san telmo

went for a stroll around San Telmo on the weekend. According to the guide books, the portenos don't like to go there because it is too touristy. No-one seemed to have told the locals, because the place was crowded.
Lots of wonderful old buildings ranging from the decrepit to the lovingly redeployed.
This house (Galerie de la Defensa) would once have been a single-family house, now carved up into antique and curio shops.

Some of the local people could also have benefited from some sensitive restoration.
Even the local cats and dogs got to enjoy the winter sunshine.

From 20070729_BA_S...

if it's wednesday, this must be bristol

...not a gondola in sight, but it's certainly wet enough for it.
Have just lived through the flying visit from hell. Left BA Tues 12:30. Arrived Heathrow Wed 08:30. Arrived Bristol Wed 11:00. Left Bristol Thur 16:30. Arrived Heathrow Thur 19:00. Left Heathrow Thur 10:30. Arrived BA Fri 09:30.
Where am I? What time is it? Why is my back so sore?
British Airways staff lived up to their sterling reputation (grey, tarnished and hard). They have taken grudging compliance to that knife-edge between smiling service and open hostility.
Food between Buenos Aires and Sao Paulo appeared to be made from various samples of industrial rubber. I think the chicken was a mercy killing.
Sao Paulo was wet but forgettable - they did turn the VOD back on to while away the extra hour and a half while they tried to work out what was wrong with the plane. I kept busy trying to work out what was wrong with my stomach after that chicken.
Back in the air again they racked up the service a notch. Whoever designed the new Club World clearly doesn't like the staff. They had to bend, stretch and contort to get anything to the poor souls in the window seats (i.e. me), which clearly didn't enhance their mood.
After all the warnings I expected Heathrow to be a hotbed of suspicion (not). I should have trusted in the famous British disinterest. At least passport control was interesting. After 16 hours in the air, I found myself trying to explain to the passport man how I could be travelling on a NZ passport, live in Australia, be coming from Argentina and only planning to spend 2 days in the country without looking like my motives were suspect. I finally told him who I worked for and he just laughed and stamped everything. Must see haggard antipodeans with laptops and strange points of origin all the time.
Bristol was an easy drive up the motorway, and the driver was friendly.
Checked into the Mercure Brigstow no problems. The Mercure lived up to the expected standard of a Mercure, qualified by its being an English Mercure. I.e. take middling and add indifference. The room was adequate apart from the intermittent hot water and the two single beds. For one night I couldn't be bothered changing.
The room service trays and empty bottles left in the hall until 6pm were disconcerting, but not unexpected.
Had a good afternoon in the office - worth the trip. Gave up trying to stay awake and interested about 5:00 and went back to the hotel.
Too early to eat and all the shops were shut, so walked around in the late summer light for a while, admiring the weird giant seagulls and the pub flowerpots .
You could tell it was summer, because it was a balmy 18 degrees and people were sitting outside. Dinner was a quite good salad nicoise and hummus at a restaurant on the river (see menu).
Went back to the hotel expecting to sleep the sleep of the just (worn out) - was just finally dozing off about 4:00am when I got a phone call from Australia about something trivial. Memo to self - turn phone off when out of normal time zone.
Got about 2 hours sleep. Dragged myself to the gym at 07:00 to try to get some circulation back into my body. I think that was probably what finally did for my back.
Spent a few more hours in the office, and played hooky to visit some of the shops we don't get at home. Weather too miserable to do anything outdoors. I heard on the radio that England is experiencing its wettest three months since 1750. For more pictures of soggy Bristol, see below.
Driving back to Heathrow took an extra hour. Luckily I got nervous and moved the car booking forward an hour, or else I would have been late for the plane. Another talkative driver - he told me lots of office gossip, and took great pleasure in pointing out the Slough Trading Estate sign (home of The Office).
Leaving Heathrow straightforward. Was expecting the one-bag carryon rule, though many in the queue were shocked & disappointed. At least they didn't seem to care how big the bag was. It's all on the website, people, if you can afford a business class airfare you can afford an Internet connection...
Going back to Buenos Aires was just the same as leaving, except with worse seats (the old version of Club World). Buenos Aires airport a lot less nerve-racking the second time, also daylight and no snow.
Now back in Argentina, which is starting to feel strangely normal...

20070726_Bristol

suburban weekend

This is the view from my apartment at about 9:00 on Saturday. As you can see, the weekend weather was sublime. I think the temperature peaked at about 13 degrees. This was the first time I tried the trek to the supermarket. It wasn't too bad.
The nearest market is 4km away, but it is a fairly pleasant walk through downtown, and I managed to get a few days' worth of groceries into my backpack. Walking is the only exercise I'm getting at the moment, so I shouldn't complain. The only odd thing at the supermarket was that they asked for my passport when I paid by credit card, and there is a place on the docket to put your passport number. Apparently they used to have a lot of credit card fraud.

