Arriving in Buenos Aires at night, the strength of the hustle and bustle there caught me by surprise. The difference between what I expereinced at the port in BA compared to the Uruguayan side was one hundred fold a difference. It was utter manic! Even under the brightly lit night sky, you could feel a certain westerness to the place, bright lights, European architecture and even people that looked like spanish students without the wax jackets on a summer in Ireland, it all started to become familiar.

The lovely taxi driver took total advantage of us getting off the ferry. He knew where we were going which was a good thing, but his rip off prices did nothing sooth my anxiousness of getting out of this traffic and to my accomodation. Mill House Avenue was the hostel that I was to stay at for the next few days. After hearing so much about this place from previous travellers, it sounded like this place was going to be heaven on earth in terms of having a good time. Centrally located a block or so from Avenida 18 de Julio, the subtly marked door of the hostel opened up to a Willy Wonky type accomadtion inside. The building was recently renovated a few years back so it was very modern, in my eyes, maybe a bit hospitaly, if you get me. It stood six stories tall I think, and I'm sure it had between three and four hundred raving lunatics stay there on a busy night, a bit like a load of oompa loompa's running about the place. Up in the room, the rooms were spacious for an 8-bed dorm with cages in each corner for ones valuables. I had been lucky so far with past room mates but this was quickly going to change. There was one guy this time around who took the preverbial biscuit. So picture this. Im lying on the bed, resting, and next thing this Isreali dude walks in, no introduction. Okay fine, suit yourself. Later on, some German girls land in and starting to pack away their stuff. Now he starts to talk, obviously I didnt do it for him. Normally in any type of situation here, one would introduce oneself. It would be, hello, my name is Peter and I'm from Ireland, etc, etc. But oh no, not this fella! His introductory line, all within the first ten seconds were, "yeah, I'm from Isreal. I've been playing professional basketball in the US for the past five years, then I've played more pro ball in Isreal". Bolloxa and I wasnt jealous by the way! When asked where he had been in South America, his answer was plainly, "everywhere". This guy was an utter t*** which made me get out of my bed and head down stairs for a drink to settle myself after ingesting so much crap. The arrogance and ignorance that I had to listen to was beyond words.

The bar there was busy during the night but half of that may be down to the line that you had to queue in to pay before you even got to the bar. What ever happened to multi-talented bar staff this side of the pond? Anyways. If you had friends there, it was no prolem, but if you didnt, I felt that it was very much a clicky bar where some wouldnt have enjoyed it as another. The hostel would be definately classed as a party hostel, actually its probably known as one of the most notorious party hostels in South America and this brings a certain type of clientel. Ones that are purely there to go stone mad, ones who have seen it all before but yet dont want to miss out on anything (me) and ones that booked it purely on its location and not for its notoriety. After a night or two there, I was firmly sure that I was in that second category. At some stages, the level of immaturity and arrogance that you sometimes had to put up with was by far too much for me. I've been staying in hostels long enough at this stage not having to listen to children that are just after learning how to tie their own shoe laces and staff that actually treat you as a person to have to put up with this bull. In Millhouse, you are not a person, nor a number, simply you are part of the matrix where no one in the outside world (reception) gives a flying f*ck about you!

Immature, busy, crazy, not my scene. Hostel aside, it was now time to actually explore the city of Buenos Aires. First of the cards was to visit the famous San Telmo market. On route to the market, we passed by a square with a lot of "fun loving people about". It seemed like they were having one of those "smoking cigarettes parties" whilst playing a lot of "reggae music" and chanting "legalise this, legalise that". I met one of the group there, who had a child on his shoulders. He asked me where I was from and sher when he heard the reply, I was also one of the "fun loving people, listening to reggae music". There was a kitchen on the way to the market, where, instead of a cake getting baked, I did! It was tremendous fun and very disorientating all at the same time. My maths skills also got a hammering during this baking class also. Anyways, San Telmo is cool, there's everything that you could think off under the roof there but from a certain period. Classic antiques and trinkets line each aisle, allowing one to spend hours and hours trawling through some of the treasures there. Sunday is the day when the market doubles in size and out onto the roads, I didnt visit that day, thanks be to god, I'd still be there given the state I was in on the beautiful Saturday.

