“Save Beirut from Hell”

 

“Please, my son, don’t shoot today,

They are kind, perhaps ordinary, our neighbours for so long.

 

Please, habibte, don’t go out today,

Stay home, eat mana’ich, break bread with your family.

 

I peer through my broken window onto Hamra Street below,

They are boys, as my own,

Eyes glazed, shoulders solid.

 

We, and our mothers, gave birth silently, to these children;

They, and their fathers, give birth violently, to this hell.

 

Please, my son, don’t shoot today,

They are tired, like we are,

We have lived this for so long.”

 

May 10^th 2008

 

Race for London Mayor: To vote or Not to Vote, That is The Question?

 Don’t switch off. Please, just bear with me for five minutes and read on. The Mayor of London race is strll cold, London has barely looked up from its free newspaper gossip on George Clooney being in town. But we have the right to vote, and the obligation to input our views into how we want to see London over the next few years. We have to vote, and that decision, for whom we are going to vote, is the reason most of us are switching off.

 

 

Nobody knows how they are going to vote next week

 

Nobody really knows how they are going to vote next week. The choices are unappealing, and the Barak Obama v Hillary Clinton debate just looks sexier, and more enticing. All we really know about our candidates is whether they plan to vote for bendy buses.

 

The truth is, we all need to inject some thought into this process. The candidates may not be inviting, and they may not really deserve much of our time, but the post of the Mayor of London is important. Think how many people know something about New York’s well known Mayor Giulliani?

 

Ken Livingstone, unattractive but a serious contender

 

 Ken Livingstone is an unattractive vote for many of us. Arrogant and brash, he has waded into hot water over ill-advised comments on many an occasion. He has lied openly and contemptuously about the congestion charge, and probably plenty of other issues. He has ridden rough shot over public consultations, for example over the western extension of the congestion charge. He has now affiliated himself with the Labour party, party of war. He has chosen his advisers with much lack of sensibility and, some may argue, sense. His multicultural benefits are hugely undermined by the open consideration amongst London’s Jewry that there is an anti-semite running their city. The man has done nothing to quell their fears. Stick vividly in my throat as it will, there remains one real reason why Ken will get either my first or my reserve vote next week. He is independent enough to shout out against New Labour. He has spoken out against the Iraq War since the outset, and since the majority of Londoners represent an anti-war vote, it is inconceivable that we could be represented by a politician who clamours in support of more deaths and destruction in Iraq. The war is not over. Thousands remain under fire in Iraq, and life is a daily struggle for the entire population. The Iraq Body Count estimate sthat between 80-90,000 civilian deaths have taken place since 2003. That is about half the population of Kensington and Chelsea borough. It is selfish in the extreme for us to vent our petty concerns over bendy buses and other such trivia, when our government has led us into war, and now relies on the general public indifference to keep us there. Ken, for all his faults, has dared to speak out and continues to speak out. The war must remain on the public agenda, and it is a reason, perhaps the reason to vote in favour of Ken.

 

The “Face of London”

 

Then there is another related matter – the face of London. The Mayor has some hand in shaping policies that affect us all, but perhaps more than anything else he is the face of London. Ken represents the best of London, the forgiving tolerant face of London in the wake of the 7/7 atrocities. Ken stood up and united voters. Can you imagine what would happen with a Boris Johnson or a BNP member in power? Anarchy, localised civil war, communities hating each other, blaming each other, deep resentment brewing at every corner. Trite as those multicultural festivals are in Trafalgar Square, they are a welcome addition to London life, showing off this city as truly multicultural, such trademark being its glory, colour and vibrance.

 Brian Paddick as the Face of London just gets us nowhere. The Liberal Democrats’ reversal over their Iraq War stance has lost them serious credit as a party, and Brian Paddick (unlike Ken, who has merely attached himself to Labour without any simultaneous hinging upon Labour policy, least of all the war) is attached to the Liberals, or at least does not seek to differentiate himself from their current and disappointing blandness in any way. It is true that he is seeking to distinguish himself on detailed transport policies, which are promising, but his manifesto promises do not go much further than this sole area. As the face of London, Brian Paddick just doesn’t have enough personality and charisma for the job. A vote for Brian Paddick sadly may be a wasted vote.

The Environment

 

Finally, one other serious issue should be considered when voting next week. The Environment. Since we live and breathe in this polluted city, the environment should be our 2^nd biggest concern after being the “face of London”. We have to consider the polluting effects of vehicle emissions when we think of our own health and that of our children. It means a vote for cheaper and more affordable public transport. It means looking for new sustainable sources of energy, like solar or wind panels. That may be a vote for  the Greens, or maybe Ken. The Greens significantly want to re-nationalise the tube. Given the catastrophe of the PPPs, that could yet be the reason I vote for Sian Berry. Especially since she also represents anti-war and the Greens want the UK to pull out of Iraq. But the Greens policy on immigration leaves everything to be desired, indeed it is a right wing disgrace of the first order. Where does that leave one’s vote?

 

Cojones

 

There is one final reason why I may yet give Ken my first preference vote over the Greens or Respect (which exists only as a protest vote, for all the reasons recorded above). He has balls. I may not like them, we may not appreciate them all the time, but he has forged ahead and introduced visionary ideas in London, like the congestion charge (though I personally disagree and disagreed with the western extension), oyster cards and even his dealings with Chavez in the oil exchange programme.

 

We need someone who can lead London forward, and sadly, though I wish there was another choice, Ken remains the only viable first or second vote.

 

 The Unforgivable Boris

 

Boris Johnson is an unforgivable vote for the following reasons:

 

1)      His response to any further terrorist atrocity in London would most likely inflame civil relations; because ….

2)      He is totally contemptuous of Londoners, foreigners and anyone not like him;

3)      He supported the war on Iraq;

4)      He has consistently made some of the most outlandish racist comments over the years as a Tory politician and journalist. It is even more offensive that he now suddenly find his Turkish grandfather out of the grave, as though that makes his racism acceptable. The comments he has consistently made about Islam are so vile, and ill-advised as a political spokesman that he will no longer represent London but invite further suicide bombings on London (on Asian Network, he tried to u-turn with a ridiculous comment saying he could “out-ethnic” an Asian presenter…;

5)      We know he has apologised for his offensive comments, where he described black children greeting the Queen as “flag-waving piccaninnies”, and  he once said that when Tony Blair visited Congo “the tribal warriors will all break out in watermelon smiles”. We know he has said they were taken out of context. Really, how can black Londoners be represented by a man who was even capable of such comments? How can white Londoners believe that it is in their best interests to be represented by a man who appears to sour community relations that are the bedrock of a happy London?;

6)      He plans to do nothing to “green” london. In fact basically he has no environment policies other than to banish bendy buses;

7)      He has indicated that he might reverse the smoking ban in London. How stupid is that? Even many smokers prefer the non-smoking ban;

      Though Ken has no power to intervene on the tube, he has spoken consistently against the private-public partnership which has left the tube management unaccountable and the rest of us like sardines. Boris is unlikely to go against PPP, and positively likely to favour them, though since he almost never articulates his policies, it is hard to know;

9)      What does BJ know about the people of London? He never travels by tube, and the oyster card has been an excellent introduction to London. I doubt he would even know what one looked like since he is so out of touch with ordinary people in London;

10)  He sends 3 of his children to private school rather than state schools. Whilst one might accept this as a personal choice for many London parents, a politician needs to be willing to say he suffers like the majority of the population. If he does  not know how awful the schools are, who will consider improving them?

