UPDATE: I have received many comments from offended Argentinians who think my view of their country is racist. Please understand before you read that the first half of the review is what was presented to us by a tour guide who drove us around on a bus. It’s not mine. Personally, I had a fabulous time in Argentina meeting very hard working entrepreneurs and eating excellent food. We had a great hostess in Vanesa, and we had a going home barbecue at a castle outside Buenos Aires. In no way did I experience what the tour guide was talking about, nor do I think it is Argentina. Rather, I believe it is one man’s attempt at standup comedy.
Geeks on a Plane (http://www.geeksonaplane.com) might better be called Geeks on a bus, because once we hit a country, we go to all our events by bus in a big group. At any given time, there may be 30-50 of us (some travelers don’t go to all the cities) visiting a city, sharing best practices and trying to help as best we can.
In Buenos Aires, our bus guide is a cynic. He is hilarious as he tells us the unvarnished truth about his country. He tells us Argentinians have the “social plan,” which gives them free health care and a stipend large enough to dissuade many from working. Argentina also has professional protesters, who are paid well to live in shanty towns and show up with banners. The driver is both entertaining and transparent, but you can see he is proud of the quirks of his country, if not of its government. In fact, he calls the Argentinian president “Christina.”
Argentinians seem never to be able to get it together. They build ports with docks too narrow for boats — and abandon them. (in Buenos Aires there’s the new Puerto Madera next to the traditional Boca neighborhood port from the 19th century.) They start to build universities and don’t complete all the buildings when the economy sours. They lose money in their own banks and then by investing in American currency, They’ve been in an economic downturn since their “crash of 2002.” They spend a ton of money on death: the biggest tourist attraction in town is La Recoleta, the cemetary in which Eva Peron is buried.
Argentina loses at soccer, and in wars. Its dogs, living in high rises and walking on leashes, look depressed. Everyone dines late and sleeps till noon. On my way to Starbucks, I passed a laundromat that had been broken into the night before, even though It had a protective corrugated metal grate in front. Robbers had cut the grate,smashed the window behind it, and marched in.
We were also told not to carry our passports, and to remember the numbers on bills we hand to cab drivers, as the driver will often take your bill and hand it back to you asking for something smaller. What he hands back to you will be counterfeit!
And the people eat beef! Lots and lots of beef. I ate more beef in a week in Latin America than I eat in a year at home.
And yet 500 people show up to an event on Friday night to hear Wenceslao Casares, Argentinian founder of BlingNation (http://www.BlingNation.com) and Dave McClure of 500 Startups (http://www.500startups.com) in Silicon Valley talk about entrepreneurship. They couldn’t be less like what the driver has told us. Here, as everywhere we go, entrepreneurs are a bright spot
Buenos Aires has software development companies to which companies in America outsource. Globant, one of the companies that hosted GeeksonaPlane,(http://www.GeeksonaPlane.com) is one such contract development company. Like Brazil and Chile, Argentina also has the not-for-profit Endeavor Program, which supports high impact founders who want to create improvements in infrastructure for their countries.
The center of Argentina’s entrepreneurial community appears to be The Universidad de san Andres, outside Buenos Aires. Wences, probably Argentina’s most successful new-generation entrepreneur, attended there on scholarship. The son of a sheepherder in Patagonia, he is the founder of BlingNation (http://www.BlingNation.com) a mobile payments platform, and of several other financial services companies that service Latin America.
The GeeksonaPlane (http://www.geeksonaplane.com) group spent an afternoon at the university,listening to a group of startups focused on the Latin American market: a cloud service provider, a safe Internet solution for kids, an event planner, a few smaller ideas. The strongest of these, Eventioz, (http://www.eventioz.com), already has 800 customers, and needs money to scale further because it must adapt to different currency conditions and payment processing systems in Latin American countries.
Most of these startups are very brave: they are targeting their own countries, or small businesses that aren’t served by the market leaders in their spaces They’re walking before they run because they are the first people in their country to try things that aren’t agriculture, ranching, or natural resources.
