Hola!

Si, we speaking the espanyol. Badly. Although we are managing to order food (sorry steak) successfully, which seems to be the only thing that matters as seemingly everybody in the service industry in the whole wide world speaks English. Which is very good or very bad whichever way you look at it I suppose. We´re going to try and have a Spanish lesson soon since that ´Teach Yourself Spanish´ present remained largely unopened (Sorry Mum. Yes I know you told me!)

Buenos Aires is exactly what I expected. It´s great to be in a slightly unfamiliar culture again as it´s all fairly easy travelling in Australia and New Zealand where things are normal but slightly different (read wrong if you´re stuck in the mud like me). Somehow, I don´t feel like I can take a country seriously unless it loves football. Being here in Latin America, for me, also inevitably feels more exotic. However, despite both of us having dark features, we´ve gradually worked out that we don´t really blend in that much. In fact, we don´t blend in. Especially me. I still can´t work out why foreigners who speak perfectly good English can´t understand Estuary English. More lessons for them methinks!

Having ticked off all of the six Lonely Planet Buenos Aires ´highlights´ we feel slightly smug but significantly tired, although we will be heading north tonight in order to see the Iguazu Falls which are slap bang on the tourist trail and supposedly very beautiful. We´re quite happy being mere tourists rather than explorers you might have guessed!

So, BA (as we locals call it) is very clearly all about the night. Late twenty-somethings and fairly solid couple that we are, we´ve been staying up late (by English standards) reassuring ourselves we´re still quite cool but have managed to resist the clubbing urge since these ´poco loco´ Latinos don´t even venture out to their saucy little nightclubs until way past 3am. All this means we´ve failed dismally of course but I´m not sure we care that much!

On the other hand, we´ve seen a passionate Tango at a very intimate venue by the name of Cafe Tortoni (tick), enjoyed/devoured/struggled to wash down a Bife de Chorizo (tick) with el bino. I´m not sure I should be proud or guilty but I´ve eaten a piece of cow in one form or another every night for the past five days. Certainly not the ´grilled gut´ I saw on the menu last night though! It´s ok though because they´ve been accompanied by vegetables in the shape of chips. Beth is looking hard for some greens in this land but is failing absolutely so far.

We´ve ´strolled the busy Av. Florida´ (tick) which was fairly unremarkable although ´shopping at San Telmo´s antiques fair´(tick..I´m going to keep doing this you know) was a joy. We´ve bought another largeish treasure for a home that doesn´t exist yet but who cares about these minor details. Gulp.

We´explored Recoleta cemetery´ (tick) which is a bit like Beverly Hills for the dead. Basically plenty of tourists taking snaps of tombs which are grandiose gothic monuments to wealth. It was a tad macabre given a lot of the tombs have been exposed to the elements revealing the coffins within. The prize tomb, of course, belongs to the ´Duarte´ family and every tourist was on a kind of deranged treasure hunt to find Eva Peron´s final resting place. We eventually got through the maze of tombs to find tourists snapping away, though most seemed to be Argentinian themselves. It seems as if they rever her in the same way that people harp on about Diana, Margaret Thatcher or the Queen. I can only deduce that the little lady seems to have been a mixture of all three. Imagine that!

Speaking of Eva Peron, we also paid a little visit to the museum/shrine to Evita. No tick although I think it reveals a little bit about Argentina. I knew nothing about her life before arriving and the Museum didn´t teach me a great deal. I don´t think it being mostly in Spanish helped me, although it seems that there wasn´t much substance or ideology behind her. Mostly ambition, although admittedly, she seems to have earned women the vote. History lesson over. Discuss..

So five ticks I hear you mutter. Well, I´ve not forgotten but was saving the best until last since one might say I dragged Beth along to a ´futbol game´ (tick) although she insists she would have wanted to come anyway as the beautiful game seems to be an integral part of their culture.

Anyway, we had the pleasure and good fortune to be able to go to River Plate´s home ground, El Monumental, to watch the minnows of Bolivia get a good pasting at the hands of Argentina in a World Cup Qualifier. Again, it was everything I expected, a feast for the eyes and a really colourful festival complete with ticker tape and blue and white balloons and even water canons to hose down the crowd since it was a scorcher. Oh, and some beautiful football too. Messi, Riquelme, Tevez et al helped create a postive football experience for Beth, who until now has been subjected to some mediocre premier league kick and rush tosh where "the ball always seems to be going off of the pitch". Also, there was no Whufc burger spat in her hair this time which is doubly positive I think.