The Mouth of the River

It's Thursday, our final day in Buenos Aires, and it looks like the weather couldn’t be more perfect. Since our flight out is at 10:30 PM and we need to check out with our apartment folks at 6:30 PM, the whole day will be abbreviated. This means we need an early start and we really want to see La Boca today.

After a few emails back and forth, we determine lunch with Emilio and Ignacio won’t work – Emilio has learned that he's got to meet with his old boss at his former job in order to get paid and it’s important that he do this sooner as opposed to later. Of course, he sends, “Un beso grande para ambas!” We’re sad we won’t have the chance to see them again, but we’re also rushing around a bit too much and it would’ve been too difficult to coordinate without a phone.

I look around a bit in our Fodor’s for a final place to eat and come up with a restaurant called “Patagonia Sur”. It seems perfectly located – it’s in La Boca and it’s a restaurant owned by one of the best chefs in Buenos Aires. Actually, they note that he’s a bit of a homesteader since there aren’t any other restaurants of this caliber in La Boca. Also, it’s listed as “$$$” – so it’s on the pricier side, but it's more like a meal at Tegui and not completely out of our price range.

After this, we’ll visit the colorful houses of the La Boca’s Caminito neighborhood and, if time allows, we’ll try to go by the futbol stadium to the little museum there. Plan! Yes, we have a plan. 

We take a taxi – a Radio Taxi this time – and drive across town and south through Centre and San Telmo. La Boca is considered a somewhat sketchy neighborhood by most and we’ve been warned that this isn’t an area to visit at night. It also has a history as being a place where many people from Genoa settled and therefore it has a bit of Italian flare. The actual translation of La Boca is “the mouth” and they say it’s named this because of its location near the mouth of the river. This sounds ominous to me –a place where the river meets the sea and where things both end and begin. 

As we drive in, the area has a somewhat industrial vibe with warehouses and loading docks. Also, we find more graffiti on the buildings in La Boca and it seems like there’s a drastic change in the way people actually look and dress in this neighborhood compared to Palermo – the La Boca folks seem to be more working class. For instance, where the porteños of Palermo were dressed in suits and summer dresses, people in this neighborhood are in flip-flops and men are often without shirts. Also, there are people sitting on porch stoops and they stare at us as we go by in our taxi, looks on their faces that reflect both distrust and weariness. We soon see that taxis aren’t quite as common in La Boca.

Patagonia Sur is actually located conveniently a block away from the colorful Caminito, so we get a brief preview of the neighborhood before we step up to the restaurant and we’re excited to explore everything after our meal. At the restaurant, we ring a buzzer to get inside and a man dressed in a suit with a tie opens the door and graciously escorts us in. As we enter, I see that Patagonia Sur is what is no doubt the most beautiful restaurant I’ve ever visited.

Inside, every detail looks like it's straight out of an Argentine antique shop – the walls are made of aged dark wood, the well-worn marble floors are covered with wonderfully faded antique rugs in soft rose hues, and each ornate wooden table is set with sterling silver, neatly pressed white linens, and crystal. I’m in heaven. And to make things even lovelier, the sun is streaming delicately through the windows and the room itself is quite small and there are maybe enough seats for a total of twenty diners.

The restaurant is maybe ¾ of the way full and as we’re seated we see a few dishes set at other diners’ tables – each dish looks delicate and exquisitely arranged. This seems impossible – how is there actually space for us and how perfect is this for our snowflake of a last meal in Buenos Aires?

After we’re seated, I see that there’s really just the one server. He’s the same guy who opened the door for us, and he’s caring for the other ten or so people in the room. He offers us our menus, and Klover and I look at each other like we can’t believe we’ve hit this jackpot. Klover surreptitiously takes a few snaps – no one will believe this place.

Everything on the menu sounds delicious, seasonal, and classically Argentine, but there aren’t any prices after each item. I look at the menu closer and see that at the right hand side, after the list of dessert items, there’s a price: “$410 menu.” This means that the meal is prix-fix and we need to get a starter, entrée, and dessert. Oh, and it’s the equivalent of a little over $100 US dollars each. Ahem.

Klover and I look at each other. WTF! And how could Fodor’s have said “$$$” when what they really meant, particularly by Argentine standards, was “$$$$$$”. I’ve never walked out of a restaurant before because of something like price, but here I am starting to sweat because there's no way I'm going to spend this much on lunch and I don’t want to make Klover spend this much, either. Oh, and there's the fact that in no way am I going to actually need to eat that much – it would take up our entire afternoon. It seems oddly decadent, too, considering the neighborhood we're in.

I call our waiter over. “Habla Ingles?” I ask.

He immediately apologizes and I can see he’s going to go find English menus.

“No. That’s not it. Is it prix-fix only?” I ask.

