Final Week in Buenos Aires

We´ve been living in a little apartment in San Telmo during our stay in Buenos Aires. San Telmo is the oldest neighborhood in the city. It was mostly built in the beginning of the 1800´s, and the streets and many of the buildings are still the same. The streets are narrow cobblestones, and it´s always exciting to see the city buses recklessly barreling down the narrow streets. You learn quickly to step back from the curb.    Above is a photo of our street on a quiet Sunday morning.

Many of the buildings have ornate, ten-foot high doors on the outside and elaborate marble staircases on the inside. The neighborhood has bars and cafés that are 150 years old, next to modern, hip restaurants and stores geared toward the young, modern, and hip. There are lots of tourists, because the neighborhood is so unique and beautiful, and lots of residents and families, because this is where they´ve always lived.

The San Telmo Market is open every day. It has little vegetable stands, butchers, bakers, clothing shops, and a little coffee kiosk, very similar to the ones back in Eugene. “Coffee Town” is owned by José, and is starred in by Hannah, the chica from New Zealand.

Buenos Aires has had at least three major contributions to world culture: Tango, Filteateado, and Submarinos. So far, Tango is the only one that has become international. Fileteado, (or filete)  and Submarinos are still very “Argentino.” The submarino is a culinary revelation. You can go into almost any café, sit down, and ask for a submarino. Soon, the waiter appears with a glass of hot steaming milk, and a chocolate bar shaped like a submarine. The idea is that you sink the submarine, then you drink a delicious glass of hot chocolate, perfect for a rainy afternoon. To make it a bit better, they also bring you a cookie.

Fileteado is a Buenos Aires art. It is a decorative and cheerful art that now is painted on business signs, doorways, and restaurants.In the past, trucks and delivery wagons were decorated with it, until it was banned during the military dictatorship of the 1970´s. It is fine, detailed work, full of colorful curlicues. You can see it all over San Telmo. There´s a saying that compares Filete to Tango: The tango is a sad feeling that you dance, and filete is a happy feeling that you paint.

San Telmo has a street fair every Sunday, full of artists and music and crafts.Here is a picture of a small coffee cart that a woman pushes through the fair, selling cups of coffee. We canwalk fifteen minutes from our apartment to arrive at a pedestrian walkway along an open green area that is called the Reserva Ecológica. It´s a haven that borders the Río de la Plata. It is pleasant to walk along the wide walkway. On the weekends, it’s full of people, eating at the parillas and dancing to the music from the boomboxes. After “your parillon” and “my parrillon” here is “the parillon.” This next one also has a partially covered sign, saying, “Let’s have a hand for the cows.”Our apartment has been great. It has everything that we need, namely a kitchen, a place to wash clothes, and a great location.  As we prepare to leave Buenos Aires, we will think of all the people we’ve met, the subway rides, the vibrant music and the late nights, two attempted and unsuccessful pickpocket attempts in the same day, (You can’t take it personally. Details upon request) and our schedule working at the English school and taking Spanish classes, and we´ll miss our apartment. BA has treated us really well. ¡Mi Buenos Aires Querido!  Soon, we’ll be heading for the Uruguayan beaches near the Brazil border, then down toward Patagonia.