Part 24 Tango!, Buenos Aires, Argentina mid Dec 17

Buenos Aires

Link to video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1UnRUCyFaU

We arrived in Buenos Aires on December 19^th 2017. It’s a big city and our apartment was in the Boedo District, near the city centre. Traffic on the way into the city was polite and reasonable. Motos and cars commonly lane split/filter through traffic, especially on the right but apart from that the driving style was quite Ottawa-like. We met our hosts at the arranged time. Gustavo and Lili were very welcoming, helping us unload the motos on the sidewalk and carry things up two long flights of stairs. Gustavo then took us down the block and let us in to the private garage where we could store the motos during our stay.

Comfy quarters in Buenos Aires

The apartment is perfect. It has 1,000 square feet with a loft bedroom and an extra one on the main level. The internet is fast. Heat and air-conditioning make it possible to keep the windows closed and the street noise out. We became accustomed to the constant roar by the end of our stay but it was surprising at first.

We figured out how to use the bus and the metro the next day, making one of what would be many trips to Plaza 25 de Mayo. Some internet research helped plan the required servicing for the motos. Dakar motors was unable to help us, they were overwhelmed with business that week. Trepat BMW Motorrad was able to take us on short notice but the price was 1.5 times the price in Ottawa for the same work! Argentina is an expensive place. I walked over to the Touratech store across the street and found similarly high prices. They had stacks of rare Heidenau K60 tires and were charging $650US for a pair.

The Homero Manzi night club 

The excellent orchestra

We visited plazas, churches and pedestrian malls. We took a guided tour of the famous Colon Opera House. It was massive and magnificent. The stage hands were setting up lighting for a show so we weren’t able to take any photos of the performance hall. We saw a dinner theatre tango show that night at another famous place in our bohemian neighborhood. Everything about the Homero Manzi night club was polished and professional. The live tango orchestra sizzled with energy from each of its soloistic members. The walls were covered in autographed photos of famous people who had visited the night club. Among them was none other than Astor Piazzola, composer of many great tangos. We had seen a sculpture of him in his native, Mar del Plata. Sorry, no taking of video allowed at the club.

Cathedral on 25 de Mayo Plaza 

Detail from the Cathedral 

Opera House gathering room for the Buenos Aires Elite 

Changing of the Guard in the Cathedral - Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

A walking tour through the La Boca neighborhood showed us the original Buenos Aires harbor with its poor tenements, the birthplace of tango. The many restaurants had folkloric singers and tango dancers to entertain the lunch crowd. The place is deserted at night since it is considered unsafe. Our guide took us to the home stadium for the Boca Juniors Football Team in the nearby streets. She warned us not to visit the area at night.

Tenement buildings in La Boca made from found materials, including the paint.

Mate cups complete with filtered straw

The San Pedro district was the next day’s walking tour. This area has some very old colonial mansions that were deserted during the time of yellow fever. The wealthy oligarchs who built them moved out of town to Recoleto and other nearby towns to avoid the mosquito born plague of the mid 19^th century. These mansions were sectioned off into densely populated tenements with entire families living in just one of the mansion’s bedrooms.

Inner Courtyard. Each room of this restored mansion would have slept four to ten people.

Ficus Tree in Front of Opera House

Opera House Facade

It is easy to believe that yellow fever could spread easily here in the claustrophobic conditions that the immigrant workers lived. The disease moves through mosquitos that bite multiple times and on multiple hosts. Mosquitos in Canada are much larger and generally bite only once. We woke up each morning covered in itchy bites, never discovering the way the little devils got in.

The cramped places were packed with immigrant workers and their families. Many of the young men were alone and homesick. Sexually charged tango dancing was an expression of their yearnings. The woman’s role was often danced by another man since there were few available women, not even enough prostitutes to go around. One urban legend claims that the dance was sometimes a competition. The best young tango dancer (regardless of the roll played) would be rewarded with professional favours that night.

Tango - practiced and precise, sultry and suggestive

Another day’s walking tour was through the Recoleta area filled with its French influences. Built after the revolution for independence from Spain, the area shows a fascination for European culture other than Spain, especially that of France. The wealthy families of the 200 oligarchs that really ran (some say they still do) the country typically spent a few months each year in Europe and came to expect marble clad structures and modern plumbing in their Buenos Aires residences. A tour of the Recoleta Cemetery revealed the lavish shrines and mausoleums where whole families are buried above ground. We saw the final resting place of Eva Peron. 

Ficus tree, 230 years old gets some help

Evita still watches over this great city 

Eva Peron's final resting place, Recoleta Cemetary 

Sculpture outside Faculty of Law, Recoleta

The residents of Recoleta didn’t like tango dancing. It was considered lewd and only fit for the poor. The church didn’t approve of the dance either because of it’s sexual nature. It wasn’t until the tango’s popularity exploded in Europe, in France particularly, that the residents of Recoleta embraced it. They became proud of its Argentinian origin. The acceptance and promotion of tango by the Buenos Aires elite can be seen through the repurposing of the extravagant public ice skating house that was in a park in Recoleta. It was transformed into a house of tango, and remains so today.

The metro line to Recoleta is ultra modern, clean and air conditioned. The area's city buses are clean and brightly painted and chromed. Plush seats and window curtains complete the look on the air-conditioned route 53. Beautifully cared for parks wind their way throughout the area that contains many of Buenos Aires most important buildings such as the austere faculty of law structure. We visited the sculpture beside the law faculty. It’s large chromed petals close up at night like a real flower.

Christmas morning, we shared.

Isa talks to Mafalda accross from the cafe where the character was created.

We enjoyed a traditional Argentinian Christmas cake for breakfast on Christmas day. Video chats with family that day were especially fun. 

Please follow the link below for two short dance videos from Buenos Aires

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPasfEADtrFeaD21vyg4Huw