A Nightmare Eviction: Navigating Argentine Rental Laws and Family Drama

For those who didn’t read my previous post, my mother had some serious health issues back in September that seem to have impacted her mental health—specifically her behavior and reasoning skills.

Hypoxia, a condition where the brain doesn’t get enough oxygen, can significantly affect behavior and cognitive function. After my mom’s recent battle with pneumonia, I started noticing symptoms linked to this condition. Her emotional state has been unpredictable, swinging between irritability and anxiety, with moments of confusion and impulsive behavior. It’s clear how much hypoxia can mess with decision-making and self-control.

This all came to a head in early October when she decided to evict the tenants living in one of our properties.

Her reasoning was that more than two people were living there—she claimed there were five—which violated the rental agreement. Based on this, she felt eviction was justified. At first, I didn’t question her logic; she’s always been a rock when it comes to managing our properties. So, at her request, I sent a WhatsApp message to the tenants, letting them know we wouldn’t charge them rent for October and that we’d cover their overdue utility bills. However, I added that we expected them to vacate the property and hand over the keys by November 5th.

I didn’t hear back from the tenants, but I did get a WhatsApp message from the former realtor who used to manage our properties. The tenants had reached out to him since he was the one who originally handled their contract. Knowing I’m not Argentine, he patiently explained the legalities of evictions in Argentina. He told me the eviction wasn’t legal and warned me that attempting it would lead to a mediation and judicial process that could drag on for six months or more.

I forwarded his message to my mom, hoping it would help her see reason. Instead, she ignored it, refused to listen to the audio, and launched into a rant about how the realtor was garbage and had spent years stealing from us. For the record, there’s zero evidence to support that claim.

At this point, I realized something was very wrong—not just with how we were handling the eviction, but with my mom’s behavior in general. I started researching Argentine eviction laws and learned some eye-opening things.

First, Argentine law heavily favors renters. This was both surprising and stressful. For example:

• Landlords can’t evict tenants without a court order. They must file a legal claim, provide a written notice explaining the reason for eviction, and give the tenant 30 days to address the issue. WhatsApp messages, as you might have guessed, don’t count as legal notice.
• Mediation is mandatory before any court proceedings.
• Even if the court approves the eviction, tenants are often given extra time to find a new place, especially if they can prove financial hardship—which our tenants claimed.

These rules are outlined in the National Civil and Commercial Code (Código Civil y Comercial de la Nación), which protects tenants and ensures fair processes for disputes.

I shared all of this with my mom, but she refused to listen. In fact, she lashed out and even threatened to evict my husband and me from our home if I didn’t support her. That’s when I decided to step back. I told the tenants I was removing myself from the eviction process because I didn’t agree with my mom’s decision. (No response from them, by the way.)

When I told my mom, she reluctantly agreed, but a week later, she insisted I act as a middleman between her and the tenants again. There was a lot of arguing—so much so that, in my anger, I had a fleeting thought that it might have been easier if she hadn’t survived her pneumonia. It was a horrible thought, but I was at my breaking point.

As the supposed eviction date approached, my mom changed her tune. She asked me to contact the tenants and request that they pay the rent. She felt everything would be fine as long as they paid on time and reduced the number of people living in the house to just two.

I reached out to the tenants again and didn’t hear back for about a week. Then, out of nowhere, they messaged me saying they had lost their phones (bullshit!) but were willing to pay the rent for October and November, as well as reimburse us for the utility bills we had covered. They just asked for an extension until November 27th.

My mom agreed, and honestly, I was relieved to have some resolution to this nightmare. If and when they follow through, I’ll add an update to this post. Fingers crossed!

P.S. On a lighter note, I still can’t find a turkey for Thanksgiving in the supermarkets here in Argentina. Looks like it’ll be chicken again this year.

Update - December 1, 2024: The tenants paid in full on November 28. 

A Fight for Breath: My Mother’s Battle with Pneumonia

The last couple of weeks have been incredibly tough. It all began during the final week of September when what seemed like a simple cough escalated into a terrifying "I can't breathe" moment for my 77-year-old mother.

We rushed her to a private hospital in Córdoba City, where she was diagnosed with acute pneumonia and admitted immediately.

It probably didn’t help that her room number was 13—an infamous symbol of bad luck.

On the first night, my mother didn’t think she was going to make it, and honestly, neither did her doctor. Naturally, she began telling me, as best as she could, that she loved me and would always be with me in spirit.

To make matters worse, my 82-year-old father, who’s not entirely present mentally, wasn’t handling her condition well. This felt ironic, considering that just a year ago, he had accused her of infidelity during their marriage and even threatened her life. As far as I know, none of his allegations are true. In hindsight, I think his accusations were early signs of his cognitive decline. But if I’m being completely honest, I suspect the only reason he was concerned about my mother possibly dying was the prospect of losing someone to cook his meals and do his laundry. Anyway, I digress—back to my mother.

