Buenos Aires 4

Guardia Vieja Tango by Israel Hoffmann

A beautiful Sunday with bright sunshine and a cool breeze. I bought my bus ticket for Puerto Madryn for Monday and then had breakfast near Calle Florida for a change. I bought a sleeveless wool jersey for the Andes. I had not brought one because I needed it for the Andes only, Argentina has a wool industry, and I wanted a keepsake of South America. L had said the day before, half-joking, make sure it doesn't have a label reading: Hecho en China.

I caught a bus to La Boca (The Mouth), where tango flourished. In the heyday of tango it used to be a rough and tumble neighbourhood, but is now welcoming to tourists. Carlos Gardel is of course Argentina's hero of tango, his legend enhanced by a tragic death in an airplane crash at the height of his career.

Caminito is a colourful walkway where walls are painted in bright pastel hues. Local artists sell their works there.

A particularly vibrant wall. You can see that street performers also entertain here.

There are murals on the walls.

At La Ribera a guitarist was playing so I took a seat and ordered a chopp. He covered standards such as Garota de Ipanema and Samba de Orfeu. I had noticed that the TV music channel played both Spanish and Portuguese songs.

I had a lunch of filet of merluza (hake) at a corner restaurant. It being Mother's Day in Argentina, the place was packed with families, and Spanish music filled the air.

As this was the old port area, it was a working class area and there are relics from this past. I saw slogans on walls: Pan, trabajo y tuna para todos (Bread, work and tuna for all) and Argentina, hay gente que te quiere y gente que te USA (Argentina, some people love you and some use you). This last was a double entendre, as usar is Spanish for use but here was an allusion to USA.

But the area wasn't frequented by lower classes only, I saw a man talking into his mobile in La Boca. Perhaps the seediness was undeserved reputation; when I bought a can of drink at a general store, the owner thanked me warmly, perhaps pleased that I was not frightened away.

Although I cannot find a connection to La Boca, the very successful and enthralling low-budget Argentinian film Nine Queens, about a pair of con artists trying to set up a sting, and which "stings" the viewer with a surprise ending, always makes me think of this barrio.

I do regret not going to see a tango show in Baires, however touristy and kitsch it might have been. I can only plead that at the time I was not that interested in dance.

In the afternoon I went back to Palermo because I liked the lake. Porteños were taking full advantage of the sunshine and clement weather. I never knew whether the pictured alpaca owner was in trouble with the park police.

In the evening I attended the João Gilberto concert. He was a hour late arriving. Ladies in the seats behind mine gossiped in Italian (it is the second most common language). Eventually he commenced. I closed my eyes, the sound of his voice and guitar filled the hall, and the world vanished. For two heavenly hours he played Brazilian ballads, Jobim songs and his own compositions, and finished with Garota de Ipanema.