12:00 - After the 13 and a half hour flight, landed in Buenos Aires. This will be home for the next 3 nights...a little old but clean... I had a little walk around in the heat for a couple of hours but I now need to rest in the cooler inside of the hotel. I will venture out later when, hopefully, it won't be as hot and sticky as it is now. First impressions: looks like most other big metropolitan places...except for the suburbs (they make the Bronx look like the Upper East side)...
16:30 - I did make it out after my little rest... But alas, it was still hot (possibly hotter) and humid. Look what I found in my search for a park! A little car of a Fangio fan (see album). Had my first meal at McDonalds and discovered that in the developing world, McDonalds is not as cheap as in the UK. I paid 9 US$ for a chicken burger meal. I managed to buy an Argentian SIM card and then walked around trying to find a park I had seen on the map so I could sit down and continue reading my book. I would have found it faster using the actual map, but I didn't want to look like a tourist :-). On the way, i tried to walk into a money exchange place to exchange some of my USD for Pesos but got stopped by a peculiar man working for a shop nextdoor (that sold clothes) and was offered a better rate of exchange... No need to give passport details either in there :-))). We don't get that in the UK! Tonight, I'm doing a very touristy thing but I guess if you are here and you don't go to a Tango show, it seems a bit of a pity. And now, a little siesta...
21:00 - My first argentinian steak: bife de chorizo especial...not bad :-) . If Schettino was here he would have misunderstood the type if establishment he was visiting though: il palazzo della patata (fritta). Of my five a day today (for benefit of non british people five a day are five portions of fruit and vegetables that you are supposed to eat each day according to NHS guidelines), I have had two...both potato based...is that any good? By the way... Forgot to say... My first day in Buenos Aires has also left me with the left hand side of my face sunburnt... Go figure... I was walking around all day only in one direction????? Surely that's not possible...
00:30 - I'm just back from the Tango. I expected the show to be a tourist trap, but I have to say that it was actually very good (I'm not much of a Tango person myself). Went to a place called Ventana. I got a chance to help out a German lady sitting at my table with her spanish (she spoke none). No one (and I mean NO ONE), speaks a word of english in Buenos Aires. It's normally one of my travel tools (english), but I've been resuscitating my spanish over the last 12 hours :-). I have to say that you'd expect those involved in the tourist stuff to at least have a few words of english...but no...nothing...and I mean nothing at all...