bendicion a las 24 horas

underneath the crumbling, calcutta-meets-parisian belle epoque a l'americaine awnings reads the sign, "bendicion a las 24 horas." overblown 'southern-city-that-never-sleeps' comparisons may be premature, though i'll take the 4-am blessing over a paco-induced mugging up the block any day. in what appeared to be an ancien-theatre-aux-spectacles-turned-temple-of-god, the evangelicals outdid themselves once again. if catholics could ever be as creative in their architectural appropriations as their pentacostal counterparts, who knows how many less hearts ole ratzinger would have hardened. en fin, this is neither the time nor the place for such ripostes - merely a call to appreciate the aesthetically-less-intimidated. some day historians will chart the fluctuations of (post)modernity by the structural conversion rate to and fro the house of God: in Montreal the Cathedrals have been converted into condos; in Buenos Aires the theatres now double as neon Pentacostal storefronts.

i am exaggerating, of course. gaging the piety of metropolitan outposts in the New World has never been an simple affair - and i, for one, claim no insight thereupon. furthermore, we must also bear in mind the socio-geographic origins of our study: the capital federal, as is well known amongst portenos and astute outsiders alike (however subtly acknowledged), is as geographically divided by class as any other metropolis; what makes the geography of its socio-economic divide slightly more enthralling is that they begin (at least in theory) at one major east-west thoroughfare (the Avenida Rivadavia) and proliferate the further north - and, consequentially, south - you get. furthermore, as if popular urban folklore weren't enough, the names of the north-south bound streets even change once they cross this threshold. imagine, for example, if something like 'malcolm x boulevard' became 'avenue of the americas' on respective sides of central park (oh wait, it does). now imagine if that happened at one intersection, ad infinitum, all they way from east to west of town. now that's what i call a roundabout cabbie's dream ride with recently arriving swedes heading for their hostel.

it should go without saying, then, that we live on the southern side of the tracks (though with the current exchange rate could also readily live in much of the northern bits. that being said, if it is only somewhat degrading to pay triple for tall-boys in the west village, tis that much more demeaning to forgo their presence altogether - as is the case in bougified bits of argie-towns). if Saint Louis, Mo can boast neither a particularly privileged northern or southern side of town (much less east or west), then both parties (if not all four) have the distinct privilege of claiming the hard-earned pride of the materially-less-endowed that occurs in many an American town. (no high schooler, on the other hand, gets to brag about growing up in clayton). Buenos Aires, alas, does not seem to allow for this sociological incongruence: wealthy enough to for its privileged classes to believe themselves part and parcel of the global, developed elite they so desperately strive to embody - but poor enough to sense the potential onslaught of darkened 'masses' at their door - northern-dwelling portenos, as of yet, do not seem to relish the prospect of dining, shopping, relaxing - much less living - in the south. as far as i can tell, there is no romanticization of the barrio - much less those that live there, as is the case in some american cities (i once had a mate who moved to bed-stuy to be closer to jay-z's birth place; no one, i'm afraid, will be moving to the villa to honor maradona).