Big fish, big price. Inflation is a killer.
I remember as a kid the time when chocolate bars jumped from a quarter to 50 cents. It seemed like the price went up without reason, and with it my life changed. I was too young to know about economics. But it was easy to figure out that I now needed twice the coins to buy a Baby Ruth or a pack of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups in my home town of Los Angeles.
Inflation is again pulling the rug out from under my life. I live in Argentina and inflation here is like water. You’ve always got it. And it can rush. Inflation was steady between 1975 and 1991, and went hyper several times, the last in 1990 before the government could get things under control. It did so with policies that largely wiped out local industry. The peso was tied one-to-one with the U.S. dollar and inflation turned into deflation. But shopping got as expensive – or more expensive – than in London and New York City. I saved my money to shop on my trips to Los Angeles and Europe, filling suitcases to take home to Buenos Aires. I got more for my money outside of Argentina. [continue reading…]
“Hey, Dad! Check out this big wave!”
My wife got gypped. I’m a surfer by practice, not by body.
When we first started going out, she thought surfer = fine body. It’s not bad. A bit flabby and pudgy but still slender in my early forties. But it’s not the firm body of a Southern Californian surfer. In fact, I don’t even look like a surfer, except maybe with my surf T-shirts and excessive use of flip-flops. But that’s pretty global now. I look more like an office boy.
That’s what a bunch of Argentine, Chilean and Peruvian surfers said years ago – I was then in my early thirties – when I arrived in Peru for a month of surfing. They were all surfers and all with firmer pecs and slenderer bodies than mine. They greeted me and we talked shop, about boards and waves and places we’d surfed. But before we hit the waves the first time out together they confided in each other to keep an eye on the office boy in case he got slammed into the rocks or swept too far out or caught by a cleanup set. The swell was 6-8 foot and building with the rising tide pushing more and more water around. Hairy and beautiful surf! [continue reading…]
“Look at this, love. A wide open beach for you, me and all these 4WDs. Ace, huh?.”
It’s summer and the media have invaded the beach resorts of Argentina and Uruguay. The paparazzi are snapping shots of the celebrities and women in bikinis. Reporters are covering the hot happenings, politicians at the beach, the rise in crime and prices for everything, and doing an occasional feature story on a beach or a trend.
Buenos Aires daily La Nacion recently did a story on two balnearios, or beach huts with cafes that rent tents and chairs. The balnearios are to the north of Pinamar, a town where we’re spending the summer and where we used to live for two and a half years. The story highlights the virgin beaches, the tranquility and the natural setting of the northern balnearios, which only can be reached on foot or by 4WD. Dozens if not hundreds of 4WDs head north every day with quad bikes blazing behind. The paper interviewed five women sunbathing by their 4X4s. They said their husbands were with the kids riding quad bikes in the dunes.
I don’t frequent La Frontera or El Mas Alla, the two balnearios. Driving on the beach isn’t for me even though it’s hip, it’s in and it’s hot. The thing to do is to blaze a trail down virgin beaches and rip through the sand dunes, chopping up vegetation that takes years to grow and is vital for the survival of the dunes and the beach. The paper has a photo of the scene and it’s nothing natural. It’s a truck-infested beach with quad bikes roaring through the dunes. I’d like to ban all vehicles on the beach. Mar de las Pampas, a beach resort to the south of Pinamar, has done just that and the beach and dunes. And it works. It’s peaceful and natural. Not in Pinamar and the neighboring towns of Carilo, Ostende and Valeria del Mar. [continue reading…]
