La Bomba de Tiempo and Asia de Cuba

In our never-ending quest to find the best local events and live music, we heard from several sources that the best option is "La Bomba de Tiempo" (time bomb).  Every Monday, at a former oil factory-turned live music venue (El Konex), a strange and wonderful thing happens.  Different drummers, traditional; tribal; modern; and other percussionists play a set that starts promptly at 8 pm.  The set continues for exactly 2 hours, building in intensity, until a spectacular finish at 10 pm exactly ... hence "La Bomba de Tiempo".

The entry fee is minimal, the  beer is cheap, and the smell of weed smoke pervades.  Very hippy, very fun.

While there, we also met a great couple from London - Pritesh and Rakhi.  They had only one week in BsAs, and like us they wanted to make sure they at least attempted an Argentine eveniing of partying till dawn.  We all agreed to meet up at the end of the week at Asia de Cuba, a dance club in the Puerto Madero barrio, for a night of dancing till dawn.  We also met Pritesh and Rakhi that week for a foray into a closed-door club "Frank" (perhaps that one will be a later blog post).

At Asia de Cuba on Friday, we met Pritesh and Rakhi around midnight. The club itself is fairly well-heeled.  Only the monied Argentines and foreign tourists are in evidence.  Merely sitting at a table will cost you $40 US, and our one bottle of vodka between the 4 of us was $200 US.  Yikes!  Thanks to Rakhi's powers of persuasion, however (we still owe you for that one!), Jax and I paid no table fee since Pritesh and Rakhi ate dinner at the club and we managed to horn in on their reservation 2 hours later.

Needless to say, one empty bottle of vodka later we were putting our chairs on the table to make some room and shaking it like teenagers to the likes of Michael Jackson, Erasure, Beyonce, and innumerable Latin stars that we didn't recognize.  Our photos are a little suspect for obvious reasons, but Pritesh and Rakhi should have a few good ones - hopefully they can contribute!

At some point, probably around 4 am, Pritesh and Rakhi threw in the towel.  Jax and I were not far behind, stumbling out of the club at around 5.  Our timing was perfect, however.  We made it back to our roof just in time for the sunrise.

Even More New Friends

You can take the American out of America, but you can't take America out of the American.  While we both love to immerse ourselves in local culture, there was at least one thing we couldn't live without: NFL Playoffs.

We researched several places to watch the Playoffs, and settled on two places run American expats: Casa Bar and Alamo Bar.  We tried both and decided we liked the crowd better at Casa Bar.  We also learned quite a bit about how expats struggle to get their home teams televised "in the manner to which they are accustomed".  For instance, here in BsAs - NFC games are televised on Fox Sports, but the simulcast is in Spanish.  Probably great for the 6 people native to Argentina who like American football, but when you're in a bar full of Americans decked out in their team gear, it can be frustrating to watch Troy and Chris do the halftime commentary while a steady stream of pop songs plays over the speakers.  AFC games, however, are golden.  They play on ESPN with English simulcast.  And by that time, the crowd is good and tipsy, so the camaraderie and rivalries get more energetic.

During one of our football Sundays, we met Andrew - an American living in BsAs - and hit it off with him.  We decided to meet up later that week for dinner and drinks, and on his suggestion we decided on a local Thai restaurant near our apartment.  Great choice, as it turns out, because the food was excellent and the cocktails were even better!  Argentine food is never very spicy, so Sudestada is one of the only places in town you can get truly lip-burning spicy food.  I had the rabbit, Jax had the best fish of the trip, Andrew had a curry chicken, and we split some samosas and "gyozas".

After dinner, we headed to 878, another closed-door club to continue the drinking and conversation.

I would love to post pictures of our meal, but as it turns out my camera (Jax's camera has decided to retire) takes terrible, blurry photos, and the restaurant might not be happy if we posted the ones we have.  We do have a few usable photos from 878;  here's me, Jax, and Andrew well into our 5th drink:

And the DJ:



El Baqueano

I'm a sucker for weird food. It's always puzzled me how we construct our food taboos, why some folks choose to eat certain things that other folks won't touch, and why some animals are sacred and are, literally, off the table. It's with this curiosity that we sought out El Baqueano, a restaurant known for serving native Argentine animals. No beef, chicken or pork here.

It's a set menu, so there's no ordering stress. 

I must admit, I was a little disappointed there was no rodent...are they ever really out of season?  But there was:

*Usuzukari (Japanese for 'thin slice') of river fish with soy sauce caviar - the highlight I thought

*Carpaccio of llama - rather mild

*Deconstructed Russian salad - a favorite here that's potatoes, carrots and peas held together by mayo

*Dumplings of Latin American alligator - could have benefited from sesame or ginger in the dumpling

*Rice soup with local prawns

*Whisky cream

*New interpretation of local coffee - layers of flavors and textures, but ridiculously sweet

Then we acted like youngsters and pulled an all-nighter at Club Asia de Cuba!

Sunrise from our rooftop.

All and all, a more adventurous than delicious meal.  It was one of our more expensive dinners in town; not sure the food really measured up although the service was outstanding.  If you're in BsAs for a while, put it on your list.  If you're here for a week, don't bother.
http://restoelbaqueano.com/



The People of Buenos Aires

If you read too many guide books or blogs about Argentina, you might travel here with the sense that everyone is going to pick your pocket, that every taxi driver will rip you off, and you might even get roughed up on the street and robbed.  I'm not kidding!  All the guidebooks are full of warnings to that effect - it's enough to make you paranoid.