Thankfully, the antibiotics and IV fluids began working, and she slowly started to feel like herself again. However, there was an issue with her IV. Being a careful observer by necessity, I noticed that the IV bag wasn’t emptying and realized the fluid was dripping onto her bed instead. Fortunately, after I pointed this out, a nurse fixed it.

One thing that stood out to me at the hospital was the lack of vital monitors for the patients. This likely explains why the nurses checked on my mother every four hours. Honestly, I was disappointed. You’d think a private hospital would be better equipped than a public one, but both seem pretty much the same. That said, the cleaning staff was exceptional. They cleaned the room and bathroom frequently, ensuring everything was spotless—more often than the nurses checked in, actually.

My mom actually thought the hospital food was great!

By the third day, my mother was already making plans for what she wanted to do once she was discharged. She sounded stronger, more determined, and eager to get back to her life. However, her relationship with my father continued to be a problem. One night, she demanded he leave and not return, even instructing the nurses not to let him into her room. This left me as her sole caretaker.

Managing everything wasn’t easy. I had to juggle taking care of her with teaching my online English classes, though I ended up canceling quite a few lessons. Taking care of my recovering mother wasn’t the issue—I’ve been caring for elderly people since I was 13, starting as a volunteer at Waterford Convalescent Center in Hialeah, Florida, for two years. Then in 2008, I helped my husband’s grandparents when they were battling cancer. But this was different.

At Waterford, the patients had nurses and staff. When my husband’s grandparents were sick in Florida, they had other relatives to step in when I couldn’t. Here in Argentina, though, the only family I have are my parents and my husband. My father, as I’ve mentioned, is unreliable due to his mental state. My husband had to stay home to protect our house because Córdoba City's crime rate is absolutely terrible. Leaving our home unattended would almost guarantee a break-in. So, it was just me, without any backup, handling everything for my mother at the hospital.

By Thursday, her doctor said she was well enough to go home, which thrilled her. Once I signed the discharge papers, we left. My dad and I drove her home—thankfully without them killing each other in the car.

She was instructed to rest, avoid crowded areas, wear a mask, and take her medications for the next couple of weeks. She followed these directions, and physically, she’s now much better. Mentally, though, that’s a different story.

A week after she returned home, I began noticing dramatic changes in her personality. At first, they were subtle, and I didn’t think much of it—she’s always been a bit of a hardass. But this was something else.

She started giving away her furniture and decided to remodel her house. She replaced an old window in her bedroom, retiled her bedroom, the main bathroom, and the kitchen, and even had the plumbing redone. Altogether, she spent over 4 million Argentine pesos in less than a month. Currently, 4 million Argentine pesos (ARS) is approximately $4,008 USD.

Had she suffered from hypoxia - a condition where tissue is deprived of oxygen? Could this have caused brain damage?

To make matters worse, she became fixated on evicting the tenants in one of our family’s rental properties. This turned into a nightmare and ultimately caused a major rift between us, one that might have severed our emotional connection forever.

But I’ll save that for my next post.

Celebrating Halloween 2024 in Córdoba: Our Spooky American Tradition

It's been quite a difficult couple of weeks – it usually is around this time of year. Luckily, Halloween was just around the corner to lift our spirits and help us forget about all the drama that's been going on lately.

We kicked things off with our usual tradition of setting up the Halloween tree, which looked even more ghoulish this year. We always try to add something new to the tree, and this year didn’t disappoint.

But we did something a little different this time and decorated our coffee table with a Book of Shadows, Resident Evil and Charmed novels, along with an assortment of hauntingly cool items. Among them were skeleton heads, blood bags, shovels, a crystal ball, and of course, the ceramic Jack O' Lantern candy holder and cauldron cup from Ghostly.

We also jazzed up the shelf above our TV with a couple of Halloween items, including two more ceramic Jack O' Lanterns from Ghostly. One of them was the original candy holder that arrived broken earlier this year. Luckily, a little super glue saved the day – so now we have two!

Of course, no Halloween celebration would be complete without candy. I think we may have gone a bit overboard this year. As of the time I published this post, all the candy was gone. I honestly don’t know how we’ve avoided diabetes, but we somehow managed. Also, I do want to point out that Argentina's selection of Halloween candies has improved significantly since our arrival twelve years ago.

Now, if you’ve seen our Halloween celebrations in past years, you know we go all out when it comes to food and treats. Although we were on a tighter budget this year, we still managed to make some pretty tasty things. And, yes, we bought a couple of ready-made items too. Don't worry – I'll tell you which ones!

So, here are our homemade Halloween-themed peanut butter cups in the shape of Jack O' Lanterns and Witch hats.

Our second item was technically our first as the hubs arranged his homemade pancakes and donuts into this adorable monster face for breakfast.

