A one-man-show in San Telmo

On Sunday in San Telmo you can meet original people. This guy was caught in a sudden "storm" on Defensa. His coat and tie flying.

 

Tango in La Boca

I don’t pretend to have any knowledge of music. So don’t think you will be reading anything that adds up to yours. Music should put me in a good mood, just as a nice red wine.

Well, being in Buenos Aires you hear and see tango everywhere. For a tourist (like me) there are certain places where the tango enjoyment is concentrated. Yes sure, we went to La Boca.

 

La Boca used to be a poor fishing village. Out of pieces of old boats the people constructed a kind of patchwork houses. Now these colorful houses are transformed into shops and restaurants or places for another kind of touristic activities. You cannot stop progress. 

Just go there to enjoy what is there: Music, dance, food and wine. It is nice to look around in the shops for presents to take home. It even looked more prosperous than 5 years ago. After visiting some shops and taking pictures of the houses (yes everybody takes the same pictures… and you can also just buy them on the street), we settled down at a restaurant called “Yunta”. Enjoying life at a place like this is great. 

There was the classic tango couple. The man, a dark looking person with an Inca face, was a fantastic performer. He couldn’t have been better casted for this show. Expressing this touch of machismo, that is so essential for the tango. There was also folklore dancing by a gaucho and his partner.

Most of all I enjoyed the singing of Julio. Julio already 80 and still going strong! Old tango songs from long ago, when La Boca was a wild place and Julio was young. “Por un cabesa”…. melancholic and beautiful. I took another sip of my wine …….

The "Librería de Avila", a bookshop

On the corner of Bolivar and Adolfo Alsina you can find the "Librerá de Avila". It is a bookshop. But wat a bookshop. It dates from 1785 - when it started as the "Librería del Colegio". This College Bookshop existed untill 1989. Then the bookshop changed its name into Bookshop of Avila. Just look at the pictures and think yourself there with all these books. Everywhere there were little corners. A desk with a lamp. The portret of Borges on an old typewriter. Cupboards with old things, pictures, memorabilia. The huge sofa inviting you to sit and read. Another desk and books, many, many books.... 


We spend some hours there. It was a pitty that they were restoring the café. Now we have to come back......
The Librería has a website.... One thing is obvious: Time didn't fly in this bookshop.

 

A yuppie theme park: Puerto Madero

Thinking it would be nice to go to a part of Buenos Aires that was completely unknown to us, we decided to go to Puerto Madero. Our hotel was not far. We only needed to cross some busy avenues. We were not prepared for the surprise. There was Puerto Madero, but it was as if we were arriving in the Docklands in London.

It was “cool”. New and trendy old mixed together to a yuppie paradise. 

The old cranes and old ships are like artefacts on a set. Walking along the docks you have no idea even of being in Latin America. The cafes and restaurants play rock, beat and other western music. 

The one thing that comes near to tango is the bridge of the women - the puente de la Mujer. Companies have European / North American names. Prices are adjusted to the level of European cities.  

Sure, the weather is much better than in London. The pieces of meat on the menu are huge. You get them with a lot of potatoes… the green is separate. The wine is excellent and the glasses are much larger then in Europe.

Everything is smooth. I found just one derelict building. I suppose in a few years it will also be transformed into something beautiful and expensive.

I loved to be there; just watching the scenery. The blue sky, the colors, the feeling of being safe. At the same time it feels artificial, like being in some theme park. It is nice for a change to be “back” for a while, but after some time I miss the noisy, busy and lively atmosphere of Latin America. 

An adapted view....

The fist time I flew over São Paulo into the airport of Guarulhos I was amazed by the way the city was unfolding itself under me. On the edges there was green between the houses, more into the city less green, small houses glued to each other. It looked like a big roof pizza cut into rectangular shapes.

Then driving north along the Dutra I had the idea there were only favelas. The Dutra is the highway between São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. I had to get used to the complete different style of building with huge gates, large roofs over everything – either to keep the sun out or the rain -  and almost no gardens. Houses hugging each other like the people here do….   abraços, abraços….

On the outskirts of the old town of Taubaté lies the little village of Quiririm. It was founded by Italian immigrants. Quiririm is divided in two by a major road going to the Dutra. So in reality Quiririm is split in two: The older Italian part and the newer parts that contain the very cheap housing estates called Cecap (Companhia Estadual de Casas Populares).

Otside with gate to the inside 

Inside a bloc around some green

The Cecap appartments

The busstop

  

We go to the supermarket in the Cecap because it is larger than the one on our side. For 5 years I see the development of this neighborhood. Of course when it was build the houses were more or less the same.  Now you see how the people work on their private space. They have money to enlarge and beautify. This results in colorful individualized houses next to original ones in a more derelict state.

Original

Renovated

Renovated

Original

After 5 years I am getting used to the discolored concrete, the peeling of paint. It is the rain that makes everything a stripy gray or green. Of course a perfect base to put some graffiti there. But just look what is happening here. The Brazilians can hardly believe that they are one of the great powers of the world. But it won’t be long before they can. Lula gave them self esteem!     Orgulho de ser Brasileiro!

And before going home - to the right at the big tree -  we have an icecream in this little icecream parlor.

See on Flickr about Brazil also:    The Americas

A miniature Amazon forest

This Monday morning we went from Aparecida to Taubaté. I choose to go the old road. So we drove by Pindamonhangaba. (Just take some minutes to pronounce this name; yes you can!) There our friend showed us the “Bosque da Princesa”.

We enter a miniature Amazon forest along the banks of the river Paraïba.

At the gate a man is cleaning the paths. The broom is made of the leaf of a palm tree. As usual I am tricked by the darkness under the trees. On top of that I had my camera still on macro… So the moving broom is blurred.

Walking into this little rainforest we see palm trees and bromelias and a lot of other trees I don’t know the name of. 

We admire the view of the river. Just pretend you are at the banks of the Amazon river….  Red flowers bloom high up in the trees, but luckily no crocodiles or snakes; just mosquitoes.

The water in the river is red-brown because of the rain. It will be raining again soon. The clouds hang low against the mountains.

The ponds in the bosque are a “dark muddy green”. Everything is a bit moist and slippery.

The little walls are rustic, like the bandstand in the middle of the trees. Children run around.

The shed is a cement tree stump. They almost fooled me… I like the reserve chair on the top.

Going back to the car, the man with the broom is standing near the cement tree, looking out into the street….. good view of the broom.

The entrance gate has a nice little corner with a tableau of azulejos “Portuguese style”. It must be  the artists view of the ideal “bosque”. 

It makes me think of the many small parks in Cuba. The “Parques Cespedes”.  So here in Brazil we have “Bosques”; da Princesa, do Papa… I am curious about my next bosque…….