heh, i went to Argentina for work once.. (it was just pre covid) and I was shocked and amazed at their consumption of this stuff... not only do they pour copious amounts of artificial sweeteners into the cups but they share the cup and straw around the office!
I shudder to think of them doing that during covid...
Sharing the straw is definitely the way to go here in Argentina. Note: I'm Argentinian but I don't like mate and sharing a straw feels gross to me. Other Argentinians tell me there's something wrong with my genes.
Mate is a social thing here. You're supposed to share and there's a ritual about how the round goes, who prepares the mate for the rest of the group, and how you signal that you don't want to drink anymore.
Also curious: Uruguayans share our love of mate but for them it's an individual thing, they don't share their mates. So we say that Uruguayans are born with a mate thermos under their armpits, one for each of them!
Mate is traditionally drank with a metal straw, a small "cup" (the gourd) and a bottle with hot water, which we Argies always call a "termo" (after the thermos brand, much like many people call tissue paper "kleenex"). This bottle is used to constantly refill the gourd, since each "serving" of water only lasts a couple of sips. Note the yerba mate inside the gourd lasts many rounds of sipping until it also needs to be changed.
So to drink mate in Argentina, you need yerba, one straw, one gourd, and one termo per group of people, because we share the mate. But Uruguayans don't share their mate, even though they are heavy mate drinkers, so each carries their own mate and termo under their arm, everywhere. Hence, "they are born with a termo under their arm".
It's not really a joke, more like a friendly description of Uruguayans and mate.
When I was there last month, a lot of people said that not sharing mate anymore was one of the major cultural things that happened in Argentina because of Covid. Of course the country has other problems that it deals with but yeah looking around it seemed that almost all people carry their own. I’m not Argentinian though so I might not have reliable info just very recent
I'm Argentinian and we keep sharing mate as if nothing have happened. Off course there may be some people that started to drink their own mate but definitely not the majority, not even close.
Sharing mate is a ritual too culturally rooted to Argentinian society. It's hard to explain but it goes beyond drinking a hot beverage.
I shudder to think of them doing that during covid...