Wander Woman
31 May 2005 (Tuesday) – Buenos Aires, Argentina
What would I do today? Wander around again, I supposed. Yes, after all, wandering around was how I had grown to know and love the city. My 2 months here in 2002 were spent checking out this barrio (neighbourhood) and that, navigating around by taking random buses using the excellent “Guia T” (Buenos Aires’ mammoth of a street directory with details on bus routes and everything), meandering down various streets and getting the feel of the barrios – ultra-snooty (Recoleta, San Isidro), upper-middle-class (Palermo, Belgrano), middle-class (Caballito, Flores, Floresta), somewhat low-class (Chacarita) and downright trashy (Once, near La Boca).
I was walking towards Av. Rivadavia along Av. Medrano when lo and behold, I happened upon Claudio, Claudia’s ex-husband!
Imagine, in an immense city of 12 million people (or rather 12.5 million as corrected by Claudio), with A LOT OF criss-crossing streets and an infinite time-span, what are the odds of anyone running into anyone familiar in this city, especially for me when I know like, what, 5 people here? Buenos Aires’ streets are designed such that in general, a block is about 100 m long. So after each 100 m, there would be a street that cuts across. Hence, at each intersection, there are 4 possibilities of heading off. As I had mentioned yesterday, the number of possible ways to go anywhere is frankly infinite as well! ¡Que raro!
Once I reached Av. Rivadavia, for want of a destination to meander to, I decided to try and walk about 40 blocks to the barrio Floresta where I had stayed for 2 months then. Well, for old time sake. I am c-r-a-z-y!
It was a rather pleasant walk, as I stopped by kioscos to grab a superpancho (hot-dog) and a drink, admired the flowers found in the numerous florists located at nearly every block along this avenue, recognised this church and that park, enjoyed the aromas of mani (peanuts) and choripans (barbecued sausages clasped in buns) being cooked on the streets, avoided dogs’ poo and also the footprint stains of those who did not manage to avoid the dogs’ poo (often overlooked), popped into different stores having whatever on sale. The avenue is very long and the feel of the area subtly changed from fashionably trendy clothes stores and bookshops (around Caballito) to rather run-down shops selling tacky household wares and antiques.
I took my time but I was exhausted by the end of the walk. I grabbed a bus to try and go to Chacarita where there is a cemetery which I thought I could check out. Oooo… the area looked downright dodgy but by then, the cemetery had closed. As the bus passed by Av. Cordoba, I instinctively hopped off. I figured I would try and head home from here. Oh well, it was another 20 blocks to cover. ¡Vamos!
That evening, I met up with Diego, a new friend who had contacted me through Virtual Tourist, a travel-related website. We headed to Palermo Soho for a bite and a drink. Usually, on weekends, this area would be full of people but today, it was very quiet. The night scene of Buenos Aires had frankly changed a lot since the fire disaster in late December 2004 where more than 190 young people were killed. I did not know that they were killed from cyanide poisoning, some sort of chemical reaction that happened when the roof caught fire, and not from smoke inhalation! Gosh, I had no idea at all. The incident happened merely 3 days after the tsunami disaster in Asia. In Singapore, I remember reading a tiny article about the fire disaster in Buenos Aires but well, there and then, the news was just full of the tsunami horrors that had happened at our doorstep, nothing much about the rest of the world. Since the fire, many discotheques closed down in Buenos Aires and the night scene basically died with it. Slowly, they are coming back, it seemed, as Diego informed me.
As I headed home at 11pm or so, I passed by several restaurants near Claudia’s house. Sheesh, this was another characteristic of Buenos Aires that I found quite interesting. At 7pm just now, when I was here, the restaurants were empty and I had thought that the food here must be crappy since obviously no one came. But now, they were all full, the Chinese restaurant, the bife restaurant, all full. Gosh. The porteños just enjoy going out really late.
I collapsed into the couch soon after I got home. I calculated the distance I covered today – well, nearly 14km.
Hmmm… useless amusing statistics time – My country, Singapore, is what… 45 km long? So, effectively, I covered 1/3 of the length of my country. My goodness, tomorrow, I am taking a break!
Tags: 01) Imagining Argentina, Buenos Aires
swesn