Buenos Aires is a long way from India but it is a beautiful city. Great food, great wine, great dancing and a peculiar fondness for statues, says Kushan Mitra
Buenos Aires, the capital city of Argentina is first and foremost a long, long way from India. After over a day of flying time, let alone the six-hour layover, the British Airways Boeing 777 crossed the massive Río de la Plata estuary into the country named after the latin word for silver. The huge urban sprawl of the city became apparent, but so was the bright green countryside. landing at Ezeiza Airport, we quickly made our way to downtown Buenos Aires on an eight-lane expressway.
The Park Tower Hotel is located in the heart of the city, opposite the central railway station and facing the Plaza San Martin on one side and the Torre Monumental on the other: A combination of the cultural and financial hubs of the city. And as I headed out to explore the city further, it was apparent that it surely was affluent. A city of over 12 million people, the Buenos Aires metropolitan area accounts for over a quarter of the nation’s population. However, the country itself has been through extreme political and economic turmoil over the past few years.
But the northern parts of the city seem untouched; down the road from the hotel, we pass through the Recoleta area, where the rich of Argentina’s past stayed. Many of these mansions have become embassy buildings now. But the area is dotted with large parks and open spaces, and most of these are full of statues and public art. Most statues are of Argentinian heroes and heroines; there are several of General San Martin, the liberator of the southern half of the South American continent having freed Argentina, Chile, and Ecuador as well as collaborating in gaining the freedom of Peru alongside the other great liberator of the continent, Simon Bolivar.
But San Martin is not the Argentinian personality that is the most famous one in the world. That has to be Eva Duarte Peron (Evita). There are a few statues of her across town, but the place to visit to pay homage to the lady immortalised by Andrew lloyd Webber’s musicalEvita and the role reprised by Madonna in the Hollywood version is the Recoleta cemetery. located in the poshest part of town, the crypts of the Recoleta cemetery recall those at the famous Parisian Pere lachaise Cemetery where Jim Morrison and Oscar Wilde are buried. Eva Peron is not buried next to her husband Juan Peron, as she died young at the age of just 33 and her body was claimed by her family and buried in the Duarte family crypt.
After Juan Peron was overthrown in a military coup in 1955, the military dictatorship ‘kidnapped’ her body and removed it to a nondescript cemetery near Milan, Italy. Only after democracy was restored in Argentina and Juan Peron returned as President followed by his third wife, Isabel, after his death in 1974 did Eva’s body return to Argentina. Even at the Recoleta cemetery, you don’t get an idea of the reinforced concrete that surrounds the coffin of the famous lady. The impregnable underground fortress is there to ensure that no matter what happens in Argentine politics, the remains of its famous political personality can no longer be disturbed.
Talking of the Argentine presidency, another must-visit site in the city is the Argentinian presidential office, the ‘Pink House’. Pink because when the house was constructed, it was covered in a layer of lime mixed with cow’s blood to keep the inside of the building dry and cool, protected from the intense breeze from the Río de la Plata. In the same square where the Presidential Offices are located lies the architecturally confusing Metropolitan Cathedral of Buenos Aires.
Thanks to different architects being involved in different phases of construction, the outside looks like a classical Greek building and the inside more like a traditional Castilian cathedral. Adjunct to the cathedral but connected through an opening is the mausoleum of Jose de San Martin, his elaborate grave topped by three apparitions symbolising Ecuador, Chile and Argentina, the countries he liberated.
Not far from these sites, indeed just a short walk away is the 9 de Julio Avenue, named to commemorate July 9, the country’s independence day. This wide avenue is considered to be the widest in the world, and is a matter of pride for most Portenos (people of the port), as residents of Buenos Aires call themselves. The Avenue is topped with a massive Obelisk (the ‘Obelisco’) built in 1936 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the city’s foundation. The avenue, which required the demolition of an entire city block spanning over a mile, was completed only in the late 1960s but it is a sight to see. Thankfully, as January is the middle of the summer holidays in Argentina, one did not get to witness the traffic the Avenue is famous for.
The reason the locals call themselves Portenos is because Buenos Aires has through its life had three ports. The first is the port located in the la Boca locality, now most famous as the home of Boca Juniors, Argentina’s most famous local football club, the club of Maradona. The story behind the blue and yellow colours of the club come from the fact that the Italian immigrants who established the club said that they would take the colours of the flag of the next ship that docked at the port, and that ship happened to be Swedish. So, Boca Juniors is always ‘blue and yellow’.
Close to the Stadium in the Boca neighbourhood are some of the most famous tango houses of the city, but the place to see is the colourful Caminito street. The reason for the multi-coloured houses was the initial shortage of paint when the neighbourhood was founded in the mid-1850s, so locals used whatever colours they could find. The street is full of vendors selling overpriced souvenirs, but one can find some interesting things on this street.
But the port at Boca soon ran out of space and a new port was built; Puerto Madero was constructed towards the north of the city. That port also ran out of space in a couple of decades and a third port on the estuary shore itself was built. Thus, Buenos Aires has three ports so the provenance of Portenos seems rather obvious now.
Puerto Madero was abandoned for a long time but in the past two decades it has been redeveloped into the poshest part of town. The old warehouses lining the sides of the port have become restaurants, nightclubs and hotels, and give the older parts of the city, such as Palermo and San Telmo, a run for their money. Restaurant Sorrento in Puerto Madero serves traditional Argentine food — well, meat and potatoes with some great fish as well — and there are other great places to eat in this city as well. However, keep in mind that despite the inflationary tendencies of the past few years, Buenos Aires is not a cheap town to go out eating and drinking in. The rest of the area is dominated by new highrise apartment complexes.
But you must go out to a tango show, and the best show in town is at the Faena Hotel also in Puerto Madero. The night begins with a fine dinner and wines, and being Argentina, Malbec is the wine of choice, and that is followed by some of the best tango dancers in the country putting on a stunning exhibition of dance. Tango is considered the most complex and sensual of Western dance forms and the glowing limbs and the speed of action even in the confined spaces of the hotels dance floor made it a night to remember.
This city might be a long way from home and it was a pity that I could not explore more of this beautiful country, but you should definitely add this city to your bucket list.