We did 2 walking tours today to ensure we get a complete view and understanding of Buenos Aires. The walking tours work well, as per other city walking tours it's usually a local that guides the tour and therefore has a much better insight into the city and can relay interesting facts or random points of interest.

The first tour we did was actually lead by not so local British guy, but he has lived in BA for 5 and half years so guess that and the fact that his girlfriend of 5 years is Columbian (so he speaks Spanish well) qualifies him to be a guide. It was quite interesting too as his views were rather objective and usually gave a well rounded interpretation.

We started in Plaza Italia, Palermo and bussed it through on bus 29 to what turned out to be our "dodgy" neighbourhood Abasto. We found out it was actually a really cool place with amazing street art and many arts and cultural activities. Carlos Gardel's (late famous tango singer) house is a monument here and many walls/houses are covered in Filete(the art form that usually forms boarders around words or signs and would always feature a ribbon-like form of the Argentinian flag). There are also many marble slabs with tango lyrics on the pavements. So new found respect for our area, but still treading these streets with caution.

We saw the impressive parliament buildings which were designed and built when the Europeans were still in control. Saw the pink house on the Plaza de Mayo (plaza of May) with the balcony that Evita delivered her famous speech from (well of course more recently Madonna).

We walked around the central Plaza obelisk where the Madre's walked and still march around every Thursday at 15:30. These mums started marching in the late 1970's in protest of their kids that have gone missing. As with many dictatorships around the world, the Militia ensured that 30 000 Argentinians disappeared, usually those that in some or other manner seemed to oppose or could potentially oppose the government of that time. Today these Madre's are funded by the government and take many of the government views and march for these now.

We had drinks in the San Martin Park where we started our next tour. This time of Retiro area with amazing Palaces and the sad story of the Israeli consulate that was bombed in the nineties (they still don't know by whom). Then onwards to the "plastic surgery area" of upmarket Recoleta. Apparently having "some work done" is included in most top range medical insurance/plans making Argentina one of the countries with the most plastic surgery in the world. We learnt about Porteno's (slang for people from Buenos Aires) and Camoochos (sweet talkers) which Buenos Aires has many of.