Report from Argentina

My life has been pretty full lately-my parents visiting, Carnaval, and I just got back from Argentina. My parents called a few days before they got to Brazil to see if I wanted to to with them to Buenos Aires to serve as their Spanish-speaking tour guide for a few days.

Hmmmmmm. Let's think...

A tranquil flight with no kids?

Three nights in a 5-star hotel?

Meals with adults?

Sign me up!

Here they are in front of the "Pink House" (Argentina's equivalent of the White House)



Last October, we went to Argentina to celebrate Julio's 8th birthday and had a great time. We did a lot of the same things that I did last time with the addition of:

1) Visiting La Boca:

La Boca is a poor section of Buenos Aires in the South side. It was founded by immigrant Italians who at one point wanted to establish their own republic. Argentina didn't go for that. It's on a port and when they were constructing their houses, they would just use supplies that were left over from the port. So, their houses were multi-colored because they'd run out of one color and start with another.







Pretty cool, huh?

2) Japanese Botanical Garden:


Lots of icky carp there:

3) The Awesome Cemetery, with a guide

When we went in October for 2 days we went to the Recoleta Cemetery 2 times-it was that cool. But, I so wanted to do it with a guide. But, unfortunately, Guapo is staunchly Anti-Guide-he thinks all guides just make crap up. I, on the other hand, appreciate a good guide-even if it's they're making some of it up, I figure they still know more than I do.

So, my wish came true and we got to visit the cemetery with a guide. Here he is:



He's standing in front of the grave of the guy who staged a successful military coup against Juan Peron and then had Eva Peron's embalmed body hidden for nearly 20 years (it was buried under a fake name in Milan, Italy)!

(How in the heck would I ever have known that without the guide? Thank you guide!!!)

Here's a scary little story-see the statue of this girl with her hand on the handle of the door?



She supposedly went out to the theater one night with her friends and mysteriously died. Her grandmother, who lived in France couldn't believe that she was dead, so she traveled to Argentina and made the family open up the tomb so she could see the body. They found the body, but with scratches all over the casket, as if she had been buried alive and had tried to escape. Ewwwww. The guide said it was probably just urban legend and that the other theory is that the casket was tampered with by vandals seeking the jewels she was buried with. Let's hope so.

Here are a bunch of kitties who live in the cemetery:



4) A Tango Show. I wanted to go to one so bad in October but we didn't know if it would hold the attention, or worse, hold the attention a little too well, of an 8-year old boy. I'm not a huge connoisseur of of dance, but I really thing the tango is cool.

So now I'm back. The kids survived my absence. Guapo survived my absence. My parents are leaving today :(. My life will get back to it's normal boring pace.

Can you believe it's already March?