Train whistle blowing.

The conversation for this week has been if free will exists or is it merely an illusion.  Are our futures determined by our past events?  Free will can only exist if there are no influences and there can be no influence when you have had life experiences.  Your unconscious mind makes decisions up to seven seconds prior to your conscious mind being aware of the choices.  This is the crux of Talluah’s essay due in 17 days and we have analysed it from every angle to the point where we decided (or did we?) to go out for a bike ride and take in some scenery.

Stumbling block number one was that I haven’t pumped my tyres up for some time and with Depp on the back in his little seat, my tyres were flatter than a personality theorist’s vote for free will.  Ahhh, it even permeates into the blog.  We detoured to the service station where motorbikes can only fuel up if they have a helmet.  The law doesn’t state that the rider has to be wearing the helmet, so long as they can show a helmet they can buy petrol.  Once the tyres were inflated we pedalled off until Truce’s chain derailed.  Some quick roadside repairs had us on our way, for 50 metres when Indiana’s shoelace became caught up in her pedal.  We had travelled a total of 150 metres and had our MacBethian troubles in threes.  Onwards cyclists, but not too fast – that would make you racists.

We know not the name of the park we found, but we do know that it formed part of the old train line that ran past 9 de Julio.  There are some old rail bridges that can be crossed by those who feel brave enough to tread the boards of the ferrocarril.  Part of the track has been consumed by a bamboo forest.  We trudged through the bamboo realising that we don’t need to be vigilant for snakes as there are none here.  It’s possible the mosquitoes killed them all. 

There is a hill in the park, as all good parks should have.  Here we could race, observe and contemplate the ghosts of the passengers who must have travelled along the old tracks.

Almost ironically, on Good Friday, we came across a giant metal sculpture of Jesus on the cross with cement statues leading from one end of the park to the other, telling the story of Jesus’ last hours.

The day finished with purchasing 1 kg of ice cream to go with our pancakes for dinner.  After all, we did have a healthy lunch and go for a bike ride…

Feliz cumple Depp

Usually when it rains in 9 de Julio it’s less than a 24 hour period.  As Depp’s birthday party approached the rain that started on Friday continued on Saturday and showed no signs of stopping on Sunday – the day of Depp’s disco party.  With 15 children and parents coming we had planned to use the backyard to help cope with the number of people we needed to fit into our on living room.

Parents are very organised here when it comes to birthdays.  There is only one class for each grade so everyone knows everyone.  The general rule at Depps age is that you invite all the children from your class and all the parents put 100 pesos in each for a combined present.  That way they are able to buy a gift of substantial size and value instead of receiving 15 little gifts.  Depp received some amazing gifts that he will love playing with.  The host of the previous birthday is responsible for buying the gift for the next birthday, so Talluah is praying that someone can help her find where the cool toy stores are.

Another tradition we have seen is the use of a birthday candle, which is like a small signal flare.  While it’s flaming away, slowly melting the cake below it and activating the sprinkler system above, the children count quickly.  Whatever number they reach when the flare stops burning is how long your life will be.  This is a scary concept when you have kindergarten kids counting to predict your life expectancy.  Luckily Depp had some parents in the corner keeping the count going.  This was the first time Talluah had seen one of these candles in action and her face went from awe to horror while the flame continued to grow over her iPad.

We Australianised the traditional game of pin the tail on the donkey by creating pin the nose on the koala.

Depp and his guests danced with the inhibition that comes with youth.  The ability to bust a groove, shake a tail feather and twist again with 1825 days of life experience.

All because of a shoelace.

Back in Australia, a box of winter clothes sat waiting to be posted to us here in Argentina.  After the problems Talluah had with three text books for university, we wondered what sort of issues our new looking winter coats and boots would cause at customs.  We looked at having the package sent to Paraguay and then driven across the border by a friend of a friend.  Eventually the answer came in the form of our niece who was coming to South America for a holiday and claimed to travel light.  Once asked, she said she wouldn't mind carting our 10 kilograms worth of luggage to Chile where I would meet her and retrieve our clothes.  The days continue to cool and we eagerly waited for our niece to arrive in Chile with our boots and jackets.  We decided that it would be easier, quicker and possibly the same price for me to fly to Chile, pick up our winter clothes and return to Argentina than have our new looking items pass through customs and possibly held up and taxed heavily.

The adventure started at 4:00 in the morning when I was picked up by a remis driver to take me to the airport for my flight.  A remis is like a taxi service but you hire a driver in his private car.  Buenos Aires is four hours away by car (longer by bus).  I think my driver went to bed at his usual Argentine time because several times he decided to use all of the road and even the shoulder.  He did offer for me to have a sleep in the back but I didn’t think it right if we both fell asleep.

After 24 hours in Chile, I returned to the airport with our bootlegged boots, jackets and merken spice – our favourite Chilean spice.  While on the aeroplane I received a customs declaration form that was in English and Spanish.  I was a little perplexed about the rules of what I could bring into the country.  There was a lot of emphasis on items that had been recently purchased and all our jackets and boots look brand new, some even possibly had tags still on them.   The form said that clothes are exempt but new items can be taxed up to 50% the value of the item.  These clothes obviously weren’t my size and I was worried it would look like I’d bought them all in Chile.  I rehearsed my story about having to leave them in Australia and my niece brought them over blah, blah, blah.

At the Buenos Aires airport, there is a machine with a button on it.  Passengers have to press the button.  If the light turns red you go to the line to have your bags searched.  If the light turns green you are free to go on your merry way.  The man in front of me stopped to tie his shoelace and let me go first.  Would this change history forever?  Is fate written in stone?  Did the shoelace really exist or was it a manifestation of my insecurities as a child?  I pressed the button and the light went green.  I walked out of the airport feeling rather relieved.

We later found out that customs is more interested in items that are being brought into the country with an obvious commercial purpose such as new electronic equipment.

I just saw a mouse with a tooth.

Truce has been working on a wobbly tooth for several days now citing various medical reasons why she needed to keep twisting and turning at the loose K9.  Finally at 8:50pm, an hour after we had said goodnight to Truce, she called out that her tooth had fallen out. We were now going to find out how far the Australian tooth fairy travels. After spending two months in Argentina and realising how difficult it can be for foreigners to do certain things we were certain that the our tooth fairy would not be able to obtain a valid work visa, justify the reciprocity fee or get an export licence to take the tooth out of the country.  It’s most likely she would need to contact her Argentine counterpart, El Ratón Pérez, a small mouse who leaves money in exchange for lost teeth.   In the morning, Truce found 40 pesos in the cup where her tooth was.  Luckily Pérez had drained the water as Argentine money is still made out of paper.

There are some weeping willow trees around the corner from us and Talluah used them to weave a plant pot holder for the living room.  We are still trying to work on softening the echo in the front room.  We went for a ride around sunset on Saturday night and the city centre has a lovely holiday vibe as all the shops are open from 5 – 9 on Saturday afternoons.  Talluah has been window shopping at a wool store for a few weeks now and on the weekend she purchased a hand loom and a variety of felt and textured wool.  She’s currently working on a wall hanging and to give it a feeling of home she’s going to use a eucalyptus branch to hang it from.

Our goal is to try to blend in, not as well as a chameleon would but you get the idea.  When you make a credit card purchase in Argentina you need to show picture ID at the same time.  This sounds like a great idea and must cut down on illegal credit card usage in shops.  While shopping at the Tuti 2, (which has 7 checkouts and one shared EFTPOS terminal) I handed my credit card and driver licence to pay.  The checkout lady handed my licence back and told me that I don’t need to show ID -officially a local?