Argentina has an interesting history, it was founded twice. In 1536 by Pedro de Mendoza, a Spanish explorer out to conquer the world. Well, the natives of Buenos Aires didn't exactly appreciate his Spanish integration and land grabbing, so they fought him off and in 1539 he returned home with his tail between his legs. But, in 1580, another settlement came and stayed. They were more powerful and therefore subdued the locals, took the land, and built a thriving city of Agentineans. San Telmo was the first settlement, but it quickly expanded in various sub-cities.
Robby and I booked ourselves a bike tour that went through the old part of San Telmo and then La Boca, the poor region that used to be a waylay point between the port and the town with a criminal and sex element. It was later turned into an art community via gentrification. To this day artists still sell their wares on the street infront of what used to be the houses. It's also the birth place of tango and the current location for the Boca Jr's, the beloved futbol (soccer team) of Argentina. If there's a game on, people flood the streets to watch through bar windows and cheer on their team.
We stopped to drink Mate and take photos of the colored houses in La Boca. The houses used to be tenaments, but were then turned into shops and through gentrification, painted pretty colors to attract artists, therefore becoming live/work studios. Now-a-days, it's mainly a tourist attraction with stores and restaurants. Still a rather poor area, but there's much history and love in the neighborhood. Mate is the tea drink that is drunk everyday by Argentineans. It consist of bitter tea leaves (from the mate tree) put into a cup with hot water poured on top and then passed between friends with a straw. One can not be a germaphob with the Mate, as you use the same cup, leaves, and straw for a sitting of Mate. To Robby and I, we didn't mind sharing the tea with our tour guide, but Mate taste like green tea that's been seeping for 10 minutes. Very strong, and therefore bitter to drink. Plus you're expected to drink it when it's super hot through a metal straw and sometimes holding it in a metal cup. I don't know what it is about tea drinking countries, but they love hot drinks in little cups without handles.
We finished out our long bike ride (which could have been short, but the sweltering head made it feel like 15+ miles), in Puerto Madero - the newest, safest, and richest part of Buenos Aires. When the city was founded they had a port run through the middle of the city, but the boats had to dock out at sea and then shuttle goods and people in via small boats because of the swallow water near the actual city. In 1882, Buenos Aires paid a politician a lot of money to build a new port, 2 km down from the old port. The politician's name was Madero, thus the name of the port. In 1897 Puerto Madero was open, but the city had a beautiful, swallow, and therefore useless new port. I guess next time the money men decided to think with their brains rather than with their political agendas because in 1930 a real team of engineers built the New Port - an actually useable shipping port. In 1989 Puerto Madero was turned into the modern part of the city with glass buildings, fancy restaurants, lots of security, and a giant wetlands that borders the water. The wetlands formed on top of the landfill, which makes the beauty more ironic. Now Buenos Aires is complete with a modern city built against the old city and a useable port a few kilometers away. It's beautiful and sad at the same time. Gentrification is great, but it also destroys part of the soul of the city and covers up the history. But then hipsters don't really care about that stuff too much, so I guess it evens out.
What Buenos Aireans care about is music and that includes, La Bomba de Tiempo - a drumming band that sounds like a Spanish "Stomp", but the conductor changes the playlist every time the 10-13 person band plays. They mostly only play on Monday nights and usually have special guests sit in with them. Robby and I decided that we should go, even if it was for a little bit because it is part of the local culture and numerous people told us it would be amazing. We figured out the subway system and ended up in a dirtier part of town, but somehow felt more at home than in the downtown part of the city. The venue wasn't too hard to find as we followed the hordes of 20-30 something's flocking to the entrance. While waiting in line for tickets, we grabbed 2 cold beers to drink from a street vendor for $3 each and a street empanada for $2. Dinner and a drink without even having to leave our spoy in line, not bad.
Once inside the facility, we discovered it was a giant warehouse converted into a dance club with a small museum inside and a large courtyard in the middle. Since it was so hot, the performance was luckily in the courtyard. The band started promptly at 8pm, something almost unheard of in Argentina because people don't eat until 10 or 11pm for early bird and 30 minutes late is still on time. But at 8pm, 12 hippie looking people dressed in trash jumpsuits started banging on drums, ringing bells, and hitting stratching instruments. The packed crowd went nuts. To me, it sounded like loud drum noises that went on for hours (but probably only in 12 minute stretches). It wasn't bad, but also not my cup of tea. Though the people watching was amazing - I'm always jealous of people that can just lose themselves to the rhythm and dance like there's no one else around, plus the special guest brought a guitar and started softly singing (probably my favorite part of the concert). La Bomba de Tiepo is amazing and for sure an event to go see, but it is loud, sweaty, and there's a lot of standing. But it gave us a night out and a great ending to our 3 days in Buenos Aires.
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