As we near the end of our almost six month trip, we realize there is so much to do and see in Buenos Aires that five weeks is really cutting it short. The official population of the city is about 3 million, but that figure is really meaningless. The surrounding area that supports all the city has to offer adds another ten million to the number. Buenos Aires is a very large city.
After we arrived, we assembled a kind of calendar to make sense of all the things there were to do. We'd allot a day to walk a certain area, and then realize just how much more that area had to offer that would require a second visit. Our calendar was constantly being amended. And in the end, there were still a number of things we didn't have time for.
There's so much to see and do in Buenos Aires, where do you even begin? This is one of the world's great cities. It's large and it's complex, with numerous art, science and history museums, a long river front with many recreational opportunities, lots of fine architecture, a vibrant music scene, interesting neighborhoods with excellent restaurants, and a system of vast open parks. But it's surprisingly easy to navigate, with a good cheap Subte (US$0.30 per ride), a light rail system (same price), hundreds of buses, and more taxis than you can imagine. The real problem is, deciding where to start.
We were glad we'd allowed more than a month in the city because there's just so much to see. And we even planned to take a short trip across the broad Río de la Plata (the widest river mouth in the world) to visit Uruguay. Five weeks seems like a long time until you really start planning it out. Our first week, spent getting an overview of the city and finding the apartment, was time well invested. It gave us a sense of distances and relationships that would come in handy time and again during our stay.
Some things were givens: a tango show, the famous Recoleta cemetery, marching with the courageous grandmothers who defied the military dictatorship. And then there was John Raymundi's father…
ABEL AND VICTORIA
John Raymundi is a friend of ours who lives in Kino Bay, Sonora, a few kilometers down the coast from us. When he heard of our trip, he mentioned that his father was living in a town called Veronica, somewhere near Buenos Aires, and that maybe we'd like to meet him. We said sure, that sounded like a good thing to do when we got there. But that had been months before. John kept us on track by giving us his dad's email and we corresponded a bit along the way.
Then, as we got closer to BA, I started studying the maps in my Lonely Planet guide in more detail. There was no sign or mention of Veronica. After we arrived there were several other tourist maps we collected during our wanderings, but still no Veronica. Frankly, we were very busy with everything else there was to do and it kept getting put on the back burner. Then one day, I saw a large detailed folding map of the province for sale at a newsstand, and bought it. I scanned all the small towns near the city, and there was little Veronica, far out in the countryside east of the city. I stopped by the Retiro bus station in BA and asked around until I figured out how to get there. It would be a few hours bus ride, on two different buses, but it was doable.
We're always up for a little extra adventure, and this looked like a good way to see a bit of the surrounding area. Hotel accommodations in Veronica sounded very minimal, so we decided to just make a day of it. After three hours of travel through green farmlands that looked much like the Midwest US, we were met at the bus station by Abel Raymundi and two of his friends, Mabel and Armando, who whisked us off to see the 40-ft catamaran he's building in a garage. Abel is now 78 years old. After he finishes the catamaran, he plans to learn how to sail it (!) so he can get to Miami.
Abel Raymundi was also only the second person we had ever met who has driven from Nome, Alaska to Ushuaia, Argentina – the most southerly city in the world. And we met both of them in and around Buenos Aires. Something about the place just seems to attract those kinds of people(!).
As a fellow sailor, he wanted my opinion of the construction so far. But I'm a monohull sailor and I don't know jake about catamaran building, so my comments were along the lines of, "Yeah. Looks good. I guess." I was glad he was following an engineer's plan and getting regular consults along the way. He has some young guys helping him build it, and they all plan to sail it to nearby Uruguay for a shakedown cruise before headed into the open ocean. That seemed like a good idea to me. And at 78 years old, it actually seemed like a better plan for Abel than just sitting around in the old rocking chair.