One of the next stand outs for BA for me was just endlessly walking down through the beautiful streets down to where the eerily beautiful cemetery of La Recoleta was, a swanky suburb of BA. There at the cemetery is where one could walk down between the hugely ornate tombs where loved ones were laid to rest, but the highlight, if you can call it a highlight is where Maria Eva Duarte de Peron is buried or better known as, Evita. I didnt cry for Argentina but it was a special place to visit when once in BA, thats for sure. The area around Recoleta is really nice also, with some beautiful green spaces to meander through whilst licking an icecream as you do so. One of the things that wasnt as blatantly obvious as I would have thought, was the great choice in eateries. I was in BA and BA is famous for its steaks. I want steak, simple as that. In central Dublin for example, theres some great places to nosh on around most corners but not in BA or maybe I was looking in the wrong places. This is where recommendad places came into fruitition for me. The countless notes made on my phone of where to eat and where to drink bore fruit. One of the places I really enjoyed was a restaurant called Siga La Vaca or in english, Follow the Cow. It was down on the banks of the river Plata, brightly lit, filld with fellow gringos and locals alike all sharing the same tastes. What was really good about it was that it had a huge salad bar with everything that you could think of, fresh too. Pile up the plate and walk to the wall where they smacked a couple of bricks out of it and replaced the space with a huge barbeque. On one end, you could get bbq'd veggies and the further you moved to the right, the more meatier it got. Chicken, pork, lamb, steak, liver, heart, you name it, it was cooked there. Once you couldnt see the white of the plate, it was time to sit down, begin to control your breathing and to tuck in with a knife and fork. The waitress then came over with a bottle of house red... on the house! Amazing! The one bottle of house red, which was on the house then became two bottles of house red... which was on the house!! This place was getting very close to an eleven stars out of ten marking! The final great thing about it too is that it was relatively cheap, all you can eat and drink for a very reasonable price. After leaving there, I might have well had gone for an angeoblast (probably not spelt correctly), buuuuuut i didnt, I just blew that discription totally out of proportion!

I was lucky enough to be in the city for a very special weekend. There is a competition in Argentinian football that has two teams playing against one another, both from two different boroughs in BA. This bout of football is also a world reknown fixture due to mostly down to both teams fans that egg on each other so ferociously. One thing was for sure, I wasnt going to be in BA and not at least try to get myself to this game. I had known about the fixture a few months in advance at this stage and so I put the set of enqueries into motion, how I would get into the match and how much it would be. Its a bit like the case of Irish rubgy fans in saying that, a lot of the time, you have to be in the know to get a ticket or to be part of a club, this was definately the case here too. If it wasnt the case, the tickets were definately scooped up online long before I knew about it. However, angel in the guise of a tourist company for gringos was offering hugely inflated prices for tickets and transportation to and from the game. Once your in a situation where you have the 100th anniversary of the Super Classico between Boca Juniors vs River Plate being dangled in front of you, are you really going to say "maybe next time"? nah, I didnt think so.

An early start to that Sunday was needed for two bus loads of us to be ferried from the hostel down into the colourful but yet somewhat dangerous area of La Boca. As today was derby day, the hostility was at an all time high and you could both see it and feel it. The process was to get the River Plate fans into the ground first, the magic El Bombanero. We were with the River fans, not out of choice, it was just the cards we were dealt with on the day. As the Boca fans hung out of the windows of their colourful houses, today dressed in the blue and gold of Boca Juniors, the buses with the enemy inside rolled into town. The police presence was just phenominal and I mean that with every word I type here. It wasnt a case of the steward at the gates at Landsowne Rd scanning your bar code, this was like being sent into prison to be locked up for a long, long time. The police there have been around before and they know what to expect. Somewhere between 25-50 people at a time are let into a 100metre area of the street thats lined by these old Boca houses. Bare in mind, the street is fully closed with 7ft high fencing so that no one can get in or out, just like a prison. Once at the barrier, your ticket is checked first and then your searched. Once done, your ushered through the stiles into another 100m long section of street. This process continued for around seven to eight times. The intensity of the search was incredible and was supposedly needed due to what normally happens at one of these games injury and once, death. Once at the yellow walls of the stadium, you can hear the pounding on the steel above your head and god only knows what the chants directed towards us were about. It was super intense and all you wanted to do was to get in, find your place and look directly ahead, making no eye contact, hoping that the fella who was roaring at you wasnt going to find you and beat ten colours of s***e out of you. Going up the stairs, the hairs on your neck rose, the adrenaline lighting your blood on fire and what was really crazy was, that it was still four hours before kick off!! Thats what the intensity was like!

