From the very first glance, Buenos Aires looked like the city I'd always imagined – big, brash, and imposing. And very very European.
We arrived by bus from Rosario – a four-hour trip through green farmlands to the impressive 75-bus-capacity Retiro bus station, just a few blocks from the heart of downtown. From there, a taxi took us quickly through streets lined with tall old buildings to the nearby, artsy-funky San Telmo district. We checked in to La Posada de la Luna, a family-run and friendly place on Avenida Perú, up a flight of well-worn marble steps with guest rooms in the back, away from the street noise. We tossed our bags in the corner and just crashed on the bed for an afternoon nap. That evening our host, Pascual, suggested we try a nearby restaurant called El General for dinner.
It was only 7:30, and still early by Argentine standards, so we explored a few blocks of the center city pedestrianway, passing a haunting display of photos of those who 'disappeared' during the corrupt and lawless era of military rule. They looked like people any one of us might know, people who were murdered for their activism. It's still an open wound throughout the country, and in many other South American countries, as well. Washington's complicity in these crimes helps to explain Argentine ambivalence toward the US, if not toward individual US citizens. On our way back to the restaurant, a blizzard of political flyers fell like rain from the top of one of the many towering buildings. It was obvious, on our first day in town, that political life is highly participatory in Buenos Aires.
We arrived at El General by 8:30. We were still early, and the only ones in the place. But we didn't want to stay out late because there was still much exploring to do throughout this world-class city, and we wanted to get a semi-early start in the morning. We had planned to spend our first several days walking the famous neighborhoods of San Telmo, Retiro, Recoleta, Palermo, and Belgrano, getting to know the city and looking for a good apartment to rent for a month. And finding an affordable and convenient apartment right away – one that cut our lodging bills in half – was the key to keeping ourselves on a reasonable budget. It's a big city with a lot going on, so we would be very busy for our first week in Buenos Aires. Retiring early and getting a good night's sleep seemed to be a good idea.
So we had our choice of any table in the restaurant, and we chose a nice one right below a framed and signed picture of The General himself – Teniente General Juan Domingo Perón. In this country, there seem to be few who are lukewarm about Perón and his two wives, Evita and Isabel, and their political legacy. An almost-mythic aura seems to surround them, and Perón – who died in 1974 – remains a powerful political force. The restaurant owner, and most of his customers (I guess) appeared to be big Perón supporters. The food, and a bottle of Malbec from Mendoza, were very good; and the service, with nobody else in the place, was excellent. Welcome to Buenos Aires!
True to form, our latest B&B was an excellent place to meet interesting people each morning over a large, shared breakfast table. Pascual put out a loaf of fresh-baked bread, home-made jams, and hot coffee every morning to entice us to the table.
Among the more interesting folks we met was a group of four young women from England who had just come from a 4-month stint as employees of the gift shop at the British base in Antarctica(!). They said they were very glad to be spending time in a warm location for a while. The excitements of Buenos Aires, and all the handsome young men that populate the city, were another attraction. At the base they'd attended to the increasing numbers of tourists from cruise ships who stop in these days to buy gifts and mementos of the icy continent. After a while, each new cruise ship was a welcome sight, as they were usually invited aboard for a good meal – and especially a hot shower! The smallest of pleasures, depending on your circumstances, can be especially delicious.
San Telmo is known for its artistic population and some really cool bohemian restaurants, with prices even a student could afford. One of our favorites was La Poesia, a cosy, friendly place on a nearby corner. We sat next to a pair of attractive young women and I asked them about the interesting bottle of wine resting on their table. They turned out to be Cuban sisters from Miami who planned to move to Argentina and stay there. Well, one of them planned to stay – she was thoroughly in love with the place – and was trying to convince her sister! They thought they might open a Cuban restaurant (imagine that!) and bring the whole family down to join them. When you're young, smart and adventurous, you could sure do a lot worse than that. Being very pretty also helps!
We spent the next week getting to know our way around the city, concentrating on the areas noted on internet listings for two-bedroom apartments that might work for us (we needed a second bedroom for my sister who planned to visit). That eliminated the many interesting, and cheaper, studio flats we found, but opened up all kinds of other possibilities. We spent considerable time on the Subte (subway) zipping from neighborhood to neighborhood, and then walking, walking, walking – looking for affordable and reasonably quiet digs to spend a month in.
