cuenta reg 02: I love livin in the city

List #02: favorite places, loosely speaking

1. Abasto: My first two months I was kind of cranky that I lived in Almagro. Most of the other Americans are in Barrio Norte and Recoleta, really nice upper-middle class neighborhoods. But now I love no area of the city more than I love the Balavanera neighborhood near the Abasto mall, also called Abasto. Abasto is home to my favorite cheap Peruvian restaurant and many more I have not yet tried, the Konex cultural center where there is theatrical live musc like the incredible percussion orchestea Bomba del Tiempo, Club Atletico Fernandez Fierro and their rock/tango orchestra, and the most incredible thing I have seen in my time in BA – an adorable porteno block party of sorts with maybe 30 young beautiful hipster couples folk dancing in the street, with an asado and lights/flags hanging that we stumbled upon walking home from Marmani (Peruvian food) one day. It was like a scene from a movie. This neighborhood is known for being a bit dangerous, as people try to pick pocket mall-goers and many poor immigrants from Peru, Bolivia and Senegal live in the neighborhood, but I fucking love it. Makes me glad to live in Almagro and be so close!
2. Santa Fe y Pueyrredon: This is technically Barrio Norte but I point to this spot specifically for a couple of reasons. First, at this particular intersection is the Galeria Americana where Axel has his tattoo parlor and the Varsity boys are opening their hardcore record store. It’s also the approximate location of my friend Alana’s apartment and very close to where Natalie lives. To get to those places I usually take the subway to Pueyrredon and then walk straight up it for 10 or so blocks to Santa Fe, enabling myself to walk through the Jewish area of town. Tons of Orthodox Jews and their Kosher supermarkets, one in which I stumbled upon a beautiful three year old also named Shana. What more makes me feel like home than good friends, Jews and hardcore kids? It’s the spot in which I am most likely to run into someone I know and like, Argentines and Americans alike (see: when I met these American girls from GW who were super nice, the time I ran into Axel before meeting Anna and her parents, how I ran into Emma while waiting for Axel, and how I just ran into Kiko Fede and Fran this weekend). Also very close to my favorite bookstore (El Ataneo on Santa Fé) and ice cream (Volta).