Before I start typing this, I am predicting this will be my longest travel blog of the lot. BA (Buenos Aires) was my base for almost 3 weeks, and Millhouse Avenue was practically my temporary home. I will try and break it all up and put into sections, so sit back, put the kettle on, and enjoy.

An Introduction to BA
We will start with the harsh reality of this large South American city, not a day goes by when you don´t hear a story about some backpacker in the hostel been subjected to pick pocketing. Usually it is nothing violent; it really is just little kids preying on what they see as drunken/hungover vulnerable tourists. I never had any trouble at all during my time in BA. The funniest experience I had on the notorious BA subway was when one of my friends was nearly pick pocketed, but the attempt was foiled, as Rob saw the little lads hand in his pocket and told him to go away (not as polite as that), and the lad scared out his mind just ran off. It was a usual standard trick where one lad throws the coins on the floor to distract others whilst toe rag number 2 helps his hand into someone's pocket. They have a severe problem in Argentina with the lack of change, so he shouldn't really be throwing all those coins on the floor. May I suggest throwing a bag of skittles next time?
Now onto more positive things about BA. The vibrancy of the city can be felt by all. Restaurants don´t get busy until 11pm, tango shows are everywhere and the Obelisk towers over the 6 lanes of one way traffic. There was something crazy, but fascinating about this city. The first day I got here, there was a protest with the drums banging, and even though people harp on about the drumming concert on a Monday night in some sort of warehouse/nightclub, let me tell you, the protests are more exciting.

La Boca
Boca was a famous suburb of BA that I visited a fair few times. I never ventured into the neighbourhoods though, and only ever stayed in the tourist (you could argue fake) area of Boca. It really was designed for the tourists and a lad who looks just like Maradona stands around asking for 20 pesos for a picture to be taken with him. What a way to make a living, whilst just standing on the cobbled streets of Boca posing for pictures with tourists. Boca is most famous for it´s football team, Boca Juniors, and that of their stadium, La Bombonera, nicknamed the Chocolate box due to its shape.
On the 15th of May, the biggest game in the Argentinian football calendar was upon us, it was the reason I visited BA earlier than I had originally planned. It was like the Celtic and Rangers of Argentina. The atmosphere did not disappoint, even if the standard of football did. The footballing experience started with us going through two police checkpoints and passing numerous riot police. Once inside the ground, a girl stood near me asked where the away fans were placed. I laughed and said "above us, so put your hood up as they will start throwing things down at us later`. She laughed at first, but once the River plate team came out and plenty of "water" flew down, she suddenly knew I wasn't joking. The game ended two nil to Boca, so with ten minutes to go, everything the River fans could get there hands on was flying down. Flag poles, shoes, bleach, you name it, it came down. I expected the grand Piano and the kitchen sink to land on me at one point. I think I probably was lucky because I didn´t really endure anything, but some people came out of the ground with ruined clothes due to the bleach landing on them.
Still on the topic of this famous shady suburb of BA, the second time I came back to this city, I was in the same room as Carl (a good lad I met at Iguassu), and we went trundling the streets of Boca (yet again) with our new room mates, 3 lasses from Carls country (the south of England). During our lunch, there was a free tango show going on, and they were getting everyone up on the stage to have a go. I pretended I was eating so I didn´t have to go up, even though I did have that one piece of carrot and brocoli infront of me for around 3 hours. I eventually was practically forced to dance, well dance probably isn't the right to word to use, as looking back at the video, It looked like I was helping an old woman up the stairs. I always knew I had two left feet, and my opinion hasn´t changed on that one.

The joys of La Caberara
I visited La Caberara, the most famous steakhouse in Argentina twice during my time in BA. The first time I took so long to eat my 800g steak, when I finally did finish, the waiters and customers alike all clapped. The waiter reluctantly let me order a Desert, after at first telling me he had a wife and a home to go to.
The second time I visited Caberara, I stupidly left my wallet in a taxi. Good job I was with some decent people who let me borrow some money, so I then I transferred the money to them via online banking. I never did see the wallet again, but the twist in the story was that someone had rang the hostel saying he was willing to give me the wallet (and not wanting a pay off), so he gave the hostel his phone number. The man behind reception lost the number, he never rang again, and I never saw the wallet again either.....ahh well.