After walking much of the city – really, the only way to fully know a new city – our neighborhood choices seem to range from 'funky-fun' San Telmo and Palermo, to leafy-quiet' Recoleta and Belgrano. There was one very pricey 4-bedroom Recoleta flat available in the $5k/month category, and I clicked on it out of idle curiousity. Turns out it's Ari Onassis' old hideout for whenever he visited Buenos Aires. We quickly eliminated that one – even though it comes complete with grand piano.
For whatever security reasons – security seems to be a constant concern here – we were not given any specific addresses until we put up the rental money. The most we could get is the two closest cross-streets. We hoped that was enough to decide whether it's a neighborhood we want to hang out in, whether there's a loud bar on the corner that keeps rocking until dawn (a serious consideration in night-clubbing BA), or if it's on a very busy street with all-night traffic noise. But they also wouldn't even show us the inside of any apartment until we pretty much signed on the dotted line. So we spent much time trying to guesstimate which apartment we'd get by studying the window views shown on the internet ads. We decided on a good looking flat and contacted the company to make arrangements, but found it was already rented and they just forgot to remove it from the site. Finally we were back in Belgrano (which we had shied away from because it was a bit pricey) to look at a street where there was an apartment available that was just within our budget. The street was leafy-quiet (for BA) and the flat appeared very nice in the photos. But there were no window views on the internet site, so we took the leap and hoped for the best.
We got a 4th floor flat that you might call 'comfortably-dated,' with some decent art on the walls. The large sliding-glass balcony doors frame a nice view of an elegant older brick building just across the street. The Parque Barrancas del Belgrano is at the end of the block,
with Subte and light-rail stations nearby. There are two Disco food stores within four blocks, several nearby coffee shops, and a very good ice cream parlor about three blocks away. What more, really, could you want? We signed a one-month lease, handed over the money, and tossed our gear into the closet. We were now ready to experience whatever else Buenos Aires had to offer. (The agency we rented from is at www.travelsinargentina.com, and the travel consultant, Raquel, is great! They have many lovely, affordable places in all the best locations.)
Like, for instance, a Charly Garcia concert. In Argentina, he's more than just a rock star; he's something of a legend on the order of Bruce Springsteen. Charly's had more ups and downs and addictions than most people can ever imagine, or survive. Google him sometime for the full story and some music clips.
We saw a notice in the newspaper that Charly would be playing his first concert of the year at Luna Park, one of the main venues in downtown Buenos Aires, and went online to get tickets. We decided to pay a little extra to get the best seats, and ended up with two tickets in the Campo section. But we noticed there were no seat assignments. We guess it's open seating and make a point to be there up to an hour early to score some good ones. Our plan is to catch the Subte (subway) to the center of town, and grab a completo (hot dog with everything) from a street vendor on the way to Luna Park.
The Subte arrives at the 9 de Julio station, we take the escalator to the surface and we realize, about halfway up, that it's raining cats and dogs at street level and our jackets and hats are in the backpack I'm wearing. Being on the escalator there's no way we can stop and get our stuff out, so we emerge drenched and head for a storefront overhang. There's a guy trying to sell us an umbrella (these guys are common in South America; the rain brings them out), but we wave him off since we have one in the backpack with our jackets. Soon we're dressed for the rain, standing under the overhang and wondering if the hot dog idea is going to pan out.
We'd had a very light lunch and we were both starving. The rain is pouring down. We happen to glance at the large windows behind us and realize we're standing in front of the main downtown McDonald's. We look at each other and decide, what the heck, we're not proud. A few minutes later, as we're wolfing down 'dinner,' we have to admit that it ain't 'cuisine' but sometimes it tastes pretty good. Refortified, we head onward in the rain toward Luna Park, hoping it's (at least) a covered venue.
We arrive at Luna Park, the biggest indoor arena in the city, and we realize why there are no seat assignments in the Campo section: there are no seats! All the seats are up in the nearby cheaper sections where the view is just as good and, in some places, maybe even better. So we find ourselves in the 'pit' where the hard-core fans stand up and rock out all night to the music. There are small groups of rabid fans who also arrived early and have staked out territory right in front of the stage. We go to the back wall and sit on the floor to wait for the show (scheduled for 9:00pm) to begin. It's about 8:30 and the place is far from being full. At 9:00, there's still lots of empty room in the place and nobody seems to be in any hurry to get the show started.
