Buenos Aires Travel Survival Guide - Lesson one

Buenos Aires Travel Survival Guide - Lesson one –‘What’s the Chamuyo?’

Buenos Aires is anything but predictable. To get the best from your vacation you must be prepared. You can play it safe or play Porteño rules to master Buenos Aires and its culture. Our Buenos Aires Survival Guide gets you off the ropes and into the centre of Buenos Aires’ cultural ring and our handful of survival techniques helps you ‘fancy-up-that-foot-work.’

The Porteño secret weapon called “chamuyo”, pronounced cha-moo-show, is a kind of finely honed sweet-talk – and your resistance is futile. Your ear and sensory being must attune quickly.

However, heed our warning – the most important Buenos Aires survival technique is the mastering the defense of chamuyo – the Porteño way of life, communication, and business. It is a slick mix of smooth talking, exaggeration, persuasion, and unrelenting confidence. It is how some Porteño might successfully convince you to part with your cash or travel to Avenida X just four blocks down the street when their nightspot is a marathon away.

Unfortunately, there is no textbook or ‘Chamuyo for Dummies’ but here are some hints to start thinking like a Porteño.

To learn the chamuyo technique one must listen very carefully and watch the experts (i.e. the people of Buenos Aires). When asking a question, you might sense that a Porteño is about to say, “I don’t know.” If this instinct strikes, then chamuyo will ensue. It is very rare that locals will admit that they do not know the answer to any question so here is your opportunity to listen and learn - when getting ‘bum’ information and meeting your ‘Svengali’ later, expect an elaborate excuse to add to your confusion.

If you find yourself feeling pressured to buy something – it is chamuyo. It could be that look in their eye, the crook in their sexy smile or their infectious comedy. Sometime they might get very serious- this is very dangerous. The serious chamuyo often has ridiculous reasoning you will never disprove. Do not even waste your time trying to convince a Porteño they are wrong or seeking an apology – turn those tables, chamuyo-back and you might just get somewhere.

So, take these few hints, and when in doubt, and if you feel you are being ‘chamuyo-ed’ it is all right to say, “Bueno, que chamuyero que sos vos!” Pronounced, buay-no, kay cha-moo-sher-oh kay sew-s vos, and meaning, “My, what a smooth-talker you are!” Most Porteño are generally warm and loving people who mean no harm by their chamuyo and are socialized with ‘old-world’ charm and good manners who welcome our appreciation of their wonderful culture.

Along with your mastering chamuyo, foreigners should carefully follow our next lessons to add knowledge of each to their arsenal to complete their survival kit:

º The Guia-T city guide
º Che Boludo vocabulary book
º Many low denomination peso coins and notes (if you can)
º Alpargatas
º Argentimes newspaper.