Our experience has not been like that at all.  Yes, we've had the occasional sketchy moment on the Subte, or been suspicious that a taxi driver may have overcharged us.  But for the most part, a basic level of awareness and precaution that you would take in any big city is all you need to fit right in with no trouble (some basic Spanish doesn't hurt).

What HAS surprised us, however, is the strange dual-personality that the city has.  On the one hand, people on the street don't smile.  Ever.  They won't look you in the eye, and if you're not careful people walking the other direction will plow right into you and never slow down at all.  In fact, we suspect they might go out of their way to plow into you.  And then there's the servers in cafes and restaurants.  Bring a rape whistle to get their attention, otherwise they will stand around and smoke cigarettes or chat up their friends, completely ignoring you.

On the other hand, when you get further than "Buenas tardes" and start having a conversation, the Portenos are surprisingly warm and effusive.  They seem suspicious and impolite to strangers, but all it takes is a short introduction, and suddenly you are a dear friend.  Here are some of our favorite examples of the "friends" we have made:

This is Manuel.  He spotted us standing on a street in the San Telmo market puzzling over a map and asked where we were going.  After giving us some pretty detailed directions, he began asking us lots of questions about our lives and our travels.  Turns out he's a total renaissance man - poet, musician, artist (he was selling sculptures and drawings in the Market), certified electrician, philosopher, grandfather, and (ahem) a bit of a Casanova.  He spoke excellent English from his decade in Canada working as an electrician, and gave us some poignant advice on life and love.

 

This is Tony.  We discovered his booth by chance when we were wandering through a public antiques warehouse.  Apparently he's a local celebrity - we later spotted a billboard with his face on it.  Tony makes all kinds of strange creations out of everyday items like bottlecaps and flatware, but his main concern is bizarre hats (as you can see).  He spoke no English, but he entertained us for a while with his facial expressions and crazy gestures.  He was no-holds-barred, giving us lollipops, posing for lots of photos and even directing the shoot.  Very particular, when she wasn't adequately following his stage direction, I think he called Jax a "maricon" (look it up).

 



Other wonderful people (whose pictures we don't have or didn't satisfy our standards of publication):

Luli -our amazing tour guide in Mendoza who enlightened us on Argentinian culture, wine, the land, and never got impatient with the overly friendly Americans after we'd had lots of wine.

The couple from El Primo - our first parilla dinner, we sat next to a couple who did not speak throughout dinner until we started struggling over some culinary words in the dictionary.  They were clearly amused and helped us with a smile, even offering some good advice about where to do some shopping outside the tourist traps.

The Ant-Guy - for some reason we got sidetracked one day by a colony of ants moving single-file across a huge plaza.  As we were taking pictures, a young Argentinian guy came up and started a conversation because he thought anyone squatting in traffic photographing ants had to be interesting.  He was a bit disheveled, a photographer himself, and possibly a paralegal?  That part was a little unclear and hard to believe, but he was really friendly and gave us some good advice on how to avoid being targets of the local pickpockets.

The Auntie from La Poesia - one of the many (no really ... many) elderly people that Jax wants to take home with us.  In an amazing cafe in San Telmo (read about it here), she sauntered in, sat next to us at a table set for 4, ordered a 7-up, and started chatting with us after hearing our English conversation.  We particularly liked her because she didn't bother to slow down her Spanish, but would happily repeat or explain things we missed.  Excellent conversation practice.

Viva la pizza!

We walked a ridiculous distance, what felt like half way across the city, to this joint on a guidebook recommendation.  These so called 'guide' books have steered us wrong before, so I was a bit hesitant.  The desire for cheese coupled with the fact we had to try the famous fugazetta pie won out though so we took to the streets and were well rewarded for our journey.

Welcome to El Cuartito - one of the cutest pizzaria's I've ever seen.

And proud too, of their heritage, Argentina's sports stars and their pies.

Holy ham and cheese!

This thing was an oozing doozie, stuffed with mozzerella and queso crema, then topped with ham, covered in parmesean and sweet onions then baked/broiled to a toasty perfection.
   

It was so good that I carried our leftovers around in my purse for hours as we toured the city, flat out refusing to leave 2 slices on the table.  It was a slightly mishapen but delicious brunch the next day.

Buenos Aires’ Notable Bars - Le Caravalle

I adore this place. 

The touristy street it's set on belies how earnest the little coffee shop is inside. 

It was all old men, reading newspapers and small talking at the old glass counters that display the day's sandwiches and empanadas. 

The sounds of the espresso machine, clanking of cups and baritone chatter were soothing. 

And this place served up one of the tastiest empanadas and best cups of joe I've had in the city.    

San Telmo

I had almost written this neighborhood off as a tourist trap before we ever visited.  Shame on me.  While it did have the obligatory craft and 'antiques' (probably just new, dusty junk) markets...

and street performers...

 it also had great food (see the post on La Poesia too),

...true character...

 ...a gorgeous covered food and sundries market...

and an evening milonga with locals in their best threads doing the tango in the plaza.

They announced that this fellow is 80 years old.  He was funky like James Brown and agile.  After this spin, he parked it on the sideline and lit up a smoke.  Ha, ha...

The neighborhood is really charming with its decaying, luxurious architecture and vibrant buzz.  I could easily lose whole days winding my way through its maze of cobblestone streets.