At the milonga Lina and I go to, they have theme nights. Last week it was polka dots, as you can see from our outfits. There were so many polka dots in the room it made your eyes swim!
This is our friend Martin, who is a fantastic tango dancer and we both love dancing with him. I don’t know why this is, but Julia, the organizer of the milonga, manages to take very unflattering photos (of everybody, not just us!) and I have to note that none of us are as fat as we look here!
Last night was the second-since-pandemia monthly BAIN wine and tapas night, and it was at my place. Everybody had a great time, and I managed to enjoy it myself! I know you don’t know these people, so I’m just putting in a montage so you can see that a good time was had by all!
Last night at our writers group Zoom call, Cliff asked me if I was up for drinks at the Rooftop Bar of the Alvear Palace Hotel afterwards, so of course I said yes even though I had been planning a quiet night at home!
Cliff and his wife Marcia are good friends of mine, and they recently returned from three months in the USA, so they are throwing themselves right back into social life in Buenos Aires! (Marcia is beside me in the photo). Lolly has also recently returned, but she has been away since the plague came upon us, so she is even more keen to enjoy Buenos Aires!
It’s a lovely place, although it was a tad chilly up there last night. Have to go again when it’s warmer!
My friend Gillian recently moved to the barrio of San Telmo. It’s one of the oldest barrios in the city, and has retained all its historic charm even though modern life has encroached on it a bit. On Thursday Gillian and I spent a few hours exploring. I didn’t stop to sketch, but I did take quite a few photos to share with you.
I think I’ve mentioned this before, but in Buenos Aires you have to look up! Often there are quite mundane, or even ugly, storefronts at street level, but up above there can be beautiful buildings with the traditional wrought iron balcony railings. I hope this selection of photos will give you an idea of what I mean.
We started off with brunch at a local bakery cafe, which was delicious. You can see the old display cases and furniture, which maintain the quaint old ambiance. That’s Gillian in line waiting to be served.
We only covered one section of the barrio, which is larger than it first appears, so we’ll do it again another time and check out a different area.
I picked up my framed painting yesterday and, as promised, here is a photo of it. I included the top of the couch to show the size of the picture, which is quite big.
I’m happy with it, and glad I have everything up in time for my party on Saturday night!
As I’ve said before, I do love my apartment. I like the high ceilings and the big walls—which present a challenge in terms of artwork. I’ve never been happy with what I have in my living room, mainly because the pieces were too small, but that’s being changed.
I’ve added three huge (poster size) mounted photos on the wall opposite my couch, where I can see and enjoy them. Here they are, with explanations.
This is the whole grouping. Obviously they are black and white (I love the drama of black and white photography), but what you probably can’t see in this one is that on each I have added a small pop of red, as my couch and some accents are red. Here’s the explanation of each one.
These lovely birch trees represent Canada. The photo was taken by my friend Susan Birkenshaw, who has so many beautiful images I left it to her to choose one. I’ve always loved the elegance of birch trees. Good choice, Susan!
This may look like a giant horse’s head, but it’s actually a Kelpie, and it represents Scotland. In Scottish folklore, Kelpies live in and around water. They are shapeshifters, but most often seen as horses. This 30-metre high sculpture is near Falkirk, and the dramatic photo was taken by my brother Bruce. Love this, Brucie!
This eye-popping staircase represents Argentina. It is the beautiful marble staircase in the Palacio Barolo, one of the countless beautiful old buildings in Buenos Aires. This photo was taken by my friend Venetia. Great shot, Venetia!
If you zoom in, I think you can see the red on each one — it was a bit more difficult on the Kelpie because it’s so dark, but I kind of like the subtlety of it.
I love having my three countries represented in these lovely images.
There’s one more picture to come, and I’m picking that up from the framer today. Stay tuned!
On Wednesday night at the milonga, Julia, the organizer, took my photograph just after I arrived. I was just off to change my shoes when she called my name, and didn’t get a chance to take my mask off! Oh well, it’s a milonga shot so I thought you’d like to see it anyway.
The other day I went for a morning of shopping with Venetia and Lina to a great old barrio called Flores. It’s old and a bit run down, and there are lots of people selling goods on the sidewalk. But there are bargains to be had, which is why we go! This time we were a bit unlucky, because there was a fire at the end of a street, and the street that was blocked off was the one with the higher end stores with good prices—have to go again, that’s all! But we did manage to, as my sister-in-law Elise always says, “get some money spent”.
Then we went for lunch to an old Bar Notable called La Farmacia. As the name suggests, it used to be a pharmacy a long time ago, and in the tradition of the Bares Notables, they’ve kept a lot of the artifacts from that time.
Venetia and I had been there before and remembered having a marvelous provoleta dish, which we had again. Provoleta is a very Argentine dish that’s based on baked provolone cheese with added seasonings. The only problem with the traditional ones is that if you don’t eat them fast they cool down and get a bit hard. But at La Farmacia they have a special version which they cook in a cast iron escargot pan. The pan stays hot, so the cheese stays gooey and delicious right to the end! I’m including Venetia’s photo of it before we dived in and devoured it. Of course, as a vegan I’m not supposed to eat cheese, but I’ve decided to relax my rules a bit when I’m out because sometimes there aren’t many vegan options. And sometimes there are mini provoletas!
A couple of people asked me to have my photo taken next time I wore Venetia’s red skirt.
Here I’m dancing with one of my new teachers at the milonga, and a friend of his took this photo just by chance. So here it is.
Last night was the Noches de los Museos here in Buenos Aires. It’s similar to the Nuit Blanche event held in Toronto. I always meant to go to that, but I realized that I’m not really much of a gallery person anyway, so why would I want to do an overnight gallery crawl? The same thing applies here, but I went with Venetia and Dolores to only one gallery, the Museo de Bellas Artes. I’m including a lovely selection of photos taken by Venetia and a couple of my own.
After our one gallery, it was time to eat. I’m sheepishly admitting that going to a parilla was my idea—and I ate a huge steak! I’m carefully monitoring the state of my knees after all this non-vegan eating, but I must get back to behaving myself this week anyway.
I’m going out to lunch today with Venetia, Jayne and Lina to one of our favourite Italian restaurants, La Parolaccia. I’m going to be totally wicked again, starting with the salmon, which is always delicious there. Then this morning I saw on the BBC that the “father of tiramisu” just died, so I feel it incumbent on me to have a piece—just a mark of respect, you understand. Tiramisu is the magic word for me, so this is the perfect excuse!
