I’ve been writing this blog for about seven years now, since the time I used to spend only part of the year here in beautiful Buenos Aires. Its purpose was to tell people about my adventures here without having to tell them over and over to all my friends.

Of course, in those early days there were more things to write about because everything was new. It’s not that life is any less exciting or marvelous now, because it’s not. I guess it’s just that it’s more normal now, and I don’t always feel like posting to the blog. I’m sorry, because when I disappear for a few weeks I usually hear from someone saying they miss the posts—or they are wondering if I’m OK.

Well, I haven’t posted for a few weeks and it’s time to catch up. But it’s all a bit of a blur, so instead of trying to do it all in chronological order, I’m just going to tell you things as I remember them.

One thing I did want to mention is that during the time Liz and Ali were here, we did a lot of tango and the girls made a lot of videos at the various milongas. I need to take the time to pick out the best bits and splice them all together, then I’ll post that video. I hope to do that this week.

So that’s the back story. Here’s the mash-up of the past couple of weeks with me in Argentina. Enjoy.

After a couple of lessons, Liz was ready for milonga — just as long as she didn’t have to dance with anyone other than Ale!

The place where Ale teaches is above a milonga called Nuevo Chique. So Liz had her lesson at 5 pm, then the three of us walked downstairs to Chique for an hour of dancing. The heat was almost unbearable, but worth it! Then Liz and I went out for dinner. She had such a good time she can hardly wait for the next one!

Next week Ali arrives from England — Ali and Ale, that might be confusing! So it will be wall-to-wall tango all week for her, and I will be part of it a few times. For one thing, next Tuesday we will have a repeat of this one, but with one more chica for Ale to dance with. We will stay for two hours this time, and with a bit of luck we might get to dance with some other chicos as well!

Here’s the video from this week.

This week some of us got together to celebrate Joanna’s birthday. It was at a lovely Indian restaurant called Taj Mahal — excellent food and very nice ambiance.

But imagine our surprise when the door opened and in came a group of Mariachi musicians! They were serenading another guest with a birthday. So there we were in an Indian restaurant in Buenos Aires listening to Mexican music. You’ve got to love it!

Here’s the video—thanks as always to Venetia.

Last night I went with Liz and her parents to a favourite Spanish restaurant right in the heart of downtown Buenos Aires. It’s called Plaza Asturias. The food is very good—and very abundant—and the ambience pleasant.

This dessert was a surprise “present” that the waiter brought for us! Basically it was fruit and ice cream with a taste of dulce de leche, but the presentation was cute and it was very tasty.

My tango teacher, Ale—you’ve seen me dancing with him in other videos—has a dance partner called Sara. They do exhibitions together and also give group classes. Here’s a link to a short video of them on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/1KAyy_2GMpQ How lucky am I to be learning from these two?

While I think my dancing is quite good, there are aspects of it I want to improve, and one of those is footwork. Ale is good about showing me foot positions but it’s usually in the context of another lesson and only for a few minutes.

But when you want to improve your “feminine technique” in tango, it’s really best to learn from a woman. So I asked Ale to introduce me to Sara, and today I had my first lesson with her. Boy, did she work me hard!

We worked solely on my posture and footwork—and she helped me understand how they are linked. Towards the end of the hour, I asked to video her basic instructions so that I could use the video to practice. I thought you might find it interesting, so I’m giving you the video here. Of course she is speaking in Spanish, but I even if you don’t understand what she is saying I think you will still understand her message.

I’m excited to see how this improves my tango, as I incorporate what I’m learning from Sara into my lessons with Ale, and also the partners I dance with at the milonga.

I like to share my experiments in art with you, especially when they are quite different from one another. Here are two examples.

This is my latest Fileteado piece. It’s very traditional, with its curly lines, flowers and, of course, the flag. Not my favourite, but it was fun working on the 3D aspect. I’ve now started on the lion I was commissioned to do. It is very complex and will probably take me a few weeks — I’ll keep you posted.

This morning in the cafe over breakfast I was playing with optical illusion. It’s fun to do, as I get into a kind of zen state just drawing lines. I’ve done quite a few of these, but this is the first time I’ve added colour.

Now this is just weird! I’ve joined an online membership site called Urban Sketching. The leader is Ian Fennelly, my go-to guru for this type of art. Each month he will focus on one aspect and go very deep. The first lesson this week was about lines, and what Ian calls “taking a line for a walk”. The challenge exercise was to choose a scene (I picked the street view from a sidewalk cafe), select one pen, and in ten minutes draw the scene with one unbroken line, ie never taking the pen off the paper. It was a challenge indeed. Here’s the result.

I haven’t posted for a while because it didn’t seem that what I was doing would be of particular interest to anyone else, but I couldn’t resist this one.

Liz is a friend from South Africa who lived in Buenos Aires for almost a year before the pandemia. When that hit, though, she went back to South Africa to be with her parents. All three of them are currently in Buenos Aires for a few weeks.

Liz took tango lessons when she was here before, but hasn’t danced for three years. Last night she had her first lesson of this visit, with my lovely tango teacher, Ale. As you’ll see from the video, she did very well. She asked for a demonstration from Ale and me first, and I’m also including the video of that.

It is about time for Ale and me to do another video just for the blog, and we still will one of these days. But this will do in the meantime!

The video of Liz was quite short, and YouTube won’t let you embed “shorts”, but you can watch it on YouTube by clicking the link. Mind is here because it was longer.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/tbMhmLW-yDY

Last Friday I went with three of my tango friends to a Criollo restaurant called Pa’l Que Guste (which roughly translated means “as you like it” or “whatever you like”). The word criollo refers to a person or custom native to South America but of direct Spanish descent. So criollo restaurants tend to have uniquely South American food and entertainment.

The first time I went to this one, they had a great folkloric show, but this time we went on the wrong day and it wasn’t on. There were some musicians at one end of the room but, as you’ll see from the video, it was very noisy and you really couldn’t hear them.

But you could certainly hear the bagpipes! Bagpipes? Yes! The piper started out of the blue and everyone was immediately into it — Scottish folkloric music I guess. I did speak to him for a couple of minutes and asked him how he came to be a piper, as he was Argentine. He told me he was actually a drummer, and only took up bagpipes during the lockdown. The lockdown was a terrible experience, no doubt, but it did bring about some incredible artistic endeavours — remember all those YouTube videos from around the world? But I digress.

We had some delicious food and it was generally a fun atmosphere. And really, listening to people sing Happy Birthday accompanied by bagpipes in a criollo restaurant in Buenos Aires? You couldn’t make this stuff up!

I posted a few weeks back about a visit to the newly renovated Confiteria Ideal to its original glory, and I went back again this week.

Edd and Cynthia are friends of Susan and Michael, my Canadian friends who spend six months of each year away. At one time they lived in Ecuador for six months of each year, and Edd and Cynthia were friends of theirs there.

They now have a business that focuses on helping people move to and settle in a new country. You can find out more about them on their website at https://www.eddandcynthia.com/

In the meantime, here we are in Ideal, having my favourite merienda of white wine and yummy desserts!

When I went to the cafe this morning for coffee, I had no plans to sketch — although I usually have my small sketchbook with me just in case.

When I saw this lovely coleus plant on my table, I couldn’t resist. You see, my mother was a keen gardener and loved potted plants. She had a whole collection of different coleus plants in all their purple and green and pink glory, and if it wasn’t her all time favourite, it was at least one of them. This plant made me think of her.

So this one’s for you, Mum.