Pablo Juan Augustinowicz: Pablo Juan Augustinowicz is a Toronto native who has established in Buenos Aires some years ago. He is an avid traveller as well as an amateur photographer. He´s backpacked most of Europe and ventured across Costa Rica’s jungle. He driscribes Buenos Aires as a "cosmopolitan city that resembles Paris but lives like New York”.
Parrilla El 22, My Kind of Place to Eat
It was my birthday a few days ago and what better way to celebrate but to go out to dinner to one of my favorite spots in Buenos Aires. There are many different types of parrillas (steakhouses) in the city, but this one is that I call special. I love this little place called El 22.
It is located in Palermo Hollywood, in a very trendy area, but you will not find it in any tour guide or web site.
To describe it is this simple: when you get to eat like the locals eat, and see no tourists, you know...
April 13th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Spice Up Your Steaks with some Salsa Chimichurri
Each country, each culture has a typical sauce to accompany a juicy piece of meat. From the bittersweet BBQ sauce to the delicious tzatsiki or the spicy salsa taquera and many more, they all are essencial at meal time. In Argentina there is the Chimichurri (sounds funny, doesn´t it?).
Chimichurri is a rich and tasty sauce or marinade made of chopped parsley, garlic, onion, salt, pepper, laurel, dried oregano and paprika with olive oil. Some people add lemon juice or vinegar to kick it up a notch....
April 6th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Remembering The Malvinas War
Today we remember the events of 2 April 1982 which marked the begining of the Malvinas War.
The war is commemorated in Argentina as Día del Veterano de Guerra y los Caídos en Malvinas (Veterans and fallen soldiers of the Malvinas Day), a public holiday in Argentina, celebrated each year on April 2. It is sometimes referred to as Malvinas Day.
The holiday is a tribute to Argentina’s fallen soldiers in the Malvinas War, which began with the Argentine occupation of the Islands on 2 April...
April 2nd, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
DownTown Matías, My Favourite Irish Pub in Buenos Aires
A few years ago Buenos Aires experienced a rapid widespread expansion of pubs, specially Irish ones. If you are in town and feel like going to an Irish pub there are a few good places you might like to check out.
One of these establishments is DownTown Matías. Since it opened its doors back in 1973, it claims to have been the first pub in downtown. The are several locations, but the one I like the most is the original one, the first one that opened, located in the barrio de Retiro.
It is nothing...
March 31st, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
The Town of Tigre… A Great Getaway
Tigre is a pretty town on an island in the Delta del Paraná, just 30km from downtown Buenos Aires. A pleasant sojourn alternative from Buenos Aires and a popular weekend excursion for porteños, it is close enough that you can go there in the morning and come back in the evening quite easily.
It is only 30 minutes by car, 50 minutes by train and about an hour and a half by bus (colectivo). Tigre is a small town that is actually an island. Three rivers (the Tigre, the Lujan and the Reconquista)...
March 28th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Acabar, A Happening Place
If you feel like doing something different while in Buenos Aires just head down to Acabar. Bright colours, strident walls covered by zinc sheets decorated in bright colours and fun tacky items, including plastic people parts and wigs, tables of various sizes and bizarre antiques revive an old house located in the heart of Palermo Hollywood, a trendy part of town full of restaurants, pubs and discos.
The waitresses seem to have escaped from a tale of magic realism. They bring you the menu, a sort...
March 26th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
March 24th, The Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice
Argentina is full of stories, some of them peculiar, some of them dreadful… Today we commemorate a sad one. The Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice (Día de la Memoria por la Verdad y la Justicia) is a public holiday in Argentina, commemorating the victims of the military dictatorship known as the National Reorganization Process (Proceso de Reorganización Nacional). It is held on 24 March, the anniversary of the coup d’état of 1976 that brought the military junta to power.
On...
March 24th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Travelling by Train Around Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is a great metropolis with numberless means of transport that take you to any point of the city (Capital Federal), its roundabouts (Gran Buenos Aires), and virtually to any point of the country. Travelling by train in Buenos Aires is not so important for tourists since the rail lines only connect the railway terminals, or stations in or nearby the city centre, with the suburbs of Buenos Aires (and very few cities in nearby provinces).
It is a very cheap mean of transportation. The...
March 22nd, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Guía T, The Ultimate Guide to a Safe Colectivo Experience
Buenos Aires is a huge city and moving around could be a bit tricky. Colectivos (buses) can be a cheap and convenient way to get around the city. But it is sometimes difficult to figure out the routes. So, I would recommend you get a transit guide if you plan on taking the colectivo. You can buy a little book called the “Guía T” which shows a comprehensive street map and all colectivos´ routes. It will definitely help you figure out how to get where you want to go. The guide costs...
March 20th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Feel Like a Porteño, Ride the Colectivo
Getting around Buenos Aires by subway or taxi is easy, but taking the bus can be a bit of a challenge. Colectivos are buses and buses are everywhere.