11)  The BNP have endorsed BJ as their reserve candidate. Isn’t that reason enough not to support him?

12)  He doesn’t seem to have any policies other than reversal of the bendy bus policy. Everything else amounts to a soundbite.

 

 

Don’t get me wrong, I would rather vote for anyone except Ken, and I may yet vote Sian Berry (Green). Londoners have not been given much choice in this upcoming election, there is no candidate worthy of this amazing city – but a vote for Boris, the reserve candidate of the BNP, is the death of a London we know, love and of which we are proud.  

April 22^nd 2008,

London

 

 

Also read these:

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/yasmin-alibhai-brown/yasmin-alibhaibrown-londoners-would-be-mad-to-vote-for-boris-812669.html

 

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/tariq_ali/2008/04/livingstone_for_peace.html

 

 

List of candidates for the Mayor’s election

·                       Richard Barnbrook, British National Party

·                       Lindsey German, Left List

·                       Boris Johnson, Conservative Party

·                       Sian Berry, Green Party

·                       Brian Paddick, Liberal Democrats

·                       Gerard Batten, UK Independence Party

·                       Alan Craig, Christian Peoples Alliance and Christian Party

·                       Matt O’Connor, English Democrats

·                       Ken Livingstone, The Labour Party

·                       Winston McKenzie, an independent candidate

 

 

The candidates’ booklet

·                       The 2008 candidates’ booklet

·                       Audio version - listen to the candidates’ booklet

London Mayor candidates

·                       Richard Barnbrook 

·                       Gerard Batten

·                       Siân Berry

·                       Alan Craig

·                       Lindsey German

·                       Boris Johnson

·                       Ken Livingstone

·                       Matt O’Connor

·                       Brian Paddick

·                       Winston McKenzie (did not submit manifesto)

 

 

Policing the Olympic Torch: A Thoroughly Modern Contradiction

“The Games have always brought people together in peace to respect universal moral principles. The upcoming Games will feature athletes from all over the world and help promote the Olympic spirit.”

(Official Website of the Olympic Games)

 

 

Londoners have woken up today in the throes of a blizzard, white frosting coating their city. Temperatures in Lhasa are similar, with thundery hail showers blowing through their rooftop city. Beijing is chilly, but without the grace of snow. In all of these cities, thoughts of the impending Olympics heat the air.

 

The Olympic movement, with its message of peace and global harmony, however, has largely failed in London today. The enthusiasm and celebration that greeted the torchbearers in London four years ago, before the Athens Olympics, is scarcely to be seen. It is true that a global hotchpotch of people have lined the 31 mile route across London: Chinese, Tibetans, British people and tourists have turned out, in limited numbers, for a glimpse of the symbolic flame. The symbolism, though, is more Orwellian than Olympian. Neither the Chinese authorities, nor indeed the British government, can be delighted with the television images being broadcast across the world.

 

Most people lining the route have been barely able to snatch a glimpse of the torch, as it races by at surprising speed. As the day has worn on, the police presence has become considerably heavier and rougher. Bystanders have been prevented from approaching the procession, police riding bicycles, both in front and behind the magic circle, have pushed people out of the way both physically and verbally. The ring of police around the torch has grown so thick, as the afternoon has progressed, that at times it is only the fluorescent yellow of official uniforms that appears alight. Like it or not, the Beijing Olympics is now marred by a police presence across the world, from Athens through to China and now in London.

 

Understandable though the police concerns may have been, having dealt with fire extinguishers being unleashed towards the flame by creative protestors earlier in the morning, and then with a handful of individuals attempting to knock the flame from the torchbearers’ hands, there has been a disconcerting lack of regard for the rights of the onlookers, the legitimacy of the protestors and the message of the Olympics themselves. If we have to enforce public harmony with handcuffs and arrests, shout the police barricades, so be it. If the public cannot see the flame, let that be their punishment for failing to react as we would wish them to do so.

 

The Free Tibet group has successfully organised protests to line the route. Their instructions to supporters have been to be visible, loud and peaceful. That has certainly happened in spots along the route – chiefly in Bloomsbury Square, Tower Bridge and St Pauls – where the protestors have shouted and booed, check-by-jowl with the applauding onlookers who welcome the presence of this almighty sporting effort on their doorstep. In other places, it appears that a carefully orchestrated Chinese campaign has tried to suppress those protesting shouts with aggressive contra-campaigning. Large student groups of Chinese in and around Trafalgar Square have tried to drown out any protesting voices with loud singing demonstrations of their own, praising the motherland in Mandarin unison. The same groups deliberately have surrounded individual Tibetan flags with several unfurled Chinese flags and banners, so that lone voices calling for a Free Tibet seem to melt away in the snow. Don’t mix politics with sport, they say. The irony of this suppression appears to have escaped them.

 

Across the route, flags and banners have been waved – Free Tibet, the red Chinese national flag and the commercial savvy of the Samsung Olympics banner, being handed out from carrier bags by men walking through the crowds. “One World, One Dream” shout the many Chinese, out in proud force in Trafalgar Square. That very slogan ignores the fact that people in our one world have different dreams, and they dream in their own languages. The right of self-determination is a fundamental right for which societies have fought for millennia. The United Nations recognised that right of self-determination “is of particular importance because its realization is an essential condition for the effective guarantee and observance of individual human rights and for the promotion and strengthening of those rights”.

 

No amount of propaganda or manipulation of the truth can deny the Tibetan people their right to self-determination. The Olympics are a tremendous cause for celebration, and many people across the world have felt torn by a wish to celebrate this great sporting event and a simultaneous desire to condone the Chinese government for their brutal suppression of human rights. It may yet be possible to do both, but in order for that to happen, our own government needs to send out a clear message to Beijing. Gordon Brown’s ham-fisted efforts to appease both sides by appearing beside the torch, but without taking part in the relay, are a clear example of the damage done by sitting on the fence. Failure to speak out against the Chinese actions in Tibet, combined with the images of the police event that has been organised in London today, deliver an altogether alternative message of the Olympian movement in 2008. The people will do as we wish them to do, say the authorities in both London and Beijing, and if they do not, we will simply ignore them.

 

Last words, then, to the Olympic Charter:

 

“Olympism is a philosophy of life exalting and combining in a balanced whole the qualities of body, will and mind.  Blending sport with culture and education, Olympism seeks to create a way of life based on the joy of effort, the educational value of good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.

