Ask TheMetetron about living in or visiting Buenos Aires, Argentina

[straate]

im moving here in 3 weeks or so.....do you know offhand if my US atm card will work there as long as i tell my bank? (its worked in europe)

[straate]

im moving there in 3 weeks or so.....do you know offhand if my US atm card will work there as long as i tell my bank? (its worked in europe)

[sdplayerb]

i agree. i have not felt at all unsafe here and have walked all over.
cool, that juice bar is really close to my friends place.
can you send me the contact info for you contact person at swiss medical please?

[JereLock]

I suppose it depends on what type of atm card you have.
I have a visa debit card and it works fine here.

[RiverPlay]

Well, safety here is kind of an issue. Two or three years ago kidnapping was the trendiest criminal activity. It was very supported by our local police, but people didn't want to see that...(they just wanted the low class people to be persecuted) A guy that went to high school with my cousin got murdered in occasion of kidnapping (not being the first one in the year) and his father became a political reference for a lot of people, and he was the man that produced the most massive political gathering in the las 30 years here (he is an idiot, but people really felt unsafe so the gave him a lot of recognition). I would have never went there, as I allways feels\ that asking for more safety here is the same as asking for military repression.
If u are going to walk all around the better areas, you will get along pretty well. But the city is pretty big, and there are some areas a foreigner wouldn't want to walk by during midnight (Lugano, Bajo Flores, Paternal, Once, Constitucion, La Boca, etc).
I live in Vicente Lopez, which technically is another city itself but I live blocks away from the line thats separates Buenos Aires form the Greater Buenos Aires (Gran Buenos Aires). Vicente Lopez is the richest city in the whole Buenos Aires State, being much more rich as a city than Buenos Aires City itself. Last year I went with my mother (she lives like ten blocks away form my house)to the bank (Banco Rio) to withdraw 3000 us$, she left the bank and I took her home with his car, as soon as I parked two guys went down of another car, with 45 caliber guns pointing at us and saying "give me those 3000 us$ you just withdrew or will kill the guy", when the say you something like that your odds of surviving if you give them just 1500 or not very great.
Months later something very similar happend to the mother of my current partner, they just told her "give my the bag" which she answered "no way", that lead to them hardly hitting her with the back of the gun all arounf her face which lead to several injures and hospitalization.
This same year my father was delivering his son to his mother in Villa Crespo (the neighborhood next to Palermo going west) the door of the house was open while they were chatting, two guys appeared with guns (12:00 PM) they had both of the enter the house, asked for money, jewellery pointing my father, his ex-wife and my 3 year old step brother, the took my father's car and left. The car never appeared.
I could talk also about when they pointed my mother with guns while she was inside the car, but she escaped (which was kind off reckless of her), the lady friend of my girlfriend that was rapped last year in Palermo after leaving a pub, a friend of mine whose car was robbed a couple monhts ago, or how I have being robbed all along my childhood here (money, wacths, snickers, etc).

I don't want to give the wrong impression, this is not Rio de Janeiro or San Pablo, but is not as safe as Berlin, NYC, or Rome. Cocaine here is very very cheap, very popular, and when you face a robber you will face a very high one on cocaine 80% of the time at least.

What you should do here is the following:

_Try to withdraw money from ATMS, it's better than doing it from the cashier at a bank, they sometimes tell robbers that are waiting in a car outside the bank who you are and how much you are withdrawing.

_When opening the door of your home look both sides, pay some attention to that moment. If you live in Recoleta its not taht important, but it is almost everywhere else to be sure you are entering your house without unexpected visitors.

_This is specially important for foreigners: Try to get taxis on the phone, if you are taking a taxi in the street at night it would be better if it says "Radio Taxi" or something like that. Anyone can rent a taxi here, so some people rents taxis and then they try to trap innocent people to rob them, turists are the main target as they have the sing of US DOllar printed on their forehead.

_Don't count money in the sight of anyone in the street if it is more than 100 pesos, try to be discrete with stuff like that.

_But most of all, despite all i said here, don't be scared at all. The most likely is nothing will happen to you here if you are cautious enough. I traveled a lot around here... Peru, Bolivia, Brasil, Uruguay, and I never felt as safe as I felt at other parts of the world and I have had some trouble at every place I've been around here (maybe cause I'm too fearless, and being kind of unsafe it's not a problem for me), and I can tell that the more scared you are the more you are a target for thieves and stuff. It's cool to know that someone like themetetron feels 100% safe, but I think is my duty to tell you that it's just not the safest place to be since poverty is high, education is sinking very bad, cocaine is a helluva big bussines here, and police is very very very dirty.

[RiverPlay]

[ QUOTE ]
LuckyDevil and I have both been here almost two weeks, and want to see if anybody would like to get a game together on Tuesday night, July 31.
Play like 2-5 peso NL.

If we can get 5 or 6 people, we'll do it.

Thanks

SD

[/ QUOTE ]

I didn't read this before, but I'm in for any poker night among 2+2 ers, and I could probably find another player if needed. It would be cool to do something like that.

[straate]

[ QUOTE ]
I suppose it depends on what type of atm card you have.
I have a visa debit card and it works fine here.

[/ QUOTE ]

same..nice

[TheMetetron]

[ QUOTE ]
im moving here in 3 weeks or so.....do you know offhand if my US atm card will work there as long as i tell my bank? (its worked in europe)

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes. I didn't even have to tell my bank. This is for WaMu/ING Direct. Your bank may vary.

[TheMetetron]

[ QUOTE ]
i agree. i have not felt at all unsafe here and have walked all over.
cool, that juice bar is really close to my friends place.
can you send me the contact info for you contact person at swiss medical please?

[/ QUOTE ]

PM me or something.

For anyone that sends me PMs and doesn't get responses (apparently this is happening more than I reaize), ask me for my AIM in a private message. That is by far the best way to get an answer out of me as I have a horrible habit of intending to get around to a question later and then not.

[TheMetetron]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
LuckyDevil and I have both been here almost two weeks, and want to see if anybody would like to get a game together on Tuesday night, July 31.
Play like 2-5 peso NL.

If we can get 5 or 6 people, we'll do it.

Thanks

SD

[/ QUOTE ]

I didn't read this before, but I'm in for any poker night among 2+2 ers, and I could probably find another player if needed. It would be cool to do something like that.

[/ QUOTE ]

If someone wants to get this going for sometime next week, that would be cool.


Also, RiverPlay is correct in a lot of what he says, but I guess I'm assuming none of you are going to leave Microcentro/Recoleta/Palermo/San Telmo area at night. If you don't you won't have anything to worry about. There is a huge part of the city that is just crap that none of us ever wander into but if you somehow did, I'd imagine it being fairly dangerous.

Also, yes make sure your taxi says "Radio Taxi" on it, especially if traveling alone and/or at night. You learn to pick these up off the street, but if in doubt, just call one.