My first two weeks in Buenos Aires

So it was in Buenos Aires that I decided to stop backpacking for a month and try to live the life of a Porteña (a person from Buenos Aires). And all I can say is that my first two weeks here have just been totally crazy (or ‘Loco’ as they say in Spanish)!  I have been going to Spanish classes for 3 hours a day, going to the gym, exploring the city and trying (big emphasis on the ‘trying’) to party like a Porteño … which is near impossible for me!  So anyway, here’s a little about my life here in Buenos Aires as well as a few things about the city that I’ve discovered in the first two weeks … 

Where I’m living … Recoleta
I have a great little apartment (well actually it’s only a studio so it’s really just one room) in a suburb called Recoleta. It’s funny that in the advertisement for my apartment, the ad says “and only 4 blocks from the Recoleta Cemetery”. Never before has proximity to a cemetery been a selling point for an apartment! But it is slightly more understandable if you consider that this cemetery is more like a suburb of grand houses; is apparently the most expensive ‘real estate’ per square metre in the country; and that it also houses the grave of the famous Eva Perón. So I live in a very nice neighbourhood, where it’s not uncommon to see a dog with a diamante collar walking around. I can also walk to school in 20 minutes and I have everything I need within a stone’s throw, perfection! 

Dogs … Dog Walkers … Dog Poo … 
There must be more dogs per person in Buenos Aires than any other city in the world, there are dogs and DOG POO everywhere!! People just don’t pick up their dogs poo either, it’s like they are too good to be seen picking up poo, and they don’t seem bothered that it ends up smeared all over the footpath. Dog walking is also a huge business here and it’s not uncommon in the parks to see one person with 10 or 12 dogs on a leash walking around. There are also special enclosures in nearly all the parks just for dogs … crazy stuff. 

Gym … Argentinian Style
So I’ve been back into going to the gym nearly every day here and absolutely loving it! It’s also good Spanish practice, so I have been experimenting with going to a few different classes and find my spinning class the most hilarious, the instructor starts the music and then goes around the room to every single person and gives them a kiss on the cheek and has a bit of a chat about life in general … every now and then he remembers that we’re actually cycling and tells us what to do! He rarely cycles and I’ve seen him get on his bike just once. Then at the end of the class he gives everyone another kiss goodbye on a somewhat more sweaty cheek at this point … all quite different to what I was accustomed to in the UK. I also do a Latin beats dance class which is a mix of salsa, reggaetone and cha cha, very good fun and doesn’t really feel like I’m working out at all! 

Crazy nightlife
The nightlife in Argentina certainly takes a LOT of getting used to. I heard a New Yorker say last week that this is the first city he’d found that had a night life later than New York. People here only go out to dinner around 10pm at the EARLIEST and then the clubs only start pumping around 3am in the morning, so the majority of people usually party until 7am or so in the morning. It is way too crazy for me. I was quite proud of myself staying out at salsa one night until 6.30am, but then my body didn’t recover for over a week … I definitely can’t bounce back like I used to! 

Meeting some cool people and getting out and about
I have been having such a great time in Buenos Aires mostly thanks to meeting some great people in my first week here. One chica in particular is Dymutsja, from Suriname (that’s the country at the top of South America that is a dutch colony). We’ve spent many hours speaking Spanish, exploring the city, partying, going to the gym etc … and Buenos Aires wouldn’t have been the same without her! 

Black Eyed Peas … Dymutsja and I were so stoked to go to see Black Eyed Peas live in concert on my second weekend here. It was part of the Pepsi Music Festival, so we also got to see a few other local bands, where we were the only 2 people in the entire audience that didn’t know and weren’t screaming out the words to the songs. There was nothing we could do to try to pretend to be a local in this situation! Then when the black eyed peas came on the crowd went absolutely crazy! I was actually fearing for my life at one point and got myself out of the mosh pit and slightly further back where I wouldn’t get trampled to death! But black eyed peas were amazing in concert and we could at least sing along to the words of their music!! 

Tigre: We also did a day trip to a nearby town of Tigre on the outskirts of Buenos Aires where the pace definitely drops a notch and we we eating ice cream in the blazing sun by the river, perfectly tranquilo. We also took a boat ride around the islands which was nice and explored the markets. But we headed back to Buenos Aires for a great Indian meal in the evening. 

Tango baby
Well Buenos Aires is the city of tango and so I of course fitted a night of tango into my first two weeks in the city. I went to a tango show at the very famous and traditional ‘Cafe Tortoni’ where I watched in awe as the couple moved around the stage so quickly, gracefully and elegantly, all the while with legs flying in every direction, while they performed this sensual dance of love. But I warn any guy that wants to have kids to take precaution learning this dance, it looks quite precarious … 

Speaking Spanish … with an accent
Well just when I thought Spanish couldn’t get any harder, I arrived in Buenos Aires where the accent is just so different from the rest of South America. For example, the word for street in Spanish is ‘Calle’, which is normally pronounced ´Car-yeah´whereas here in Buenos Aires it is pronounced ‘Car-Sheh’… completely disorientating and definitely has taken my first two weeks just to acclimatise my ear again to this strange accent. However my Spanish classes have been going really well, my school is great and I have a lot of fun in my classes, so the 3 hours really flys by. 

And that’s only my first two weeks, you can understand why life here is pretty exhausting hey! I will hopefully get another blog done of my latest adventures soon, including football games and a trip to nearby Uruguay.  Please keep in touch, Tamara 😊