12 Argentine Observations

Since being in Argentina and spending time not only in Buenos Aires, but also Tigre, Rosario, Santa Fe, Posadas and Parana we can safely say that the below list is quite a comprehensive one with regard to all things Argentine. I can confirm sightings and/or experiences of each of these items on this list in all of the above cities mentioned...I think our favourite has been the ice cream, though the Dulce de Leche might be a tie. Our least favourite is the dog poo...it is EVERYWHERE...it cannot be escaped and you WILL step in it at least once, but most likely dozens of times throughout your trip. Despite this, Argentina has been such a lovely and easy country to explore and we absolutly love it here.

1) Mate -


A cultural experience more than just a tea really. Mate drinkers are Argentinians and Argentinians are mate drinkers...it is an equation that cannot be dissected any further than this! First, you purchase you thermus. They come in all sizes, shapes and colours and this holds the boiling water that you need to drink cups and cups of mate. The mate cup purchase is the more challenging of the purchases, as these little orb-like cups come in hundreds and hundreds of shapes, sizes and colours. Some are super touristy with pictures of gouchos or horses or tango dancers on the side, while others are more modern with funky shapes and bright colours...you can even get them to match your thermus. The final item to complete this trio is the metal straw you use to sip your mate from your mate cup. These too come in an array of materials, colours and shapes. Some have a clever little bit at the bottom that enables you to suck your tea without getting tea leaves in your mouth. Mate itself is VERY strong loose leaf tea that you can purchase in an array of brands and sizes, but the taste is always the same (according to my pallet, though don't say that to an Argentine.) There are 3 distinct flavours of Mate, suave or smooth, medio or medium and fuerte or strong...I suppose it is more about the strength than the flavour. But, you can sweeten it with sugar...and that is a bit bitter for my liking. They also seel sugar holders that match your Mate cup and thermas...and that is pretty exciting. You fill your mate cup to the brim with the loose tea leaves, and I am talking to the brim and then you pour a tiny bit of hot water in your cup carefully not to overflow it and lose any precious bits. You then sip the rather potent concoction through your straw and continuously refill the cup over and over again until you run out of hot water. The sheer amount of leaves maintains the strength of the mate throughout the drinking process...and this is a process that occurs all day everyday. You cannot go anywhere without seeing the locals carrying around their thermus and mate cup...and it does not matter how percarious or challenging it may be to hold the MAte cup and thermas along with groccery bags, a small child, a mobile phone etc...the Mate will be carried regardless. Oh, and the MOST important part of all is the sharing. You rarely if ever drink mate alone and NEVER see two people with two mate cups if they are hanging out together...it is one cup per two people or more...there is no fear of germs and no concern with hygiene. Those who suffer from OCD would not be fans of the Mate experince.

2) Dog Poo Everywhere -


In some countries the streets are paved with gold and according to Fivel Mousekawitz in An American Tale, some streets are paved with cheese. But we ain't in America and the streets of Argentina are paved in dog feces...a lot of dog feces. I swear we have seen dozens of people fall victim to the dreaded poo...some simply step in it, while some slide along the street and even fall. You usually see a few peices spaced out, but there are occassions where you see some poo schmears where some poor bastard has stepped/slid in the shit and desperatly tried to scrape the reminents off the bottom of his/her shoe and if you look to the left or right and onto the grassy bits along the sidewalk in true investigator fashion, you will likely see some other poo bits wiped through the blades of grass in a feeble attempt to get it off! Alex, Wendy and I were super careful and continuously looked down when we walked everywhere...it was a choice we made between poo on shoe or crick in neck...we opted for the latter. I don't understand why people in this country don't pick up after their dogs...it just boggles my mind that they don't take a tiny plastic bag out with them and do the scoop pull through inside out bag maneuver that we all know and love...seriously. On our graffitimundo tour, we even saw some desperate person's attempt to make a statement about this issue and beg for support in the form of a picture of a dog trying to sweep his own poo up into at dustpan...obviously unable to with some Spanish writing below, which I decided said something along the lines of, "obviously a dog cannot pick up his own shit, therefore you must do it for him. Please pick up your dog's shit or I may have a mental breakdown and never recover, as I step in it regularly and have been pushed to a breaking point that involved digitizing this picture of a dog trying to scoop up his own shit. Please help me, please save me!" Hmmm, perhaps that was a tiny bit of my own projection.

