Domingo -- Dominicus -- Dies Solis -- Sunday

We took the rickety train to the luxurious outskirts of the city to ride bicycles along the coast of the River Plate. The comparison to the city was stark, with the streets calm and clean and smelling of jasmine. Upon returning, I encountered a festival put on by Bs.As.'s Russian community. On the stage were a dozen dancers, with a soloist jumping and doing the splits in the air. A little man with long white hairs fanning out of his nose and blue eyes like glycerin sidled up next to me. This person half my size and triple my age gave me the once-over and then fixated on the logo of my baseball cap. It was unnerving enough that I excused myself and left, walking my bike to the pedestrian area that turns into my street. A man with long dread locks and sun-weathered skin, standing with two others, motioned for me to come over. His first question -- so many people's first question to me in this city -- where are you from? When I answered that I lived here in Buenos Aires, he chuckled and asked me again. I said the United States. I did not say America. I have learned than to say America, because it annoys Latin Americans. "How does it feel to come from a country that sells weapons and supports Israel in its attacks on the Palestinians?" It doesn't feel like anything, I thought. "It's a complicated issue," I said. Later, approaching my heavy glass and ironwork door, dragged down by grocery bags, a man in a tattered red Cuban shirt stopped at my doorway, said something incomprehensible. "Excuse me. Please," I said. He flashed me a crooked smile and backed up a foot. I jammed my keys in and crossed to the other side of the door as quickly as I could. I looked back through the ironwork to see his eyes wide and his mouth open, making an obscene gesture with his tongue to haunt me as I walked away down the unlit hall.