Hola! And so my Latin American Adventure begins!!

They say time flies when you're having fun and so there is no more apt phrase for the time I spent in Buenos Aires. What an amazing city! Bloody expensive, but it was so cool it can be forgiven for that. I was originally intending to stay there for a week but I decided to take some Spanish lessons which meant I ended up staying for 10 days instead. It was no hardship. I found the city to be diverse, friendly and incredibly vibrant. I was really fortunate in my choice of hostel too. I stayed in Portal del Sur in Monserrat which was a perfect location and I met some wonderful people there, whose names will pop up throughout this post.

As it's taken me ages to get round to writing this post, and given the length of time I spent in Bs.As, there is a risk that this will become a monster post so I'm going to give you the highlights on each day rather than the more descriptive posts of my days away that some of you will have been used to from my European Adventure.

On my first day I had planned to do a walking tour of Recoleta, one of the neighbourhoods within Bs.As but I hadn't taken into account the impact the temperature hike from 4 degrees in the UK to 34 degrees in Argentina would have on my speed! So I missed it and decided to treat myself to a nice breakfast instead! Having heard in the hostel bar the previous night that the language school that gave free lessons to hostel residents was good, and knowing I was close I decided to wing it and head there to see about signing up for lessons. This was one of the best things that I did. The school I went to is Porteñisima, 1785 Avenida Corrientes. Everyone there was soooo friendly and super helpful, I really recommend them.

On arrival I was met by Karo Torre, one of the directors who interviewed me to make sure what they offered was what I wanted and vice versa which was great and so I signed up! That evening the school was having a social which Brian and Grainne (who had told me about the school) and Seb (attending the school and sleeping in the bunk below mine) were planning on going to, so Robert (who had arrived in Bs.As. the same day as me) and I went along with them too. This is Seb (left) and Robert (right). I'm holding a bottle of some dodgy alcohol/mixer combo Seb and Robert were drinking (OK... I may have had a sip...).

At the social I also met Majo Lonardi, the other Director of the school and I got roped in to play Sapo by changing my name to Pierre (who hadn't turned up) momentarily!

The idea is that you stand behind a line around 2 metres away and throw metal 'coins' with the intention of getting them in the high scoring parts - the wheel at the front, the frog (Sapo) and the mouth at the back. Failing that you hope to get them in one of the holes in the top to score points. I was hopeless! Takes more skill than you'd think! Mind you one girl managed to get it in the mouth at the back which caused much whooping and jollity!

The next day saw the start of my Spanish lessons with Ivan. Ivan has the patience of a saint. I am about as good at Spanish as I was at Sapo and definitely no natural at this language! So we'll say no more about that lesson and move to Friday's highlight which was an Asado (BBQ) at Brian and Grainne's hostel - they'd had to move earlier that day as they weren't able to get a room at Portal del Sur for their entire trip.

It was delicious and about as far from the vegan phase I had last year that you can get!! I particularly liked the black pudding which was much softer than in the UK and more like a blood sausage. That plus a few glasses of vino tinto went down a treat! 

On the Saturday I got up a bit later and had an easy morning to give my head a chance to recover from the previous evening's entertainment then had ice cream for lunch (yum-my!) and then went for a walking tour of the city centre. This was one of the free tours offered in Bs.As by www.buenoairesfreewalks.com and was excellent. Our guide Martín Wasserman was so interesting to listen to and told us the history of Bs.As, its political and economic landscape, and as he's from Bs.As we learnt of some of his own experiences during times of political turmoil which made it more real. A throughly fascinating couple of hours. Below are pictures of a few of the highlights: the Congress Building,

One of the three Rodin sculptures of The Thinker (I adore Rodin after my trip to Paris years ago with my friend Sunita and am super excited to be back in the UK before the exhibition in the British Museum finishes!).

And a building based on Dante's Divine Comedy where you can only get to the hell and purgatory (the lower floors) in one lift. You have to change to a different one for the upper floors of paradise!

