ARGENTINA – 18th June to 4th July

Argentina - home to Evita, Gauchos, huge steaks and Iguacu Falls. This country is huge, almost the size of India, and houses some of the most beautiful looking people on the planet – luckily they let me in to explore….
The majority of my time in Argentina has been spent in the buzzing, nocturnal city of Buenos Aires. En route I stopped in Salta in the north and Cordoba in the centre before losing myself in the fiesta that is BA.

Salta and Cordoba were quiet mainly due to a bank holiday on the winter solstice (21 June) here. Highlights were my 1st taste of Argentine meat on a massive BBQ, and watching the Argentina vs. Greece match in Cordoba. After the match, which was pretty pointless they all took to the streets and had a massive party! It was chaos, as if they had just won the World Cup, not just qualified from the group!! Firecrackers, drums, dancing and people climbing traffic lights and statues, MAYHEM!

An interesting Museum in Cordoba was the Museo de La Memoria which was an old police/detention centre named D2. It describes how the building was used in the 70s to detain prisoners in the Guerra Suecia (Dirty War) where thousands of people literally “disappeared” - meaning they were detained, tortured and killed. Everywhere I have been there seems to have been a struggle of some type and when you stand in the very cell or place that people were only 30-40 years ago you realise how crazy the world really is. One cell had names scratched into the walls with dates of occupancy...a lasting self inscribed confirmation of existence.

Buenos Aires
OK...if you want to party, then I don’t think there are many places better than this city. This city NEVER EVER EVER SLEEPS!! And nor do you!
I made my way to meet some friends I met in Salta, in an area of town named Palermo which is party central, filled with boutique shops, tasty restaurants, trendy bars and bizarre clubs.

PARTYING IN BA...
My 1st night in BA was a trip to a friend house for pre night drinks. After trying to speak in Spanish for 5hrs it was 2am...finally it was time to go out! You have to be kidding me...at home I think about bed at that time!! Wandering the streets I couldn’t believe it when people said it was “muy temprano” meaning too early!!!! Most of the nights followed suit with 2-3am starts and returning at 5-7am! Mix that with a World Cup at 11am everyday and you are in trouble - even quiet drinks on a Sunday evening finished at 3am!
Other nights were “La Bomba” (drums), which was entirely improvised. If it doesn’t take too long then I will try to upload one of the videos of the conductor. His hands seem to play the music all by themselves, it´s amazing – or maybe I was just really drunk! Then there was Club 69, an electro music club with a transvestite Cabaret and break-dancing show...now that was weird but after a few Cuba Libres it seemed to fit!

THE ENIGMA NAMED FREDERICO
I met a bizarre fella who for the purposes of this blog I will call Frederico. This guy seemed to have zero life skills – god knows how he will survive in BA after we have all left! He speaks under his breath, so that you have to ask him to repeat everything he says about 5 times, but then changes his question when he repeats – really annoying. On asking me about my travels in Australia he questioned whether the Aus $ was different to the US one (Have you been sent here to wind me up?!), and asked us how many eggs to put in an omelette – how long’s a piece of string mate! I’m told there was a burning smell in the kitchen following. We also couldn’t remember the name of the Parthenon (not a good reflection on us I suppose!) but he thought it was Aztec!! BIZARRE.

SOME SIGHTS IN BA...
Amongst the chaos in Buenos Aires there are some interesting sites to see and I managed on a ´couple of days´ to get out of bed and explore. First was Museo de Evita detailing the life of Eva Peron and her effect on the people of Argentina in the 40s. Her life ended abruptly and in my opinion after reading a lot of info in the museum somewhat strangely. We also got to see the balcony in the Casa Rosada from which she inspired people in the square below and her tomb in the Recoleta Cemetery which houses hundreds if not thousands of coffins, all kept in crypts in a sort of mini-town. It´s like walking around a normal street - very eerie and creepy when you can see peoples coffins - some of the ones I saw were over 150 years old.

TANGO IN BA
Yes ladies – I can Tango!! I couldn’t come to BA and not give it a go, so four of us ventured to a local bar for lessons. Now that is one sexy dance. I was hoping to dance with a few sexy latinos. Instead I had a 64 year old lady grab me when we were asked to swap partners! Fantastic!! Unfortunately my moves were not quite up to scratch after 2 lessons so failed to leave with her as my Latin lover. 

LA BOCA
Boca sits in the south of town, and is notoriously dangerous unless you stick to the tourist streets. The only way to get there is by bus and by the time we entered Boca we were the only ones on the bus. I was s***ting myself after hearing a few bad mugging stories but was pleasantly surprised on arrival. The streets were cobbled and the houses that lined them multi-coloured with figurines of funny looking characters filling the balconies. Waiters harassed us to enter their restaurants, watch the Tango shows and a Maradona lookalike hounded us for money. I loved it. Then a tour of the Bombenera, the Boca Juniors ground – its tiny! Shame I couldn’t go to watch a match while I was here as the season is finished but I climbed the fence Boca stylee after a make believe Martin Palermo wonder-goal! It hurt my fingers...

BEING DUTCH
After England finished dismally in the WC, we needed a new nationality. This turned out to be Holland when we befriended some Dutch guys in our hostel. They knew of a Dutch pub nearby and we decided Orange Togas made of the hostel curtains were in order. We had a few beers at an early morning kickoff against Slovakia and proceeded to prove our Dutch-ness....

Ma nam es Hans De Jong. (My name is Hans De Jong)
Wat es yer Nam? (What is your name?)
Eck com out Utrecht (I am from Utrecht)
Eck how fun Oraigna!! (I love Orange!!)

As you probably know the Dutch won and we promised to return for the Brasil match. With 2hrs sleep after a heavy night out we dragged ourselves to the Orange pub. This time the Argentine TV crew were there. They grabbed me (5ft 7ins, dark curly haired, brown eyes and fairly tanned skinned) thinking I was Dutch and asked me for a prediction. Drunk and slurring I managed a “dos y uno” prediction. At full time they grabbed me again as I pretended to be Dutch celebrating with the ceiling scrapers. I introduced myself live on Argentine TV as Hans De Jong from Utrecht and ran away in celebration jumping on my Dutch friend Johan! Immense! Vamos Holanda!! Haha!!

FINAL NIGHT
The last night in BA played out in a way to leave a perfect image of exactly how BA will be remembered in my mind. With an 8.30am boat to Uruguay the next morning we planned a chilled night out in a fancy steak restaurant. Predictably in BA you order a steak and get half a cow on your plate. Feeling bad for the veggies I ate half. Then I sent it back because it was overcooked...without argument they brought me a new one which I felt obliged to finish - I have never had a better steak! A few bottles of vino later we opted for a bar with a rooftop terrace and live music. Dinking with Johan is a nightmare, as he buys you drinks without even asking - perfect on a normal night out but not so when you have to be up in a few hours! When 5am came around I thought I better call it a day, but on return I found my Dutch friend at the bar with a freshly opened litre of beer just for me. So with zero sleep I met the others for the boat and slurred Spanish to the taxi driver on the way to the port. That is BA for me - Steak, Beer, No sleep, trying to speak Spanish and being Dutch. Excellent. Do it again? Anytime.