Our first week living in Buenos Aires
If you plan on visiting Buenos Aires, check out the google maps link I created.
Saturday
We explored the El Ateneo Grand Splendid, an old theater turned into a bookstore
And then we took a free walking tour of Recoleta. I swear, free walking tours are the best way to explore a city.
On the tour we learned the following from our guide:
- Once BA opened its borders to immigrants, in 20 years the population size doubled from 2 mil to 4 million
- Argentina received a lot of immigrants from italy
- Templo Libertad – Museo Judío de Buenos Aires
- Argentina has the second largest Jewish community in the American continents (more than 200,000)
- Also (not a BA fun fact but a general knowledge fact) the Spock hand gesture is Jewish. It is hard to see but here is an image from a temple in BA with two hands over the door using the “live long and prosper” hand gestures
- Teatro Nacional Cervantes – Is the only national theater
- Argentina started to make money in the 1880’s because it started exporting grain and meat
- 9 de Julio was the widest street in the world up until 2006 when it lost the record to a road in Brasilia.
- 9 de Julio has 22 lanes.
- 9 de Julio was created in the 30’s, it is named for the day Argentina won its independence.
- When Argentina won the World Cup, 5 million people met in 9 de Julio and it was the largest gathering of people in Argentina on record
- The Obelisk, located in 9 de Julio, is located where it is because there used to be a church there. That church was the first location that the Argentine flag was raised. Since they demolished the church to build the road, they wanted to build something in its place to commemorate that location.
- Palacio San Martín
- Iron door was brought from Europe here in one price. If the iron door was sold, all Argentine debts could be covered (this may be an over exaggeration from our tour guide..?)
- After Wall Street crisis, the Palacio San Martin was sold. The building is now the Argentine Chancellors office. The Argentine chancellor deals with foreign policy.
An Argentine Revenge Story written in Stone
- The Basílica del Santísimo Sacramento wasbuilt by Mercedes Castellanos de Anchorena Mercedes, owner of the Palacio San Martín
- Mercedes’ son fell in love with Corina Kavanagh. Even though Corina was rich, she was not an aristocrat so Mercedes did not allow her son to marry Corina
- The son was a gambler/drunk and he lost some of his families lands in a horse race. One plot of this land was located right in front of the Basílica del Santísimo
- Corina bought the land and in front of the Sanchorina church and built a giant tall “ugly” tower there so that it blocked the view of the church
- And to top it off, the only street you can see the church from is named: Corina Kavanagh
- This “ugly” tower is now the most expensive place to live in the city
- San Martin Square
- San Martin is a famous and beloved Argentine Military general.
- In 1808 Napoleon held the current King of Spain (Ferdinand VII) in prison, so Spain made a counsel to lead the country. This crashed in 1 year so then Argentina was like “why are we listening to a country that has no king, let’s be free”.
- San Martin studied Napoleonic military tactics in Spain.
- In 1812 San Martin returned to Argentina to free Argentina, but the government was suspicious because San Martin was coming from Spain. That being said, they came around to trust him.
- The San Martin Square (SMS) is where San Martin organized his military in BA
- San Martin used Napoleonic tactics to free Argentina from Spain, then he freed Chile and Peru.
- He died in 1850
- The statue in the SMS square is the first statue of San Martin ever made. He is pointing west towards the Andes.
- Chile was going to make the statue first but the Argentine government heard about that and so they paid the artist double to come to AR first so that AR could claim the first statue (he was Argentine after all).
- The Malvinas Islands – (The Falkland Islands)
- The government decided to start a war with the UK over the Falkland Islands
- In Argentina they still claim it as theirs (you will see signs like this all over Argentina)
- Sadly there were more suicides than casualties in the war over the Marinas
- Argentina has been a democracy since 1983
- Why is this neighborhood called Recoleta?
- A group of Franciscan monks Calle s the Recoletans was here
- Basílica Nuestra Señora del Pilar — a Recoleta church. Only colonial building in all of our tour
- Currently Argentina undergoes 100% of inflation a year
After the tour we went to Buller Brewing, a bar across from Cementerio de la Recoleta, and we met two locals, meeting Lucky and Alejandro.
Sunday
We went to the San Telmo market, an outdoor street market with pop up tents selling anything from antiques to clothing to jewelry. Little did we know that going to this market every Sunday would become a tradition of our (also because the food in San Telmo is so good).
The work week
Half (medio) work, medio fun.
Tyler worked in the afternoons, so most mornings we either ate eggs at home, or we explored nearby cafes (to see the places we frequented, check out my Buenos Aires page or explore the google map I made). Since moving to Argentina was a relatively last minute change, Tyler and I had not done much research on Buenos Aires or what to do, and since my spanish class would not start until the following monday, I spent a lot of time wandering the streets, researching what to do, and trying to get plugged in with some local social groups.
One group I found was a small WhatsApp group of travelers in Buenos Aires interested in attending soccer (fútbol) matches. Early on in the week, one member said he was going to buy tickets to go see a Racing match, and so Tyler and I decided to join and buy tickets as well. Yes! Our first fútbol match in South America was booked!
I got plugged in with a local WhatsApp ground called ‘Foodies Buenos Aires’. This group not only is full of foodies, but we hav found it to be one of our favorite social groups. People are always chatting about their favorite places to eat and inviting others to join them in testing out different restaurants. The first Thursday we were in BA, they had an event at a Strange Brewery (una cerveceria) 20 minutes away from our apartment (apartamento).
We left after Tyler finished work for the night (~8 PM), and arrived to find a lively, bustling brewery similar to one we would go to in the States. Tyler and I love a good brewery so rightly, we were stoked.
Technically, the Foodies Group event was full. They were gathering in a room in the back of the Brewery and it had limited seating, but Tyler and I figured we would try and join anyway. That being said, initially we could not go back there, and the Brewery was filled to the brim so there was no indoor seating. So Tyler and I hopped in an outdoor line that serves as more of a to-go window. As we stood in line discussing what we thought we may want, we heard someone call to us in spanish. We looked down and to our right to see a group of local guys sitting up against the wall of the brewery with drinks and huge smiles. One of them started to tell us in decently good English that the beer he had was good and that he recommends it. We chatted with him and his friends until the line moved to the point that we had to say goodbye, but they told us to come back after we had our beers, and so instead of heading to the Foodies group, we did exactly that.
We ended up hanging out with these guys the entire night. All three currently live in Buenos Aires. Santiago is an architect from Guamini, a small city 5 hours away. The other two were Juan Martin and Tomas. While not all of them had the best english, we were still able to communicate with the limited spanish we knew (and of course google translate-an app that is truly a blessing to the traveling community). By the time we left that night, we had an invitation from Tomas to join him at the Racing match (he too was planning on going), recommendations for good restaurants to try (if you want to read a full list of the places I ate/drank at and/or were recommended to me while I was in BA, check out this), and plans to return and meet the same group of folks the following Thursday. We smiled as we walked back to our apartment, feeling like we had just made our first set of friends. It was a great night.
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