Buenos Aires - Part Uno

Please excuse any awkward formatting, the blogger app doesn't like us or the iPad...

Buenos Aires (BA), or literally translated as 'good airs', is a city whose reputation precedes it. It's cultural commodities include tango, football, steak, wine and Lionel Messi. It's also a city I've been curious to discover for much of my adult life. 

Palace of the Argentine National Congress

Thus, we boarded another Emirates flight from Rio and bid the unfortunately crappy weather adios. I was eagerly anticipating the flight for two distinct reasons. Firstly, I wanted to see whether my pants would be victim to another dose of red wine. Secondly, I had it under good authority that upon landing in BA Argentinians erupt into mass applause. 

Fortunately, my pants enjoyed the journey sans a lap full of vino and amusingly I can confirm that upon landing Argentianians do applaud vociferously. But there was another amusing aspect to the flight: the surprising popularity of the duty free trolley. I'm sure you can all recall memories of the tired and rickety duty free trolley clunking its solitary way down the aisle as you privately think to yourself, "who actually buys any of that stuff?". For Argentinians the thought is quite the opposite, more like "why wouldn't you buy anything?" Fortunately for us the cart conducted most of its commerce nearby and we sat, both perplexed and amused, enjoying the show as what felt like the majority of the flight heckled and hassled their way over to the cart for expensive perfumes and hard liquor. 

The passengers in our plane on landing*

But the air travel amusement didn't quite end there. We'd been forewarned of the sometimes dubious taxi drivers in BA. Arriving at night we were subsequently and understandably alert and especially eager to seek out an official, airport-sanctioned taxi service. Fortunately for us but unfortunately for our budget this meant stupidly committing to a chauffeur driven car with all the hallmarks of a VIP limousine sans the white gloves and security detail. Suffice to safe it was a comfortable and safe journey to our apartment. 

The chauffeur driven car we stupidly committed to*

Arriving in the lovely suburb of Palermo, we were glad to have a hot shower and somewhere to sit other than on the bed, two things unfortunately lacking from our Rio stay. I'm a big fan of arriving at destinations at night as the morning offers a wonderful surprise as your senses adjust and imbibe the new and foreign surrounds. We slept in and as good Melbournians do, headed off for brunch. Or so we thought. Argentines do everything hours later than us Australians. So a 1030 brunch actually means an empty cafe with staff still wiping the sleep from their eyes. The contrast of two well rested tourists and bleary eyed local staff didn't matter to us as we enjoyed one of the best brunches of recent memory. Including house-made yoghurt. Why hasn't this caught on in Melbourne yet? 

Fantastic brunch! Why hasn't house-made yoghurt caught on in Melbourne yet?

Such an excellent meal proved to be merely an introduction to the excellent quality and standard of food that was to come. Despite Argentineans being notoriously carnivorous, vegetarian options were aplenty. After one delicious meal after another our commonly used and particularly articulate phrase became, "vegetarianism must be a thing here."  

One thing we've really committed to during this trip has been checking out the local art scene. BA has a plethora of excellent and impressive art museums but enough from me, what's the saying about pictures and 1000 words?

Notice how the canvas extends beyond the wall 

An interactive exhibit which required us to make our way through various rooms and claustrophobic spaces 

We did an excellent walking tour with a guide who was an impassioned design student with an amusing penchant for the world 'allegory'. This meant some fantastic insight into the stories that various forms of architecture can tell the keen observer. Not only chronological iterations of architectural styles and trends but particularly economic ones too. For example, the more ornate buildings were mostly constructed during times of economic prosperity while the converse is true of the duller and more mundane structures which were constructed during economic downturns. 

An example of the different architectural styles. Notice the higher and more ornate buildings across the street from the more utlititarian and mundane buildings? What would the economic implications of this difference be?

*Not the actual passengers 

*Not the actual car 

To be continued!