And he nods and smiles. Klover and I look at each other, shake our heads, and tell him we have to go. Then we try exiting as discretely as possible. Fortunately, there’s no fuss – no doubt we aren't the first to sneak our way out the door after looking at the menu. Once outside, I feel immediately and incredibly relieved. Whew! Sometimes there’s really too much beauty, and it really is out of reach. Klover and I can’t help but laugh nervously, happy to have escaped unscathed.

We walk around the corner and find ourselves in the heart of the colorful Caminito. And without pause we find people are trying to ply us into stopping into their restaurant for a beer or a pizza. The neighborhood is very touristy and there are couples dressed garishly in tango gear, posing for tourists’ snapshots. It’s such a sudden shift from the interior of the restaurant that Klover and I feel a tad shocked. It’s also incredibly warm all of a sudden - unbearably so. We decide to head back toward the water and consult our guidebooks; we can’t eat at one of these places, we decide. There has to be another option.

And this is how we find ourselves at the Proa Museum. It’s right above Caminito and slightly around the corner and we find it through a little note in one of our books about its café being a good place to stop in for a light salad or a café con leche. The building itself seems to be a bit of an anomaly for the neighborhood – cool and airy and modern in the middle of kitsch - and as we walk up the stairs to the third floor, we find we have excellent views through the large windows of the docks and river below. It’s perfect, and the architecture interesting and incredibly modern and the whole place is more on par with the MALBA and maybe in some ways even better since it’s so unexpected.

The café dining area is also big and airy with modern furniture and a deck with beachy, sand-colored couches that face out onto the water and a view down into the colorful bookshop below. We find a table near the center and look over the menu – everything sounds amazing, and there’s even a selection of empanadas, a must for our final day.

Klover orders a fresh fruit drink and a café, and I order ice tea and some agua con gas. We also order the empanadas and salads made with grilled shrimp and avocado. The empanadas turn out to be extraordinary – one is made with sweet corn, and the other is a carne empanada. Both are served with a spicy salsa and I’m in heaven to finally have some legitimate spice, something that’s been lacking in most of our food during our time in Buenos Aires. Also, as odd as it may be, our drinks are above par, too. My tea actually has ice, something I’d actually gotten used to going without, and our agua is con MAS gas. Wowzer. 

When we receive our salads, we’re not shocked to see that these too are absolutely sublime. The shrimp is cooked to perfection and the tomato and avocado are seasonably fresh. 

After lunch – which, again, takes a really long time – we explore the Proa a bit. The bookshop has an Apple computer, a few small tables with Scandinavian designed furniture, and we find there are odd art objects on the walls and hanging from the ceiling. We also explore an exhibit with native Argentinean ponchos – and the whole visit to the exhibit is actually free. 

After this incredibly refreshing lunch, we’re finally ready for an adventure in Caminito. We walk down the small cobblestone streets and again we’re greeted with a barrage of hawkers. I feel a bit like I’m on Beale Street in Memphis – we've got cheap drinks, music blasting, and trinkets and tacky souvenirs for sale in every doorway. Also, all the men who work at these places are making catcalls – I keep hearing, “What’s your name? Barbie? You want a place to stay?” I also see women carrying babies - they wear tight tops and appear to have gang tattoos on their necks and shoulders. There are also little children who come up and beg for money. 

But the buildings themselves, painted so brightly, are really quite beautiful. The actual streets aren’t that long, so we’re able to get over to a little section that has train tracks and though we’re approached again (“What’s your name? Do you need somewhere to stay?”), Klover and I are able to take some photos in peace.

On a street over, it’s a little quieter with fewer cafes. There we find a few tourista shops selling everything from shot glasses, to small furs, to ashtrays with “Buenos Aires” and “Argentina” displayed prominently. I also see rows of snow globes with mini Caminitos inside, and some that just forgo any reference to Argentina altogether and have Lucy and Charlie Brown from the Peanuts forever encapsulated in a magical winter wonderland. 

I look at this stuff for a bit, but I honestly don’t know what to do with knickknacks – it’s like I can’t even fathom who would want this or have enough of an imagination to know where to put any of it. I realize I probably need a bit more of a sense of humor about the kitsch, but I’m not feeling it. I see silver spoons with the Argentine flag, and I think of how my grandmother used to collect this stuff – a life of collecting trinkets from all over the world, and for what? Me, I'm always trying to get rid of stuff rather than collect it.

Klover is better at the hunt through this sort of stuff than me – she can shop and bring home something that amidst the masses is just a blur to me, but when she puts it on it somehow looks fashionable and unique. At one shop, she finds a pair of handmade boots she tries on. I’m completely skeptical, but I realize she can sometimes work these things. Our saleslady is willing to bend over backwards to make a sale, but Klover eventually decides the shoes are too uncomfortable and not very forgiving. 

