Santa Maria de los Buenos Aires

For the Easter long weekend, I headed to the lovely and charming city of Buenos Aires to meet up with some Canadian friends who are currently posted to Paraguay and Chile. I’ve been to Buenos Aires twice now, and I have to admit that it is one of my favourite cities in the world. I am not alone. While the Mercer survey rates it as 115 out of its 215 cities surveyed, the scientific-survey-which-really-matters ranks it as the world’s sixth best city.

Buenos Aires really is the Paris of the South. Or perhaps more likely, is Paris actually the Buenos Aires of the North? In any case, one of the best features of Buenos Aires is the architecture. The city is replete with wonderful five to six story apartment buildings on wide, shady, tree-lined avenues. Just wandering in the different neighbourhoods admiring the architecture is a fine way to while away a morning or afternoon.

Other fun spots in the city include:

Café Tortoni on Avenida de Mayo, one of Buenos Aires oldest traditional coffee houses: In addition to the café, a small back room hosts nightly tango shows which are a fun way to spend an evening (and a lot less expensive that most other commercial tango shows).

El Ateneo bookshop on Santa Fe (with a smaller version on Avenida Florida): El Ateneo is a small chain which converts old theatres and opera houses into bookstores. The books are set up both on the ground level as well as in each level of balcony while the stage has been turned into a trendy café. Presto! Another afternoon gone!

Teatro Colon: Argentina’s Opera House (which thankfully has not been turned into a bookstore, as much as I do enjoy El Ateneo) took eighty years to build and was inaugurated in 1908. It seats 2,500 and was designed with a mixture of European styles. A daytime tour of the House is a must, with the five floors beneath ground level being just as interesting, or even more so, than the main stage area [the underground floors include the set-building rooms, the costume making and storage shops, dance studios, and a one-to-one replica of the main stage]. On Easter Sunday, we managed to get much sought-after tickets to a performance of Verdi’s Requiem. Well worth the time!

Recoleta Cemetary: I think that land per square metre is more expensive in the cemetery than it is in the rest of the city! While Evita’s grave is clearly one of the main attractions, it is easy to spend hours wandering around the rest of the cemetary marveling at, once again, the incredible architecture.

Plaza de Mayo: No trip to Buenos Aires is complete without a stop at the Plaza de Mayo in front of the Casa Rosada [Presidential Palace], where the mothers of men and women who disappeared under Argentina’s military dictatorship used to silently circle the central monument of the Plaza with the names of their missing children embroidered on white handkerchiefs. The madres started circling the monument in 1977 in a time when all forms of protest and civil society were forbidden. They continue to circle the monument today, on Thursday afternoons, still demanding social justice and democracy building.

La Boca: very touristy, but still fun, La Boca is worth a visit. Developed as a trading centre and shipping yard, and settled by Italian immigrants, the neighbourhood’s aluminum-walled houses have been painted using strong, vibrant primary colours. Artisans set up their wares on the streets and tango is always in the air.

San Telmo Antiques Market: Held on Sundays in the Plaza Dorrego, the market is a terrific place to browse the antiques, watch some tango, and have a drink.

Shopping: Argentina is a bit more conservative than Brazil when it come to clothing, so it was a treat for my northern sensitivities to peruse the shops on Avenida Santa Fe. It's probably a good thing that I didn't have more days there ....