 

The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity…

 

The practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have the possibility of practising sport, without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play”.

 

Anyone lining the Torch Route today in London will have queried whether the upcoming Olympics will indeed be compliant with their own Charter. Human rights are for life, not just for one month every four years.

 

From the Torch Procession, London,

April 6^th 2008

 

http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/report/what-human-rights-legacy-beijing-olympics-20080401

 

 

 

Bariloche - Of Good Spirits, and of Bad Ones

Bariloche – Of Good Spirits, and Bad Ones 

There are spirits in these mountains, they never leave, they have never left. 

High in the Patagonian Andes, I nestle amongst my clothes for warmth. The air is bright, alive with life. I can breathe again. 

The cordillera rises, like a spiny dinosaur. The rock face creeps down the bare mountains, a bluish purple, bruised from its birthing battle with the earth, millions of years ago. The snow cap on the Chilean border hangs high in the transparent blue sky. As the gaze lowers, forests cover some of the lower slopes. From a distance, they are just a dark green haze, like moss or algae, dripping into the clearest blue water the eye has ever seen. Neither cobalt, nor azure, the icy fresh water lakes glint like giant sapphires winking at the interminable skies overhead. They reach depths of some four hundred metres. No one knows what might live down there, and no one has tried to find out. 

 

I have dipped my toes into these jewelled, precious waters, whispered to the ripples to bring me back the secrets of its calm. The image of my own feet shines back at me, not distorted by sand, or mud or any other sediment. This is the water that feeds the spirit life, echoing in the tress. 

 

I have walked amongst fairies, and wood sprites and elves. For the moss is not algae, but an enchanted forest of life. Electric green canes of bamboo are hidden by the deciduous conifers. Hidden, dense walkways where the bamboo folds and bends and fold and sways until it is covering the dirt paths with its own artistic canopies. There are murmurs in the forest, where the robins jump with sticks. Small clouds of dust rise from the chimneys of elves. 

 

A unique tree lives in these cloud forests, the twisted red Arrayan, a Chilean myrtle which the Mapuche used for medicine, fruit and health. At 20 metres high, it towers over the creatures below and gives no other tree space to grow. Their cinnamon latte bark glows orange and cream, as though drops of milk are splashed all over its bark. I sat against one, the first one I saw. It was hiding, spying on me from a clearing in the bamboo, and then teasing me with its twisted, furling branches that beckoned me into its grasp. I could not let this mockery pass, and so I sailed, across the icy waters, in search of the elusive, beautiful strangler until I fell upon a whole forest of its tangled sisters, the Bosque del Arrayanes, where gnomes live under the fallen leaves. 

 

But it is not just gnomes who lay disguised, building homes. I stayed in amongst Nature, but just once, I drove, towards humans, towards their town. Driving into a settlement known as the Swiss colony, my heart froze and I could not breathe. The clear, oxygenated air was being used up, and I could not see the owners of such greed, such barbarity. I could see no one, and yet someone was there. The road was too narrow, we could not turn the car around, and so we had to continue down this dirt track for several miles, isolated and remote. Grand houses lay behind hectares of land, with large threatening signs warning people to stay off the private property. Forebodings of  evil. What could people be hiding that they need to warn trespassers to stay away, wanderers that do not even exist in so remote a wilderness that even the Devil needs transport? The land was aching, burning, despite the biting cold.  

 

The Germans, Swiss and Austrians who fled here fifty years ago created this little town, which we never dared to enter. They brought with them their houses, chalet style, Mont Blanc pens and Alpen choclate. There were spirits in the air here, bleeding evil, reeking of another time, when the people who had built these houses were fleeing from a country that had just been vanquished. I could no longer feel the protection of the forest fairies, and we needed to get out, away from the fences that hid the protectors of fascism, away from the land where the Peron government, and many since, tolerated and protected, nay welcomed the highest order of the Third Reich. I needed to escape and get back to my forest, and so I drove, with the lake Nauhel Huapi, misnamed by the Indians who thoughts the pumas were tigers, dropping away to my side as the sun was setting on the earth, fire falling through the clear skies so that it could take revenge on the souls who lay buried here, and perhaps those who still sat, elderly and frail, but alive with the knowledge of what they had done on the old continent, maybe still celebrating the 20th April, the birthday of their satanic god, every year, behind closed doors, behind closed fences that warned trespassers not to enter. Primitive rites of passage dressed up as legitimate heirs to thrones far from here.  

 

It was later, after I left, that I learned that those roads had been the homes of the Nazis. Open about their roots, until Israel began to prosecute. Open about their affiliations, since impunity ran deep in the veins of this country at the end of the earth. Protected, ironically, by the remote Patagonian Andes, Pacific and both Argentina and Chile’s vile dictatorships. The house to which Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun had escaped, the streets where Mengel, and Eichmann, Priebke and many others had wandered, with false names, and with dirty, filthy honour, reclaiming Patagonia as their own. 

 

And this is the land of the fabled Mapuche tribe, a tall,beautiful people who were almost wiped out by contact with the white man. This is the land where they understood the puma. This is their territory, and the survivors of this other genocide breathe through the stunning faces of the mixed population of these parts. Here are the smiles, and the welcomes, and the people of the Andes. Here are the protectors of the spirits world, and the trees. 

 

I stole back to the forests, where the green soothed me, and cleansed me. Where the scent of wild lavender revived me and brought back serenity. Where the rose hips glowed coral against that sapphire of the lake. Where the giant sequoias, and cypresses waved away the crippling energy with their huge, shady branches and roots spread solid in the earth. They were here, long before, and they will remain, long after. 

There are spirits in these mountains, they never leave, they have never left.  

March 28^th 2008

Buenos Aires - The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Buenos Aires: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly 

27^th March 2008

After the riot, spectacle and melodrama of Iguazu, we returned to Buenos Aires to see that riots, spectacles and melodrama were hitting the big smoke in our absence. First off, the tail end of a tornado had swept through the city the day before we returned, knocking and breaking things about, although causing no loss of life or serious damage. Next, massive anti-government protests across the country were spreading to Buenos Aires.

On March 11^th, the government hammered export taxes of around about 44% onto soybeans and sunflower seeds. The farmers, whose livelihoods are made from the export market world’s since the country constitutes the world’s second- largest corn exporter and the third-largest soybean exporter, went out in protest before Easter, blocking the roads and setting fire to tyres. By today, March 27^th, buses between major cities have been cancelled by the protests and supermarkets across the country are running out of essential products, including all dairy products and meat. Thousands of people have descended on Buenos Aires, banging pots and pans, symbols of protest here which clang eerily like reminders of the huge financial crisis herein 2001/2. They are the noisy clamour of anti-government demonstrations that are threatening to unseat the government of Argentina’s first elected female President, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. She insisted yesterday that she would not back down, and the farmers show absolutely no sign of ending their protest. The pots and pans, it seems, will continue to clang for some time.

