I just ordered the awesomeness that is Cobalt Fluxes and all the domestic PS2 DDR's. I think my feet will hate me now.

After much delay and procrastination, I've finally gotten around to writing about my trip to Buenos Aires. Hopefully, you'll find the entry worth the wait. For brevity & sanity's sake, I am splitting the report into several entries. The first is on the flip side.

First of all, a little background on the trip itself: as some of you might have heard, I started a new job late last month. I actually accepted a while earlier, but scheduled the start date a few weeks off so I could get my last bit of slack in before the drudgery began once again. Originally, I was going to simply bum around home & maybe take a road trip somewhere. My dear, dear friends had other ideas and eventually convinced me to take a trip out of the country while I had the chance. At that point, it was a mad dash to figure out where I could go on 7 days notice without paying several thousand dollars in airfare alone. Although I was initially a bit worried about my incredible non-mastery of Spanish, I finally decided upon Buenos Aires. Then I had to make the other very important arrangement - lodging. Luckily, it turned out that there were a large number of short-term rental properties in very primo locations throughout the city. I settled upon a small apartment in the Recoleta neighborhood.

Fast-forward 5 days or so after this all goes down: I get on a plane sometime midday to DC. I arrive in the evening, have a small layover, and then get on another flight down to Buenos Aires from there. I finally arrive there in Argentina around 10:15 am local time the next day. At that point, I'm brutally tired & my muscles are sore from all the sitting in cramped spaces. To top it off, my apartment isn't going to be ready until 4 pm. To get around this, I drop of my luggage @ the rental office & just start wandering about Microcentre & Monserrat just to kill time - learning to love the national sport of jaywalking, snapping a photo of the Obelisco, avoiding a protest headed to Plaza de Mayo, checking out the Casa Rosada & Congresso Nacional, even touring the shopping district along Calle Florida. For some odd reason, I was actually awake enough to walk all that distance.

Around 5 pm that day, I had my first impromptu lesson in Argentine cuisine. According the guidebook I procured earlier, porteños eat dinner fairly late - 9 pm is an early dinner so normally people will have té around 5 pm or so. Since I was trying to fit in with the native schedule, I decided that I would drop in some café, have un café chico and a sandwich. At some random place, I decided to order hot sandwich. I should've realized from the prices that the sandwiches might be more substantial than I thought. Before that occurred to me, a very large plate was placed before me. In the center was a 6" diameter sandwich that was about 3" thick. This monstrosity had bread, fried egg, ham, cheese, and steak. I just about died eating that thing. Eventually, I just gave up and left a quarter of the beast there.

After that, I checked into my apartment & just relaxed until dinnertime. Then I hopped around the corner to a restaurant called Los Sanjuanninos - a native Argentine restaurant that specializes in northern Argentine cuisine. I had an empanada, half a bottle of white wine, locro (corn, white beans, various cuts of beef + pork stewed together with black pepper) and a dulce de leche flan..of death. At that point, I had my first impromptu lesson in how wonderful the exchange rate was - the entire meal was under $20. All hail the beauty of the 3:1 exchange rate in my favor.

I closed off the night by sampling the glorious cable in my apartment. There was a good amount of local fare, but the number of multinationals was Spanish versions was a bit surprising - TNT, WB, CNN, MGM, MTV & even Canal+. It shouldn't have been surprising, but it was interesting to see how far the larger media conglomerates reach. Also, it was an odd mix of dubbed & subtitled shows. Vote for strangest show: Robotech en castellano.

Eventually, I just dropped into slumber, recharging for the next day.