Man are you a Tourist

pedro: Pedro our savior and Florencia in the backBefore I left for Buenos Aires, I received an email from the administrative staff of NYU in Buenos Aires about what to expect when I arrive. The email claimed that when I arrive there would be a bunch of people awaiting my arrival in NYU hats and other gear right past all the taxi stands (Whatever that was supposed to mean). I was to find the group and wait for their instructions. When I arrived here that was simply not the case. I took a plane ride from Houston, Texas to Buenos Aires with about a dozen other kids going on the NYU program. When we arrived here, there was no one in sight past the taxi stands. A couple of girls who were on my plane ride started freaking out. I quickly organized a search team. I was to watch the group's stuff while the girls scoured the airport for someone from NYU and report back to me in ten minutes. One of the girls ended up finding someone from NYU. It turned out who we were supposed to find was a kid, not to much older than us, with a small brown NYU flag hanging outside of his backpack (Not even an NYU hat ). He happened, also, to be waiting outside of the airport, and not near the taxi-stand where we were told he would be. The girl who found Pedro (We found out later what his name was) told us we were all supposed to go outside.

After we solved our first crisis of the trip, there we were all just sitting outside the airport waiting for a van that Pedro told us was coming. We ended up waiting outside the airport for forty five minutes. Now airports in New York are sketchy. Now double the sketch factor and you have an airport in Buenos Aires. Even though I was with this big group, I was a little scared. The van finally pulled up and two people were outside the van waiting to help us. People started leaving their bags for these two men to throw into the back of the van and then, just walking into the van. I was amazed how people were so trusting. I stayed outside to make sure my bags made it into the van. Hadn't everyone heard that stealing was rampant in this country. Then once we were all settled into the van and all our stuff was supposedly in the van, one of the men who was throwing stuff in the van jumped onto the bus. He didn't know much English all he said was, “No salary, tips for porter and driver. ” Now we didn't know that he was being paid by NYU and that he should not be asking for tips, but most of the kids didn't know so they started tipping him. One girl even tipped him twenty bucks. I wouldn't even do that in the states. Then that guy left and the next guy jumped on the bus and said the exact same thing. Everyone just realized that they had been screwed. I thinking something was a little strange didn't end up tipping but most of the rest of group got a nice “welcome to Buenos Aires” gift.

In Argentinian culture, tipping is very rare. One doesn't tip taxi drivers and waiters only get ten percent. From then on, I learned there are some people in Buenos Aires out for your money. Eventually, we made it to the school and everything was fine. My arrival here was a good lesson about this place. One needs to be smart and careful with money here... well really everywhere.