0. I live in Argentina.
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1. Last Friday, I was walking back to my flat, and it was my turn to cross two-way street A - which, of course, coincided with the turn to keep on moving for cars on street B. (Street B being perpendicular to street A.)
I started crossing street A at the same time as this car from street B was turning to its right (i.e. to my left). As I always do, I slowed down my pace but kept on moving (to make it clear that I, as a pedestrian walking on a pedestrian crossing, had priority), but the car didn't seem to care. So, I walked slowly for a couple of seconds very close to the car. Once the car had completed its turn into street A, the driver blowed the horn; what's more, this guy on a motorcycle yelled at me: "
Fuckface! Didn't you see that our street-light was green?".
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2. On Saturday, the final match of Libertadores (the most important South American soccer tournament) was to take place in Buenos Aires. The teams were River Plate and Boca Juniors - the two most popular teams in the country. This was to be the first River/Boca final in the tournament; the match was to be played at 5pm at River Plate's stadium. (The same one that appears on DVDs by AC/DC and The Police, and where countless international acts have performed.)
As Boca's bus (with the team's players and staff) approached the stadium, some River fans started throwing rocks and other items. Some rocks hit the bus' windows, the broken glass hurting one of the players. Furthermore, police intervened, which resulted in other players being accidentally pepper sprayed.
Of course, Boca complained, and the match was postponed by CONMEBOL until 6pm. Then, until 7.15pm. Then, until the following day at 5pm. Then, on Sunday, it was informed that the match would not take place that day, and that the date and location of the match would be decided on a meeting on Tuesday morning.
So, yesterday, the teams' presidents, along with CONMEBOL's and other organizations' presidents, held a meeting and published a press-release, according to which the game
might take place on Saturday 8 or Sunday 9 in December, with the host
country still to be determined. (There's talks about the US, Paraguay and Qatar.)
As of right now, Boca is trying to solve the issue (and win the match) legally, without playing.
Martín Ocampo, the Minister of Security of Buenos Aires, resigned two days ago as a consequence of all of this.
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3. As you might have heard/read on the news, Buenos Aires is the host of the upcoming G20 summit. Some key world leaders (such as the President of France) have already arrived, and the event is supposed to run from Friday into Saturday.
Yesterday, John Kirton, a Canadian Political Scientist who founded and directs the G20 and G7 Research Groups, was mugged and hurt by two men, half a block away from a summit site and a police station; fortunately, John was accompanied by two women who helped defend him. When they talked to the police, the latter said that this sort of things "
happens three times a day".
And all of this happened while the city is basically shut down and the security efforts will be focused on the summit.
You can read some of John's tweets about his unlucky encounter here:
https://twitter.com/jjkirton/status/1067517863211208707https://twitter.com/jjkirton/status/1067540467804450817https://twitter.com/jjkirton/status/1067720185598144513____
I wrote all of the above because I'm considering moving to an English speaking country next year, and would like to know how much you think these sort of things will affect my getting a visa, or how I might be treated or talked to by people in First World countries. (By the way, I chose English because I love the language; I'm taking the IELTS test in two weeks.
)
Also, to those who moved from a crappy place like Argentina to somewhere more civilized - what was (or has been) your experience?
Thanks!
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PS: By the way, the whole bit about violence within football fans/teams is the latest example; stuff like that has happened for a long time. (So many people have been hurt and died during similar events that, since 2013, fans of the visiting team are legally prohibited from attending the host team's stadium on big matches.)