Playing a piano that belonged to one of my favorite tango composers, Osvaldo Pugliese
The cradle of the flag in Rosario, birthplace of the argentine colors
With Pia at the Cradle
Do you get the color scheme yet? It's the same as the... Argentine flag!
There is a huge torch there that in high winds will burn your eyebrows off.
There is a strange form of political marketing in Argentina that bears a suspicious resemblance to certain used car ads in our country.
Rooftops of Rosario
Rosario
The Girls outside the house of Che Guevara. There's nothing to see there.
Mocking election ads. Always a great time!
The Rio
At least we got to walk on a beach
Mmmm.... sand.... water....
I forget the name of that bridge...
but there was a kid fishing in front of it.
I don't know if he caught anything.
An ice cream parlor. Obviously you see where my head was.
A government building in Rosario
OK. There was a Japanese restaurant that had delivery, and out front there was a bicycle with this awful dummy wearing a fu-manchu and robes, and an EMPTY SEAT in front! What else are you supposed to do but get on and take pictures?
Pia going for pole position
We had dinner in front of the opera house.
On a riverboat to Tigre. They don't take no crap on that boat.
The river delta of Tigre
Mas Tigre
A restaurant on the rio. Did you know they serve Quilmes beer?
There are no cars there, at least. Only boats. Like the Venice of Buenos Aires.
At the river
I went with my friend Corinna from Germany (Dusseldorf). We'd been planning on going for like 2 months before we actually made it, and it's only like 2 hrs from Bs As.
The aforementioned Argentine flag in Bs As
Cafe Tortoni (a historical cafe, aka Tourist Trap Central) and above it, the National Tango Academy where I took tango dance lessons
The D line Subte (subway) gets impossibly crowded anytime between 2pm - 10pm. I'm talking Tokyo rush hour full. Actually, these very trains are from Japan, there are even plates with Japanese still written on them. These people couldn't even begin to make it on.
Even the next train after that was full. I took the time to document these people's discomfort. Suckas.
A cool building with a windmill on top on Callao.
Architecture on Avenida de Mayo downtown.
More Avenida de Mayo. The sun hits this street in a really nice way at around 5 in the afternoon. It's terribly charming.
A cafe called La Maie two blocks from my apartment. I wanted to love this place. I wanted it to be MY place. It's small, charming, and has lots of newspapers. Unfortunately, both the café con leche and the medialunas (croissants) were awful. Couldn't continue going.
Remember that thing? The sun? It was 80 degrees when I left. Actually before I took this photo, an Argentine woman came up to me and asked if where I was from. I told her America, and she said, "Don't EVER let your computer out of your sight! It will be gone in 2 seconds!" I told her I wouldn't. I don't want to be like the Bush twins.
Many trees in Bs As in the spring/summer sprout these beautiful purple flowers that fall all over the ground, blanketing the streets in lavendar.
Me in the Ateneo bookstore
My apartment in Palermo Viejo on Calle Guemes. I met my landlady Vivien by chance in the post office. A really nice lady with a lovely family who lived in the flat next door.
Emma, Vanessa and Pia, before they parted ways.
Me with Pia and Emma before disembarking on a week roadtrip up towards northern argentina. I wanted to document that I was alive at some point in case we drove ourselves off a cliff.
Tucuman, a major city at the foot of the Andes about 18 hrs north of Buenos Aires.
Some of the bus ticketing people are very good at their jobs. Others suck. This lady took soooooo long I put my head thru her window. Luckily there was already a hole there.
Woohoo! On the open road, finally.
On the road
Clouds and a big truck
At a traffic light outside Tucuman, this guy came up and asked Emma where she was from. After replying England, he serenaded her with a horrible version of Wonderwall by Oasis. Luckily, I also got it on video.
Gettin' jungly
With Emma in the Bolivian jungle, I mean Argentina.
A dangerous looking roadsign
A large and expansive body of water
Nobody on the road for miles...
Pia getting sexy on our amazingly rugged Renault Clio. Emma wanted the pickup truck but it cost a lot more.
We basically wrecked this car by the end of the trip but were able to cover it up with enough gunk and crap the guy at the car rental agency didn't notice.
A passing couple on the highway. With an infant!! Don't they make baby motorcycle helmets?
We literally drove into the clouds
We climbed into a place that looked like Ireland...
Then it looked like the moon.
Eating dinner in Cafayate, a little town between Tucuman and Salta
Emma's ear is eating my head. We were all really hungry.
