Do you eat it?

The Harper Family Miming Quintet returned to the stationery shop with the remainder of our dwindling stash of Blu-Tac.  Two shop attendants looked at this magical blue substance from another planet wondering what it was used for.  In a fashion similar to The Lorax where the Once-ler explains all the virtues of a thnead, we told them its many uses.  They had never heard of it.  Perhaps this is a business venture we could consider for the future.

During our bus trip across Argentina, we saw some blatant littering which caused us to snack on our tongue numerous times.  Since arriving in 9 de Julio we have seen some forward thinking practices regarding basura, or rubbish.  The supermarkets we have been to do not give out plastic shopping bags.  Most shops have a bottle return system where you exchange bottles for pesos.  There is curbside recycling once a week and rubbish is collected five nights a week.

No one has a rubbish bin and there are a few dogs that roam the streets.  To counteract dogs pulling rubbish bags apart, the rubbish is put in an elevated rubbish perch.  We don’t know who makes them but we haven’t seen any two that are the same.

                                    

    

                                    

The siesta is alive and well in 9 de Julio.  All but the larger supermarkets open for four hours in the morning, close for four hours around noon and then open again at around five o’clock for another four or so hours.  With the late sun set here it sounds like a lovely idea of sitting down to a big family lunch then having a snooze before returning to work.  Probably reduces the stress levels of workers too.  The danger is though that at noon the roads become alive with clapped out scooters all zooming towards siesta-ville.  This is taking a little bit of adjusting to and today we returned from a walk a few minutes after noon with not much planned for lunch.  Luckily we had a few crackers and jam to fall back on.