Random things I remember
I was in various dorms during my stay, but room 406 was definitely the land of dreams. Sofia who used to always check the rooms at 11am without fail, and one morning she looked at our room one morning and said to me "it's a good job you are my friend Richard and I like you, it looks like the Amazon in here". I think someone may have not put the shower curtain inside the shower properly...woops.
I met two hull lads who let me watch rugby league games with them through skype. They were a good bunch. We went to the supermarket and said how were going to cook something substantial. We filled our basket, looked at each other and asked "who actually wants to cook this". We looked at each other again and put it all back and then finally left the supermarket with 2 greens apples and a packet of chewing gum.
A word of warning if you do go to the millhouse, be very cautious of the low ceiling near the computers, especially if you are tall. I smashed my head and was in cloud 9 for a few minutes. After then feeling ok, I went down to the bar to get some food and drink, but as no one was there, I asked at reception if they could get someone to serve me. Betty the reception girl, looking horrified said "you need ambulance, not beer, look in the mirror. There was abit of blood, but they forced me to wait for the ambulance to come and see me as a precaution. I was fine, so they just cleaned the blood up and I was right as rain again. The reply from my Dad when I told him was "Next time, wear a crash helmet", Cheers Dad for the enlightening advice.
One night, an Irish lad in the hostel seemed to walk into something behind reception. God knows why he was behind the reception in the first place. He was out cold, so went to hospital, and his mate told me the following day that he was put in an induced coma, and his parents were coming over to see him. It puts things into perspective, regarding lost items, and petty little things that do happen when you are travelling.

My Birthday
Still a fair way to go I´m afraid. I did warn you that it would be a HUGE BLOG. The champions league final was on my birthday, so un-surprisingly, we were all on the beer all day. The hostel increased my bar tab, and other people bought me a few drinks, so least I was not reading a book on my birthday. Well to tell you the truth, I have never read a book in my life, so I probably wouldn't have started doing on that day anyway. I think I staggered in at around 6am. I may have been not in the UK for my birthday, but I just had to keep the tradition going. I came in the room, and did abit of patriotic singing. The next morning I asked someone if I woke them up when I came in and the reply was "of course you woke us up you legend, you sang Rule Britannia, and Marching on together" One girl said to me after, she didn't mind my singing because she loved the Yorkshire accent, so she wanted me to carry on bursting out the vocals.
Becky woke me up at around 1pm shouting "RICH...WAKE UP NOW, I´VE BOUGHT YOU A FOOTBALL TICKET". That's rule number one, never agree to anything that anyone says to you after 10 o clock on a night out. I wasn't that bothered about going as I saw the biggest game in Argentina a fortnight before, but as she did buy me a ticket, so off I went. She told me how she had been bashing on the door of room 501 all morning shouting every abusive word in the book to wake me up. I was in 406, and it turned out, 501 was a private room, I bet they loved her...NOT.
Jo and Becky made me laugh as usual at the football game. I think we were still all one drunken mess to be fair. Two of the funniest quotes of the day were when after 30 minutes, Jo asked "Rich, which net are Boca trying to score in". I did presume after half an hour, she may have worked that one out. But the all time classic was just before kick off, when I got asked "Rich, what are the team in blue called walking across the pitch at the moment", My reply was "they are the riot police my luv".....ohh dear.

My final night in BA
I said bye to people at the hostel and one receptionist said to me "you made me work harder in 3 weeks than I ever worked in 5 years of working". The exact quote from one of them was "You lose your wallet, smash your head, you're loud and usually come into the hostel singing we all love Leeds, usually I don´t like people like you, but you do it all in a very elegant and funny way, and no one will ever be like you Richie¨". I will take that as a compliment HA.
I went to bed early to get some sleep before my flight and all the people in my dorm around 5am came in and started singing 'In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight" I think on behalf of everyone I have woken up in the past 7 months of travelling, well that was for you. Shaylee and sam in particular.
I set my alarm early to go to the airport so the plan was not to be in a rush. It didn't quite go to plan, as the snooze button seemed to let me down. I woke up and chucked my phone across the bed shouting "s*** s*** I've missed my f***ing flight". It was 9:50am, and my flight left at 11:20am. I got everything swiftly ready but then I realised I had to find that stupid piece of crap that let me down only a few hours before. After searching the bed I found my phone and was ready to go. The conversation to the taxi driver went as follows "AIRPORT......VAMOS......VAMOS..VAMOS".
This was a message from up in the sky telling me that I loved Buenos Aires, and Buenos Aires loved me, and it just did not want me to go. After some strong resistance though, I managed to catch my flight easily (it was delayed by an hour and half anyway), and Rio De Janeiro awaited me.

Summery
I was in BA 3 times in total over 3 weeks, and each time, I met some brilliant people and some I will no doubt hopefully meet again. It´s actually been a while since I actually was in Buenos Aires so I have probably forgotten a fair bit of what I did, but hopefully I have included the main jist of it, and if I remember anything, then I will just add it in one day. This blog has taken me around 3 weeks to write, and I haven´t wrote this much, since I last wrote my dissertation for university. So well done to anyone that is still here reading this. I presume there will not be very many.
As you can no doubt tell, I had an absolute ball of a time in BA. from cutting my head on a ceiling, to practically being penniless on my birthday. FAN-TAST-IC.

Buenos Aires, Thankyou.