A different theme  

But, I have moved beyond myself. Whilst this new tension has been hotting up, we realised that a few essential things remained that we had not seen in Buenos Aires.  The first must-do was MALBA, the Latin American Modern Art Museum about which we had heard such marvellous comments, and the other was to see, even for a moment, the Casa Rosada, seat of power in this vast country, with a tumultuous past and, by the shape of the protests now swinging across the country today, potentially a rocky present and future.

 MALBA 

MALBA turned out to be vastly disappointing, both in respect of the art itself and the famous café-restaurant, which was packed to capacity on that Easter Monday. The café was waitered by the most stuck-up Argentines we had yet had the privilege to meet, and since almost every female customer present owned (and proudly displayed) at least one Prada or Gucci bag apiece and every male customer seemed to have been drinking large pieces of ice, doused in several bottles of white wine, for most of the day, the atmosphere in this aesthetically pleasing modern space, sadly was less than convivial. The art collection whetted our appetite still less. We immediately learned two things. One: Most Latin American modern art is housed in Mexico City, despite the grandiose name of this Austral museum. Two: Argentine modern art is bizarre. My adorable two year old nephew could have reached the same elevated standard of many of the paintings adorning these walls. True, there was one Frieda Kahlo, one Diego Riviera and one Amelia Paelez to be admired, but that was the end of the creative road. There was, however, one exhibit worth mentioning – a 20 minute video called The Fox in the Mirror, which consisted of a toy duck being soaked in the rain, and the “artist’s” hand then cutting off the toy duck’s wet hair with nail scissors, in an act of exquisite barbarism. A Chairman Mao watch then tick-tocks furiously in spiral circles, whilst a pair of children’s dolls, not unlike those used in the film, Chucky, spin uncontrollably across the screen. At first we laughed hysterically, wondering in whose name this constituted art. Then, when we watched part of it again, this time from the beginning, only to realise that the piece claimed to illustrate the apparent fact that angels did not recognise concepts of  time and space. Suddenly, this “art” represented some dark, deranged picture of a troubled, abused childhood. We left MALBA needing a drink.

  PLAZA DE MAYO 

Hesitating to drown our sorrows in Malbec too early in the evening, we hailed a cab to cart us across town to the Plaza de Mayo. This seemed a less touristy way of asking the driver, who was swearing chronic expletives at other crazy cab drivers all the way through town, without so much as a “Pardon-my Disgusting-Filthy language” for the two elegant women sitting in the back of his taxi, to get us to the pearly gates of the Casa Rosada. This swearing, we have since learned, is a typically Argentine trait that we have heard boarding planes, sitting in cafes or lying half-naked sun-tanning in the park of a Sunday in the presence of all and sundry.

As we approached the central area, police were blocking off the roads and the cab driver let us out, grunting vaguely in the direction of the Plaza de Mayo.

“Barbaro!” we thought. “We managed to pass for locals, and did not look like complete tourists heading for the famous Pink House.”

We were right. He obviously thought we were on our way to the huge protest march which was converging on the Plaza looking onto the Casa Rosada. Huge chants could be heard, and the sound of marching. We had been totally oblivious to the recent news, having been parked in the fashion show of Iguazu for a few days, and neither of us knew about the farmers’ protests, nor whatever this particular march seemed to be about. From where we were standing, however, it all looked quite carnival-like, with lots of people dressed in brightly coloured cotton clothing, backpacks and Doc Martens, much like any anti-war rally in London. Riot police looked casually onto the scene, parked outside the square. We did notice the red flags being hurled above the trees, and the face of Chairman Mao on one of them came up unexpectedly for the second time that day. It seemed we were having a Communist Day. Ah, and that much painted face here, my very own Che Guevara also looked out at me across the swirling mists of banners and flags. Since Che is little more than a famous Argentine with a recognisable face in this country of conscious consumerism, I paid surprisingly little attention.

 EVITA and the CASA ROSADA 

For now, I was more fascinated with viewing the Casa Rosada. For those not in the know, this is the famous rose- pink edifice from where Evita and Juan Peron famously roused the nation’s masses in the 1940s, shouting to the descamisados (the shirtless ones, in other words the workers) about their rights, and where the First Lady famously made speeches (from the lower balcony of the edifice, ostensibly to be “closer to the people”) about bombing the middle classes, whilst inconveniently being kitted out in diamonds and fine European fabrics herself. But, put aside the controversy for just a moment- Evita has mythical status in Argentina. There have been numerous petitions to the Vatican for her to be canonised, and her public works of charity and for women’s rights are much lauded. On an earlier visit to the Museo de Evita, I watched her informal canonisation take place in a small house, in the wealthy suburb of Recoleta: Her speeches are televised in black and white, her dresses lay hang on display behind glass cases (similar to the collection held for Princess Diana in Kensington Palace in London) and even her sewing machine from her early film days is put out for the adoring public to consume, cry over and remember how much they loved their lady, even those who are too young to remember or to have known her. Her speeches are framed on the wall, and even the cynics amongst us cannot fail to be moved by the images of an entire nation in grief when she died at the age of 33 from cancer, only for her corpse to be stolen by the incoming military, battered and buried in a hidden grave. She was eventually found in Italy, and her body was brought back to be buried in the Recoleta cemetery. I also visited this on a previous occasion. Unlike most cemeteries, there is nothing remotely haunting about this ground of mini-palaces and shrines to the most applauded or most aristocratic in Argentine history. Families have invested stocks and shares to get the best situated chapels, towers and remembrance houses. It is no more a cemetery than a small town, peopled only by the dead and the visitors who come, often in family outings on Sundays, to place olive branches on the buildings that house their physical remains. Evita’s final resting place is here, along with that of her husband, Juan Peron.

Reading a recent interview with Antonio Banderas on board the Aerolineas Argentinas flight to Iguazu last week (quick aside: it was something of a miracle to find an actual interview, since most of the airline magazine’s pages were dedicated to the advertisement of Spa Plastic Surgery treatments, which made us finally realise why all the girls from trendy Palermo all have the same nose), the Spanish love god himself revealed that one of the most passionate and intense moments of his life was when Madonna sang “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina” live, without rehearsal, from the lower balcony of the Casa Rosada. Although the choice to have the Material Girl play the “Actress-Comes-Good-Turns-Politician-Turns-Saint” was hugely controversial in Argentina, apparently Madonna played such a life-like interpretation of their icon, as she sang to 7000 extras in the Plaza de Mayo, with her hair tightly pulled back in a blond bun, that thousands of people genuinely wept as she sang, remembering their beautiful Evita. The images of grief that we watch in that film are all genuine. I would venture that Madonna looked so beautiful as she played the steely actress/politician that the actual pictures of the real Eva Peron are not as photogenic as I had imagined before I came here. Criticism still rages about whether Evita was a gold-digger with knives neatly stuck out for her opponents, or whether she was a Mother Theresa character. Whatever the truth, it is undeniable that she was instrumental in bringing universal suffrage to the country in 1947, and that she was heavily responsible for the Peron labour laws, which certainly played a positive role amongst the iron fists of their dictatorship.

