Jaywalking

In elementary school, Mrs. Jackson provided each of us with dictionaries one day. She told us to close our eyes and gingerly thumb through the pages, stopping on whichever page we chose. My finger landed among the thin pages of J. Next, we were told to look at the words on our page and pick one that we had never seen. I picked jaywalk and wrote it up on the chalkboard. After reading the definition to the class and contemplating the extra explanation from Mrs. J., I remember thinking it was an unnecessary word in my life. I hardly ever crossed streets in busy intersections because I was from Waco…in reality, the suburbs of Waco, and any moderately busy street intersection was always crossed in the comfort of a station wagon or my mother’s big-as-a-boat Cadillac.

To my knowledge, there is not one simple Spanish word for jaywalk, so we must settle with this WOTD:

cruzar [croo-thar’] : to cross (verb)

cruzar mal [croo-thar’ mahl]: cross poorly/bad/wrong (in other words: jaywalk)

Fast forward 18 years or so, and cruzar mal is now part of my daily life. I feel anxious standing on the sidewalk corner. Why would I wait for the red standing man to change to the white walking man when I can just cross now? No cars will come close to me for at least 5 seconds. And there I find myself…across the street. I just crucé mal. Many times I do not wait for the street corner. I take those short, quick glances over my shoulder as I step into the street halfway down the block as if I’m Alberto Contador checking out Lance Armstrong in the 2009 Tour de France to make sure I still have the lead. But one of the biggest threats of cruzar mal isn’t the cars. It’s the little motorcycles and mopeds that the 50,000 BsAs delivery and courier boys use that could potentially give you a whopper of a bruise. In the busy streets of what is the downtown business district of Buenos Aires, it’s not uncommon to see them run someone over every once in a while.

I only think twice about cruzar mal if it’s obvious that I won’t make it to the opposite curb without losing a limb, or…if I’m standing next to or on the corner across from a woman with children who is glaring at me suspecting that I’m a person who cruza mal and will set yet another bad example for her poor Marcelo/a who just 35 seconds before walked by a newspaper stand with nudie magazines plastered everywhere and inquired, “Mamá, Why doesn’t your bottom look like that?”

Ah, the thrilling monotonies of daily life in the big city…

Torta de Zanahoria

Your WsOTD:

torta [tor’-tah]: cake Listen

zanahoria [zahn-nah-o’-ree-ah]: carrot Listen

Yesterday, for the first time in over two years, it was my chance to teach my adopted Argentine grandmother a thing or two about baking. Or maybe just a thing. The recipe. She’s got the baking part down to her own science to the point that she adamantly expressed three times how no one knows her oven better than she. True, and that is more of an art here considering that the majority of ovens have no friendly knob with etched centigrade markings. But even those numbers could cause confusion for the United States baker until he figured out how to use the conversion application on his cell phone. What's more, you definitely won’t find any fancy digitalized technology that beeps to give you special culinary hints. “BEEP! I’m warm to your liking!” “BEEP! Did you want to leave my light on?” “BEEP! I think it’s ready!”

So, together with my oven expert, we carefully mixed together first the “wet” and then the “dry” ingredients in order to make a cake that the common Argentine has never heard of nor tasted: torta de zanahoria (carrot cake). Coaxing an Argentine to try a new recipe is a topic unto itself. They are simple eaters and the vast majority do not delight in trying the newest fusion at the newest restaurant even if they have the money to spare.

While she updated me on her children and her true, non-adopted grandchildren, I finished off the coffee she had percolated earlier that morning and waited patiently to see if the finished torta would please her as much as it had me. Timers are often thought to be an unnecessary kitchen ornament with the sense of smell serving as a useful replacement. And to the trained nostril, this almost never fails. The aromas of cinnamon, zanahoria, brown sugar, and orange (the secret to this recipe) began to seep out from the trusted oven, the door was hatched, and our torta was ready. I copied the recipe into Spanish for my “grandmother” and even taught her the adjective yummy in English. She put her new word to good use because mmmm, it was yummy.

This is the recipe we used.

When Whistling Works

I thought the burnt kettle might actually stick around and cool off for a little while, but she got thrown out into the street along with the rest of Friday's useless garbage. Poor little thing...I wanted a picture to commemorate her months of service. She was white with little flowers. As a result of her tragic destiny, she ended up grayish black with melting petals. Oddly enough, I believe someone might have premeditated our feminine teapot's untimely death. About a week ago a big, blue, masculine teapot showed up in the apartment. Come to think of it, I didn't ask why or from where. He just appeared, sat patiently next to the stove letting the lady do her job for a week or so, perhaps taking pointers, and then took over as the protagonist teapot as of this morning. Because he's a male teapot he's bigger and holds more water which never impressed me because I only need enough for one cup of coffee. But he does whistle...something extremely characteristic of all males here in Buenos Aires. This whistle, for once, is appreciated.