On the Sunday, Seb and Robert, along with two other friends I'd made, Florian and Mieran, left to go up to Iguazu Falls and that afternoon I met up with Brian and Grainne to go to the San Telmo market. If only I'd been at the end of the trip rather than the beginning - I could have bought loads! People were so creative and inventive: this is Grainne playing a instrument from a guy who made them himself out of what I think was some kind of dried vegetable. 

I think it takes a bit of practice as we weren't great, but the guy made it sound like a cross between a trumpet and saxophone! If you don't believe me watch this YouTube video!  We then spent a very enjoyable evening with Emma (a friend of Grainne's) and her partner Chris.

In Monday's Spanish lesson there was much hilarity as I'd done my homework using a Spanish Spanish book rather than a Latin American Spanish book and I'd had to write comparisons. I'd tried to say my hostel had the same number of beds as at Art hostel. However, the word from my book meant that my phrase translated as 'Porta del Sur brothel has then same number of beds as the Art Factory brothel!' Needless to say there were many laughs between Ivan and I over that one!! 😳😳😳 Goodness only knows what sort of establishment he thought I was staying in! From there I went to Pallermo to see the amazing street art...

Then in the evening went to La Bomba De Tiempo with Brian and Grainne which is the most amazing group of percussionists and was a brilliant evening! This is the group...

Me drinking a beer that's as big as my head...

Brian, Grainne and I at the end of the show.

Tuesday evening we had a free tango lesson at the hostel. It's way more difficult than they make it look on Strictly Come Dancing! We changed partners throughout the lesson and it was amazing the difference it made. I won't be on stage anytime soon though I don't think... 

Then on Wednesday I did a tour of Recoleta Cemetery, again with Buenos Aires Free Walks (although this one I had to pay for) led by Fernandez who again, was fascinating to listen to. This cemetery is where Eva Peron is buried. You know me, I love a good cemetery and this is one of the best I've been to.

The history of what happened to her body is incredible; this article gives you the details: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18616360.

As interesting as her story is, the cemetery is filled with interesting stories - the one that freaked me the most was this girl who was buried alive mistakenly. 

She loved a man who was having an affair with her and her mother, and when she found out she collapsed, was presumed to be dead and buried within hours The next day when they went to her coffin it had moved and rather than checking why, they just put it back where it was and then when her grandmother came to pay her respects and wanted to see her granddaughter's body two weeks later (she'd had to travel some way to get there), they opened the coffin and the girl had turned over and there were scratches on the inside of the coffin lid. So it's said she died twice, once of a broken heart (which was actually catalepsy) and then a second time from being buried alive. Eek!! The statue is thought to have been erected out of guilt... 

This story horrified me as one of my biggest fears is being buried alive! 😱😱😱

For interest, a couple of other tombs...

Thursday was the last of my Spanish lessons with the lovely Ivan and then I did a tour of Teatro Colón. Holy moly what an impressive building this is! It's unfortunate that it's off season at the moment so nothing was showing...

Inside the main hall is so big I couldn't fit it all in one picture so here's a bit of it!

I took this one for you Chris!

However, I am super lucky as I'm planning to pretty much do a round trip back to BA and then to head over to Uruguay from there so hopefully there will be a performance on then, plus I'll get to do a tour of La Boca (where the tango started) which was a tour I wasn't able to fit in.

After that I went to El Ateneo, a bookshop in an old theatre! It rated as one of the top five bookshops in the world in a review by the Guardian a few years ago and I can see why. It was beautiful... 

Less beautiful was the £14 it cost me for a sandwich and coffee in the cafe there! But hey ho, when in Rome and all that!

So I guess it still ended up being a monster post after all!! But then this is the most amazing city. I absolutely loved it ❤️❤️❤️ Here's just another random photo of the place that I liked...

Sadly I had to leave yesterday to continue on my adventures and I'm now in Rosario. I'll be here until Tuesday when I have a bus at a ridiculous hour of the morning (1.30am!) to Codoba so will update you on my exploits here in a few days.