Feliz after her second day at the jardin

So those of you who know me well enough know that I wouldn’t usually write a “cutesy” title like the one above, but the little smocks that they wear in Argentina in preschool are so dang cute, what else could I write?

Molly has recently started preschool (jardin) here in Cordoba, and so far, so good! The jardin is called Sui Generis,  and according to my Spanish teacher, that is also the name of a crazy former Argentine band http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sui_Generis.  The community center/gym in which the preschool is housed has an indoor and an outdoor pool, so Molly and her jardin buddies get to go swimming twice a week.  She’s thrilled!  The teachers are warm and loving (like all the teachers seem to be here), so it is the right place for us!

Molly says her favorite thing about her preschool is the pool, but she hasn’t even gone in yet:  tomorrow’s the first swimming day.

Molly was ready for this big change:  she needs an outlet for her energy, we want her to have some friends her own age, and we want her to learn more Spanish!  We are so very fortunate because jardins seem to be about as common as Starbucks in Seattle here, and her’s is two blocks away.  From 9:30 – 12: 30 she plays, sings songs, does crafts, swims, has an English class, and eats snack.  A lovely way to spend her mornings while the boys, Rob and I work away the hours working on our Spanish, and grade school curriculum.

The boys are still playing rugby, and this past weekend it was COLD, and the boys raced over the field to keep warm.  Apparently, they were playing the Jailbirds.

Ben on the take-down

Elliott on the run

The pool is full now, and someone came to clean it today.  They had some pretty specific instructions for me, but I didn’t really get it all, so if our skin falls off the first time we take a dip, I’ll know we used too much chlorine.  Maybe we should just invest in someone to take care of that for us.  Now all we need is the weather to warm up.

We’re headed to the “mountains” this weekend for a long weekend, so maybe we’ll be able to swim when we get back!

My ever so patient husband has been after me for quite some time  now to write a post about our house search.  We’ve been in our house at Lafinur 3572 now for one week.  We’ve settled in quite nicely, and are looking forward to hosting our first asado (for all Argentine friends—-wish us luck!) this Sunday.

This was a journey that started for us, really, back in April when Rob and I came on our own for a “scouting mission.”  We looked at just a few rental houses then, and although we in no way expected it to happen, it would have been really nice and easy if we had met someone in the process who said, “You know, I don’t have anything now, but I do have this lovely house that will be ready at the beginning of September.  When did you say you’re getting here?”  Well, that DIDN’T happen, so instead of arriving with a set place to live, we arrived with a set place to stay:  N’Aike Casa de Huespedes, http://www.naike.com.ar/.  The people there were wonderful, but we were ready to have our own space, and the kids were ready to spread out and run around.

Several difficulties exist when trying to find a rental house in Cordoba from afar.  The first difficulty, for us, was the language barrier.  Neither Rob nor I speak enough Spanish to really get along well in a face-to-face conversation, so the thought of trying to have a conversation on the phone about real estate put us into a cold sweat.  Language barriers aside, however, we soon found out that real estate agents will only show you the properties that they represent, so in essence, you have to have several real estate agents working for you at the same time.  And then there’s the whole issue of the fact that we were trying to look for these properties from many, many miles away.  Like many things in Argentina, finding a rental house is all about who you know, and what contacts you have.  As a general rule, Argentines prefer to conduct all business face-to-face.  We had a very difficult time getting anyone to return our phone calls, and an even more difficult time getting them to return e-mails.  When we did get a returned call or e-mail, people would ask us to just come by their office.  When we explained our situation, they simply told us to give them a call once we arrived.  Having something as major as SHELTER (I’m pretty sure it’s one of Maslow’s basic physiological needs) as part of the unknown was not a comfortable feeling.  Lucky for us, Rob and I had our individual periods of anxiety at different times.  This made it much easier for one to calm the other one down and remain cool-headed.

Although you can find listings on web sites like casas.trovitargentina.com.ar, and La Voz, many of these listings give a very brief description of the house, and have no pictures.  And I found out fairly quickly that although houses may be listed, that does not mean they are available.  This was the most frustrating part for me because, of course, I would find a lovely house in the same neighborhood as the boys’ school, and it would have been rented six months ago.  How easy, it seemed, it would be to simply erase that listing when the house was rented…hmmm…..

Yet another stumbling block that we encountered (although we knew about this one in advance), was that most houses in Argentina are either rented for short-term (up to 6 months), or long-term (at least 2 years).  The short-term rentals are furnished, and the long-term rentals are not.  We wanted to rent a furnished house or apartment for one year.  This probably would not have been as much of an issue had we been looking downtown, but because we wanted to be in a more residential neighborhood, there were fewer options.

Apparently in Argentina, once someone is in your house, and has started paying bills, it is very difficult to evict them.  This is even the case if the person is basically squatting, and not paying any rent.  The difficulty to evict them becomes even greater if they have children.  People told us stories of court cases that dragged on for years of home owners (who were not even renting their house–it was just a private vacation property!) trying to get squatters out of their house because those people had moved in, started paying the property taxes, and refused to leave.  Because of this, owners of rental houses require what is called a “guarantee.”  This is basically a co-signer who promises to take on the rent if the original renters refuse to pay. Getting a guaranteer can be very difficult, and complicated.  Often it involves getting pay stubs and tax papers from the guaranteer, and proof of employment from both the renter and guaranteer.  Not having employment, and preferring not to ask our new Argentine friends to put themselves forward to be our guaranteer, we were forced to approach this from a different angle, re:  cash up front for six months rent.