They treated us to lunch at a nice little place a few blocks away, where we were joined by Abel's sister. Veronica is a very small town and everybody in the place knew each other. Afterward, we took a spin around the town and visited their modest homes. Overall, it seemed like a quiet place where someone on a very modest fixed income could retire and live a decent life. The day went quickly, and soon we were on the bus headed back to the city, arriving at nightfall to a massive traffic jam. Welcome back to Buenos Aires.
ON THE WATERFRONT
Puerto Madero is the extensive waterfront area and yacht marina for Buenos Aires, and it can take a day or two to see it all. The area is being redeveloped from its gritty beginnings as the city's port, where crews of laborers used to load ships by hand, and it has now become a hot new neighborhood, with towering high-rise condos lining the docks of the old port, with glistening yachts tied to the new marina docks. The old brick customs buildings are now fancy lofts, offices and restaurants, and the old port cranes are freshly-painted, well-lit sculptures standing tall against the sky. They're especially impressive at sundown when they add even more color to the evening.
A sidewalk cafe overlooking the yachts in the marina is where we met Lance and Cathy Barrs, the other folks who've driven (in stages, in a VW Westphalia van) from Nome to Ushuaia. They ran a day camp in Ontario, and used the off-season to wander. Now they're back in Argentina to check out some of the rest the country has to offer. They, and Abel Raymundi, seemed to validate the concept that living life to the fullest just has to be an effective cure-all. And disproves the notion that "the guy who dies with the most toys wins." More and more, high-quality experiences seem more important than endless toys.
As we looked out over the marina, one of the more impressive yachts in the basin was a nice Baltic 152 (!) named Pink Gin. This is a huge boat, and we could see its mast from a long way off, towering over the other masts, as well as many of the surrounding buildings. She was an impressive site as we relaxed over a sandwich and limonada for lunch. Basic 'sailor's curiosity' got the best of me, and I looked her up later on the internet. There's just no way a sloop this big could slip by without being noticed – if, by some odd chance, the owner even had that in mind.
Pink Gin was built in Finland by Baltic Yachts and named after a cocktail (gin with a swirl of angostura bitters - no ice) that was popular in 19th century England. She's built of high-tech carbon fiber composites, designed by one of the top yacht design firms in the world, and she was a hit at her debut in St. Tropez about 5 years ago. Now she's hanging out in Buenos Aires, where there are lots of sailing opportunities and a very active racing schedule on the broad Río de la Plata. She's owned by a very wealthy German who somehow did not seek us out for a day sail – probably just an oversight on his part. If you're really into sailing and megayachts, check out:
http://www.yachtingworld.com/supersail/features/343436/a-large-pink-gin
THE COSTANERA
Just a few more steps past the new high-rises by the port finds us on the old, funky, and wonderful La Costanera Sur, a 30-foot wide tiled walkway that borders a nature preserve/wetland area. So, yes, it's possible to leave your high-tech condo and walk to a semi-wild area within 15 minutes. This wetland area is home to any number of birds and animals, and there are long walking, and bike-riding trails to enjoy as the sun sets over the Río de la Plata.
Afterward, you can stop for a choripan, or 'chori' – a large tasty sausage on a bun, with all the trimmings. You can toss a few bread crumbs to the pigeons, and watch the green parrots who live in the wetlands swipe their food when the pigeons (for whatever reason) stop to look around. We went for a walk with my sister Elyse, and ordered a chori to share, cut into three pieces. The vendor only charged us for our sodas, and gave us the chori because we were from out of town. This is not an uncommon experience in much of Latin America. It may be one of the reasons we like traveling south so much.
Along the Costanera there are musicians, Tango dancers, jugglers and all manner of entertainers. And later, there are all those great restaurants and fine wines just a few blocks away. We stopped at one of the many good restaurants for a large plate of ñoquis (that's how they spell gnocchi, phonetically, in Argentina), and yet another bottle of fine and inexpensive Argentinian Malbec to end the day.
SPORTS ARE IMPORTANT!
During our wanderings, we passed several gas stations where the top grade of Premium is named Fangio. Juan Manuel Fangio was the famous Argentine Formula One race driver who dominated the sport in the 1950s, winning five World Championships while driving for Alfa Romeo, Maserati, Mercedes, and Ferrari. In Argentina, where sports heroes tend to become larger than life, he's still a legend.
