Buenos Aires has been an enjoyable city to explore despite some ups and downs. Caught a ferry into town from Uruguay but the ferry dropped us on the complete opposite of town than we expected, into La Boca - a somewhat dodgy neighborhood. So it took us a bit to get our bearing but we sorted ourselves out and made it to the hostel, which was more like a frat house, glad we only had to book in one night there before switching to a better hostel. Had a few fun days walking around admiring all of the beautiful European style buildings, we did a ton of walking each day - so much so that we are looking forward to our 22 hour bus ride tonight so that we can give our poor feet a rest. It seems that blue is the color of choice for menś dress shirts and that smoking is much more popular here. The sidewalks are amazingly crowded with people in a hurry to get somewhere and extremely narrow - guess that is the price you pay when you have really old buildings in close proximity to each other.
We really enjoyed the San Telmo markets on Sunday afternoon, and our trip to the Recoleta cemetary which is quite old and very ornate and was so large that it looked like a small city in itself. Our highlights of the trip though dont have so much to do with the places as with the events. Our second night here we were able to watch a political demonstration, people walking down the street waving flags and banners, banging drums and shouting. This was followed by a speech by the president in the Plaza de Mayo and that was followed by fireworks and a 4 hour long concert by a dozen popular Argentenian artists. People were singing along and dancing in the square all around us, it was quite amazing. Another fun event we witnessed was students finished their studies and exam to become lawyers. On the university steps everyone gathered to wait for the students to emerge one at a time every 15 or so minutes. When they came out of the building there was cheering and shouting, then the student had a quick second to hug and kiss their parents before all their friends and family smashed eggs on their head and covered them in flour, confetti, shaving cream and what ever else they took out of the cupboard. It was very amusing to watch it all and see everyone end up filthy but smiling.
Our last night in BA we were fortunate to miss the other end of the spectrum- As we were eating dinner we saw on the TV some footage of thousand of Boca fans celebrating in the street around the Oblisco (1 block from our hotel) The Boca fans are know to be crazy and violent and they did not disappoint. The footage we saw they had climbed on top of the McDonalds and were tearing apart the sign. When we returned to the hostel we only saw the aftermath, but the entire street was coated in broken beer bottles, thousands of bottles were smashed in the middle of the road. The McDonalds sign had been stripped of the yellow coating, and there was graffiti and broken windows everywhere. At the same time as all this was happening, 2 blocks from our hostel in the other direction, there was a violent protest about the acquittal of a dozen people charged with the involvement in the disappearance of woman. The police were out in riot gear and the protesters were throwing rocks and setting stuff on fire. All pretty intense stuff. Luckily for us, we had chosen that evening to spend in the ritzier neighborhood going on a gallery tour, la te da, arent we fancy.
As much as we have enjoyed our time in the city we are really excited to be getting into the country, we are off to Bariloche a town on a lake in the mountains. Sorry we dont have any photos to post, it is difficult to be able to upload them right now, but we will do our best when we can. We have put a link to a video of the event for you to check out.
We really enjoyed the San Telmo markets on Sunday afternoon, and our trip to the Recoleta cemetary which is quite old and very ornate and was so large that it looked like a small city in itself. Our highlights of the trip though dont have so much to do with the places as with the events. Our second night here we were able to watch a political demonstration, people walking down the street waving flags and banners, banging drums and shouting. This was followed by a speech by the president in the Plaza de Mayo and that was followed by fireworks and a 4 hour long concert by a dozen popular Argentenian artists. People were singing along and dancing in the square all around us, it was quite amazing. Another fun event we witnessed was students finished their studies and exam to become lawyers. On the university steps everyone gathered to wait for the students to emerge one at a time every 15 or so minutes. When they came out of the building there was cheering and shouting, then the student had a quick second to hug and kiss their parents before all their friends and family smashed eggs on their head and covered them in flour, confetti, shaving cream and what ever else they took out of the cupboard. It was very amusing to watch it all and see everyone end up filthy but smiling.
Our last night in BA we were fortunate to miss the other end of the spectrum- As we were eating dinner we saw on the TV some footage of thousand of Boca fans celebrating in the street around the Oblisco (1 block from our hotel) The Boca fans are know to be crazy and violent and they did not disappoint. The footage we saw they had climbed on top of the McDonalds and were tearing apart the sign. When we returned to the hostel we only saw the aftermath, but the entire street was coated in broken beer bottles, thousands of bottles were smashed in the middle of the road. The McDonalds sign had been stripped of the yellow coating, and there was graffiti and broken windows everywhere. At the same time as all this was happening, 2 blocks from our hostel in the other direction, there was a violent protest about the acquittal of a dozen people charged with the involvement in the disappearance of woman. The police were out in riot gear and the protesters were throwing rocks and setting stuff on fire. All pretty intense stuff. Luckily for us, we had chosen that evening to spend in the ritzier neighborhood going on a gallery tour, la te da, arent we fancy.
As much as we have enjoyed our time in the city we are really excited to be getting into the country, we are off to Bariloche a town on a lake in the mountains. Sorry we dont have any photos to post, it is difficult to be able to upload them right now, but we will do our best when we can. We have put a link to a video of the event for you to check out.
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