Somehow the thought never occurred to me that this was possible. You have any info on this?

Yes, the funny thing is that it is possible only for foreigners, not for Argentines. It's US $60 for the year, however they will not give you a carnet during the week before a Boca home game. That's why we are going Monday, immediately after Sunday's game. They give you the carnet that same day.

It's pretty crazy since I'm paying almost $60 for each ticket for Sunday's game, and then I get a season ticket for $60 the very next day. I assume that they are better seats for Sunday though, as my understanding is that the carnet gets you popular...not really sure about how to upgrade to platea for any given game.

By the way, all credit for the discovery should go to Luis, who has been the best addition to the dinner club since he actually knows stuff about Buenos Aires.

I guess I should also note that I have one ticket for sale to the Boca game on Sunday.

how much are you charging for the desktop?

The replacement cost in the US is about $700 so I'd be happy with that.

I'm leaving the monitor and desktop here with Boquense. If anyone wants them let me know. If not, I'll just use them when I get back next month.

Dinner, Tuesday 9pm.

Italian restaurant named Vittorio in the Caballito neighborhood. Here's a map.

In these types of threads I have seen many references to the ability of US citizens living abroad to exclude up to ~$86k of their income when filing their taxes.

I am wondering if any of you have discussed this with a tax attorney or if you have filed tax returns as professional gamblers in which the IRS accepted this exclusion.

The IRS says that "Foreign earned income generally is income you receive for services you perform during a period in which you meet both of the following requirements [of living abroad]"

More importantly, they also explicitly list gambling winnings as unearned income.

My hope would be that they are using gambling winnings in that context to refer to recreational gambling, and that by filing as a professional gambler I would still be able to count my winnings as earned income. However, the language used in "services you perform" is somewhat vague - I'm not technically performing a service, but the examples they list give me the impression they just mean that you have to spend time working. And of course, filing as a professional would still mean that I owe self-employment tax.

I think I will have to discuss this with a tax attorney before I make a decision about moving but I'm still interested in hearing experiences from others.

IRS Guide

I've had this discussion 100x. Bottom line:

You file as a professional using Schedule C and it's by definition earned income. They are referring to gambling income filed as gambling winnings. The government can't decide you owe self employment tax (which is only levied on earned income) then tell you that what you are making from poker isn't earned income for these purposes at the same time.

I've filed for this before and it hasn't been a problem.

thanks

Hey guys,
great thread so far. Seems like you are having a great time. I decided to stop lurking Just arrived in Buenos Aires trying to avoid winter back home in Germany. I am gonna be living here for the next months (or maybe longer, who knows?), currently I am in Recoleta. So far, I love this city, lots of interesting places and beautiful women...
Well, I am looking forward to meeting some poker players, I am a NL200-400 grinder on Stars.
How does it work with the dinner? Can I just show up?

I've been reading through the old BsAs thread and now this one and just want to thank everyone for their contributions. I'm making the move to Buenos Aires in January and had a couple questions/recommendations that I didn't see covered earlier(or can't remember).

Can anyone recommend me a good Spanish school preferably in Palermo? I would say I'm average at best right now, I took Spanish for 4 years in high school(I'm 23 now) and am trying to use Rosetta Stone to brush up on it.

Are there any soccer rec leagues around Palermo that I could join? Or do people usually just get together and play pickup games?

If I'm living there for 4 months, how much money(USD) should I bring on top of my rent? I'm not on a budget but am not gonna be living super balla or anything.

Will I be the only redhead in the entire country?

I appreciate any input on this, and look forward to joining you guys at the Tuesday dinners.

I'm pretty sure you'll be able to find a spanish tutor once you get here. lots of us have spanish tutors, so you'll probably just get a referral from one of us.

there are some regular soccer games. if you seek, you shall find.

re: money
you can take money out of the ATMs. if your question is how expensive is it to live here, well...that's like asking how expensive it is to live anywhere. as a general guide, take whatever you spend in the US, divide it by 3, and that's about right.

there are redheads here. not that many, but some.

re: Steiger
just show up at dinner.

Money depends a lot on how much you eat out or cook yourself, I'd probably think a minimum 2500 pesos a month if you'll be supermarket shopping and only occasionally dining out/shopping.

This is pretty much spot on IMO.

I'd recommend you bring as much cash as possible, it's a pretty huge PITA getting rent money/living expenses from the ATMs here (currently capped at 600 pesos per transaction).

Except it's not. I took out 3500 pesos at once just last week.

Dinner this week, Tuesday at 9pm as always.

Pura Tierra.
Address: 3 de Febrero 1167.
Barrio: Belgrano C.

I haven't made reservations yet bc my friend accidentally took my phone after a soccer game Friday, but I'm going to assume that I'll be able to make them Monday.

as long as we do more fun archery post dinner

I have heard USA citizens with Citibank can do this....meanwhile every other single tourist I know here (admittedly not many) is capped at 600 pesos.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/archi.../t-662744.html

http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic..._District.html

You mean 300 pesos

You're giving away the post-dinner secrets.

I'm Irish, and not a Citibank customer, and I can take out 2500 pesos at once

Yeah I don't use Citibank. Couldn't tell you what ATM it was since it was the only one I used while I was there. Try a different ATM if you are having trouble as clearly some of them don't have this restriction.

And as an Australian the citibank ATMs don't even work for me, and so far I've been limited to 300 pesos a withdrawl, forcing me to try my luck in dinnerments with my CC and losing

Fwiw, I'm a local and I'm limited to 300 pesos. I do believe there's a fair amount of randomness regarding specific ATMs/withdrawal limits. But then again, the randomness factor is jacked up most times in Argentina.