After more photo ops, we head back toward the water. We stop to watch some boys play soccer in a park and see evidence of the influence the Boca Juniors futbol league has on the neighborhood. Sadly, we won’t have the chance to visit the stadium – it actually seems like this isn’t the sort of neighborhood we’d want to hang out in long and the traffic looks pretty heavy and we’re afraid of how much time it will take us to get back through town.

Our cab ride means we have another 40-minute journey with a complete character. And our latest cab driver is maneuvering between cars like a complete maniac, almost hitting pedestrians and giggling foolishly. He speaks only castellanos, so we have what starts as a lively conversation – with him pointing out sites along the way, including the futbol stadium – but what quickly dissolves into too much talk. We actually grow exhausted and want a little quiet. He’s relentless, though. He keeps asking us questions – about shopping, the length of our stay in Buenos Aires, and where we’re from. He even asks us our sexual preference.

“Viva, l’amor!” Klover says with a wink.

Somehow Klover tells him she’s Korean and he drives us by the Korean embassy – something we’ve already taken snapshots of – and he eagerly notes, “Korea and Barbie!” I’m so tired at this point I want to punch him.

“What the hell,” I say. “Isn’t that offensive?”

“Well, we clearly don’t look like we’re from here,” Klover notes wryly. And I realize this is true and no doubt the reason for all the catcalls. We look like foreigners. We don’t really look like we belong in Buenos Aires.

When Klover responds to our driver’s inquiries about shopping, she sort of insults him by telling the truth. “No. No shopping. No me gusta.”

Our driver tries to say that the best shopping in the world is in Buenos Aires – are we crazy? But Klover is adamant. She doesn’t like. And our driver makes a gesture that we take, politely, to mean, “Shove it up your ass!”

“Wha-?” Klover says, and she makes the gesture vigorously right back. For a moment, I think she’s actually going to be the one to punch him and not me.

But the cab driver just giggles, and swerves to avoid hitting another pedestrian.

We talk about how we’ll be leaving that night and he tries to get us to have him drive us to the airport. He tells us it’ll be $150 pesos, but we know we can’t stand to be around this guy beyond him dropping us off in front of our apartment at the curb. And when we pay our tab, we heartily slam the door shut, glad that this cab driver came so late in our visit.

After a quick clean up, we meet with Karina, our little landlady, and take care of getting our deposit back. The whole transaction is straight-forward enough, though there are some language issues and some questions about the number of nights we stayed at the apartment that mean we end up wasting precious time on the phone with her 18 year-old son, trying to communicate with him via his rudimentary English.

And then we really are getting nervous about time – traffic out of Buenos Aires can be really tough in the evening and we’re not sure what to expect. When we finally hit the curb with our bags, we can’t seem to see any “Radio Taxis”, and the ones that do stop don’t want to take us to the airport. I’m on the verge of an anxiety attack. Stupido! I should’ve actually booked some sort of car, but here we are, last minute and there’s nothing we can do.

There’s a woman standing in the doorway to our apartment building and she’s been watching us do this whole taxi routine. It seems she’s a friend of Karina’s and no doubt we’re providing mucho entretenido. At one point, she waves at us and gets our attention. There’s a man – a friend of hers – exiting a cab and they tell the cab driver to hold on for us.

Thus we embark on another comedy of errors – one that includes the cab driver trying to figure out how to get our bags in the trunk, taking the exiting man’s luggage and placing it back into the trunk, trying to squeeze Klover’s bag into the front seat of the cab, and then the former passenger laughing and telling the cab driver he’s not going with us and, um, he needs his luggage back. During this whole confusion, Klover is standing there looking at the loco cab driver with an expression of complete disgust on her face. She looks over at the apartment building at Karina and her friend and slowly rolls her eyes.

Once we’re seated in the cab with our now sweaty cab driver, we see the meter has been running the whole time and it says, “$35” pesos. Alora! I tell Klover that I have a total of $146 pesos left. I’m thinking she has cash, but it turns out she actually has absolutely none left at all. I know from our previous freaky cab driver that the going rate for a ride to the airport is probably $150, and we’re clearly short.

I ask the cab driver, “Qwanto questo aeroporto?” but there’s immediate confusion. He seems to be saying $150, but he’s very excited and he keeps talking rapidly in castellones. The man who just exited the cab comes over and tries to help out. He’s gray-haired, somewhat jovial, and probably in his early sixties. I have my money out in front of me and he can see that I’m just short of the amount needed to get to the airport, but he tries to haggle a bit with the driver on our behalf.