3) Meal Time Issues -



This one is a bit of a conundrum to me in that I always thought, and learned in all my Spanish classes as a youth, that Spain, Mexico and the whole of South America loves a siesta and that means they have a tiny breakfast and a HUGE lunch and then a long afternoon nap with a tiny dinner late into the night. Well, this is just not the case in Argentina regarding the food. Perhaps it is because we are travelling and not at a home we we would prepare a huge siesta-time lunch, but the towns shut down from noon to 4:00pm and they become ghost towns. Now, knowledge would dictate that resturants would remain open to prepare these huge glorious lunches for all to enjoy...well those who don't want to cook and prepare a lunch, but tey too shut leaving travellers and those who don't want to cook totally out of luck. Breakfast consists of coffee with sugar, tea with sugar and sugary partries. Even the crossaints come with a sappy sweet glaze on the top. Lunch is the bane of our lives and we usually end up getting bread and cheese or bread and chicken or bread and tuna and putting together some sort of sandwich, but you know when you just want to go to a resturant and have a nice big meal prepared for you in the mid-afternoon or even late afternoon. If Al and I loved pastries then we would be in heaven as the panedarias never shut making it possible to purchase pastries all day everyday. The big meal of the day is dinner and this consists of meat and maybe vegatables or a pizza and service for dinner begins at 8:00pm...so vegetarians or those that are starving for a meal just have to suffer. One other thing to note about meal time and food in general in Argentina is the sheer lack of choice in the groccery store. We all know how much I adore the groccery store and LOVE my Sunday shop at the Sainsburys, but not so in Argentina. The shops at tiny and difficult to move around in and there are few to no choices of food...the best places to shop for food are markets, though they can be quite difficult to come across in Argentina as well.

4) Pastries -


As discussed above, pastries in Argentina is like barbeque in Texas or Sunday roast in England...it just goes together! They LOVE a pastry. They are eaten by everyone during breakfast and then throughout the day...the Panedarias (bakeries) are on every single street corner. Some are a bit more posh than others, some only sell sweet breads, while others sell the entire gamet of baked goods. Now, I come from a family where baked goods from a bakery was part of life...my grandfather owned a bakery so it's in my genes. Walking past these shops and being bombarded with these sweet treats at every turn is a real challenge to avoid. Then, if you can prevail and not fall victim to the temptation, you get to watch everyone devouring them with a lovely coffee drink on every other corner...oh the sweet torture. We have tasted several different kinds of breads and pastries since spending time in Argentina and they are amazingly divine and I can understand why they love them so much and eat them all day everyday.

5) Ice Cream -



Next to each Panedaria is a Heladoria (ice cream parlour)...so imagine the joy of working so hard to avoid pastry treats to then have to muster up the will power to then avoid ice cream...it is a torture that is hard to describe. We both love a pastry, but our love of ice cream I think trumps this every time...and Alex only discovered she loved it duing this trip. She actually thought she hated it until recently. Now, we were told by EVERYONE that the ice cream in Argentina is world renowned and known for being the best and un-missable so of course we had to try it...but I think it is kind of like heroin in that once you try it that first time, your body aches for it for the rest of your life. Every single day since the first day we tasted the sweet creaminess we have ben fiending for it...no matter which city or town we are exploring that day, we are on the hunt for the heladoria before the supermercado! Disgusting I know, but don't judge us before you come to Argentina and find yourself digging through the bins outside the ice cream shops looking for that morsel that someone couldn't finish...watch out...that might be you someday. We have found sneaky ways to get a free fix if we are fiending and we have spent our ice cream budget for the day...it is called the 'Quiero Probar technique' and it means I want to taste. You can have a taste of how ever many flavours you want and if the shop is empty, they will oblige you and laugh at your lack of SPanish knowledge regarding flavour names. After about 20 tastes, you do fee satisfied for a few hours, but the soon the body shakes return and it is time again for a fix. Luckily, there are dozens of heladorias lining the streets so we just move from one to the next...eventually they will catch on and we will see our pictures up behind the till and we will be barred...I swear we never thought it would be us...but it can happen to anyone. Even two girls from the 'right side of the tracks.'

6) Maradona -



I am quite confident that all our Engish readers will know who Maradona is, but I am not so sure about our American fans (other than Jill)...so I will begin with a brief background story. Maradona was born into poverty in Argentina, but grew to be one of the countries most beloved, as well as richest, football players of all time, though his reputaion has been marred worldwide due to the 'Mano de Dios' or 'Hand of G-d' incident. Let me take to you back to a time where space exploration was all over the news when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded on our TV screens, Bruce Springsteen, Van Halen and WHitney Houston were blowing up the charts and Crocodile Dundee, Top Gun and The MOney Pit were blowing up the big screen while Magnum PI, Hill Street Blues and CHeers were all the rage on the television. Alex was a mere 4 years old and I was 9. It was the FIFA World Cup quarter Final where England lost 2-1 to Argentina. Both goals were scored by Maradona, but it was the second of those goals that lives in infamy to this day because Maradona actually punched the ball with his hand (which is an illegal move in football) into the goal and this was the deciding goal that knocked England out of the World Cup and Argentina then went through to the semi-finals and onto win the entire World Cup that year...alex says, and I quote, "his cheating enabled them to win the whole thing, asshole!" Clearly the ref was not paying attention and was unaware that the ball was not kicked or headed into the goal, but this was before the time of instant replay though Alex tells me that even now that instant replay exists, once the ref makes a decision it is final and there is no way to overturn said decision. Needless to say, that ref fell into obscurity never to ref a game again. Maradona became the most hated man in England and the most revered man in Argentina. Despite the fact that everyone in the world, including Argentina, now know that he hit the ball with his hand, he is still loved and cherished as a national icon...they even make flip books with the entire goal replayed for eveyone to see and have a giant Hand of G-d painted outside the Boca stadium...disgusting!

7) Tango -



This is a country known for Tango...it is the national dance... a slow, sultry and alluring dance to equally slow, sultry and alluring music. I suppose I thought that we would see people tangoing in the streets throughout Argentina, but sadly this is not the case. It also seems to be something that is more geared towards the tourist with loads of people running up to you with lamenated pages of big ballrooms offering tango shows complete with dinner and drinks for a whopping $150 per ticket. But, if you are travelling on a budget and you spend omost of that on ice cream, you can head to some cafes or touristy streets where they put on shows on the streets or in resturants for tips. If you stay just far enough away, you can catch a glimpse without having to spend a dime...just the way we like it!

8) Dulce de Leche -



This is a special and magical thing that we have found throughout South America, but it has been the best in Argentina, as well as the most abundant. Dulce de Leche translates literally to sweet of milk, though it is a thick gooey caramel sauce that can be spread on anything, put into ice cream, used as a topping, eaten plain with a simply a spoon and there are dozens of items that are ducle de leche flavour such as yogurt, hard and soft candies, ice cream and biscuits to name a few. It is seriously the most delicious sauce we have ever tasted and it is one of the two flavours we indulge in on our ice cream cones. I like the Super Dulche de Leche flavour, as it is ducle de leche flavoured ice cream with the dulce de leche caramel sauce mixed throughout it, while Alex prefers the Dulce de Leche Granizado, which is Dulce de Leche flavoured ice cream with chocolate chips in it. We also both enjoy any sort of cookie or cake that includes DdL in, on or around it! THey make this one cookie that is two round pieces of thick shortbread with a huge smathering of DdL in the middle like a sandwich and then they roll it through some shredded coconut so that it sticks to the DdL that is sticking out from the middle...I mean how do they even come up with these things! I could seriously, in true obese fashion, sit with a tub of the stuff and eat it with a spoon,maybe even dip that spoon into a bag of Minstrels...then I would throw up and get right back to it!

9) Alfajores -



These are famous in Argentina...kind of like the country's cookie. It is made up of two crumbly soft cookies with either chocolate cream, coffee flavoured cream or DdL in the middle (like a cookie sandwich) and then the whole thing is dipped in chocolate (white, dark or bittersweet - it is hard to find milk). You can buy cheap ones from the convenient shop or go to more posh shops like Havana and get the more elite versions. These are eaten as regularly by the Argentine people as pastries, ice cream and steak (that will be discussed below). A typical snack you might see a local eating would include either a fizzy drink and an Alfajore or perhaps a Mate and a pastry or any combination there of.

10) Beef and Malbec -



I will hand it to the Argentines...they know good beef! People have told us this, but we have now experienced first hand and can agree that they know how to make a steak so tender and juicy that it tickles the mouth with pleasure as you chew it. Now I am not a big meat eater at the best of times and after 5 weeks on a vegetarian eco farm, I was really not into it, but when in Argentina you MUST try a steak and so we did. What a blessed meal we had with Wendy when we all partook in two large beef medallions drenched in a brown jous made with mushrooms and garlic with a fluffy pile of creamy mashed potatos just waiting to be speard along the top of each tender bite of meat like fronsting on a cake. And what better to go with this meal than a deep, earthy, spicey rustic Malbec to wash it all down? Again, like I said before, the Argentines know good beef and good Malbec and they aren't afraid to share it with the world!

11) Subte Salesmen and Women -



This is a very interesting observation that would NEVER happen in New York or London. The Subte is the subway system in Buenos Aires and just like in London and New York, people try to sell you crap while riding on your way to work or where ever. The difference is that when the Argentine Subte Salespeople come around, they actually leave their items on your person and walk through each car to return later to collect the items and/or money for the items. For example, one woman was selling stickers so she came by us and left a pile of random sheets of stickers on our legs to browse through and only retruned 20 minutes later to collect the stickers. How did she remember whose leg she left the stickers on? I thought this was a one off, but then a pen salesman and a candybar salesman did the same thing. This would NEVER happen in New York or London, as their merchandice would slowly disappear with such a technique. I suppose if you leave people with your product they might look at it and strat to think they may need it, but is that worth the risk of it being stolen? This is also true for the street salespeople where there is no subway and the bus salespeople as well. The other day we were sitting in an outdoor cafe when some guys came by and handed us a pile of bootleg DVDs (yes I did have the shakes, as I flashbacked to Bali when I bought 150 of them) and just walked off leaving us to browse through them honestly...honestly being the operative word...

12) The Smoking Ban -



Or should I say the lack there of!! When you have spent the majority of your adult life in countries that do not allow smoking in public places such as toilets, resturants, clubs, bars, hotels you sort of get used to it and expect that you will not have to endure second hand smoke when heading out for a day of errands...not so in Argentina. They smoke EVERYWHERE and all the time. It is not nice and you don't realize how not nice it is until you are dealing with cigarette smoke all day everywhere you go. I was squatting in a public toilet when I strated smelling cigarette smoke...I thought surly there must be a resturant nearby or cafe or something, as no one would smoke in a toilet. I was wrong and when I walked out to wash my hands, there she was...just standing there with a fag (that means cigarette not derogatory word for gay man) hanging from her lip having just finished using the toilet herself. Imagine smoking in a toilet! The horror!

Now, we can safely say that these 12 observations have been researched in Buenos Aires, Tigre, Rosario, Santa Fe, Parana and Posadas so far. We still have Puerto Iguazu to explore though I suspect we will see these very same 12 obervations there as well.