This is a city of character, of flavour and of history. I’ll be upfront – I didn’t see everything I wanted to. I didn’t see any tango – it’s a damn shame and a reason to return – but I did meet the people. I slept in their houses, ate meals with them, drank with them, shared mate with them, and walked the city with them. It was the people, and not the city that made Buenos Aires worth the difficulties that found me.
Coming off the back of two months travelling, I arrived in the Paris of the south somewhat rundown. From lakes and mountains to full city, I wanted to absorb as much of this cultural melting pot as I could but spent the first three days staring at the ceiling from my mattress on the floor. Once on the up I had a money crisis (not a rare occurence in Argentina). I fled the country in search of a fortune in foreign lands, and found it in neighbouring Uruguay in the form of American dollars. But that’s another tale, for another tab.
I finally feel like I’m travelling – having reached my limit, I now know better what I can do, what I can do better, and what I cannot do and do not need!
Buenos Aires is a sprawling metropolis, thronging with movement and the bustle of millions of lives running in parallel. Every day, millions make their way into the centre, an invasion that leaves the avenues and streets of the city packed with cars and buses, horns blaring, but nobody moving. The subway (called Subte) is equally tight – trains crammed so tight that the air feels close, with people all squashed together in a hot, humid, noisy environment. A bus network that defies imagination goes to all places at all hours, simetimes 4 buses of the same line in a row. I am very glad I never drove in the midst of this madness because the people are maniacs and I understand why the bus drivers are generally grumpy, short and take a savage pleasure in not stopping if, for some reason, you’re not right there, right then. But it all goes with the territory and it is precisely those territories that I explored. I invite you to walk with me awhile and together we will explore some of the sights of the streets and neighbourhoods of Buenos Aires.