So, as we gazed up at the lower balcony, glowing a dusky pink as the sun set on Buenos Aires, it was with a uncanny sense of deja-vu that we thought we heard a woman shouting for Justice for the People, for the Workers and for the Cartoneros.

 CARTONEROS 

Cartoneros are the Argentines (and sometimes the Bolivians or Peruvians) that nobody wants to see. The ugly birthmark hidden behind a neatly pressed shirt and tie. They are the reverse of the coin, the shanty town dwellers, who do not visit modern art museums, and who do not drink in the trendy Palermo bars, although they frequent the Palermo haunts every night, sifting through rubbish bins for cardboard which they pile into their heavy wheelbarrows to sell for pittance to recycling plants. Porteños do nothing to make their life easier. With consummate arrogance, they fail even to separate the card out from the domestic trash into separate bags of rubbish, so that the young boys who often walk 30-50 kilometres every day simply to retrieve these bits of cardboard, are forced to wade through the waste of the wealthy. In my view, this failure of consideration is an attempt, conscious or unconscious, to deny even the existence of this underclass. Such denial is rampant, and extends even to the governing classes who have recently declared that many of the train routes into the city from the shanty towns (known as Villas here) are to be closed, effectively impoverishing yet further whole communities who rely on this pathetic wage; in the case of those who cannot walk the distances which measure from one end of the London Piccadilly line to the other, and back, every day to collect this cardboard, the end of any paid work.

 THE RALLY 

Back to the rallying cry for Justice then. It was as if Evita was speaking to the people again. And then, suddenly, there they were, the masses, thousands of them, pouring into the Plaza de Mayo with banners, and flags, banging drums and chanting songs that bore strange resemblance to the tunes we had joined in with at the Boca Juniors football game a few weeks ago. A carnival atmosphere prevailed, despite the riot police who stood calmly and without provocation, at some distance from the main podium.

Although there were many hundreds of people marching in support of the farmers’ protests, this was an organised march to mark the 32^nd anniversary of the military coup which ended with over 30,000 “desaparecidos” (the disappeared), and thousands more executions. This was the day for the nation to remember, and to ask for truth and justice.

The Partido Obrero (the Workers Party) was out in force. Firecrackers exploded in front of thousands of people, and in front of the Churches which line the square, overlooked by the eerie, glowing Masonic symbol high up on the Banco Galicia building. As the speeches called for the perpetrators of the atrocities to be brought to justice – in a country that is finally seeking to come to terms with its past, but shackled by a justice system that is grinding to a halt under the weight of the petitions to the courts – the Casa Rosada glowed in the background, an ever-present reminder of what the seat of power has brought to the people of the Pampas. Children sit on their father’s shoulders, watching and learning, whilst Quilmes sellers carry crates of the local beer to quench the thirst of the participants. This is a side of Argentina we have not seen before, and we are electrified. Gone are the beautiful people of Palermo, and out come men and women of striking mixed Indian ancestry, ardent men with tattoes of Che on their arms, bearded and revolutionary, without identikit haircuts or noses. Mothers bang on drums, calling for justice for their sons as they have been doing since 1977. The anti-war and anti-globalisation rally is out in force too, calling for Bush and Uriarte to get out of Latin America. Peruvian flutes are whistled in Andean unity, drums are beating and people are dancing. This is no poker-faced protest of the kind seen in London. This is real, and the people are demanding change. The Casa Rosada fades into insignificance as the light disappears. Autumnal nights are drawing in now, and fires are being lit in the middle of the streets to keep the marchers warm.

It is a long time until we finally decide to move from the electricity. This is the passion of Latin America that seemed to be lacking in the city that has been our home for the last month.

 Some thoughts on Argentina Today 

As we move onwards past the rallying masses, looking for the warmth of hot chocolate at one of the famous old cafes along these central streets where Borges and Lorca sat to write their works, we are confronted with the reality of Argentina today.

A country of football, literature, grilled beef and a dream of tango. A country of bad coffee – since the good stuff is all exported – and great clothes. A people caught between a crazed Latin passion and a stifling European reserve. A country moving into the future of design and innovation, but a country where mothers still bang drums in front of the Casa Rosada every Thursday asking what happened to the thousands of their sons. A country with pride in itself and its identity, but unsure of how it should value its Indian heritage, since those of Indian blood are still considered second class citizens. A country with a strong European heritage, though with dubious Nazi links. A country unsure of its future, whilst its past remains haunting its every movement. The dollar may be worshipped in these parts, but it cannot buy justice. Argentina’s “dirty war” (1976-1983) left scars deep in the spirit and soul of this country, and although twenty years’ worth of impunity laws were lifted in 2005 (known as the Full Stop and Die Obedience laws), the healing process has barely begun. Judges, human rights lawyers, witnesses still face death threats, and the prospect of potential “disappearance”.

The people, though, still have power here. I could feel it on Easter Monday. I can hear the shouting in the streets below, as ordinary people take to the streets, and those who do not join them come out to applaud them on their balconies. They might not go to Mass, but they do still believe they can bring some righteousness to their country. Argentines still believe in something, and that makes them uniquely Latin American.

 http://www.humanrightsblog.org/archives/cat_argentina.html (the link to an Argentine human rights blog page with some interesting perspectives on the attempts to seek justice)     

Fall Season at Iguazu

Visitng Iguazu Falls on the Argentine/Brazil border

The Autumn/Fall Collection is out on display in Iguazu this year, in a blaze of striking monochromes. Set against a fabulous variety of greens in the dense rainforest foliage, which extends over miles of the region across the Brazil/Argentine border, a startling array of Blacks and Whites marked the designers’ moods this Fall. 

The wildlife  

First up, the Coatis, whose black and white raccoon tails perfectly accessorised their brown stoat-like clumsy bodies, as they scuppered amongst the shrub, foresting for food. All programmes are marked with warnings that, no matter how much they might smile and batter their lashes, coatis are not to be fed. Size zero, it seems, is maintained with rigour across these parts. 

The Vultures are, as ever, resplendent in their funereal blackness as they soar in packs over the forest canopy, landing to sleep with an eye crooked open on a single naked tree, all hooded and gothic, as the dark night creeps in overhead. Contrast could be found in the Toucans, whose shining squat black and white coats, glossed to a perfect finesse, are lit up by their magnificent yellow beaks, an oversized coating of bold lipstick so clown-like that one could believe they requested extra lip filler just to look different. Or it could have been botox, since the beaks are so rigid that they practically cause the birds to topple sideways out of the high branches. 

