La inseguridad

Lou: What is the big political issue of politicians running for election this October in this province? Health care? No, luckily we don’t have info first hand, but affordable or free health care is the rule here. Immigration issues? No, We’ve heard that the penalty for overstaying your visa is only a US$16 fine. It seems the biggest political issue is “la inseguridad”—the insecurity. They’re not talking about the insecurity of not being able to have gas delivered in a simple and timely manner or of getting something as important as a water heater fixed immediately—those are just common annoyances (for which we haven’t received much sympathy here—people think we’re too uptight!). It’s the insecurity of the recent spike in crime. I’ve always felt safer here than in the Twin Cities. I figured petty crime is a worry since we look and act like foreigners much of the time, but random gang crime or other violent crime just doesn’t seem typical. And historically, it seems it is atypical.

The crimes involving guns that we hear of in the news involve robberies—for money or for cars. If someone is killed in a robbery the people hold protests and the community bands together. It still seems to me that violent crime is a worse problem in the states. It seems we hear of someone being shot almost every week in the Cities, but there have been less than a handful of shootings in Mendoza and greater Mendoza since we’ve been here. Maybe all of the crime doesn’t make the news, though. They have declared some sort of state of emergency and have brought in a some National Guards to help patrol. But it may just be a show for election season

The criminals, I’ve been told, are often young people that come from poorer communities further out of town. I guess living in the center of the city we are a little isolated from all of the crime that takes place farther out of the city. We often see cops on street corners and in squares, but I guess people are really frustrated with the lack of cop visibility outside of the touristy center.

Guns are very hard to get legally in Argentina, but I guess there are illegal ones to be found. I think more than often the perpetrators are without weapons and are just in a group able to overtake just one person on the street. Every few weeks Dan hears stories of someone that knows someone else that got robbed for money and jewelry, usually in less well lit, quieter suburbs. Our policy is to only carry valuables and money that we need and, if need be, to hand it over & get out! The laptop only gets out about once a week and is disguised in a backpack.

I hope we’ve had our experience with the “insecurity” and we can be done with it now. One Saturday evening I was in a large internet joint that has rows and rows of computers. I was there for quite awhile and had come in with my phone. While I was there, my phone seemed to have disappeared from coat pocket (my coat was on the back of my chair). There was a man that bent down to pick up something and asked the lady next to me if she had dropped it; I think this is the point that my phone grew legs. When I talked to the security guard there (who was nice, but not all that helpful) he said it was a bad day and a woman had lost her purse that morning. So, petty, opportunistic theft seems to be pretty prevalent. Even so, there are plenty of people that leave their phone or purse sitting right next to the keyboard in plain view. Maybe, plain view is better where everyone including yourself can see it! We are slowly learning.