Buenos Fucking Aires

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Hola todos!
Well alot has happened in the last few days. We had two days in Rio Gallegos, a shitty flat oil town with nopthing to offer and no hostels with kitchens. We literally stayed in and watched movie after movie on cable TV and ate junk food in bed. Then on Monday 21st we finally made like a shepherd and got the flock out of there, arriving in Buenos Aires (a joke here apparently is that its the ugliest city in Europe!) around 3.30pm into Tango Backpackers. We could only really afford to stay four nights, but on the first we found an Irishj pub with Guiness on draft although it was 4 quid for not quite a pint! Then we got lost twice at midnight and ending up eating in a loverly street cafe at 1am under a full moon.

The next morning we watched the dog walkers go by (some with as many as ten) from outr Palermo hostel roof terrace, their crew fouling up the pavvement. That is the one bad thiing about BA, dog crap everywhere. Then we walked around the Avenida de 25 Mayo and the 9 de Julio, a street that has 20 lanes of traffic and is 150m wide!! We had a little lunch and did a bit more rambling getting back to the hostel for 5pm, where we ate 5 empanadas each (mini cornish pasties). Then because of tyraffic it took us nearly 2 hours to pick everyone up and head to the Boca Juniors game. Even the Venezualan away team was late sitting next to us in traffic, so that it was about 9.30pm before the gaME KICKED OFF at the Bombanera (resembles a chocolate box from the air)!. Trying to get to the toilet was the biggest mission as they was no fire escape stairs, so you had to weave through tthe dense standing crowd up abpout 5 flights of stairs. and men walked around selling coke and ice creams so the jammed crowd didnot have toi move. They won 3-0 and the crowd and songs was fantastic, at the end they celebrated narrowly scraping through to the next round of the Copa Libertadores. I have a video I will endeavour to put on the blog when I get home, but you´ll just have to believe me, we choked on the fumes from all the fireworks! Then Maradona had his tiny midget shirt off and was swinging it around his head from his box on the half way line and they started singing a song for theit most famous son! A great experience, although it cost us a cool $40 more than the locals to get in!

On Wed 23rd - we went on a city tour and found out all about Eva Peron and saw the main sites - La Casa Rosada, where the president works and where Evita did her famous speech in the film. The docks, Puerto Madero, designed like Docklands in London, then Recoleta, San Telmo the first inhabited plac ein Argentina before yellow fever struck it and sent the wealthy north and the immigrants there and to La Boca, where a part of the street La Caminita is a splash of colour in an artistic neighbourhood, all the buildings painted from leftover ship paint from La Boca port. In the evening we hightailed it to the bus station and booked ourselves a plush overnight 16 hour bus to Iguazu falls. It cost $60 but has a bed and champers and stuff so we are looking forward to that in two hours (Friday 25th) time! Then we legged it back up the mad avenue 9 de Julio and found our way back to Tortoni Cafe where we booked into an 8.30pm Tango and MArimbo show, which was amazing, the latter being like a two stones on the end of strings that are lassoed around and around at pace and hit the floor to the rhythm of the band, while some other guy plays the drum and tap dances. Seriously quick and cool, like an old Gaucho cowboy with a new yoyo!

On Thursday we had the whole day at an estancia a couple of hours north of BA. This was a cattle ranch where we saw how the gauch dressed and lived his life herding the cattle. It was very touristy to say the least but they had an awesome meat feast lunch and a good show, Roberto banging out folk tunes from all over the country before getting tourists from the represented countries and singing songs with them. Thankfully Laura and I did not get called up for Let it Be, but L was asked to dance by Don Juan de Riverdance and it was quite funny watching while stuiffing my ever growing belly with steak! Got home and drunk a 40p bottle of wine that was actually good!

Today - Went to the Falklands museum but no English information so I had to struggle to understand Sertrido, who was a seargenat major with the Argentine army during the conflict. I felt embarrassed to be British and would like to read more about the two month war in 1982. Then we went to see Eva Peron amongst others graves in Recoleta cemetary and tried to find Dave from our tour who said he had just arrived in this great Eurpoean city. It really is a true blend of French architecture, Spanish lifestyle, but it is still undeniably South American and the varied faces are unbleievable. You think you have spotted a Swedish beauty and then bang, fluent Spanish chatting to her darkest of mates! Had a small picnic in the park too and walked around for a couple of hours, jumping into the Museum of Fine Art for half an hour. Then we headed back to palermo to pack and get our asses to the bus station in rush hour. My next blog should be from Sao Paolo, Brasil, where we head in two or three days time. Cheers and hasta lluego

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