It is warm here. It hasn’t been below 21° C (70° F) since I arrived, even in the middle of the night. During the day, it’s quite humid and sticky, and the sun is all up in my face in a way it hasn’t been the entire time I’ve been in Europe. I think I need to buy a pair of sunglasses and something SPF >30.
Many people in Europe told me that Buenos Aires is the most European city in South America. South Americans I’ve met refer to BA as “the Paris of Argentina”. This is the first South American city I’ve ever been to, so I can’t really comment on how “European” it feels relative to the rest of the continent, but I will say that it doesn’t remind me very strongly of Paris, and I was in Paris a couple weeks ago. The place Buenos Aires reminds me most strongly of is downtown Los Angeles, which I suppose just demonstrates that if you take a First World city and infuse it with a heavy dose of Latin culture, or take a city with a Latin culture and infuse it with a First World (or near-First World) economy, you wind up in roughly the same place.
From all appearances, there is a great deal of money floating about in Buenos Aires. There are many high-rise buildings, (one of several ways in which BA does not resemble Paris) I’ve walked past several places where significant construction and road repair works seem to be underway (I wrote my initials in wet cement yesterday!). The towering office buildings appear to house local offices for many major multinational firms, including everyone’s favorite Bob developers (P.S. I promise not to rip on Redmond in my next post).
The world’s cuddliest evil empire comes to America del Sur
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