There are several cool videos on the internet of Fangio winning various international races. It's fun to watch those guys racing back in the day when they drove cars that some of us could actually recognize, or maybe own. But watching them race gave me an uncomfortable feeling as this was before the era of roll bars, adequate helmets, and all that other very important safety equipment that started being required after numerous horrible accidents. From today's perspective, those guys racing at high speed with so little protection was a sobering sight.
NIGHTLIFE, AND A LITTLE JAZZ
If you're young like us (well, hey), there's a swinging nightlife in BA – depending on how late you're willing to stay up. In Buenos Aires, live music requires a commitment. One night we went to Konex, a funky open-air venue, to see BA native Kevin Johansen and his band. They played in collaboration with the artist, Liniers, who painted a huge mural on canvas while the band played into the night. Johansen, who spent many years in the Bay Area and is now quite famous back in Argentina, sings his own jazz-rock compositions in English and Spanish.
Liniers took a break from the painting, and picked up a guitar to belt out a few tunes himself – he's a pretty good rocker in his own right. After the show, there were plans to sell the 30-foot-long, or so, mural to benefit a local charity.
One night toward the end of our trip, we got ourselves to the Thelonius Club for some good jazz. First we missed the sign, walked right past it, and found ourselves a block away. We returned and looked around more carefully. Then we noticed the sign was unlit because it was only 8:30 and they didn't open until 9:00pm. We stood out on the sidewalk and chatted with a nice couple from Burlington, Vermont. We asked if they knew Carolyn and Tony Spiridakis, our only friends from Vermont (it's a small state), but they didn't.
I asked him what business he was in back home and learned he was Jeff Phillips, one of the founders of Seventh Generation, a producer of natural household and personal care products, and other fine goods. They were one of the innovative leaders in the field. We used to buy from their mail order catalog in the early days before their products were in local stores. Now, he's heavily involved with the local jazz scene in Burlington, so the Thelonius Club in BA was on his radar screen. Again, you travel to interesting places, you meet interesting people.
DAYTRIP TO TIGRE
During sister Elyse's visit we took a day-trip (at 30 cents each on the light-rail system) to nearby Tigre, where the rails end and the broad Delta of the Río Paraná empties into the Río de la Plata. We walked from the very nice new train station a short distance to the boat canal and got a ride on a beautiful old woody tourist boat that carried us through the watery warrens of the Delta, dropping us off at a spot where we could do some exploring along the narrow back canals on foot. After wandering canal-side lanes for awhile, it was time to head back, have a cool one by the main channel, and wait for the bus, I mean boat, to pick us up. Afterward, we wandered the quiet, verdant streets of Tigre – a welcome contrast to the busy urban streets of Buenos Aires – before heading back to the train station for the ride home. And then, we enjoyed a short walk to another fine dinner with another good bottle of Mendoza Malbec.
IT'S THE FOOD!
One of the highlights of Elyse's visit to BA (and ours!) had to be dinner at Astrid y Gastón, a top-level way to experience the best Peruvian cuisine available anywhere. Yes, fine Peruvian food in Buenos Aires! Actually Gastón Acurio began tweaking the distinctive foods of his native Perú in the upscale Miraflores section of Lima. That's where we first set aside an evening – and a chunk of change – to experience it for ourselves. It was memorable and worth the money. And, since the US buck still has a good exchange rate in South America, we were in the right place to be able to afford it.
Now there are Astrid y Gastón restaurants in most of the capitals of South America, and a few other places around the world. We didn't get to the one in Santiago, Chile, but wanted to share the experience with Elyse in Buenos Aires. Dinner began with a platter of fine bocaditas (delights) to whet the appetite, along with (of course) a fine bottle of red wine. Dinner proceeded to a variety of 'mains,' which we shared bites of, and then moved on to some spectacular desserts. One of the true joys of traveling in South America these days is that it allows people like us to play way above our pay grade. It makes a long, luxurious evening at Astrid y Gastón possible.