Overall, it’s a lot easier to understand what the gray-haired man is saying compared to the driver. The driver indicates that he will turn the meter off, and that it’ll be $150, but he insists he needs the full amount. We’ve got US dollars, and we’re thinking – hell, why not give him the equivalent? But this won’t fly and our gray-haired friend seems to agree that being short a mere $4 pesos (this equals $1 US!), is a silly reason to not take us to the airport. At the last minute, our new friend hands me $10 pesos and though we try to give him US dollars in exchange, he’s very generous, insisting that we keep it and that he doesn’t want anything from us. We’re almost in tears at this point – we can’t believe this man is being so kind! We enthusiastically thank him.

Once en route to the airport, the drive goes along smoothly – we pass through surface streets and again we’re fascinated to see parts of this enormous city that we never even imagined. Klover spots her favorite sign – one that she thinks indicates, “Watch out for the lady carrying a clutch”  - and the sun is slowly setting and everything is awash in the lavender color that we now identify with Buenos Aires.

On the highway outside of town, Klover naps and I see farmland and fields and a whole other world that is so different from the large elegant buildings found within the city’s barrios. All the drivers are so aggressive, too – again I note there’s no such thing as a line between lanes, there’s not a shoulder that is not meant to be driven on in order to pass your fellow driver, and there’s not a horn that is not to be honked at passing passengers. As we move down the highway, I occasionally meet the eye of another passenger – sometimes I see sad, lost, and barely expressive eyes, and other times ther's the lift of an eyebrow, or a sudden wash of curiosity that falls over someone’s face. So far away, I think. I’m so far away.

At the airport, again we have a moment of hijinx with our cab driver. He holds two receipts, one for $6 pesos, another for $1.75. These are from tolls on the way to the airport and he demands we pay these, too. Klover looks like she’s about to blow – how can he unexpectedly throw these at us when we clearly agreed back at the apartment that we’d pay $150?

As far as she knew, we couldn’t cover this. But I hunt through my wallet and find a few more peso coins in my purse, and I’m able to very lucidly provide exact amounts for each of his receipts, as well as the $150 for the cab ride. If he were truly trying to cheat us, I figure this extra comes out to the equivalent of $2 US dollars. Meager. He can have it.

And then, there we are. Klover and I in the terminal, saying our goodbyes – she’s taking a flight through Miami and I’m heading through Houston. “Talk to you tomorrow!” we say and we’re a tad rushed and out of sorts for a moment as we hug briefly.

And I’m alone again and heading home, and it’s sort of hard for me to believe I’ve spent so much time with another human and, alora, I didn’t even get sick of her. It makes me think of how all my expectations have been debunked – and I realize that this is what I like. I make these broad statements – like, the porteños don’t like cheese, or all the cab drivers in Buenos Aires are great, or it’s hard to travel with friends…or I don’t need to see Pavement play again – but the truth is, I really don’t know what I’m talking about. I don’t know what’s out there, and I like being proven wrong. I’m just trying to capture the unknown and hold it down long enough to make sense of that which doesn’t make sense at all.

Once on the plane, I sit next to a young woman who speaks Spanish occasionally with her neighbor across the aisle. Her skin is light brown and she has shoulder-length dark hair and a small piercing in her nose. At one point I ask her if she’s from Buenos Aires, and she tells me, “No. I’m from LA.”

As we talk a bit, a whole new tale unfolds. She’s Mexican American and from the town of Taft near Bakersfield and she’s just been in Buenos Aires to visit her fiancé who’s in the Marines. She’s a mere 24 years-old and he’s 22 and they’ve been together for two years. It also comes out that they became engaged after dating for four months and until her three-week visit to Buenos Aires, she hadn’t seen him for fifteen months. Also, he’s Caucasian and before she met him, she’d never even dated someone who wasn’t Mexican, but here she was – getting married.

“When will you see him again?” I ask.

“In nine months,” she says and smiles. She can’t stop looking at her ring and she tells me that he’s planning the wedding and it’ll be held in Reno, Nevada, two years from now and right after he gets out of the Marines. She says she’ll only see him a few times between now and then, but they have Skype and it’s not so bad.

As I listen to her tell me all of this, I can see she’s clearly so happy every time she merely says his name. And a part of me feels an urge to tell her the truth – that things don’t turn out the way you plan. And for one sick moment, my impulse is to say something like, “Be careful.”

But then I don’t. I realize I don’t even want to be careful anymore. Instead, I think of how different my life was from what I thought it was going to be, and how as silly and cliché as it may sound, I’m glad I made some mistakes.

So, instead, I smile at her and say, “Well, I’ve done it the opposite way. I dated someone for six years before getting married and that didn’t work. You never really know. It seems things might just turn out better by doing things your own way. Good luck.”

The plane is getting higher and higher in the sky and I look out my window and see the lights of Buenos Aires below – such a huge city from this distance. And still so much to see and do and so many adventures to be had. Bonita diversion, I think. And I can only hope I’ll be back in this hemisphere sometime very soon. Me gusta, Buenos Aires. Me gusta.