Your WOTD:
silbar [sil-bar']: to whistle Listen

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Gashes in your Lashes

It's quite possible that you've never noticed missing patches of hair on someone where it should be. I’m not talking about receding hair lines or overestimated waxing. The Mayo Clinic describes Trichotillomania (trik-o-til-o-MAY-ne-uh) as an irresistible urge to pull out hair from your scalp, eyebrows, eyelashes or other areas of your body. It is thought that around 1% of the U.S. population experiences the disorder.

Of all the possible places from which to pluck your natural layer, one area in particular might invite the most attention. Your WOTD:

ceja [say-hah] : eyebrow Listen

What causes this strange compulsive disorder? The most trying for individuals who suffer the symptoms is the fact that those who have never experienced a similar peculiar comfort cannot come close to relating. Who on earth would want to knowingly damage his natural symmetry? Some loved ones go so far as to put tape across the cejas of their poor picking person. An unfortunate individual with this habit will often lie nonchalantly when asked. “Oh, my waxing lady messed up.” Yeah right. Or, “Oh, I accidentally shaved that part off with a razor.” That’s about as believable as a stammering 16 year old swearing that the plum-colored hickey is a curling iron burn. Come to think of it, even that’s hard to say these days as I have this notion that curling irons are not quite used by masses of women as they were 10 to 15 years ago.

Discovering this particular type of compulsive behavior makes me wonder how many of us suffer from concealed self-destructive actions. It seems as though something’s not right. Is it possible this particular disorder, even if not identified, existed a century ago? What about eating disorders, self-mutilation, etc? I’m not so sure we can blame all this on global warming.

Gauchito Gil

"How 'bout them cowboys?" Not the Dallas Cowboys (not that they resemble anything close to the real thing) or the wild west cowboy, but the:

gaucho [gow-choh] : herdsman, or cowboy of the South American pampas Listen

As in Texas, this special character is not as easily found in Argentina as in the 19th century, but their historical reputation keeps them alive and breathing. Picture a Texan cowboy, now take away the 10 gallon Stetson, replace it with a lower, broad-brimmed black hat, tuck a knife in the leather belt at the back and you’re on the right track. In case your imagination is betraying you:

Gauchito Gil (the diminutive form of gaucho used in a loving way) was an unruly Argentine gaucho in the late 1800s. In his Robin Hood adventures he served the poor by spreading the riches of the wealth. After refusing to fight his fellow brothers in one of the country's civil conflicts, he was held at knife point by a police sergeant who paid no heed to Gil's proclamation that he could cure the officer’s ailing child. With a flick of the wrist, Gauchito Gil was left dead, but the officer prayed nonetheless and the child was indeed healed. Ever since then, Gauchito Gil has been the channeled recipient of many prayers and requests from those just knowing that he can work another miracle.

On a late spring day not oh so long ago, I found myself on a road trip through the Argentine countryside. Every now and then along the two lane highway, we passed a little red, wooden, doghouse-looking structure propped against a lonely tree trunk. Red flags and banners waved outside the entrance of the little house; some big, some small. As we passed this curious scene, the driver would yell, “I’ll Cheeto here!” I wondered if the little red doghouses held sacred bags of cheesy Cheetos puffs, but that didn’t seem quite right. After the fifth “I’ll Cheeto here!” I had to ask.
“What on earth are you saying?”
“It’s Gauchito Gil! Don’t you know Gauchito Gil?”
No, at that time I didn’t. And when I asked the driver to slow down as we approached the next eye-catching banners, I saw that there was in fact a little gaucho standing inside his private shrine. He was surrounded by everything from flowers to used car parts – offerings and personal tokens from the road. There were no Cheetos in sight; perhaps that could be my contribution the next time around – a little inside joke between GG and me.

Go Go Grease Lightning

I received a random text message today from a student asking me, "How do you say 'grasa'?" If he had wanted the simple translation, it would have been the following definition of today's WOTD:

grasa [grah-sah] : grease, fat, lard (found in the kitchen) Listen

His question held my attention since I had been asked the same question by two other Argentine women while preparing dinner in the kitchen on Saturday night. Fortunately, I follow conversations well enough in Castellano to know that they were not talking about the grease. Nor the fat, nor the lard. Had the conversation taken place two years ago, I would have automatically assumed they were referring to the white stuff forming on the pile of meat leftover from lunch. But no. They wanted to know how we translate this word that in Argentina, and only in Argentina I believe, is used to describe:

-the hairy-chested man with 4 buttons left open and a gold chain dangling around his sweaty neck

-the woman with extremely overdone silicone bosoms

-the kid who flashes you a vulgar gesture in the road just because

Today, my answer to the text message was "tacky, sleazy, trashy." I've never found ONE single word to describe this idea that can be used in so many ways here. It's still one of those words I use with doubt unless I'm asking where the jar of grasa is in the kitchen.

A grasa birthday cake?