URUGUAY
Uruguay is an easy side-trip from Buenos Aires. There are fast ferries that make the trip each day in about an hour to the charming little town of Colonia, and others that go direct to Montevideo in about three hours. We hopped the ferry to Colonia and spent a couple of days wandering its quiet, historic streets. We were much taken with its simplicity and beauty, and lingered into the evening at the small local marina as the sun set over the Río de la Plata.
Then we caught the bus onward to Montevideo. This is a large city, though smaller than Buenos Aires, rich in history, with streets of historic buildings. We spent a couple of nights in the central district and wandered the streets to capture its flavor. On our departure, the taxi driver gave us more of that 'Uruguasho' flavor as he flipped off other drivers, barked epithets in Lunfardo (the 'porteño' language), and tried his best to run over several pedestrians. Other than him, most Uruguayans treated us very well, indeed.
POLITICS, ARGENTINE STYLE
And then there's politics, one of the favorite sports of all Argentinos. While we were there, the British drilled some exploratory wells north of the Falkland Islands in search of oil. This brought up all kinds of grand-standing and posturing by every politician in the country, and re-opened the old wounds of the ridiculous Falklands/Malvinas War of 1982. You may recall, that was where the corrupt and inept military dictatorship started a war to distract the Argentine people from the disaster they'd made of the economy. It was the first time Argentina had shown any real interest in the wind-swept, sheep-infested islands populated by a hardy batch of English-speaking people. They sent a bunch of poorly-trained kids over to occupy the place, and then lost the brief war after the British Army returned.
But that hasn't stopped the rhetoric. Now there's a shabby permanent encampment of Veteranos de la Guerra de las Malvinas on the Plaza de Mayo. They're calling for veterans benefits and recognition of their sacrifices for the nation. La Presidenta, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, has joined in the chorus and questions what right the Brits have to a speck land that's thousands of miles from the British Isles, and only a couple of hundred miles from Argentina. There is much graffiti reading, "The Malvinas are, and always will be, Argentine." The fact that nobody in the Falklands wants to live under Argentine rule seems to be overlooked in all the screaming.
READING THE NEWSPAPER…
Sometimes things can get a little strange in Argentina(!). And the newspapers are right there to report it.
Two Argentine actors, Antonio Grimau and Leonor Manso, reported the disappearance of their adult son, Lucas Rebolini Manso. He'd been missing since some time in February (2010), and was last reported seen on February 22 by the doorman where he lived. His body was finally discovered in the Buenos Aires city morgue. Turns out he'd been in police custody since February 6 (?!) after being arrested for running naked through the streets, and had died on February 10. The police said, unofficially, that he died of an overdose, and remained in the morgue, unidentified, for more than a month.
After he was reported missing, the police reviewed every corpse received after the date he was last sighted, and did not look at previous deaths. The search was further complicated by state birth records having been digitized after 1996 and there was no money to manually search records before that time. The police and medical staff said they failed to recognize the body because the ID photo they were given was of a younger man and the body lying in the morgue was far more haggard.
Nevertheless, the body was IDed within 24 hours of the publication of his photo on FaceBook. There was considerable speculation about the revelation that the parents were famous actors being an important factor that added renewed diligence to the search. The parents, openly suspicious of the initial autopsy, have asked for a second examination of the body to determine if police brutality was involved in the death. Few people here seem to trust the police.
Cristina Casares, a friend who led the Facebook search effort, remembered that Lucas was "a musician, an artist, with a fragile soul, a sensitive soul, that maybe just couldn't resist the weight of the world that was so foreign to his idealism."
AND MORE POLITICS
In his classic work, The Republic (380 bc), Plato asked the important question, "and who will guard the guardians?" It's a question that has haunted every form of government ever devised. And it's a question that has long haunted Argentina.