As the sun came out, so did a kaleidoscope of butterflies, with uniformly black slim bodies, dressed up in vintage lace designs, red and orange spots, electric blue wings and every bright blockprint imaginable. These girls are all about pretty, and they certainly know it as they flit about all over the place, eliciting exclaims of “how beautiful”, everywhere they go.  

The reptiles, also out with the sun, maintain their image as the gangsters of the neighbourhood. As ever, they let the side down with their monotonous greys. It is true that the odd lizard got somewhat decked out for the new collection in greens that would change to yellows according to the stage backdrop, but by and large, the reptiles hung back from accessories and stuck decidedly with shades of grey. As we traipsed over the raised walkways which crossed the broad tributaries of the river Iguazu, a dark grey crocodile lay sunning himself on the rocks just a couple of metres below us, face turned to one side to maximise his sun tan. Too much meat lends one to laziness, definitely not lithe and in shape. Perched on rocks a few ripples away sat a group of turtles, also preferring the camouflage shades this season. Very military. Thankfully, no serpents were out on show this year and the author of this piece had no reason to freak out. 

The big cats

Fur is happily out of favour again this season: For all my fevered imaginings of pink pumas and beady-eyed jaguars, the big cats were nowhere to be seen, though they stalk these catwalks of Natural beauty. Given the advice of backpacker’s Vogue (Known quietly, in a whisper, as the Lonely Planet), this was a good thing. That sage of wisdom counselled as follows: 

“Park wildlife is potentially dangerous; in 1997 a jaguar killed the infant son of a park ranger. Whilst this is not a cause for hysteria, visitors should respect the big cats. In the unlikely event that you encounter one, don’t panic. Speak calmly, but loudly, do not run or turn your back on the animal, and do everything possible to appear bigger than you are, by waving your arms or clothing for example”. 

My companion practised this routine by flapping her red lycra skirt around madly. Frankly, I am convinced that would drive any creature to madness. As we say, fur looks much better on the television. The lack of any sighting on the catwalk this season was no doubt to be welcomed. 

The stars of the show - the Falls themselves 

The stars of the show – the ones we were all waiting eagerly to glimpse, from afar or near, whatever we were given – were the Falls themselves. Pouring, bursting and hurling torrents of white water over the black cliff faces, it is though the river is leaping from the earth and freefalling as far as the crater will let it go. Blessed with front-row seats, we viewed these creations from every possible angle, soaked by the mist as we gaped, mouths-open, from below, eyes glazed over as we stood literally beside the masses of water being flung down without mercy for any creature who may find itself in its clutches.

Brazil vs Argentina

Different views are afforded by crossing over the Brazil from Argentina, and no designer worth his salt today is content with showing his collection in just one location. We made the trip to both sides of the border, noticing the different habits of the human species on both sides too. The Argentine audience remained as addicted to its yierba maté tea as ever, carting around giant thermoses of the green leaves and hot water concoction, in leather or plastic cases specially attached to the hips for the occasion. Despite the heat and humidity, it seems maté is the new champagne for these folk. The Brazilians were having none of that. Tiny shorts, large ice creams and belly laughs came out of this audience. Both were equally appreciative of the catwalk, they just strutted around it in a different manner. 

An unfortunate ending  

Apparently, when the Falls first became open for public viewing, the locals would make a buck by rowing the aspiring photographers to within an inch of the Falls, and the furiously row on the spot whilst they looked down and took pictures. Eventually, one hapless canoeist did not have the strength to row against the overpowering current and the whole boat was taken down the chute, so to speak. Nowadays, those who make their way to the Devil’s Throat can view the giant whirlpool from a safe, but wet distance, over artfully constructed bridges on both sides of the border. The sheer unworldly scale of the water is overwhelming. No one with vertigo should attempt the views from above. 

A happier ending 

 Our unrivalled access allowed us to sleep without curtains to the gushing roar of the water all night, waking at first light to see the black curtains being raised over the jungle, giving way to the spectacle of white mists and spray over the Falls glowing red with the sun’s first rays. By dusk, our caipirinhas afforded us a blurry vision of the rocks, jungle and waterfalls that we had been climbing all day, and when we closed our eyes, we could hear the rush and see the shower of water that some wizard had created. So magical seemed these moments that we could have sensed the spirits of the jungle present in every flower and plant that we laid eyes on, and more profoundly, in those we could not see. 

What a tremendous privilege, and what a spectacle! This year’s Fall, it’s all about Iguazu. 

“I Left my Tango Shoes in London” (Buenos Aires Travelblog)

Buenos Aires – “I left my Tango shoes in London..” 

I left my Tango shoes in London.

It is sad, but true. The obsession with Tango is one shared by many a woman, charmed yet further by the seductive charms of the Strictly Come Dancing men. It is a dream that envelopes the holder in a smoke filled room in the 1930s, wearing a black satin dress, slit to the thigh, hovering dangerously over creaky wood-panelled floors in wine-red shoes so impossibly high that the wearer stands taller than her own mirror will reflect. Strains of violins weigh the air down with memories of broken hearts. The dreamer is standing by a wall, pondering the end of her own recent love affair, when from across the crowded room, her eyes are caught, then reflected in the gentleman’s eyes. His black felt hat is tipped across the front of his head, so that his gaze seems hidden. Yet the dreamer can feel his eyes on her, and so she walks, haughtily, towards the centre of the room where he grabs her arms, she resists and pushes him away but his tenure is strong. They stand on one place, swaying, exchanging weight until a spiral of heels has electrified the room, and suddenly Buenos Aires society stops to stand and stare and… 

The violin string snaps. 

Ouch. We all wake up one day. This dream may once have been true, a vision of its own time whilst Europe was still swaying to the ballroom dances which had grabbed society then. But times change, and with them, so do fashions of music and dance. Tango is, in many ways, a cliché which tourists have transported back from their own television sets to this far corner of the planet. 

Where once I dreamed of a sophisticated dance that would mesmerise me too, last night I found myself too bored to carry on my only lesson, some three weeks into my stay in Buenos Aires. 

It started like this.  

The Dream  

N and I have spent the last three weeks talking about doing Tango, learning tango, imbibing Tango. We fill any gap in a conversation with the animated statement that we must find a dance instructor. We usually follow that with lying inactively by the pool. Other than the first week when we went to Catedral, an underground local haunt where a Wednesday night milonga draws in a mostly young crowd, we had found ourselves uninspired to seek out the other venues scattered about town. We repeatedly told ourselves it was because we were too tired, after being extraordinarily active for up to fifteen hour days here.  

The truth, however, was less kind if not equally placid. We were already losing our dream of Tango, and the act of refusing to go to another milonga constituted the final wall of our resistance. Because the 1930s stay the 1930s. And the men who continue to dance the Tango were mostly born in the 1930s. So, dashing young men were not going to lead us to the dance floor and capture our hearts. More likely, we were going to have to prevent our Tango dance partners from having a heart attack. Fall at our feet, they might, but for all the wrong reasons. The Tango dream was turning sour. 