Emma taking a quick snooze in a hammock above our hostel
The rooftop of our hostel in Cafayate
On the road again. The clouds up there are stunning
Emma wanted to climb this tree for some reason. And then had a hard time climbing down.
British-Asian Sasquatch! Hide the women and children!
E & P
Cows. Sweet.
Pia in rearview
Luckily my roommate in college taught me how to drive a stick shift in case he ever were to become incapacitated and I could drive him to the hospital. Much cheaper than calling an ambulance. He's a doctor now.
Emma in shades
Pia
Wagon
Good times.... and not the safest time and/or place to take a self portrait.
See all that land out there? One day it'll be all ours!!!
Strange lookin' cacti...
Not the best road for hitch-hiking....
Jumping Series #1
This is one of my favorite pics of Emma ever. What is she doing?!? Kung-fu fighting! I think the altitude had begun to get to us all.
This dude had a lot of goats.
A cafe on the road
Nothin' but open sky
Watch out for John Deere
The one building everyone wants to see in Salta.
It was sort of cheesy. Pia and I were discussing its merits and faults rather diplomatically, then Emma came up and said, "God, that's disgusting." :)
A folklore band in Salta
Drunk on fresh lemonade
This is what they think of tourists. Just look at those people! Jeezus!!!
On the salt lake
Jumping Series #2
It was windy.
Me and my imaginary friends.
Salt lake angels
The landscape was so bizarre we started doing these crazy Dali-esque tableaus. This one works somehow.
I have no idea what we were doing. Going crazy.
Don't ask.
Meditating
Lots sheep. The shepherd came up to the car and literally had green teeth.
Perusing the Lonely Planet, which by the way, happened to be a pretty poor judge of things in our opinions...
A traditional restaurant in Tilcara, an incredibly charming pueblo town in the mountains.
With my girls in our awesome cabin in Tilcara.
Back in Buenos Aires and its hip and funky cars and cafes
With Corinna and fellow Californian-New Yorker Amy at the Police concert in Buenos Aires! Contrary to all these photographs, I do actually have male friends.
At the Police concert
The Police!
mas Police
Beck actually opened for the Police, although the crowd was a bit lukewarm for him. Tragic.
The concert was in River Plate's futbol stadium. It was pizzacked.
Cafe Plaza Dorrego in San Telmo
At the Cafe Dorrego. A cafe con leche and my journal. That's all I need.
Trying to play my friend Dom's bandoeon. This instrument is fiendishly difficult and completely counterintuitive. And it's German!
Striking my Astor Piazzolla "Zero Hour" pose. Dom is lucky I didn't drop the thing.
Buenos Aires
With my old roommate from Madrid Maricarmen! She's originally from Buenos Aires and came home to visit her family. It was great to see her in her hometown.
Studying in my apartment in Palermo Viejo.
The Orquesta Escuela de Tango Emilio Balcarce rehearsing. I watched these guys rehearse twice a week.
With Nélida Rouchetto, a very famous tango journalist and cultural authority in Buenos Aires, also the Señora for the Casa del Tango where the Orchestra rehearsed and where I studied and practiced piano every day, torturing poor Nélida for hours. After three months, she paid me a huge compliment by saying she witnessed my "evolution" and that now, only now, do I actually understand the tango.
Artistic graffiti
Dancing with my tango instructor Mirabai in her amazing apartment in San Telmo.
With my other tango teacher, Liliana at the National Tango Academy. She was rough and tough on me, which was good.
With Lily
Jacinta (from Sydney) and Juri (Japan) making a traditional japanese dinner for the orchestra
Members of the Orquesta Escuela de Tango chowing down on Japanese food.
With Nico, a hilarious bandoneon player and Juri and a big bottle of sake.
Nico toasting to Gardel
A house with tango written all over it
A dramatic setting for music, La Catedral. Sadly, this tango orchestra was incredibly mediocre.
My going away party with Juri, her boyfriend Hernan, Jacinta, and Amy at La Catedral
At Olsen restaurant with Corinna and my buddies, travel writer Elliott Hester and bandoneon player and tango dancer Dom Bhupbaibool.
Amy and I waiting for our flights out of Ezeiza Airport bound for the US. In true Argentine fashion, right in front of the gate you have ONE LAST OPPORTUNITY to purchase a huge goddamn side of grass fed, sun kissed Argentine beef. Try getting that in thru customs.
