My trip actually didn´t start off very well. I had packed everything the night before and had enough left over Argentinan pesos from my other trip to bring with me, but no matter how prepared I was, I was not prepared to leave wide awake at 5:30 in the morning. This meant I was in no shape to double check my passport to make sure the slip of paper inside of it which contained my entrance stamp for Uruguay was still in there. Huge mistake. I took a bus/boat combination to Colonia and when I had to present my passport to immigration in order to get on the boat for Argentina... I didn´t have it. This is where all of the episodes of Locked Up Abroad that I've watched came back to haunt me. As soon as the lady realized I had no evidence proving I was a study abroad student and legally in the country, she demanded to know what I was doing in Uruguay and why in the world I didn't have my stamp. I´m not going to lie... I did get a little teary eyed as she made me look through all of my stuff and made me hang up my phone as I tried to call someone in my apartment to see if I had left it somewhere (like that would have done any good). But the lady was reluctantly nice to me after watching me having a badly contained almost panic attack in the middle of immigration and let me pass with a stern look. Lesson learned!
I didn´t do too much in B.A. because I was actually leaving to renew my 90 day tourist permit and could only stay the weekend. This is called a border run, my friends. I did manage to do a few fun things, however.
The first day I arrived to a rainstorm and a quiet city. Buenos Aires a quiet big city? Nahhhh. I actually arrived right in the middle of the Argentina vs. Nigeria game. There were tons of empty resturants and full pubs/bars as people watched the game and it was actually kind of cool to walk through the city that way. I then arrived at one of the best hostels I´ve ever stayed in, Carlos Gardel, and headed out to find a cheap lunch. According to my guide book Calle Florida was a great place to grab something to eat and indeed it was. Calle Florida is a nice, long pedestrian street that is full of resturants and all kinds of shopping. My orginal goal when I arrived to Buenos Aires was to buy a big coat and a backpack and I definitely could have done so within the first few hours of arriving to B.A. after walking this street. It goes for blocks and being a Sunday it was flooded with people and even more so after the fútbol game ended. I ended up just grabbing some Mcdonalds and walking to a fancy mall called Galeria Pacífico where I had fun listening to the baristas of Starbucks try to call out my name and sat down in the middle of the food court cheering on the USA in their game against England. The mall wasn´t really my style because it had expensive designers like Dior, but it did have a museum that I´m not sure I was suppose to pay to see, but no one said anything to me.
The second day there I had all day to try to find a backpack and a jacket, so I set off just before the Australia game for a shopping center the girl at the hostel told me about called Abasto Shopping. Loved it. I had to take the subway and definitely spent a good while looking for the entrance on the right side of the street which
was conveniently located in the middle of a park. Then I had to pull my map out several times to make sure I was going the right way and that I knew how to transfer trains and then which direction the next train needed to go in. It was confusing and I looked like such a tourist but I made it without asking a single person. As soon as I stepped out of the subway on the other side Abasto Shopping was right in front of me. So, I spent the next few hours trying on jackets and travelers backpacks making sure I would be content with my purchases. The guy at the first shop I went too was actually really frustrated that I was taking up so much of his time and when I went back the third time to buy the backpack I knew he and another of his coworkers were betting if I would buy anything from the store. It was annoying at first, but honestly, I had taken up a lot of his time and I probably would've done the same thing if roles were reverse, though, I would have been more subtle about it.So, I bought my things and headed to the biggest food court I have ever seen in my life to go on another adventure via the subway. By the way, the food court had tons
of restaurants lining both sides of the space which included an Arabian restaurant, McDonalds Kosher, a sushi restaurant, two sit down restaurants in the middle of the food court, among plenty of others. I was so happy to be there it made not being able to find a seat for over 15 minutes of walking around and having to eat while standing seem not as bad. It was still bad though after all the walking I had done and would do that day. Ooouch.The next day I had to leave at 2pm so I tried to wake up early and see at least two more things. I actually woke up two hours later and got hung up watching the Denmark
game and got to see one of them-- el Caminito. I´m really glad I chose that as my one thing to see. It´s basically a block of houses and restaurants that were painted by a famous artist some years ago. It´s a huge tourist trap but it was worth it to see this part of B.A. that you find all over post cards and to just take your time to look at how colorful it is. And when I saw a famous artist painted the houses, I mean solid colors. No huge murals or abstract paintings cover the buildings. Just bright colors. It is unique though and actually was somewhat near the boat terminal I had to walk to, so it worked out.My overall impression of Buenos Aires is that it was awesome! There were so many things I didn´t get a chance to do and will definitely have to do next time when I will hopefully have more time to meander. It almost makes me wish I was in B.A. instead of Montevideo, but I´d never get anything done because there is just so much to do.
Did you think I could say everything I wanted to about B.A. in one post? I think not. This one is long enough already, but I´ll write another one to cover what I missed.
And notice how I marked my days by fútbol games? I´m not a soccer person at all but put me in a continent where it is a big deal and in a hostel where the games are always on and people are talking smack then I´ll watch a little.
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