I spent most of the weekend with a colleague from work, doing lunch, shopping, etc. We had lunch in Palermo. Despite the picture to the right, it is quite a chic area - full of clothing shops and restaurants.
We had lunch at a restaurant whose name escapes me. Though the menu was heavy on the less appealing internal parts of animals (gizzards?), they did nice salads.
Sunday we went to an up-market riverside suburb called Martinez, had lunch and walked along the river for a little while. It was a bit too cold and miserable to be out, so I felt for this homeless guy with his little fire on the river bank. We got to go to the mall and have coffee to keep warm.

no delante de los criados

My apartment has a cleaner. Normal, right? Not this cleaner.
When I got home Tuesday night I thought I had been visited by a poltergeist. Everything, I mean everything had been moved. She moved the sofas back where they were before I moved them. She moved the blue pouffe from the living room to under the dressing table in the bedroom (re-locating my luggage to do so). She moved every candle from where it was to somewhere else. She moved the bath salts from the shelf to the bath tub and changed the hook the loofah was hanging on. She burnt incense in the sink and moved my battery chargers from the living room shelf to a chair.
The strange thing was she didn't actually clean anything.
Of course I was braced for the worst when I came home last night. Would I find the stove hanging from the ceiling? Would all the chairs be piled on the balcony? Would she add dirt?
It wasn't too bad.
She cleaned things. All the furniture and the knick knacks were where she left them. She did move my shoes, relocate the spice rack, fold the clothes I left lying around and hide the ironing board, but I eventually found the extra blue blanket (in the bed). Perhaps tonight I will find my coffee cup. It's probably in the bathroom cupboard with bath salts in it.

Puerto Madero and Costanera Sur

20070715_BA_puerto_madero

Puerto Madero is very new. So new in fact, half of it is under construction. Though it is well-supplied with up-market restaurants, furniture stores and hairdressers, it lacks the basic suburban amenities - supermarkets, banks, bookshops, public transport,etc. I expect my next purchase to be a granny trolley on wheels so I can trundle my vegetables home from across the tram tracks.

East of Puerto Madero is the giant nature reserve of Costanera Sur - several square kilometres of pampas grass and wetland, bordered by the Rio de la Plata (see pictures). First time I ever saw a river I couldn't see across. If the air was clearer and I was standing on something taller I could probably see Uruguay.

Costanera Sur is crawling with wildlife - mostly wearing jogging suits and toting IPods, but I did see a few non-human denizens. Lots of birds - egrets, hawks, woodpeckers, and at least one coypu (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coypu).

Recoleta

20070714_BA_Recoleta

Recoleta is a collection of parks and green spaces with a little cemetery in the middle. If you have ever visited Pere Lachaise in Paris, you will feel right at home. The cemetery is a compact wonderland of funerary art, populated by plump, indolent and very grubby cats who stroll among the visitors with complete indifference. Evita's tomb is here - still with fresh flowers every day.

The park is next to a graceful little church (see pictures). The cloisters next to the church have been turned into a cultural centre which is in varying degrees of restored condition. If you are looking for design or homewares, the mall next door is the place to go.

On the weekend, the green space around the cemetery filled up with craft stalls. I bought a bright purple cotton scarf and a New Zealand 10c piece with the background carefully drilled out. Lots of people were strolling around exercising their dogs, and there were musicians playing tango on the footpath.

you are now leaving the zone

on this side of the line of naval control - peace, tranquility, nice lighting, bridges and boats...

on the other side of the tram tracks...cardboard collectors and stray dogs where Juan first met Eva.

Dead Cow Culture

everything here has dead cow in it - seriously, everything. I had dinner in the hotel restaurant last night (yes Tony, I do know better). Menu - cowhide. Placemat - cowhide (hair still on). Amuse bouche - something pink on toast, but I'm sure there was cow in there somewhere. I think I had hake, but it could have been dugong...
Two loud Americans at the next table - definitely cows.

Welcome to Buenos Aires

well, I've survived the plane trip and gotten through the first couple of days in the office. Weather is cold and clear. Have not yet managed to get out of line-of-sight of the hotel, but hope to remedy this (and do some shopping) on the weekend.
We are in Puerto Modero, which is supposed to be one of the safest parts of town. The high degree of police presence (both naval & other) is very reassuring. We have been out to dinner a couple of times - a tip for travellers - if you don't eat red meat or drink red wine, you are going to have an interesting time...
Moving to an apartment Monday, so should start living more like a normal Argentinian from then on.
Here is the view from the office at about 8:00 this morning (which is also the view from the hotel because they are next door to each other). Click on the picture to see more views of the neighbourhood.

20070712_BA