The epitomy of my account outlined above occured last Saturday. After getting up somewhere close to midday, I met up with Alex, and Simon from Australia, and we found a dodgy looking parrilla where the meat and service defied our presumptuous concerns. We laboured back to Simon´s hostel where the best dessert we could find was a friendly bewteen Brazil and England. Unsurprisingly this didn´t quite reach the levels of the main course and there was a feeling of relief at hearing the final whistle.
By now it was late afternoon and for a second time (first being in Rosario if you´ve been paying attention), I said my goodbye to Alex who was heading back to Seattle and a strong slap in the face from the hand of reality.
After consuming you-know-what for tea, my day appeared to be heading for a fairly mundane conclusion but everything changed when a trip to the bathroom turned into a sensory blitzkreig. With my penny spent, I was suddenly standing face-to-face with a pair of guys; one showering happily while sipping a gin and tonic; the other standing beside him, draped in a towel and sporting a bizarre yet seductive combination of dyed black hair and a blonde handlebar moustache. Probably the first and last traveller I´ll meet from Chorley, I stood and chatted with him and his friend for a good five minutes while I marvelled at our crazy little cocoon of manhood and steam.
Eventually they got clothed in pursuit of a worthy dancefloor and audience, while I stayed at the hostel bar chatting with a funny and lightly bearded Norweigan.
Sunday got underway shortly after lunch with a trip to the San Telmo street market. Famed for it´s huge array of craft stalls, cafes and street performers, it was something even I, the lethargic budget traveller, had to go and check out. I walked a good ten blocks through a tangle of tourists and downed a cup of freshly squeezed orange juice to reward my efforts. The main attractions I came across were a foot-painter and a faceless man. With money-saving a key ingredient of my stay in Buenos Aires, I congratulated myself on leaving this trail of temptation with only the fruit juice leaving a trace of unrest in my pockets.
Another attraction synonymous with this city is football. The two big teams Boca Juniors and River Plate enjoy one of the fiercest rivalries in world football and when in Buenos Aires, watching a game is something you can´t afford to miss. Sadly for goingcaracas.blogspot.com, I missed the derby as it was played a few weeks ago but I did still get the chance to see River take on the cute and cuddly sounding Tucuman.
Being a fairly well travelled football fan, I was extremely reluctant to stump up thirty quid for an organised trip to this game which promised great seats and a ¨FULL stadium¨. After a quick look on the River website, I targeted the five pound tickets and a counter-organised trip. By departure time, we had an army of twelve and after a twenty pence metro journey, followed up by a thirty minute trek, we were inside the gates of El Monumental. If I was a feeling clever, I´d make some reference to it indeed being Monu-mental but I won´t.
Once inside the stadium it soon became apparent that we were in amongst the fanatics as our route through to the seats was met with a blockade of delerious fans singing, jumping and waving their hands about. This belief was clarified when I got a tap on my shoulder.
Though I couldn´t interpret all of what the man was saying, I did understand that his general point was that as tourists, we probably shouldn´t be where we were and that this might be the last time we saw our cameras and watches. With a smile and a wave, I left him behind and rejoined the group as we made our way up into the stands, close to but not completely amongst the nutters.
As I anticipated, the stadium was by no means ¨FULL¨ but being where we were, the atmosphere was sheer madness. Like in Brazil, the endless stream of songs and orchestral ensemble worthy of headlining Glastonbury, seriously put in the shade my memories of United´s Stretford End. It´s like comparing a playground squabble at school with the Iraq war.
Whether everyone was watching, I don´t know, but the game itself was a decent spectacle in it´s own right. River went one-nil down within five minutes and looked a beaten team until midway through the second half. After missing a whole host of chances, eventually they nicked one and with the crowd injecting them with further belief, they grabbed another couple to seal a much needed win.
Our group got broken up on the way home but my faction had a good spread at a local restaurant where we were joined by a local who was eying up one of the girls we were with in the stadium. My final memories of the day were beers on the roof terrace.
While most of those reading this blog will have endured the usual grind that Monday brings, my greatest struggle was trying to minimise the amount of naps I had throughout the day. In between a couple of solid sessions on my bunk, I managed to have a good browse in the shops on Florida Street and enjoy a lengthy chat about travel with a couple from Ireland.
I apologise once more, for Tuesday followed a similar path.
Where the day before there was sleep, on this day I wrote the odd letter and postcard. Also on my agenda was enquiring about volunteer work which so far has yielded little. An orphanage was high on my agenda but after looking into the costs, soon discovered that after a few weeks of working there, the kids would probably have more money than me.
Onto yesterday and another encounter with Che Guevara.
Having heard reports that a museum in his name existed here in BA, I hopped on the ninety six year old ¨Línea A¨ (South America´s oldest subway line) and ventured out. Ten stops along, I found the address I´d been quoted and there I found ¨Bagatella¨, a junk shop so full, you could barely get in. I knew I´d found the correct place however, as amongst the guitars, rubber masks and bike chains, were lots of traces of Che. After a short wait, I was introduced to Eladio, the founder of South America´s first Che Guevara museum. Unfortunately this wasn´t it.
Opened in the mid-nineties, Eladio ¨Toto¨Gonzalez Rodriguez´s museum was a shrine-cum-community centre, where he would teach about the life of Ernesto Guevara while also holding a range of activities from dance classes and music shows, to fundraising events for Cuba. Despite the hostility of the local council due to his affilitions with the communist state, he and his wife made it a success for six years until they could fund or run it no more. From then on, they aquired the shop that now stands today and within this, the traces of ¨Toto´s¨ greatest acheivement.
For over an hour, he spoke of his love for Che and the spirit he embodied. He welcomed all visitors to his shrine as he revealed ¨We all need each other.¨ To him, El Commandante was an example to society who fought above all else for equality among people and that in order for people to be better they should look at people not only like Guevara, but also figures such as Gandhi, Luther-King and Schweitzer.
For six years, Eladio and his community helped the stranded island of Cuba by sending three tonnes of aid a month and this would have continued until this day had it not been for the Argentine government´s intervention. In the end, he had seven tonnes of aid sitting around in his museum that he could not send but when a hurricane hit the Caribbean some years later, he saw this as a perfect opportunity to make use of his stock. On realising who he was and his ties with helping Cuba, the local authorities blocked his attempts to get the aid shipped over. Defiant, Eladio marched round Congresso Square in the city centre complete with loudspeakers and placard until someone paid him some attention. Eventually, he got to speak to a local minister who subsequently backed down and Eladio at last got his wish.
Before I left, he also shared with me the identities of who he calls the ¨Godfathers¨. By this term he was just referring to important visitors he´d had and as you may expect, one was Alberto Granado, the friend Che Guevara travelled round South America with. The other went by the name of ¨Pombo¨. This probably means little to you, but I tell you, it´s a coup, as he was one of only four who escaped from Bolivia in 1967 and was only 200m away from Che when he was captured and days later, executed.
On my way out, he told me I have good soil and that I just need to start sowing the seeds.
Armed with my leftist ideology, I made my way back into the centre and met up with an American called Jack, from which point we both went to attend a free thirty-minute Spanish class. It was free and it was Spanish so it was good.
Back at the hostel, I watched all the World Cup play-offs that were being televised and that took me through to late night beers and a viewing of Jarhead.
And so here I am. The remainder of my day will involve basic organisation activities ahead of Kobus´ arrival in the morning and then hopefully a good sleep so I´m ready for ten days of hardcore fun.
The wait is almost over...
keep on ramblin man enjoying it. easy on the steak tho eh?
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