A Holiday Weekend in Buenos Aires.

As luck would have it, even though I was oh 6,000 miles give or take away from the states I still was able to get a three-day weekend in Buenos Aires. On May 25th Argentines celebrate La Revolución de Mayo. I'm still not 100% sure what the holiday is all about, something about an epic battle in the cause for independence but not quite independence day (it kind of reminded me of Cinco de Mayo in that respect). All I know is that I took advantage of the weekend and did some of the 'must sees.'

On Wednesdays the MALBA museum is free if you show your student ID. This was the sole Frida Kahlo painting in the museum, but it was beautiful!

Mostly I took a picture of this piece because it reminded me of something that was in a local taco bell  in Compton when I was growing up. My grandmother and I would sometimes walk to taco bell and there was this thing that looks almost exactly like the piece above that sat by the cash register except it was filled with water. On the top of the thing you had slits where you could put quarters in and if your quarter landed on a colored circle you would get a free taco! The trick was the circles moved (& actually, so did the circles in this piece). I was getting all nostalgic in the MALBA thinking of my grandmother.

Saw these murals on my walk towards Andrea & Alyssa's apartment. I had to snap a take a few shots.

I was blessed to discover two more BYU interns here! :) I'm sure there's more of us in the city that I just don't know about. Andrea and Alyssa have become new sightseeing friends. We went to go see Caminito in Boca—a beautiful, brightly colored series of streets. Major tourist location with your typical series of souvenir shops, but still a place you HAVE to experience in Buenos Aires. 

Even the trees are colorful!

La Bombonera where Boca Junior play. Sadly, I won't get to go to a game BUT the stadium was just kind of nestled into a neighborhood it was really interesting.

I had almost given up on having my tastebuds satisfied in Argentina. The food here is very European, kind of bland but this is also coming from someone who has probably killed her tastebuds by eating spicy foods and strongly flavored cuisine. Anyways, on my list of things to do here was a pizza place called Las Cuartetas. I am STILL dreaming about that pizza. We ordered the Super Napolena. It was pure deliciousness!

Paid our tip partly in pesos, partly in dollars.

Ended our day at Feria Puro Diseño, a weekend long design fair. If I had to describe it in anyway it would be a fair featuring Etsy sellers. 

With it being Sunday, we tried to do things that wouldn't require us spending money, so we went to Recoleta Cemetery to visit Evita's grave. Surprisingly even though she's probably the most famous resident of the cemetery, her grave wasn't anything too luxurious or special. We also couldn't find it at first and I joked about asking 'Siri'. I looked it up and people said they had done tour groups. As soon as I read that we saw a tour group pass by and we though, "maybe we'll get lucky?" Wouldn't you know it, Evita's grave was the next stop on the tour!

Climbed a really sketchy ladder (probably illegally) to get this shot.

So, one of my best friends Shelly told me once that her Mom takes pictures like the above in cemeteries, you know as if you're taking pictures with a spirit??? Recoleta seemed like an appropriate place to take just a photo...

There was a HUGE political rally on the 25th of May downtown as tons of Cristina supporters flooded the streets in front of La Casa Rosada. Our plan had originally been to go see the plaza de Mayo and La Casa Rosada. Wellll....it took about 20 minutes to get around one block so we abandoned that plan.

Alyssa, Me, and Andrea inside of Cafe Tortoni—Buenos Aires' oldest cafe.

delicious Medialunas!

We all ordered hot chocolate and split medialunas and churros. The churros: not my favorite.

It's a national tradition to eat locro and empanadas on the 25th of May. So we went to a local restaurant called Ña Serapia and did just that. Locro is a stew that has corn, white beans, potatoes, and meat.

That little pin that Andrea is wearing is called an escarapela and is traditionally worn throughout the whole week leading up to the 25th of May.