There are more than 150 different lines in the city with different routes that will take you basically wherever you want to go. Colectivos are a great way to go. They run 24 by 7, though service at night is less frequent. All colectivos within the city cost $1.10 pesos (which is less that 40 cents USD) for a single fare. They take coins only…no...
March 19th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
El Viejo Almacén: The Temple of Tango
Tango started at the beginning of the 1900′s as a way of entertainment for porteños as well as for those immigrants who spent all day working very hard and wanted to relax and have fun at night. Prohibited for women, tango was danced only by prostitutes and amongst men as well. With time, tango songs and the dance itself started gaining everyone’s heart and soul.
Tango cafés are an important part of the life of Buenos Aires. While Café Tortoni is the most famous of the old-fashioned,...
March 16th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Tangos y Milongas
Buenos Aires is the birthplace and the world capital of the Tango, a rhythm that was created by the banks of the Rio de la Plata at the end of the 19th century, as a fusion of European and African music.
The tango is manifested in the lyrics (many of the words used in the tango come from lunfardo or porteños’ slang); in the music (the bandoneon provided the music from the Rio de la Plata with that melancholic and somewhat sullen sound that characterizes tango today); and in the dance.
You...
March 13th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Tango… How Did It All Began
When most people think about Argentina, they think about Tango. Well, somehow it is true, Tango and Tango dancing is in the very soul of Argentina, specially in Buenos Aires.
Tango has a long history, and many stories. It is believed that the starting point for the Tango was the decade of 1880 by the Rio de la Plata as a form of entertainment for the many labourers of European descent who settled in the poorer areas of Buenos Aires as they tried to make their fortune in the New World. Since they...
March 11th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Fileteado… A Very Peculiar Urban Art of Buenos Aires
Towards the turn of the 20th century in Buenos Aires there was a flow of immigrant workers from the old continent to this young and cosmopolitan city. With new architectural and aesthetic styles filling the city, a very peculiar type of urban art was introduced: el filete or fileteado, a popular decorative art with stylised lines and flowered, climbing plants.
It soon became the new aesthetic or ornamental style found on carts of local vegetable, milk and bread vendors all over the city, an original...
March 8th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Confitería Ideal… A Unique Time Capsule
As you may know, there are lots of tango venues in Buenos Aires. On previous articles I’ve written about the famous Café Tortoni, and El Viejo Almacén (the temple of tango), and also the Piazzolla Tango Show. So if you like tango, you must drop by the Confitería Ideal.
This is a place that oozes with 1920′s opulence and character. It was founded in 1912 and I don’t think much has changed since, including the crowd.
It is a café-bar-restaurant that has two floors. The main floor...
March 6th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Take Tango Dance Lessons at Milonga La Viruta
If you want to take tango lessons while in Buenos Aires, then I would recommend you drop by La Viruta. La Viruta is a milonga located in the basement of the Armenian Cultural Center at the barrio de Palermo.
If you are new to tango, let me explain that a milonga is simply a place to dance tango. In the case of La Viruta you can also dance Cuban-style salsa or rock and roll.
First you check the schedule at the website and decide you want to take the 9 pm tango class. Because you plan to have a...
March 4th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Teatro Catalinas Sur – A Unique Theater Experience
If a tourist with only one more day to spend in Buenos Aires asked me where to go, my advice would be to go see El Grupo de Teatro Catalinas Sur, at El Galpón de Catalinas. Located right in the heart of the barrio de La Boca, a typical port area where working-class Italian immigrants traditionally came to live in the early 1900′s, El Grupo de Teatro Catalinas is a community theatre with a clear political orientation.
They present various professional productions featuring entertaining epics...
February 28th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
A Day at the Movies in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires offers a wide variety of activities… thing to do and places to visit… so maybe you haven’t thought much about going to watch a movie. Well, think again for it can be a really cool thing to do, especially if it is pouring rain outside or hot and humid.
You would be surprised. There are some movie theatres that date back from the 1930’s and 1940’s that still continue to operate. You can still find traces of the good old times splendour they lived. They are immense inside. Definitely...
February 26th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
A Helpful City Guide
Buenos Aires is a great destination!!! It allows the visitor not only to enjoy a modern city but also to live an exceptional urban adventure and make you part of it. Buenos Aires combines varied experiences and this variety may suit all tastes.
Buenos Aires is really great to all visitors and to make the experience more exciting, the Government of the City of Buenos Aires through the Tourism Bureau has created a web page with lots of interesting and important information for all those who...
February 23rd, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
Almost Anything Can Be Delivered At Your Door In Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is a city where almost anything can be delivered to your doorstep. Literally almost everything is at your fingertips. Everyone delivers. I am not just talking about your everyday normal delivery like pizzas or empanadas, I mean everything.
Say you are at home and you want a cup of coffee, just call your friendly café. They will send a waiter to your door with a cup of coffee and saucer on their tray. You can add a half dozen medialunas (croissants) to go with you coffee.
Then, let’s...
February 18th, 2010 | Buenos Aires | Read More
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