Ok ok ok. For those of you who know me (which is assuredly everyone who reads this blog), ya'll know that I am not a negative person and that I truly don´t like being negative. With that said, I must go on a little rant for this edition of my boi in BA. Here goes...
Since I last posted, I've had a small housing fiasco. To explain, a little background: I moved into this apartment in early February. It was a shared place with an Argentine guy. There was no set limit to how long I would stay there. He was a cool guy, tango musician, dancer, actor, and had an overall chill vibe. We got along well, when he wasn’t holed up in his room practicing guitar and singing loudly off pitch. We developed some trust so he went out of town for 10 days while I held down the fort. Our rapport was friendly, we talked about girls, going out, tango, Argentina. My room was large, I had a double bed, I had worked out my daily commute to an unconscious status. In other words, things were easy, rolling along.
Then, one warm morning in the first week of April I had just sat down at my computer in the office when I received a surprising text message. It said something like this: "I just found out that my best friend from Spain is coming here in the beginning of next month so you have to move out by the beginning of may." A TEXT MESSAGE!! Needless to say, I was surprised to be getting the boot in such a matter. I mean, since when do we ask people to move out of their apartment through a text message. A phone call isn’t even acceptable in my book. Can I get a little face time?…I mean damn. As the day passed, my surprise rose into anger then simmered to a low boil by the time I returned home later that night.
When Santiago walked into our apartment, I politely asked him if we could speak and discuss this bomb he had dropped. I politely told him that I really didn't like how he had handled this situation, that if needed me to leave than he should have asked to discuss the situation with me, not send a text message. He then said, with a well practiced actors puppy dog face, that he was surprised that I was surprised, and that we had never agreed on anything past 3 months. I then explained to him that the fact that he had never mentioned anything before, coupled with the fact that we were supposed to 'discuss' the living situation after 3 months, and that I had mentioned on multiple occasions that i was planning on staying for longer, created a setting in which surprise was a natural reaction for me. I then told him that I would look for a new place, but that if I didn't find something to my satisfaction by the end of April, I would stay at least through the first week of May while continuing to look. He said that there was no reason that it should take that long, to which I replied, "Well, if it does it does." So I turned on some music signaling the end of our conversation.
Needless to say, our relationship became a little rocky after this episode. I'm of the opinion that important discussions, information, news should not be delivered through text message. The more I thought about it, the more slimy he became in my eyes. My apartment search started immediately. I found some things, some nice, some not so nice. Then, one night, I spoke to my other roommate about the whole situation. She is a young Norwegian darling who had just moved in a few weeks before. She told me she wasn't so happy with her living situation and was thinking about moving out. So I told her she should talk to Santi, and get back to me...as there now was a chance I didn't have to leave. A few days later, she told me they had spoken and that Santi had told her he would make some changes to make her more comfortable. I found this a little strange: that he had convinced her to stay while I was getting the boot, but I let it go and continued with my search.
A few weeks went by and as the time passed, Mari, the Norwegian, and I became closer. My final week arrived, and I had found a place that was considerably nicer and in a better neighborhood. The price was a little higher, but fine temporarily. One night that week, I got home from the gym and sat down with Mari in the kitchen. I mentioned to her that I was going to have to delay my date of departure by a couple days while my new room was being prepared. Previously, Santi has told me that his best friend from Spain wasn’t coming until the 20th of May, so I figured this was fine. As I say this, a little grin came across Mari's face and she dropped bomb numero dos of this fiasco, "I should tell you something," she says, "There is no best friend. Santi was lying the whole time. He says you guys don't get along and didn't want to hurt your feelings so he made the whole thing up."
I'm sure you can see the look on my face: chin on the floor, eyes at the dumfounded size. At this point, I've already lost most of my personal respect for the guy for the whole text awkwardness and his lack of viable communication on the entire issue. But, Wa Wa Wee Wa. This is just too much. He'd been lying to my face for the entire month, tried to make me feel bad about even wondering why I was being asked to leave, and done it all with a big, "I'm really sorry it’s working out like this," face. Ugly.
I told an Argentine friend about this, and he wasn't surprised. All he could say was, "Welcome to Argentina." I mean, I've met plenty of Argentine men who would not have done this. But I've also met a slew who truly act like children, not that this is so different from those of the masculine disposition around the world. And I do believe that each person needs to be judged on the merit of his or her own actions, so I'll try to only pass judgment on my ex-roommate Santi. But lordy lord, this was a hell of a welcome. I honestly don't ask for much, but cowardly, pointless lying goes a little far. Well, at least I finally got the lucky first member of my BA sh*t list.