Then the hubs made his famous dirt pudding. All he needed were some crushed Oreo cookies, some homemade pudding, some gummy worms, and an empty Starbucks cup.

And for all you health nuts out there, the hubs gave these cucumber slices a spooky makeover. He carved the eyes and mouth using a straw.

This is actually a homemade coconut cake. We used food coloring to turn the icing orange. Then we used chocolate chips to make the eyes and mouth for this Jack O' Lantern cake.

Graveyard Brownies, anyone? The tombstones were made out of coconut cookies, while the Umbrella Corporation shed was made out of Kit Kat bars. The shovel, zombie human and dog added a nice touch to this tasty dessert.

Again, for those of you who prefer healthier snacks on Halloween, we cut a few bananas, used chocolate chips to give them spooky eyes and then surrounded them with orange slices.

Full disclosure! The following items I'm about to share were either bought or we bought but modified with food coloring.

Alfajores are super popular here in Argentina—they’re basically two soft, crumbly cookies with dulce de leche (kind of like caramel) in the middle. A lot of them are covered in chocolate or dusted with powdered sugar, and there are all kinds of varieties.

Luckily, these two alfajores were covered in white icing, which gave us the perfect canvas to add some spooky features using a food coloring pen.

These donuts are actually from a pizza place called Bravucona, which offer donuts filled with Bavarian cream or jelly. They also come with eyes and a mouth. But as you can see, we gave one a vampiric makeover in the first photo and made the eyes in the second photo a little more pronounced.

These truffles were from a store called Rapanui and they came with these spooky designs beforehand, but they looked great on our coffin plate from Ghostly.

Another annual Halloween tradition at our house is watching a horror movie every day throughout October. So, here’s our 2024 list. Some of the films were classics, while others were brand new and surprisingly good. But, of course, there were some real duds too.

Halloween 2024 Movie List

• Strange Darling -- It was watchable
• Last Straw -- It was watchable
• AfrAId -- It was watchable
• Wrong Turn 2 Dead End - Bad, Bad, Bad
• Hold Your Breath - -- It was watchable
• The Crow - Waste of time
• Azrael -- It was watchable
• Beetlejuice 2 - Bad, Bad, Bad
• Hellboy The Crooked Man -- It was watchable
• Never Let Go -- It was watchable
• Resident Evil - A great classic!
• Scream - A great classic!
• Mr. Crocket - Decent but quickly forgettable
• Terrifier 3 - Decent
• Alien Romulus
• Stream - It was okay.
• Bagman - Disappointing.
• The Substance - It was okay
• False Positive - Meh
• Super Deep - Meh
• Smile 2 - Worst film of 2024
• Carved- A surprise hit
• A Nightmare on Elm Street - The original not the remake - Another great classic!
• The Hills Have Eyes 2 - Unrated - Sweet!
• Joy Ride 3 - Decent but not as good as the first one
• Don't Move - It was watchable
• Outside -  A total disaster of a zombie movie
• Dawn of the Dead
• The Faculty
• 28 Days Later
• The Others
• Time Cut - New and watchable, but easily forgettable
• Train to Busan
• Bonus - Final Destination in honor of Tony Todd. We watched this on November 9th after learning of his passing.

It's worth mentioning that the day before Halloween was my husband's 42nd birthday. Naturally, we focused more on his birthday celebration – we wanted the attention to be on him, not Halloween.

Thankfully, our dear friend Melisa joined us to celebrate. Though she couldn’t be with us on Halloween itself, we helped her get into the spirit a day early by carving Jack O' Lanterns out of peppers.

It’s not the first time we’ve done this. The truth is, finding a good pumpkin to carve at the supermarket isn’t always easy, so we decided to carve peppers instead.

We filled them with rice and cheese, then baked them for about 20 minutes. They were absolutely delicious! I might add some red sauce next year to take them up a notch.

In addition to stuffed peppers, pizza, potato balls and cake, we also made my husband's favorite non-alcoholic drink, which is a Shirley Temple.

Now, I'm more of a fan of alcohol than he is, so we also made alcohol-laced Jell-O and placed them in these skull shot cups.

Afterward, we had some fun taking photos in a collection of masks we've gathered over the years. I’m thinking of investing in more accessories next year so we can dress up in full-body costumes.

Speaking of costumes...

24 hours after my husband’s birthday, we decided to dress up as our own versions of Ghostface from Scream, the Terminator, and V from V for Vendetta. We snapped a couple of photos, but by this point, we were pretty exhausted.

Now, we're already thinking about next Halloween. Of course, those plans will have to wait as we prepare for Thanksgiving, which is only two weeks away. But we're a little worried because we haven’t been able to find any turkeys at the supermarket. It's not very popular in Argentina. In fact, last year we had chicken, but this year, I’m really hoping to cook a turkey.

I’ll keep you posted on whether I have any luck finding one!