Reflections on the other Paris

My sister Erin finally arrived safely, albeit a day late, which is a bummer since her vacation was only going to be 12 days anyways, and one day had to be spent in Seattle. But we had a great time - we rented a sweet little apartment right in the center, a two minute walk to the subway. We took tango lessons, and struggled with the notoriously complex Buenos Aires bus system, went to museums, and ate a lot of great food (MAN these guys know how to do steak). And one night it started snowing - the first time that has happened in the city since 1918. It was pretty special, to see all the amazing architecture through a film of huge, gently falling flakes of white.

Erin and I weren't sure if we were interested in tango; we had been hoping to take some salsa lessons but finding tango lessons turned out to be much easier. We ended up doing both, but ended up loving tango in the end. It has a pretty steep learning curve, but the end result is a really spectacular, focused, passionate dance. And the music is cool. I think we ended up doing pretty good, considering my Spanish vocabulary doesn't include a lot of dance terms, and Erin has no Spanish at all - making it pretty tough to understand the instructions being called out in the large group lessons. But we got some basic steps down, and had a lot of fun.

Of course, Buenos Aires is a huge city at nearly 3 million people in the city proper, and over 12 million in the metro area (there are only about 40 million in the whole country), and this meant our dance classes weren't so close to home. And THAT meant either negotiating the complex bus system of the city, or using the beautifully simple subway system and then taking a taxi to the school. The subway system is much older than the one I saw in Santiago - in fact, the A line is the oldest in South America, built in 1913 - but it has a lot more personality: intricate colored tiling that matches the line (green tile in the green line stations), artistic murals, and some of the cars are the originals with wooden interiors. Many of the exit stations likewise have the old wooden posts inside. But sometimes Erin and I felt adventurous, and when we would go places off the subte (from the Spanish subterraneo, or "underground") - like our dance classes - we would try and use the buses. This meant first consulting the transit guide, to find out what buses went roughly to the area we were going - the transit guide divides the city into small grids, and displays which buses run in each grid, but not where they go or where the stops are. So, after cross-referencing the buses that ran where we were going with the buses that ran where we were, we next had to start asking people where we could get X bus. The kiosks, or little mini-mart type stores, were good for this. Then, I had to watch like mad as the bus ran a labyrinthine route through the city so I could try and determine when we were in the grid we were trying to get to. This was stressful. Oh yeah, and you have to make sure you're going the right direction - one night we took the bus going away from the center, instead of into it, and we had to get off. And, since we didn't have enough change for another bus ride (they take only coins, and there are no transfers) we ended up having to take an expensive taxi ride home. And this was after I made a small navigation error and walked us the wrong way for 15 minutes. The moral of the story: go with a porteno, or just take the subte as close as you can get and cab it.

There were a lot of funny little idiosyncrasies in Buenos Aires that I enjoyed. One was discovering that there is a sizable Jewish population there, which I found out when I saw the McDonalds, and then across from it was the kosher McDonalds, with a clientele where yamakas and head scarves featured prominently (that was the idiosyncratic part, not the Jewish population itself, although after the experience I started seeing little bits about the history of the population in the city). Piropos weren't as evident there as in Chile, although if a girl is out jogging in spandex all bets were off, and the men couldn't seem to whistle or yell loud enough. Our apartment was just off a large main avenue, and I knew we were at the right cross-street when I saw the billboard proclaiming "9 out of 10 people prefer to worry less. Buy this insurance today." Medicine in Argentina seems to revolve around aspirin, and they combine it with everything: caffeine, weight-loss products, antacid products - and then they place billboards for these products on billboards all around town, because I need some aspirin with my caffeine pill! There's the ubiquitous yerba mate, drunk from traditional silver straws at any point where you can sit and enjoy it - in parks, at offices, at meals. In fact, often times when meeting Argentines abroad you will see them carrying around huge sacks full of mate, so they never have to go without. Some of the food featured strange combinations, like Roquefort cheese and celery empanadas, or avocado-apple salad. But it was all good, and that was one great thing about Buenos Aires, everything there is just really nice. The food is all delicious, the buildings are all beautiful, and even the signs are always intricately hand-painted to a standard of aesthetics that we just don't seem to appreciate or understand how to do in the US.

The portenos we met I thought were all very friendly and helpful, despite having a reputation for being snobby and pretentious - but maybe they can be that way to other Argentines. I didn't quite see why Buenos Aires is supposed to have a population of such beautiful people, which is it's reputation (supposedly helped by a large amount of plastic surgery), but since I didn't see the people as being so cold and stand-offish as they supposedly are, that worked out, I think. I'd rather have a good conversation with an ugly person than wonder why the beautiful one won't talk to me at all. It's funny though, because in Chile the Argentines have a robust reputation for being outgoing, spontaneous, artistic, and fun. I had several Chileans of different ages and genders tell me this, and then they would add that Chileans were all so serious and business-like. I didn't find the Argentines to be so different than what the Chileans imagine, but I do think the Chileans are selling themselves short - they're way more silly and spontaneous than I found in Buenos Aires, and they have such funny hair and clothes, and, well, I loved those guys.

The portenos did live up to their reputation for being fashionable, though (unlike their Chilean neighbors). Most women wore pointy-tipped, high leather boots, while the men were sure to be wearing something that could be shined - no tennis shoes here. Fancy wool coats and matching scarves were everywhere. There are a huge number of fashion designers in Buenos Aires, many of them who make it big on the international scene. This means a large variety of innovative and occasionally funky clothing, which is often sold in innovative venues: Erin and I stumbled upon a market of independent designers one day, who were showing their wares in an old, white-washed brick parking garage. There was cool music playing, and half of the area was still functioning as parking. It was one of those places where you kind of just had to buy something, because it's just so cool to have cool clothes that come from such a cool place. We both picked up some new shirts.

My Brazil trip is all planned out, and it worked out better than I imagined - when I went in to buy my airpass, where you can get up to four flights within 21 days anyplace in Brazil, the agent didn't notice that I had planned my flights over 25 days instead of 21, so I got just the itinerary I wanted - it was a serious travel coup on TAM airlines. I fly into Sao Paulo, have a couple hours of a layover, and then continue on to Manaus. The next day I'll head into the Amazon to the Xixuau nature reserve, where I'll stay for 10 days, then about 8 days each in Natal, Salvador, and Rio de Jinero. Also, since I got to time my itinerary just how I wanted, instead of having to work within a restrictive 21 days, I get to start in each new place at the beginning of the week, and finish with the weekend, which will give me time to learn the city, make friends, and look into the good spots to go out, which I think will be a good way to do it. Like I said, a serious travel coup.