Last Tango in Buenos Aires

« Return to Argentina

The following day, I managed to walk around before it got dark (I only got to bed about 7am…The Milhouse parties until the lost person passes out on the couch). Rafael, who heads up a backpacker travel agency, gave me the best advice I received all week. “When walking in Buenos Aires, look up!” All along the wide boulevards, old streets and modern pedestrian channels, I kept staring at the architecture, amazed by its grandeur and opulence. With heavy colonial, gothic and art nouveau flavours, B.A is a wonder to walk around. Monuments and heroic statues are everywhere, as are throngs of people, many of whom, admittedly, are gorgeous women living up to the hype. It was easy to get lost, and even easier not to care. That night I had arranged to meet Jessica, who was a friend of Marika, who I had met in Bolivia. The meeting point was a gallery opening at the Metropolitano Museum. It was a ritzy affair, TV cameras, high society stuff. Within moments I was drinking complimentary pink champagne and surrounded by models and actresses, which was truly awful, no really. Here I met the lovely Jessica, and Luz, a French actress who looked like but didn’t like Julie Delpy, and Santiago a painter, and Frederick and his lunatic wife Sophie, who embarrassed me with her three ribald answers for my Finish the Sentence. Drinks followed, but I rued my misfortunate haircut that morning, which shaved me down the bone and let the autumn air chill my brain. The hairdresser went a little nuts with the clippers, but I only have myself to blame. I should have gone with a mullet to fit in with the futbol-crazy Argentinean men.

My days were spent sleeping, recovering, walking around, and eating massive lunches at the All You Can Eat Buffets. At any of the Parrilla Libres, you could eat BBQ’d beef, chicken and lamb, help yourself to a massive salad bar, eat one of a dozen stews or Chinese dishes, all the garnishes and condiments, even grab some sushi, for the whopping price of $3US. Subsequently, I would eat only one meal a day, but what a feast! The best of the lot, a place called Grant’s in the swank suburb of Recoleta, even had personal chefs to cook up your own concoctions. Gourmet heaven, especially for meat and potato typesÉone piece of steak was bigger than my dinner plate.

The following night I met some more locals, a birthday party for Gaby, who I had shared a jeep with on the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia. Her friendly pals took to me warmly, although my lack of Spanish wasn’t helping the situation. Post party was another party, at a hectically crowded bar. Around Christmas last year, a fire in a nightclub in Buenos Aires killed 175 people and injured 700. Clubs are only just starting to re-open, having been scrutinized for fire regulations, but the tragedy is still devastating what was once the biggest nightclub scene in South America. “Many people still don’t know where to go,” says Miguel, “it will take time to recover.” Nevertheless, the four clubs I went to this week were all jammed to the point of dangerous absurdity.

On Monday and Thursday, The Milhouse hosts its own party, for its past, current and future patrons. “The key is to stay a few days, meet some good people, then go somewhere else for the option of sleep, but come party at The Milhouse,” Phillipe may or may not have said over the booming music. It appeared that half of England had moved into the Milhouse, specifically the half that is blonde and doe eyed with Essex accents. On Saturday they all joined me for the a truly authentic B.A. experience, a local football game. The home side, River Plate, is currently top of the league and the visitors, Lanus, evoked hysterics from Gaby and her friends - a kind of best vs. the worst scenario. The National Stadium, which holds 60 000, was almost three quarters full, draped in red and white. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen a tattooed mullet break a stadium chair in two because of a ref’s whistle. The score was 1-1, but I was more interested in the war chants, the passion, the ferocity of the fans. I realized that the drop in centuries of bloody Latin American warfare is directly related to the rise of organized religion, by that I mean organized football leagues. The Lanus fans were highly vocal, directly opposed to the River Plate standing section. A hundreds years ago, they would have run onto the field and slaughtered each other, but with the aid of a little ball and two nets, mankind has moved on. The visiting fans evacuated directly after the final whistle, and no one was allowed to leave their seats until they were all out the stadium, thus preventing certain bloodshed. People here are crazy about soccer. Maradona, that washed-up, coked-out little gremlin, even has his own museum in Buenos Aires. The Hand of God indeed.

By the weekend, it was all getting too much for me. Plans were running askew, misinformation abounded, and the constant flow of cheap Quilmes beer clouded the clean skies of my better judgment. A storm was approaching, and it hit me Saturday night when all my plans bottomed out, along with my energy, motivation, or willingness to talk to English lads and ladies looking to large it. I stayed in, read my book, tried to sleep through the gothic sub-woofer thump located next to my pillow, and the persistent whine of venomous mosquito. I checked out the next morning, burnt like a used match, found a quiet hostel in the lovely suburb of San Telmo, and slept for a day.

I realized on May 1st that I have less than a month left in South America. The cost and effort of taking in Uruguay suddenly seems too big a hurdle to leap, especially in my current state. So I booked a night bus for the infamously beautiful and chilled out Iguazu Falls, where I will enter the world that is Brazil for the final push in this step of Modern Gonzo. While I found myself thinking how easy it would be to live in Buenos Aires, with its boulevards, beef and beauties, the city nevertheless wore me down like a used brake pad. Time to take control of the wheel again.

Hostal Tangotelmo
Buenos Aires

Gonzo Gallery for Last Tango in Buenos Aires

view full gallery

Tweet