If Your Compass Could Talk…

Buenos Aires is perhaps one of the best places in the world to take in some Tango. Whether you want to see a show, take classes or see some street tango, the dance is can be found almost literally around every street corner.

Street Tango

Seeing Tango on the streets is slightly more refined than all the soccer you’re bound to run into in Buenos Aires, but just as prevelant. On Florida street there are Tango dancers almost every few blocks and in the San Telmo fair on Sundays you will also see some impressive dancers.

Take a Class

If you want to take a Tango class you’ve come to the right place Many language schools offer excursions to learn tango and there are probably just as many tango schools and venues as there are tango shows. Many shows have a ‘learn tango’ option if you want to learn some moves from the pros and if you’re savvy enough, you’ll find an underground tango sho.

Watch a Show

You almost have to watch a Tango show if you’re in Buenos Aires. Most shows include dinner and drinks and its a fabulous way to spend the night out. There is the famous Carlos Gardel tango show which houses close to 100 people and offers an amazing dinner. Some of the smaller shows might only seat 20 and is a great idea if you’re looking for a more intimate feel. Faena Hotel is the ritziest tango show in the city and tickets purchased will earn you a private car pick-up, dinner at one of the most exclusive hotels, the tango show itself and an empty wallet. But of course, it’s more than worth the pesos you’ll speand to take part in an iconic Buenos Aires past time.

 

A while back I posted a question about the South American economies and their rate against the dollar. Here is what I think, is the best response:

Think of it this way: if there’s a world wide credit crunch (as it appears there is) and banks and things are cutting credit off to US companies, which have traditionally benefited from extremely generous lending policies and many of which are considered very good credit risks . . . then what do you think happens to under-developed countries, many of which have been recently in default (the equivalent of bankruptcy) and are considered very BAD credit risks – do you think an investor or bank with only limited funds will still keep investing in Latin America or will decide that it’s better to go with the safest of all possible investments (ie. AT HOME and the absolute SAFEST bets at home). Latin America is, essentially, one big sup-prime borrower. And sub-prime bets are all off.

When the developed world falls, the under-developed world tends to fall harder. EVERYONE is freaking out and withdrawing investments – they keep their money in only the safest bets, and sometimes that’s under the mattress. And the safest bets are NEVER in Latin America, even in the best of times. (Latin America is where you go if you want to make lots of money in a short time, but confronting big risks that you might lose it all.) Hence, when the going gets tough US and European currencies will go up – while Latin American currencies will go down.

Also, in Argentina it’s South American economic factors which are driving the lending policies (and the limited interventions from the Argentine central bank, which has lots of US dollars to spend to make sure that the exchange rate is more or less what they want): Brazil just devalued their currency rather significantly, which makes Brazilian goods cheaper in Argentine markets. The way Argentine industry can compete is if the Argentine pesos is also cheap, which means that it needs to be devalued a little – hence the Central Bank of Argentina lets the peso inch upwards against the dollar. (Many economists have argued for a long time that the peso, absent Central Bank interventions, should be valued at 4.00 to the dollar, or even 4.20. )

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