Civic Duty

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Today is the day for our civic duty. We are off to mail in our absentee ballots. Heard that the US embassy will accept our ballots and make sure they will get to the US of A in a timely manner, something the Argentine post is not known for. Besides we don’t have to pay two bucks each for postage as the embassy will sneek them into their diplomatic pouch along with state secrets and recipes for beef empanadas.

Heard that you need your passport to prove you are a good guy and fortunately we remembered them. We usually just carry a copy of the passport with us caus if you lose this document a high front would hit a low front head on and the resulting occluded front would accumulate cumulus and our parade would get rained on.(I can’t get today’s geography lesson outta my brain.) The line outside of security was a block long but we got to cut this process as we were privileged US passport holders. The lady in the booth marked “US passport only” smiled as we showed these docs and buzzed us into the security room. I thought the guard said something about stripping naked but again the translation was misinterpreted. He only wanted my cell phone (that doesn’t work here…I just use it to tell time), my camera, my water bottle, my extra batteries etc. These were kept for us under their watchful eye while we did our business inside. We then went to the next building where visas are handed out. But we needed to go to window 15…only for US citizens abroad. We got a number much like the hospital process and waited about 15 minutes. We then went up and handed the lady our ballots. She took the next 5 minutes putting our ballots on the desk behind her and cutting two “I voted” stickers for us. I pondered this inefficient bureaucracy and wondered if it came from the US or did it sneek by the security guards watching over my cell phone.

As we left I felt proud that even though it was a hassle I was able to make my small voice heard. I hope that you back in the states where all you have to do is drop it in the mail or stop by those friendly election folks the first Tuesday in November will remember our ordeal and take the time to vote.

Chow

danny

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