A translation of a few words in Spanish (or as they speak here in Argentina 'Castellano') may not appear in regular dictionaries, may be of interest to a visitor to Buenos Aires.
A few self employed entrepreneurs populate the streets of Buenos Aires. They are more or less tolerated by the general public, but on occasion not by the local law enforcers. They represent a segment of the 'underground' labour force, which may not be entirely legal or may in certain cases indeed belong to a branch of organized crime.
Lets introduce the MANTEROS first
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Manteros (manta = table cloth)
Street vendors spread out their blankets and cover them with wares of doubtful origin along sidewalks, pedestrian thoroughfares, near rail and bus stations and wait for commerce. |
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| Trade is always brisk, as the merchandise is usually cheap (illegally produced and or brought to market). Regular shops may offer apparently identical merchandise at higher prices a few steps away from the manteros. |
Obviously, the legal businesses are not happy with this unwanted competition. Certain parts of the city almost become impossible to transit on foot, with high incidence of pick pocketing de rigeur. The metropolitan police force attempts to 'clean up', which often result in 'mantero protests'. But, like in the case of tourist heaven Calle Florida, the offending manteros are 'removed' and soon turn up in some other location not yet targeted for clean up, but promising good trade.
And then we have the CARTONEROS
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| Cartoneros, people who raid the recycle bins for cartons and corrugated paper. |
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| Some cartoneros use horses to transport their booty. |
The cartoneros are the unofficial recycle sorters, packers and sellers of almost anything that can be dug out of the 'new' huge recycle bins along many of the city streets and avenues. Their re-sorting plant usually covers several street corners, where traffic streams by, and pedestrians pick their way through heaps of debris. It can be a bit disconcerting, leaving Nueve Chique dressed in 'tango fashion' after dark and pass through a flock of these guys.
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The 're-sorting' and wrapping takes place at selected street corners of el Centro, one of them near the milonga Nuevo Chique.
The job of TRAPITOS (trapo - rag) seem to be an international phenomenon. They clean windshields at intersections, guard parked vehicles, and get paid in tips.
Windshield clean ???
Carwash while you park.
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The trapitos are a special tribe: insistent, aggressive and at times downright extornionistic. Drivers routinely lock their cars while driving and even keep windows tightly rolled up (even if their car lacks air conditioning and the city is a furnace) when transiting certain districts of the city.
Grab and run thefts are common. Refusing to have a windshield cleaned may result in some 'accidental damage' to a car's exterior. During one incident just a week ago, a driver refused to pay for unwanted windshield washing, and was promptly knocked out by a burly trapito. The driver is still in hospital in a coma....
And then we have people who earn a good salary, but have no visible work to show for it. It is said, that over 200,000 public employees have been put on payroll 'in a hurry' to the tune of about 100 per day in the last few years (lottery, connections, whatever) but in many cases concerning these hires, there does not appear to be any labour, productive or otherwise, to offset the pay connected to it. One way, to get unemployment numbers down I suppose. Apparently the hiring by the now ex-government hit a record high just before it was defeated. About 200,000 hires are said to be of the 'noqui' version - numbers vary....
These employees are commonly known as NOQUIS (from the Italian delicacy gnocchi).
The real thing Gnocchi (NOQUI) tasty and delicious here in Buenos Aires.
La definición en lunfardo de ñoqui, aquel que sólo cobra una vez por mes y que no trabaja, no tiene que ver con quienes se presentan al lugar de trabajo y hacen poco y nada sino con aquellos que directamente no trabajan pero tienen un sueldo estatal.
Noqui now refers to a multitude of 'workers' who are described as in above paragraph and translated here:
The definition of Noqui in lunfardo, which covers those who only turn up once a month and do not work at all, has nothing to do with those who turn up at a work place and do nothing or little; but with those who not really work but receive a public wage.
Some critics define Noquis as: Noqui-eren estudiar, noqui-ren trabajar.
(don't like to study, don't like to work)
For the readers who understand Spanish....here a bit of history of the Lunfardo (specific local dialect) origin of the word...
Wictionario definition of Noqui: Con el significado de aquel que cobra un sueldo fijo por un trabajo que no realiza ya que es un "acomodado". La palabra se difundió desde los 1970 y surge del siguiente modo: se difundió -y persiste- la costumbre italiana de comer un plato de ñoquis (gnocchi) con un billete bajo éste durante el día de san Pantaleón un día 27 de julio, aunque por diversas causas quizás principalmente porque "a fin de mes" mucha gente se encuentra escasa de dineros, el rito rioplatense se realiza el día 29. Tal rito se considera propiciatorio para obtener más dinero. En Argentina y Uruguay se ha hecho común comer un plato de ñoquis todos los días 29 de cada mes; por metáfora se llama entonces ñoquis a los pseudoempleados públicos, conocidos también como "ñoquis primbasicos"(ya que sólo se presentan en el supuesto empleo a fin de mes para cobrar).
One may call these affected unfortunates 'free loaders' maybe. The new government got out the broom and is cleaning house, meaning any employees who hit the payroll under suspect circumstances and have absolutely no work assigned to them, are being reviewed one by one....and laid off.
With the usual Argentine reaction to unhappy events: one takes to the streets. The Noquis arranged a march to Plaza de Mayo on the 29th January, protesting lay offs. There was not much coverage about the 'event' neither on TV or the daily papers....
Photos and quotes: compliments of public Internet....
