There was a TV on in the corner with a live news channel on. Most of the news concerned the 2009 Dakar Rally which is taking place here in Buenos today and tomorrow – a parade around Recoleta this afternoon and the official departure tomorrow. But a more disturbing news story concerned what we concluded was a robbery and a death. When we asked our waiter about it, he explained that an attempted robbery and subsequent killing of the robber had just taken place 2 blocks from the restaurant, on Arenales Avenue no less! Wow! Later in the afternoon I went by the scene of the shooting. A local resident explained that there had been two gunmen on motorcycles. They were trying to rob two small parking lots – apparently lots of people pay a monthly rent to park there and so the amount of money in the cashiers’ booth wasn’t insignificant. And, because of the Dakar Rally, there were lots of police just down the street from the robbery. The robbers had machine guns and fired many shots – there were chalk circles all over the sidewalk and on the road. One gunman got away; the other was killed by police fire and his motorcycle caught on fire. The SUV had a flat tire and a big dent on the rear fender – and was covered in fire extinguisher dust. The bystander told us that it was lucky that the Dakar Rally was happening at that place on that day, since otherwise ‘the police would NEVER have responded or even shown up!’