Up at the very top is where we were positioned, in the real nose bleed seats. There were no seats however, just like a Hill 16 a few hundred feet higher in the air. It was a case of get your spot now or you wont have one at all. Well, we did get a nice spot but then we were ushered to the other end of the stand. Why? Well there was full riot geared police over there that would be able to save us if anything got out of hand. With the amount of concrete, steel and barbwire up there, the only way that things could really get out of hand was if the steel door separating both sets of fans apart was to be breached. This is where we had to stand and where the riot police stood. To say I felt safe was an understatement but the feeling was still oh so god, always thinking what could really go wrong. Thankfully nothing did, so lets have this game of football!

The sun shone all day long and to be honest it was tiring there just waiting for the game to actually start, standing there taking in the 35 degree heat looking out over Buenos Aires, tough, eh? From the time we got into the ground, it took another four hours for the Boca fans to fill the remianing majoirty of the seats. Fans ate hamburgers and drank flat pepsi, not a cold beer in sight but then again, thats a good thing, given that you are in a modern day version of a roman coloseum, things did tend to get out of hand back then and they certainly could today. I watched in wonder as the singing started, some beautiful songs with so much heart and soul not like chanting one would get in Old Trafford a few years back with chants about Ji Sung Park eating rats and dogs and so forth. The River fans standing next to us all were wearing surgical masks and were literally belting out some chants. Even if you didnt understand spanish you'd know that they werent saying kind words about the other teams mothers, lets say. I asked one why they were wearing the masks. The reply that I got really made me chuckle. You see, Boca is from a poorer part of BA, in the past it wouldnt have had the best facilities etc and things wouldnt have been as good as what the wealthier River fans would have had. So, the reason behind the masks was simply, so that the River fans when they visited the stadium of El Bombanero and the neighbourhood of La Boca, it was that the River fans wouldnt catch any disease! The guys had all the jokes lined up and ready to go!

Finally the game started with a great cheer from the crowd. From the get go, the chants and songs got louder and louder. It was only 40 seconds in, the ball was crossed in, I couldnt see the goal, nor could anyone standing in front of me, so all in one go, basically, the whole stand bends freakishly forward and sure enough we can then all see the goal. When the cross game in from the wing it was duely slotted in the back of the Boca goal and then this happend. GGGOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLLLLL! The whole place where we were, only 45seconds into the game, went absoltuely BAT s*** crazy!!! The reinforced concrete stand below swayed wildly, once thinking we could all go down, tocuhing cloth and so forth, but the craziness continued as River enjoyed an early lead. For the majority of the game, it was bad enough game in terms of football. In the stands was where you wanted to be. But the guys on the grass did their thing too to keep things interesting. Boca equalised to put them each on a level pegging and then one of the coaches gets himself sent off. What for, i dont know, but sher that all added to the excitement. I was kept occupied by looking around me at the crazies there roaring their heads off. These guys I'd say would, deep down, in my opinion, whole heartidly die for their respective teams. I've been to a few premiership games before and experienced the excitement there but this place just takes the biscuit. Its a must see for any footie fan whos ever going to be down this neck of the woods. Their is no camparison in terms of football, the city inself being so insanely huge and full on and then the hostels that house's these travelling gringo's, for their all f***ing animals!

Buenos Aires, you were amazing, but a few days there nealy killed me both in body and bank. It was time to discover Rosario, five hours further west. What for, I do not know, but I was curious. Lets ride!