Phil´s Observations from BA:

-Everyone in Buenos Aires is white. Everyone. I haven´t seen a single person of African or Asian descent who wasn´t clearly a gringo tourist in our 3 days in town. The only time I´ve seen people who appear indigenous was during a protest in the Plaza de Mayo for the rights of workers in interior states, the participants of which I presume are from said interior states. Anyways, it´s very bizarre and noticeable not to have a visible immigrant population. I´ve never seen any place like it.

-BA is extremely similar to Madrid. Two noticeable differences (besides the lack of African and Arab immigrants): People from BA (Porteños) are friendly, unlike Madrileños, who are rude; and BA is dirty, unlike Madrid, which has a huge continuous public cleaning program. I believe the friendliness of the place outweighs the dirtiness. I like BA.

-The museums in BA are terrible. For example, we went to the Museo de la Ciudad hoping to learn about the history or culture of the city. