Buenos Aires, still...

Hey hey there,

Been having a great time in BA with the girlies, and Beth and Ron. Hayley and J have been leading me astray again (well I haven´t really been complaining,) so have had some fantastic nights here.

Sunday we visited the main cemetery in the city, and also saw the crafts fair outside. The cemetery was amazing - so different to anything else that we´ve seen. It was full of very tall crypts of families, pretty much all of them are in disrepair and falling apart, plus covered in creepy cobwebs and dust. So different to the cemetery in La Paz, where every Sunday the families are around the boxes, replacing the flowers and making sure that everything is in order. It was strange in that you could see the coffins in this cemetery (BA) - they were stacked up on top of each other, and you could also see the little children´s coffins which was sad. Saw Evita´s crypt - the only crypt full of flowers as well. Was very strange walking around the cemetery, and it certainly had a weird smell of death around the place. Saw Beth and Ron that evening for a delicious Chinese meal. Fantastic to catch up with them again, and they very kindly treated us. Went back to the hostel and ended up seeing Mike, our friend we worked with in Bolivia, and all his Canadian friends, so ended up chatting until the small hours of the morning... oops!

We saw a Tango show on Monday night. First of all we had to try and tango ourselves, (very embarrassing and difficult, but ended up being great fun), before we had a gorgeous 3 course meal, which was very appreciated by us 3, and then watched a stunning professional tango show. The food was delicious, and we had lots of wine included in the price - such a shame! - but the show was so good. Very sexy, fast and impressive. Lovely to ´do´ a bit of culture!

Unfortunately we ended up going out after the show, with the result that Hayley and J went to sleep for a couple of hours, but I actually did not make it to bed. Stupid move, as we were leaving to visit Uruguay for the day with Beth and Ron! Luckily managed to sober up on the ferry - they loved laughing at a tipsy Alice - and we had a lovely day meandering around Colonia de Sacramento, eating and sleeping in the park. The place was beautiful, and very peaceful, but unfortunately a little too touristy at times. However it was a lovely day out, and certainly worth seeing.

Wednesday we decided to be cultural again, and visited the MALBA art gallery - Museo de Arte Latinamericano Buenos Aires as it was free that day. The gallery was good - not too big, and we saw some great pieces. Even saw a Frida Kahlo - it´s great to see her work after being in her house in Mexico City at the start of the trip. We also went to see the Evita museum, which was great, apart from the fact that we know virtually nothing about her, which is annoying. So definitely need to read up on her when I get back to the UK! Definitely worth seeing though, and we were feeling very virtuous after visiting the gallery and museum. Met up with Beth and Ron, and had a gorgeous Indian meal. Cannot really say how much I enjoy eating these huge meals, the food is beautiful and it is so nice to not feel hungry! Again, Ron was very generous and treated us, so we took Beth and him to the cinema. It is fantastic here, you can go and see a film at 1am if you want to, - everything is open late. Saw the Tom Cruise film about Hitler - brilliant, and great for perving over him! So we were all happy... It´s very strange at the hostel, because we can hear pornographic noises when we are in the bathroom. Took us a while to figure out who was making the noises, until someone told the others that there is a sex cinema next door to our hostel. It is certainly very entertaining when we go to have a shower and all we can hear is porn!

Yesterday we ventured into another area of town, La Boca, which is beautiful. Not really quite sure whether it was quite as vibrant and colourful originally, or whether it has been overdone for the tourists, (even the window decorations are staged!) But it was lovely to see and the colours were beautiful - such fun photographing it. Went to see the Museo de Bellas Artes, again great gallery, but it was baking hot and so we ended up heading back to the hostel. Had a 3 hour siesta, absolutely brilliant, and then had an entertaining evening drinking in the hostel. Seem to have made quite a few more friends last night! Certainly more people were chatting to us this morning... oops! I blame Hayley...

So we are slowly recovering (J has homeopathic medicine for hangovers!) and are doing errands today, before we head out to meet Beth and Ron later on. They fly home tomorrow, - perhaps we could kidnap them?! BA has been great this week, it is a very European city, but it seems to have lost some of its own identity, however we have had a great time doing day trips, seeing galleries, meandering around and eating delicious meals. Certainly true that it is people who can make or break a place!

We are organising the next stage of our trip down southern Argentina. We have invited ourselves along on a road trip with Iain and Mike, the 2 guys we worked with in La Paz, to hire a car and drive down to Ushuaia with them - the most southern city in the world - you can get a boat to Antarctica from there. Just trying to work out logistics and time frames to see if this is possible. Hopefully it is, as it would be amazing to have our own transport (and cheaper than buses too)...

So love to all back home, - have just put some more photos in the Argentina folder, and will write again soon.
Lots of love,
Alice xxx