But they will succeed, just as Chinese startups succeed, because Spanish is the third most spoken language in the world, and Spanish speakers are an underserved online market.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
A shallow naive and biased analysis, yet not the authors fault. It’s a real pity this is all Argentina could get through to you guys during your three day trip. We Argentines should stop focusing on our flaws and start encouraging new solutions for our local problems.
Thanks for the post, excellent insights on Geeks on a plane visiting Argentina. There are some errors and misconceptions in your post, though: (1) They’ve been in an economic downturn since their “crash of 2002.” must be changed to They’ve been in an economic upturn since their “crash of 2002.” (2) Everyone dines late and sleeps till noon. -> C’mon, most people have to work here, too, so this would be “Everyone dines late and some sleep till noon.” (3) The center of Argentina’s entrepreneurial community appears to be the Universidad de San Andres <- not really, only rich parents can afford to send their kids there, those then often move to the US (e.g. Wences) and don't invest in their home country. Most Argentines are entrepreneurs at heart and under difficult circumstances which make them extremely adaptable to whatever conditions there are (I would exclude those that you mentioned rightfully supported by Christina's social programs).The center of Argentina’s entrepreneurial community appears to be the Universidad de San Andres <- not really, only rich parents can afford to send their kids there, those then often move to the US (e.g. Wences) and don't invest in their home country. Most Argentines are entrepreneurs at heart and under difficult circumstances which make them extremely adaptable to whatever conditions there are (I would exclude those that you mentioned rightfully supported by Christina's social programs).
I don’t think you can actually anylize what happen on a country out of a taxi ride. if the taxi driver you got was not a government hater, for sure you wouldn’t had heard such a racist, clasist and biased view. The “professional protesters” concept is plainly stupid. This is a dumb and dangerous as if I go to the usa and try to explain reality using as a basis the testimony of an NRA fanatic member…
Thank you all for your comments. @twitter-140937822:disqus I do understand that the bus driver was biased, and it is interesting that he works as a tour guide.I think he was trying to underscore the prejudices. it is dangerous, but I tried in the second half to point out the entrepreneurship in a very positive light. BTW, I was told by Wences that he attended on scholarship, and his father is a sheepherder in Patagonia. I also know Wences has invested in Latin America, as he founded a bank for the unbanked in Brazil. And personally, I loved many things about Argentina, as I loved many things about Brazil and Chile as well. And you will find me a harsh critic of the US on Twitter if you follow me. I just try to call it the way I see it.
I appreciate very much your update. I understand that you didn’t try to offend and that it may be very difficult to understand the political/economic momentum of a nation based on a short trip. Also, University of San Andrés, for example, is a private institution with very defined political objectives. In Argentina, the bulk of the university education and investment in investigation is state-sponsored. And it is also the state, the main promoter of enterpreneurship. Some of it is “micro-business” oriented to the poorest parts of the nation. In the other hand, the public healthcare system is quite effective, as the subsidies per child implemented, to combat structural poverty. Argentina, after the most recent spectacular economic crisis that a western nation could face, stands today as the nation with the highest per capita income in latin america (by purchasing parity) and holds some of the highest human development rates in the region too. (surpassed only by Chile by a very close margin).
I do not say this, IMF, WB and IDB say so.
The economy has been growing in rates from 6% to 8% annually for the last 8 years (not without inflation, to mark a pending debt). Huge companies like IBM hire tons of personnel here as do the main world car manufacturers. Would you call this an economic downturn?
This are facts. The crime rates in Buenos Aires are among the lowest in south america. Let’s face the truth, lower than in most american big cities.
And this is why it surprises me to read that your bus guide talks “unvarnished truth”. I’m sad you got a wrong impression of what’s going on. And I’m affraid that wrong impression, does also confuse people reading your posts.
Best Regards,
hardaway , It is very difficult to write about a country with a 3 day trip. Many of your comments are true, but this doesnt show Argentina´s reality. I would have been more careful because people read this and get the wrong view about investing in Argentina. Specially, when there are many enterpreneurs, just like Wences back then.I don´t agree with the actual government, and the country´s institutions, but this country has a lot of talent and you could still for example make a big difference in costs by developing software in Argentina.