20 reasons to leave everything and go to Buenos Aires
1) THE ARCHITECTURE
There are a thousand constructive varieties in this great city. The French-style buildings of the Microcentro contrast with the painted sheet metal houses of La Boca or the skyscrapers of Puerto Madero , where the iconic red brick port warehouses remain converted. There are large avenues with an air of Madrid's Gran Vía and corners with a Barcelona touch. Some streets in Palermo Chico look like something out of the poshest London Chelsea and all over the city there are those chalet-style single-family homes that point to the multiple origins of the salad that is the city's population. You can find a transcript of a cottage that would not be out of place in the English countryside in the middle of Belgrano or an alpine chalet in the middle of Avenida Forest. All different, perhaps without much climatic logic but strangely harmonic . It is a city to spend hours observing facades.
2) TAKE A ROAST
everything that is said is not enough . The worldwide fame of Argentine meat is well deserved and enjoying a barbecue is an experience that no one should miss (vegetarians apart). It is not only the quality of the product, it is the cut, which is different, the way of preparing it and the hand of the grill, which achieves that, based on slow preparation, the pieces closest to the bone acquire a texture like butter. Gizzards, bondiola, matambre… nowhere else in the world are you so delicious.
Argentine meat: all that is said is little
3) THE ICE CREAM
Even sincere Italians will recognize you: ice cream in Buenos Aires is, without fear of generalizations, the best in the world . The Persicco or Freddo chains will tempt you with winks from each of their establishments, but it's worth wandering around the neighborhood ice cream parlors looking for that perfect point of creaminess reminiscent of freshly whipped cream. Keep in mind that here granita does not mean crushed ice but chocolate specks and, above all, do not forget to try the sambayón flavor . As far as we know, there is still no Fernet flavored ice cream with Cocacola, but everything will work.
4)GRAFFITI AND URBAN ART
More politicized or more arty, Buenos Aires is a paradise for street graffiti hunters . Books are sold that compile the most emblematic and circuits are organized to go through them, but it is best to go with your eyes wide open to appreciate this lively and mutable way of measuring the pulse of the city.
Urban art
5) TALK ABOUT POLITICS
The key word is "peronismo". Probably your narrow mind accustomed to the reductionist parameters of "rights" and "lefts" will never understand the multiple mysteries and ramifications of Peronism , but surely you will end up arguing for hours with those who are pro and anti Perón, pro and anti Kirchner and pro and anti Macri. An important social conscience that leads everyone to have a well-founded and very extreme opinion about Menem's neoliberal policy, the Kirchner's foreign policy or the current government's social plans, which they will be willing to debate intensely for hours. A topic to get everyone to agree? Hey, the Pope is Argentine!
6) TALK ABOUT ECONOMY
The key word is “inflation” . Get ready to handle macroeconomic concepts whose meaning you are not very sure of. Everyone is aware of the official weight and also of the blue, whose price you will not be able to explain; everyone with an opinion on the export measures for meat and soybeans; everyone moving with the fatalistic certainty that every ten years there is a crash and the country's economy goes to waste... don't try to understand it because you won't get it. Argentina is a difficult country to explain for Argentines themselves and very complicated to understand for foreigners.
Typical posters in Plaza Dorrego
7) GO HIKING
At the exit of that world that is known as "the great Buenos Aires" there are infinite possibilities waiting. It is worth going to spend the day in a ranch surrounded by green plains and have a snack of Argentine rural life, or get on a boat to explore the canals of the Tigre estuary, dotted with beautiful stilt houses and idle porteños practicing water sports. And we must not forget that one step by boat crossing the Silver river (Optimum time not to be afraid and sing this) is Uruguay, where the cobbled streets of Colonia de Sacramento with its peace and slow pace will make you think you've moved to another era.
8) THE EMPANADAS
There are infinite regional varieties, as with so many other traditional dishes of Argentine cuisine (you have to try, even if we are in the capital, the northern cuisine). The type of empanada does not matter to us; fried in fat or baked, with ham and cheese or meat, stuffed with humita … they are simplicity made perfect.
9) THE RITUAL OF MATE
This bitter drink is one of those acquired tastes in which it can be difficult to start but once you try it, you understand the addiction that it generates. Pass it from hand to hand, fill it with a thermos of hot water and learn its ritual has some collective communion that invites to talk and twinning. Remember that whoever has it must finish the water and never have to remove the grass, no matter how much it tempts to turn the light bulb.
The empanadas: mandatory stop
10) THE PARKS
Baires is devilish traffic, long distances, the street with the most lanes in the world and also surprisingly a very green city . It is dotted with parks and gardens everywhere where the young chatter or the old soak up the cool, and almost every street enjoys the shade of the trees on the sidewalks. Thus, by miracles of urban planning, it manages to be a great city that does not smell of pollution but of vegetation, and even occasionally of barbecue.