After spending about 10 days looking at different rental properties (most of which were basically empty:  no furniture, no kitchen appliances, NO LIGHTS!), I decided to ask one of our real estate agent, Matias http://www.ilamarca.com/home, a very American question. Did he have any clients who were trying to sell their house, and would be willing to basically move out for a year, take the house off the market, and let us rent it lock, stock and barrel.  He thought for a minute after I asked him this, and then said he might have one, but he would have to contact her first.  The next day we walked in to Silvina’s house on Lafinur.

The house was perfect for what we needed:  three bedrooms (plus one maid’s room—storage room for us), four bathrooms, a pool, a washing machine (!!!!), a pool, a lovely quincho (a covered patio where you have

your parrilla and asado)

and all the furniture that we could have asked for. These are really pictures of our quincho and parrilla.

Waiting for the bus to in school attire

Since an accurate description of my Spanish so far would be “caveman” I thought a post about learning the basics in Argentina so far might be fun.  I can’t imagine how this experience might be going if Erica and I hadn’t made the trip down in April first.  Our new friends Brad and Lisa describe the importance of this best on their blog here.

Shelter:  If and when we finally figure out how to rent a house in Cordoba, we’ll have to write a post on just that process alone!  It’s been a roller coaster ride so far.  Fingers crossed for a house in the next few days.  In the meantime, we are extremely fortunate to be staying at N’Aike Casa de Huespedes.  We found it purely based on proximity during our April trip on www.booking.com.  The family that owns it happened to live in Corvallis, Oregon years ago and all speak wonderful English.  I truly don’t know where we’d be if it weren’t for Marcos, Carlos and Sebastián.  A week before we left Costa Rica we checked availability and found 2 adjoining rooms.  They’ve gone over the top on helping us find a house and making our stay comfortable with the kids.  From giving us rides, setting up airport pick up with our mountain of luggage, posing for Molly’s drawings, calling tons of realtors for us, and putting up with a loud American family of 5, they rock.

Food:  N’Aike is located on some busy streets in a residential area.  We have to walk to a variety of shops for supplies.  Learning when they are open has been a challenge.  Siesta is in full effect here, with all the pros and cons.  We’re eating out more than we plan to when we settle in, we have breakfast included at the hotel and we try to plan either lunch or dinner on our own using the hotel kitchen.   We’ve made a few trips out to hit the veggie stand, the butcher, the baker and the kiosko.  We finally just went to a supermarket for supplies.  It’s been fun to try our own mini-asado on the hotel parilla (bbq) a few times.  It’s an art here that I hope to master after a year.  The best meat so far was at some friend’s houses, but for lunch or dinner we’re having either pizza, tostados (toasted sandwiches with no crust), pasta, or lomos (skirt steak sandwiches).  The wine…we’ll have to do a whole separate post on the wine, we need to sample a lot more before posting anything noteworthy.

Transport:  Along with the occasional ride from one of the guys at the hotel, we’re on foot, bus or remis (taxi).  I’ve got an aversion to spending money on cabs that’s made for a few long walks and might lead to divorce, but the buses so far have been great.  The first day we arrived Brad filled me in the prepaid bus pass that’s needed for all city buses.  It takes a few days to get used to finding the regular bus stops you see in the US, and knowing the stops are just telephone poles.  Some buses are deluxe, some are not.  There’s bus protocol too.  Sit in the front of the bus and you better be ready to give up your seat for the older lady or mother with kids.  You also must wave the bus down or it goes zooming by the stop.  Same idea when you’re getting off.  It’s a good idea to have a remis driver you trust plugged into the phone.  We met our guy the other night, he’s looking for a house for us!

Support:  One of the big selling points for us in moving to Cordoba over other destinations was the support system we felt we’d have here, and that’s been true so far.   An old friend of Erica’s brother lives here, plus we made a number of connections thru the Facebook expat group we joined 8 months ago.  We were able to actually meet with a number of great people from this group in April who have been invaluable in giving pointers and advice.   Getting the lay of the land from locals or expats has been so important and we just hope to somehow repay the favor eventually.

Having connections has been critical.  Finding a house, finding a school, finding a way to access cash all rely on who you know and personal connections.

Communication:  Skype has been the primary means for chatting with family and making calls to banks, airlines, etc.  Wifi is easy and everywhere.  Our friends Gaby and Tom loaned us a phone that we will use for local calls.  Buying a SIM card and loading the phone with prepaid minutes took 3 stops and about 2 hours to figure out, but should be easier next time.  WhatsApp is a free international texting app that I still need to master, but that seems to be the way to go also.

In terms of language, between Erica, Elliott, Ben and I, we can usually communicate in Spanish.  Molly and I are about on the same level.  When we get settled we’ll get her in some sort of day care and I’ll start taking classes.  The difference in Spanish from Costa Rica to Argentina has been interesting.  Our ability to get the gist of a conversation or question now as opposed to April is huge though.

1 1/2 weeks in Argentina and all is well.  We love it but really want to find a place we can call home, for now.  Back to my caveman Spanish, “Nosotros hablamos con tu despues.”