4 days left. Time is just flying back. More fun, more adventures (I must write about Bar “El Chino” in Pompeya, adventures in Boedo, and more, but that will have to wait), but I just feel LA pulling me back to “reality.” Bittersweet, to say the least. I will relish the [...]
The other day I went to La Boca, a very interesting part of Buenos Aires (ok, it’s all interesting, granted). I’ll write more, but for now, I thought you might enjoy this:
Some more mate pics. BTW, everyone was more than happy to have their mate moments captured by the camera.
This isn’t a mate pic but it was from the same day in Recoleta (a neighborhood in Buenos Aires). A bunch of people playing this really goofy game where they are all still and then everyone [...]
What is mate? (pronounced Mah-tay) It’s kind of like green tea, but it’s much more. Very much an Argentinian cultural institution. It is everywhere. Everyone drinks it, all the time, everywhere. But it isn’t just Argentinia’s Coca-Cola (everyone drinks that too) but a social custom. Mate is shared among friends from a single mate mug, [...]
I can’t help but feel a bit sad already.
Not that I didn’t have a great time at my first tango lesson (see below, it’s down there somewhere) but it was a bit difficult and I felt somewhat out of place due to my age and inability to understand 99% of what was being said. At a party I went to a couple [...]
As many of you know, years ago I was a NYC taxi driver. The yellow cabbie has an almost-legendary place in American urban lore and is, in fact, known beyond the borders of the U.S. And yet compared to BA, driving a yellow cab is like floating in a heated swimming pool: slow, [...]
Like many European countries, people here greet each other with a kiss on the cheek. Just one kiss here, unlike two in Italy or two or even four in France, but still, there is a kiss, some contact beyond a cold and distant handshake. Of course it is fun, but beyond that, it [...]
After a small quasi-meltdown (see below) I went all out and contacted as many spanish teachers as I could find. I already have met some very nice bilingual folks will to help me with Spanish but they’ve already become more like friends and so I don’t want to burden them nor change the nature [...]
If this theme hasn’t already been expressed, then here it is (again?): A great thing about being a stranger, a tourist, out of your element, is that you are willing to take chances (perhaps), with fewer (if any) routines, instinctual reactions, and that as such opportunities that might not otherwise present themselves occur, and [...]