Getting to the Milonga  

Still, we are not ones to give up our dreams so easily. Having failed to attend each promised milonga night after night, we vowed to get to Catedral again. This was where Tango was hot, or at least cool. Apparently there are venues where youngsters sporting hot pants and vest tops, are reclaiming electric Tango since the Gotan Project have regenerated some trend back into tango. We have heard about these places, but we have not seen them. Catedral it was. 

I wore the black satin dress. I wore the fishnet tights. I reclaimed the night in my impossibly high purple heels. I then stood on a street corner for half an hour trying to hail a cab as the rainclouds opened in fierce revenge. I wished very hard I was not wearing the fishnet tights. 

The taxi driver  

Eventually a real cab came for us, on this night before the 5 day Easter holiday when most of Buenos Aires was jumping ship.  

“Where are you beautiful women off to?”, he asks.

When we reply that we are heading to a milonga, he can barely snort his contempt loud enough. “Young people dance to electronica, or reggaeton, not Tango!” he snarls. “What are you women thinking of?” His lecture continues for the rest of the cab ride. He is not amused.

 Our First Tango Lesson  

Walking into the almost empty Catedral seemed just about right. The masses had gone, put off by the rain, the public holidays and, perhaps, the fact that Tango just was no longer Cool, or Barbaro, as porteños like to say. We faced up to the fact that we may as well just profit from the attention of the dance instructors, square up for the show and learn some basic moves. After all, they were still highly prized in Europe. 

But as we tripped over our heels, and watched the hole in the unused factory ceiling for the electrifying displays of thunder, the dampness on our skin was not the excitement of the dance, or the sweat of our hard work, but the rain falling through the roof, quite literally, as the heavens told us what they thought of Tango in 2008 Buenos Aires. 

Mid-way through the two hour lesson, I stopped trying to imitate some faux-tango pirouettes and went to sit down at a table with a Greek couple from north of Athens who ran a bookshop .We had a blast with the Greeks (don’t ask – they follow me, not the other way round!) and some real porteños, who are a rare conversational species in these parts since aloof residents of this sprawling city usually prefer not to talk to anyone at all. Still, I knew it was time to leave when I mentioned that we might go on to a club some Chilean girls had told us about the night before. The young porteño advised me that the club was very Not Barbaro. He told me in all seriousness that his female friends said that at that particular recommended club, there were a lot of “very mature men hanging about”. With visions of ancient crooners being our only access to the male species in this city of beautiful people, I must have looked crestfallen for he then added, by way of explanation: “I think the men are all at least 35”. 

The End  

With that cheerful vision of what it means to be old, N span a few loops with the wiry, unsmiling dance instructor on an empty floor and I wondered whether I was bidding my final goodbye to the dream. 

The cobbled streets and squares of portside San Telmo lie tired now, lined only with tourists, where once gauchos, sailors and women made light work of the night. Electronic Tango may be making a comeback, but the regeneration is very slow. 

It seems I have left my Tango Shoes in London.

The show must mournfully go on. 

Buenos Aires 20^th March 2008 

A Very Silly Story of a Chelsea fan in Buenos Aires

THE FOLLOWING EXTRACT IS WRITTEN TO A FRIEND DURING THE MATCH LAST NIGHT. IT IS NOT TO BE TAKEN AS A SERIOUS REFLECTION OF ANYTHING ELSE ON THIS PAGE.

 ” I am pathetic, i know, but now is the time of year i become a civilised football hooligan.

I have watched the entire second half of the Chelsea- Spurs game on the internet, and most of the first half cos Chelsea just HAVE TO WIN in order to really put the pressure on.

Oh my god, the score it is 4-4 as I write. Seriously, how many goals can one game have.  God this is unbearable, waiting for the live updates..come on Blues.

God. Four all. Final score. Gutted. Gutted. Football by internet. Cruel. Miserable.

five points behind. we need to win on sunday. and come on liverpool. you have to beat Man Utd.

yes folks. i watched a premiership football game in BA on the net…and i will be standing somewhere in an pub in BA on Sunday to watch Arsenal go down to Chelsea………..and hopefully liverpool to totally thrash man utd.

Come on J, you know you are a Chelski fan these days. Throw that tattered red shirt away.

And Speaking of red shirts, M has been to more Stamford Bridge games than me this season, so I think you better all root chelsea this sunday.”

INSANITY OVER. BACK TO REAL STUFF.

APOLOGIES TO ALL.

An Extraordinary Day in Buenos Aires (TravelBlog

10th March 2008 

Well, not so much an extraordinary day perhaps, as a series of quite ordinary things which felt quite extraordinary here.

 Dance

After a weekend of walking through markets, parks, the dockside and brunching in our neighbourhood, we felt the urge to see something different last night. We had visited the Centro Cultural Borges on Saturday night, downtown, for a modern production by the Ballet Argentino. It was quite a spectacle, with a modern ballet take on mambo, traditional modern and to end it all, ballet tango. It was quite extraordinary, set against a blizzard of peacock and magenta body-hugging costumes, heart-thumping music and an exquisite take on classic dances, but all pointé. The audience was mostly an older generation, interspersed with the odd younger model – clearly the ballet is no pursuit for youthful porteños in the know. But, well, we were inspired to seek out some other forms of modern tango and so on Monday night, after an amazingly productive day on both sides, we headed back downtown to the Borges Center to watch Brazo Abrazo, a current interpretation of how Tango came to its 21^st century form today.

It was like watching a car crash in slow motion, horribly painful but somehow unable to leave for the sheer grotesque form of both the dancers and the interpretation. If you have seen Sally Potter in her own film, The Tango Lesson, you begin to understand what we experienced. It pains me to say it, but well, here goes in all honesty, ugliness is just not attractive in a lace skirt or tight trousers. The lack of any beauty or real sentiment for this most complex of sensual dances led the middle-aged dancers to put on an ugly display of the violent, backstreet roots of the Tango, without any of the nostalgia or romance that one associates with the days when European sailors mingled in the ports with the earth-hardened gauchos, and ladies of the night. Instead, a surly, eight-stepped performance felt like watching a history of the apparent hopelessness of the female of the species, who all seemed to have their hair pulled by every man on stage, and whom, in any event, looked so much like men that, at the beginning, we truly thought we were watching a drag act. The men, with more make-up than hair, occasionally brought a touch of fancy footwork to the proceedings, leading me to wonder whether Greek sailors may have contributed disproportionately by bringing in aspects of zebeikiko to the dance. When two of the men stepped around each other, lightly flicking their heels and ankles, I did indeed think perhaps this show was going to get off the road. But, then, this unimaginative troupe decided that, actually, Tango’s roots lay in repressed homosexuality, which they revealed with barely hidden ardour and naked sexuality on stage. Now, I have nothing against an open display of body parts, but seriously, the people showing them need to have just a little touch of beauty. Perhaps that is cruel, but they were putting themselves out there as sensual people of the night, and all I could wish is that they stayed in their duvets. We left the performance with a glimpse into why Hollywood directors insist on screening only beautiful people…

 Divine Patagonia 

So, that cultural feast over, we headed back to the northern suburbs for a late Monday night meal at Divine Patagonia, an eclectic restaurant showcasing the best of Patagonia’s wild meats, fish and wines. Truly, it was both original and divine – as was our beautiful waiter. Beauty, it seemed, had become the theme for the night. Until pudding, when the house speciality was “torta gallega con helado de crema inglesa”. We were impressed by the owner’s flair in explaining that this was a Patagonian speciality, brought over by the multitude of Welsh immigrants in the nineteenth century. Convinced as I was that we were about to see something revolting, I was not prepared for traditional Patagonian pudding to be, in fact, English Christmas Cake, replete with a dollop of custard ice cream. Oh yes, the British do export their ways with merry glee,  more often than note inflicting their poor taste on the rest of the world.