11) THE THEATER
The Buenos Aires stages enjoy enviable good health, exude creativity and an amateur public that regularly attends the stalls. There is something for everyone: comedy shows, great dramatic productions of classics, underground improvisations and an off (and an off off): currents that neither envy nor consider the existence of Broadway.
12) BOOKSTORES
Strolling through the central streets of a city and finding bookstores instead of international fashion store franchises is becoming an increasingly precious treasure. The old Ateneo theater converted into a cafeteria bookstore is an emblematic example of this good habit, but there are many others and numerous old bookstores in which to get lost for hours.
The old Athenaeum theater
13) THE LANGUAGE
Yes, officially it is the same but no: it is not the same at all. Without reaching the tango extremes of “los morlacos del otario/los tirás a la marchanta” we all know that the idiomatic differences between the Spanish of Spain and the Spanish of Argentina are an ocean of distance. Checking the changes in one's own body enriches and gives color to the Buenos Aires experience. From the basic and perfectly understandable “pretty” to the different use of “obvious”, going through the great mental effort that will have to be made not to say “go take the subway” but “go take the subway” , in Buenos Aires you will quickly learn the rude meaning of “garchar” or the differences between chetos and fatty ones, you will screw up, you will not understand anything, you will learn new terms and you will want to keep them forever.
14) TANGO
The myth obliges, but with criteria: you have to flee from the shows organized exclusively for tourists and go to places with their point of authenticity where non-professionals and amateurs dance tango from Buenos Aires with coolness who do not necessarily wear a suit or fishnet stockings. Try on Tuesdays at ** La Catedral , an old warehouse converted into a social center / venue ** for shows / a place with a rollaco that will blow your mind. Less spectacular as a venue but more for dance enthusiasts who have been condemned by a pope on their resume, is Club Villa Malcom. And to put memory to the test and sing those satanic and angelic lyrics at the same time, Roberto's bowling alley on Bulnes street.
Tango in the Cathedral
15) SWEET MILK
One of the Argentine contributions to world heritage is this addictive substance not suitable for diabetics. There is no need to look for it: it is everywhere, industrial or homemade, tempting us with its texture and cloying.
16) BILLS AND SWEETS IN GENERAL
In case it had not been clear, the population of Buenos Aires responds to that cliché of "melting pot of cultures", and the greedy world is nothing more than another translation of this miscegenation . Spanish churros, European-inspired invoices (pastries), Guarani-influenced chipá, Italian tiramisu, cakes of various origins... Whether it's breakfast, dessert or a snack, you always have to leave a place for them.
infinity Buenos Aires
17) CROSSES A DOG WALKER
One of the most typical pictures of Buenos Aires is to see the walkers walking the streets with a well-ordered and obedient herd of up to fifteen dogs around them. Without yet being a hundred percent dog-friendly city, the offer of restaurants or hotels that allow pets has multiplied in recent years. Here almost everyone has a dog, and they are great dogs.
18) SHOPPING
Gain or lose weight, the temptation to shop cheaply in the city's neighborhoods is too strong to resist. It is obligatory to go antique shopping in San Telmo (mainly Sunday market), explore the designer shops of Palermo , buy some alfajores in any corner or an inimitable kitsch souvenir in the Microcentro. Beware of the very traditional and vindicatable jugs to serve the wine in the shape of a penguin.
The facade of the Tortoni cafe
19) THE HISTORICAL CAFE
El Tortoni is the most emblematic, with its atmosphere that evokes gatherings, intellectuals and Spanish exile during the Franco years (it even sells its own souvenirs and exhibits some wax statues of the Buenos Aires icons Gardel, Borges and Alfonsina Storni), but there are many more loaded with scrolls, plywood, marble and diligent waiters . The 36 billiards, the Violets, the Black Cat... all perfect for a Buenos Aires breakfast of coffee with milk, medialuna and a lot of tradition.
20) THE RELATIONSHIP WITH THE MYTHS
More than delivered, it is ambivalent. For every fan who makes a pilgrimage to Evita's tomb in the Recoleta cemetery (where she rests surrounded by the enemies she fought throughout her life with the resentment of a bastard daughter), you will find a fervent anti-Peronist who will shit politely (or not). ) in the deceased and in her husband. And for every admirer of Maradona who refers to him as a God on earth, there will be a skeptic who defines him as a jerk, a drug addict and a scoundrel who does not recognize his children. This is the country, extreme and enemy of half measures; capable of making two historical-popular characters symbols of national identity with which to identify or hate, a bit like what happens to the population with Argentina itself. An intense, visceral and irresistible relationship.
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