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Published: August 13th 2007
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Los Portenos
us non locals at "the locals" pub The locals, or “los Porteños”, of Buenos Aires energetically bridge the gap between their 2 passions: tango and football. In Australia you would think that this gap would be as impossible as getting the Canterbury Football team supporters to the opera for the night but here in Buenos Aires it is a way of life.
As soon as we arrived we were introduced to “teng-goh” as people took a free open-air lesson in the basic tango steps under the landmark obelisca. We were amazed; people do tango in the streets of Buenos Aires! The old, the young, families, couples and tourists were all tangoing to the scratchy sounds of Carlos Gardel echoing into the early evening. There were also free open-air concerts and tango demonstrations throughout the city as the annual tango festival was coming to a close. The warm evenings were bustling with sounds and feel of tango as clubs, cafes and dance halls filled with people waiting to absorb their fix of tango. But as we found out this didn’t stop after the festival; los porteños did this every week of the year. Old fashioned tango clubs still linger throughout the city and you can take lessons to
People Do Tango in the Street!
A free outdoor tango lesson during the Tango Festival. learn the basics (like we did) for next to nothing. Tim and I sashayed around a dance hall, last decorated in the 1930’s, while big metal fans poured cool air onto us and a cold beer waited for us at our table. I can definitely get the appeal of this dance.
Here in Argentina I’m sure that siesta was introduced just so los porteños could stay up late and dance. All this late night activity also means that people don’t eat until very late, an early dinner is 9.30pm with most Argentineans having dinner around 10.30-11pm, yes even families. You often see well behaved young children out with their parents in the late to early hours of the evening. Argentineans also eat huge quantities of steak, very, very good steak, with a slathering of chimichuri (a chilli salsa oil). Here, if you say you are vegetarian, you are typically given a quizzical look and a smaller portion of meat. Apparently if you are vegetarian you have to specify no red meat, no chicken, no pork, and no ham (“but ham is not meat?”).
When not eating steak and tangoing, los porteños are discussing, watching or cursing about football.
Buenos Aires has 2 local teams: River Plate, and Boca Juniors. There are huge differences between these teams:
River Plate is red and white and their home stadium is next to the polo club and race course (keeping with the rugby league analogy, think Roosters);
Boca Juniors are blue and yellow, and have been banned from their home ground recently because 2 of their supporters shot each other after a game, their supporters busses are given a police escort (to stop them hurting other supporters), and Maradona started his football career with them (think Canterbury).
The only local game on that we could get to while we were there was River Plate vs Charcas (Venezuela). Although no where near the intensity of a home derby, the crowd did not stop singing, chanting, or drumming for the entire game, except to swear and whistle at the referee. Unfortunately for los porteños, Charcas won 2-0. Apparently Boca Juniors won that weekend (many a “Goooooooooooooooooooal!” was heard from the commentator). We may not have seen their game but we did see their most famous player, Maradona, strolling the streets of Boca and greeting the locals with a TV camera behind him. Apparently
Buenos Aires in Bloom.
The "little Big Ben" in the background since his “problems” a few years ago, he was given a new lease of life as an entertainment show host. Unfortunately it seems as though he’s been back on the drink again and was admitted to hospital again in late March (a national day of mourning for Argentina).
In order to get around South America we thought that learning some Latin American Spanish might be useful so during our time in Buenos Aires we did some language lessons and were billeted with a local to help us along. Our host, Silvia, was everything that is Buenos Aires. She answers her buzzer with a sultry, slightly nasal “oh-laaaaaaah?”, owns a dog named “Car-laaaaaaah” (every second person in Buenos Aires owns a dog, but they never seem to have the time to walk them themselves), is a phycologist and tangos 3 times a week; “today I teng-go,aaaah tomorrow I work”. She lives in a 4 bedroom apartment in trendy Palermo, works 2 afternoons a week from her home and takes in students to help pay the bills. The rest of her time she spends socialising and tangoing. In the mornings before our lessons she would make us breakfast and then sit
with us to give us tips on what to see and where to go. These tips helped us see the real, un-touristy Buenos Aires.
We also met some great new travel buddies: on the first day that we arrived, a bunch of Aussies from the hostel went out in the town with Pablo and Susana. Steve (from Newport, Australia) and Dunja (from Fussen, Germany) we met at our language school and spent most of our free time exploring the city with them. Before long we were doing as the locals do, tangoing, going to the football, staying up to eat and drink into the late steamy evenings… even hanging out at our own local bar called “Los Porteños”, where the waitresses came to know us and give us complimentary drinks. Steve, Dunja, Leanne & Tim; locals at “the locals”. We may even start to follow River Plate - they are red and white afterall.
L
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Haggis
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A Leetele Beet of Tango Eestorrie
The conjunction of soccer and the tango in your latest blog update reminds me of my young days when I was playing centre forward for Cambuslang Rangers JSC, usually against gangs of young trainee thugs dragged up from the lowest depths of Glasgow society. The tango was not very well known in Scotland in those days (even now), probably because of its poor correlation with bagpipe music. However, due to my skills and advanced soccer dribbling technique on the field of play, I was known as "tango feet", which was a massive compliment to anyone familiar with the intricate steps of the famous dance. I was, naturally, very proud of my soccer nickname. It was not until some years later that I discovered that my nickname was really "tangled feet", which, to be honest in retrospect, was a more accurate reflection of my soccer skills. As for super-chilled larger beer, youse will have to try tumblegum Pub, where we were on Easter Sunday. It is the coldest Tooheys I have ever tasted without going beyond the "too cold" limit. It has become a place of pilgrimage in my Lexicon of Outstanding Beers of the world. I have added Quillmes to the yet-to-be-tried section. Buena suerte. Bebida muchos cerveza e fruir muchos bisteca gigante. Hasta la vista.