There's also lots of cigarette smoke hanging in the air, since many Argentines are smokers. They have a certain way of holding their cigs that makes them look tragically hip, and vaguely French. There are several announcements that smoking is "absolutely forbidden" but few people take notice. By 10:00 the show still hasn't begun, but the place is now full of clapping, singing fans.
This appears to be normal procedure. The fans know the show isn't going to start on time, so they show up an hour late. The band knows the fans won't be there on time, so they start an hour late. In Perú it's an institution that's actually called "hora Peruana." I don't know what they call it here. Ten minutes after ten o'clock, the lights dim and the opening spectacular light-show begins. The cigarette smoke is replaced by a much more 'herbal' smell that helps to set the proper mood, the filmy contains are stripped away in pieces that whisk off toward the far corners of the room, and the fans are now rocking to one of their major heroes.
How to describe Charly Garcia? Take Frank Zappa and blend in a piano player who's half Randy Newman and half Bob Dylan. Then make him the front man for Led Zepellin, mixed with The Rolling Stones. And add a big dose of Sgt. Pepper. He's been described as "the father of Latino Rock," and some of his work can be downright challenging.
Most of the young (and otherwise) women in the crowd spent most of the evening jumping to the driving beat of the music. Many of the rest were rocking out on their boyfriends' shoulders, waving their shirts and other removable garments over their heads. Ever the gentleman, I offered to lift Carolyn up to join in the melee, and was relieved when she declined.
All the people standing around us seemed to know the lyrics to all the songs. The giant screen behind the stage carried videos of buildings collapsing. Two gauze-draped young women drifted over the crowd, suspended by cables, moving and contorting in mid-air.
Charly, who has the well-earned beat-up qualities of Keith Richards – with a small moustache, horn-rimmed glasses, and bushy eyebrows – didn't make it on his good looks. Like many poets, he made it on his ideas, his lyrics, and his attention to showmanship. Charly is the 'Cyrano de Bergerac' of his time, giving voice to the hopes and frustrations of his generation. We can understand why his earlier band's "Farewell" performances back in 1975 attracted the largest crowds (20,000 each night) ever seen in South America.
At the end of the two-hour show, we duck out a side door and catch a cab back to the apartment. Our ears are still ringing from the impressive acoustic system. But we've experienced, and survived, one of the great cultural events of modern Argentina. Charly Garcia is kind of an indicator of the great cultural gulf between Anglo North America, and everything else below the Rio Grande. I imagine I could spend a tremendous amount of time looking for someone, anyone, in the US or Canada who's heard of him. Or other famous bands in Latin America like Kjarkas, who we saw once in La Paz, Bolivia, or Maná, Mexico's famous band that's still playing after decades together. But mention Charly Garcia to Latino musicians and the chances are good they know him well.
Ultimately, you have to decide for yourself. Here's a Youtube clip of Charly at the Viña del Mar festival, near Valparaiso, Chile:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbdWPBPRtDs&NR=1
The Sunday issue of Clarín, BA's main newspaper, carries a magazine insert called Viva. The March 14th magazine carried an Argentine footnote to the earthquake in Haiti. A Mendoza couple, told they could never have children, chose to adopt instead. Their fifth adopted child would be a little Haitian girl named Rosanlindha. The paperwork was complete, they had met the child, and everything was ready for her arrival. Then the earthquake hit.
Rosanlindha survived – the orphanage was several kilometers away from Port-au-Prince – but the building containing the records was destroyed and her paperwork was lost. In addition, the judge who signed the form was among the dead. Suddenly she was once again just another homeless child among thousands, now trying to survive the tragic aftermath with little food or drinking water. The people caring for her were overwhelmed with daily life-and-death struggles and none had time to go digging for one piece of paper. And then, Rosalindha was sent to the US, along with many other children, to receive the proper care that was impossible to deliver among the ruins of Port-au-Prince, adding yet another layer of bureaucracy to the problem.
But the story has a happy ending. After the right amount of political intervention, Rosalindha finally arrived to a new life with her four adopted brothers in the wine-country of Mendoza. We wish her well in her new family.
Check out photos in the accompanying album -- 31 - S. American Odyssey: ¡Hola, Buenos Aires!