Ice Cream

Speaking of car crash dance performances and ice cream, I missed out one other special detail of our ordinary extraordinary Monday.  As I came back from a productive day of work, pistachio ice cream was filling my brain. The ice cream here far exceeds the quality of any other in the world. Believe me, I have tried a universe of the creamy, hip-broadening stuff. And so, I can safely say, that I know Good Ice Cream. There happens to be a hip and trendy ice cream bar two blocks up from us which does not close until the middle of the night (porteños live late here, restaurants never fill up until about 11pm and it has taken us 10 days to work out why we are the only ones in any restaurant at around 9pm any night of the week). So, pleased with my day’s work, I swanned around to buy my favourite green ice cream. Portion sizes of everything cater to the 7foot American tourists one loves to deride, but here the men and women are in astonishingly good shape. My guess is that the women only eat ice cream, drink maté and smoke Marlboroughs. Ordering a small cone of pistachio heaven, I emerge from the depths of the ice cream bar carrying some Marge Simpson hairdo in an ice cream cornet (only green, not yellow) and can barely see over the top of the mound. Crossing the road, I hear two cars screeching to a halt. “Eat your damn ice cream linda – you can’t see the road”, the taxi driver shouts….

And with that, it was the end of a truly extraordinary ordinary day in Buenos Aires.

Buenos Aires - the early days (Travel Blog, March 2008)

MARCH 9TH 2008

BUENOS AIRES - THE EARLY DAYS 

“Never to return from the Pampas?”“Have you fallen in love with a porteño?”“Or a gaucho?”“Do you plan to come back to us?”

And just plain..

“Where the hell are you?” 

Yes, my dear family and friends, these are the kind of messages you have been sending me as I have disappeared over the last week…But the truth is this. No, I have not fallen in love and yes, I do plan to return…although, I should add that if there was any way I could stay an extra month here, or 4, there is no doubt that I

would. If my diary was empty for April, I would not return.

life here…

Buenos Aires gets under your skin in a quiet way. Without the drama of Cuba, Beirut or Cape Town – and without a drop of sun for over a week – it has been easy to sink into a new life here, as though I simply always lived here. I have found an amazing yoga centre which also has some of the best kulfi and other Indian healthy food I have ever eaten (Valle Tierra/Quibombo), I have found pilates studios aplenty, and we have found tango teachers…I even found a little course in the bakery near our flat where I could become an expert bread maker….

The truth, of course, is that I haven’t done a single class of any kind. I have been over a week and I have little to show for it. Studiously, I have been spending time aside every day writing, as I planned. And maybe because of that, it has honestly felt like I have been working in Buenos Aires, a true porteño. The dismal weather, rain every day and grey skies has only lifted this morning, and so, although it has not been cold, there has been no passion in the streets, no faultless, cloudless skies to admire. In fact, we have not yet profited from our spectacular balcony for which we bought (rather optimistically it seemed last Sunday – in queues of over 1 ½ hours for home delivery at the local supermarket) an inflatable mattress in case we were too lazy to walk up one flight of steps to the dipping rooftop pool and sun loungers.

I am not entirely truthful, perhaps. There are some spectacular moments that have been packed into the daily routine of working and cooking delicious food with some of the finest produce I have ever encountered….

Forgive me, just a moment, if you are not from my family. You may not understand this next paragraph: The melon, which the local Peruvian grocer happily delivers with his round of coriander which arrives on Monday mornings with chillies (especially for me and those of chilli fame in this quarter) is “SUGAR SWEET”. Pappa, that is just for you, so one more time “Shhhugar sweet!” And the little eggs are unbelievable with freshly baked medialunas (salty crescent-shaped croissant like pastries everyone eats here in the morning).

MILONGA

Back to life outside the flat. Wednesday night, after a day full of writing inspiration, we were invited out by a friend of a friend to a milonga, the traditional tango evenings in random unmarked dance halls all over the city. Do you remember the scene in Scent of a Woman where Al Pacino dances with the stranger as she waits for her partner? Now, multiply it, add romance and sensuality. Now add a healthy dose of reality and imagine Nath and I on the side with a random selection of French, Italians, a Japanese girl and one porteña, sipping happily on Malbec and avoiding eye contact with any men who want to dance (making eye contact is the subtle and sophisticated way of asking a woman to dance here). No, you can’t make up the Tango. Stunning and elegant, it would take months to learn. And given that over a week has gone by and I have barely made it to the telephone to call the dance teacher, I am not sure I will come by ready to dance with Anton du Bek. 

Leaving the Neighbourhood..

Well, Thursday was a special day. And I need to precede this by saying that I have had a terrible migraine since Thursday morning, no doubt to do with working at a laptop without any ergonomic support, endless banging and drilling from construction of new buildings in the barrio and maybe a glass or two of the finest Malbec ever to be encountered most days…So, we decided we needed to leave the flat and the neighbourhood for a few hours. We decided to venture to La Boca neighbourhood, a proletarian quarter of which Che may have been very proud today, but notoriously known amongst porteños for being unsafe. Birthplace of the Tango, and a million miles from the scrubbed-up Notting Hill-esque neighbourhood of Palermo Viejo in which we live, it was time for A Change.

EL OBRERO 

So, hurling ourselves into a taxi, we sought out a little worker’s eatery known as El Obrero somewhere in the heartland of La Boca. All we knew was that we should turn up in a taxi, and that it was somewhere south of the river…The taxi driver, having much in common with his London cabbie comrades, whinged endlessly about having to cart us south of the river. Even when we eventually got close to the restaurant, he sourly threw us out about 2 blocks from our lunchtime goal. He was the only unpleasant cab driver we have had, for they have all been of almost unbelievably cheerful disposition.

So, back to La Boca. The first thing to strike me was the change of vehicle. A far cry from the jeeps and Peugeots of Palermo, here was the real 1970s deal. No fancy Chevrolets, Havana style, but definitely green and redbacks with more than a hint of Scrappy Doo about them. Everyone here seemed to be a mechanic. But, for all the warnin