Best part about going out with an Argentine...

...would have to be that I can count spending time with her as productive time, as she doesn't speak any English.*

*Well, that's not quite true. Sometimes she says a two or three words in English, and it's really really cute. I don't want to say anymore in case she reads this and decides to stick it into google translator.

If you ever want to know why the dating culture here is so ridiculous...

...just talk to old ladies on the subway.

Seriously, random old ladies started talking to me on the subway today about how beautiful girls in Buenos Aires were...for minutes. and minutes.

I get tilted when...

Portenos stop me on the street to ask me directions, I tell them where to go, and then they clearly disregard my directions when they hear my accent.

Don't get me wrong, I understand why you wouldn't trust someone who doesn't speak your language, but it annoys the heck out of me anyway.

Cristina isn't a 100% failure?

I've written a few times about how it is impossible to get coins here. Not such a big deal, except that they are necessary to use the bus. Well President Cristina has finally announced that they will put electronic card capability in buses and trains as they already are in the subway.

Bout time. When this eventually happens -- supposedly it will start in 90 days and have a transition "as brief as possible"...I'm guessing this means the transition will take years -- I assume the black market in coins will die. Of course this happens when I have stockpiled like 15 pesos in coins.

Random pictures

I know I'm like a broken record, but my sister tells me she likes pictures, so I post more pictures. Even when they aren't very good.



This is my supermarket, Coto. Not sure what I was doing this day...I was going to the subway I think, and looked back to snap the picture.




I must have been going to Alto Palermo...yup, I was. Alto Palermo is one of the nicer shopping malls in BA. This is the food court, up on the top level (if I recall correctly). I went looking for Wii controllers and it was a fail.

There seems to be no Wiis in the country. I think I saw a Wii priced at something like 1k USD. yeah. wow. socialism is great.




Random street in Recoleta/Barrio Norte. By the way, what is Barrio Norte? Depending on who you talk to, it's the area between Palermo and Recoleta....or the area between Recoleta and Tribunales...or the northern part of Recoleta. It's a little like River Oaks, in that everyone claims to be in Barrio Norte, even if they live at Buffalo Speedway and Kirby.



Well, this was a great picture, wasn't it? It's Plaza Vicente Lopez. There's a fountain in the background, but my photography skillz are lacking.



Not sure, still the same area.



The other side of the plaza. By the way, Plaza Vicente Lopez is not in Vicente Lopez (which is technically a city and country immediately outside Capital Federal).



I made it to Republica. This is the inside.



This is my appetizer. Simple, but it worked pretty well. Note the book. Ten bonus points if you identify it. If it's not my favorite book of all time, it's close.



My main course was a Penne with dried tomatoes and basil. It was good, but I've more or less had it before for lunch here. It was good, but schmeh. This was the dessert. The cheesecake was a bit dry (too long in the fridge?), but those figs (?) were tasty.

Anyway, $13, ship it? I swear I'll never go to a restaurant again in the US because I'll get so angry at how expensive it is. This was no Sudestada for lunch -- even though Sudestada is appetizer, main course, and no dessert -- but man, it was good.



This is the little passageway where Republica is located. Inside that unique little passageway are a few restaurants. 3 are well regarded. Republica, Sirop, and Nectarine. Republica didn't blow me away. Went there for dinner tonight and had extraordinarily slow service. Food was good, but nothing amazing. I felt a little like Jenn did at Cafe Annie: is it really something I should be paying a premium for? Yeah, it's good. But where was the daring? In my two experiences at the restaurant, I literally heard English being spoken by every table. It wasn't all by native speakers, but it's quite obviously tourist dependent.

Especially after going to El Baqueano in San Telmo last week, I was so underwhelmed. El Baqueano was incredible. For the $120 peso tasting menu we had 7 courses with 7 paired wines (it's $165 for the premium wines). Everything was gourmet, everything had thought put into it. The meats were exotic, and while I'm generally skeptical of exotic meats (there's a reason we eat beef, chicken and pork), it was phenomenal. And you know how some meals get better and some get worse with age? El Baqueano continues to improve. Also, they change their tasting menu every day. I should probably be thankful that it's not near me, as I'd probably start eating there daily. The only negatives are that it's in San Telmo, which is not my area, as I said.



Look, I am bad at taking out photos, no? That wasn't something of a translation from Spanish to English of what I'd have said. Anyway, this is El Ateneo, which is a famous bookstore here inside of a former theater.

To be honest, I've been to Bookstop in Houston, over on West Alabama and Shepherd. And, schmeh, this reminds me alot of that. Although this picture is quite dark (and my stats say that almost none of you click the pictures) this is from the second floor of 4 floors. Despite being quite large, there aren't that many books. Despite many trips there with the intent to purchase, I am a failure. I don't know, buying books in a foreign language is hard.





Top of the theater/bookstore. That's a painting, if the picture was good.


Time for bed. Chau chicos.

Chau, besos.

I guess in the process of fitting into the culture, a large step was taken today. I ended my first email or phone call with "un beso." It sounds pretty odd to me, but yes, the normal thing to end things here is by saying "a kiss."

I'm still pretty partial to "later," but what can I say?

My first mate (with my own set)

I finally got around to buying a mate set at the supermarket today. Presented in beautiful style on my bedroom floor, is the thermos, the yerba mate, the cup, and the straw.



Looking down at the open yerba bag. With the cup and straw inside. By the way, that straw cost me 40 pesos! I really don't understand how a metal straw can cost something equivalent to 40 dollars if I was in the US. Anyway, as I took this picture, the water was boiling upstairs. Then I poured it into the thermos.




So, after filling the cup 2/3 of the way up with yerba, you move it all to one side by tilting it. Then you fill it with near-boiling water on the empty side. I tried to get a picture of me doing this, but only succeeded in running out of battery power...and getting lots of pictures of my leg hair. I'll spare you those.



Action shot.

Edit: man, I have long eyelashes.

Ok, I have to go get ready for a party.