Indeed, how do we ensure that those who are charged with protecting the people, and are given the power and arms to do so, will not turn on those they protect and become a state unto themselves, accountable only to themselves? In March of 1976, there was a military coup in Argentina after years of political unrest. People were ready for some order and stability in their lives and many backed the coup. But very quickly, the military leaders resorted to a brutal and criminal campaign of abductions, torture, murder, and corruption.
In the Platonic view, human societies are predestined to move from Oligarchy (rule by the merchant elite) to Democracy (rule by the rabble) to Tyranny (the establishment of order). This sordid cycle then, presumably, repeats itself. Plato felt that humanity's greatest hope was to establish an order of wise 'philosopher-kings' to rule in a benign manner. Such a thing has never happened, and it certainly didn't happen in Argentina.
By 1977, a group of 14 mothers had had enough of these crimes, and marched into the Plaza de Mayo directly in front of the imposing Casa Rosada, Argentina's version of the White House. These brave women were the first to confront the criminal regime, and would ultimately aid in its downfall.
More than thirty years later, they have grown in numbers, and they still march every Thursday afternoon in the Plaza in front of the Presidential Palace, still demanding justice for their murdered children. Their distinctive white head scarves have become an icon throughout Argentina, and the world. They march in the Plaza de Mayo every Thursday at 3 pm. We were honored to be with them on two different occasions.
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(A note from the other member of the traveling team: Many of you know that I long have been involved with the international peace and justice movement. It was, then, a particularly moving experience for me to be with the remarkable Madres de Plaza de Mayo as they marched. They've been doing this for 33 years! Every week! It just so happened that the first Thursday we joined them was the seventh anniversary of the Women in Black group I was part of forming in Albuquerque that many years ago. So, I looked at my watch and got goose bumps! Three o'clock in Buenos Aires is noon in Albuquerque. We were with the Madres at the same time my friends were standing, yet another Thursday, from noon to one, in front of the Federal Courthouse in Albuquerque. Standing in silent vigil, calling for peace, justice, compassion, and an end to violence.
There are actually two factions of the Madres -- one which continues primarily to march, mourn, and honor their lost children. The other has chosen to seek justice not only for themselves and their disappeared loved ones, but for all of society. They have formed a non-profit organization that provides education, housing, and employment opportunities for those in need. They are political and social activists. They made the decision to harness their grief and energy to change society in a way that will ensure such atrocities aren't repeated in the future.
Argentina has hit me hard in the gut. It is such a remarkable, compelling place; and it is painfully complex. I was so intrigued by the crazy political scene, and unable to make sense of it by reading the papers and watching TV, that I set a task for my month in BA -- get a handle on the various political parties and what they stand for. Well, a month later -- forget it! I was told by Argentines that it is an impossible task. But I did get a bit of an picture of how it got to be as it is by reading a remarkable novel by Tomás Eloy Martinez -- La Novela de Perón [in English, The Novel of Perón], a perhaps truer than life account of the return of former president, General Juan Dominguez Perón (known, to his jealous dismay, as the husband of Evita), to Argentina after 18 years of political exile in Spain. His return marked the beginning of events that led to the horrific Dirty War, and the varying brands of Peronismo that continue to dominate, challenge, and haunt Argentina's political reality.
Argentina. Buenos Aires. I am enchanted by them, troubled by them, and they are now embedded in my consciousness. — Carolyn)
Argentina
Voluptuous, dramatic, seductive…
her greens more green than green
her damp kisses wafting
off grandest rivers
and broadest plains
Her sky so brilliant blue yet darked
by anxious clouds
the way cruel history
clouds the vision of her self
that she so longs to hold
Vast land and matchless wealth
art, intellect
and agonizing passion…
a tango dance of light and shadow
This tragic beauty
with blood on her hands.
C. Kinsman
03/24/10
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And so we bid farewell to Buenos Aires, knowing there remains so much still to see and experience. We'll just have to come back!
There is a Photo Album named "Ciao, Buenos Aires" with many more photos from Buenos Aires, Veronica, Tigre, and Uruguay. Hope you enjoy them.