask me.) But, nonetheless, I guess I am an American, so spending all day every sunday inside with my extended family sounds like torture.

And back to cafes -- yes, people take their sweet, sweet time at cafes. This is lovely. In theory I should love this. Take the time, smell the roses. Bond with your friends and family. I know, I know this is the most important thing in life. But, I don't know, I am just not that into sitting around. It might not be who I am. I want to do stuff, at least during the day. Evenings I like to hang out with people, but during the day, I feel a need to be active.

Who knew?

I guess the big question then is this -- if I stayed here, or somewhere else with a similar culture, would I adapt?

PS -- the funniest thing about the neighbors downstairs is that one of them -- I think the father, roughly 35 years old -- is smoking weed pretty regularly down there on the terrace. Once he was even smoking weed on family day, with all these people down there. Sometimes I have to shut the sliding door out to my terrace, because it comes right in my apartment.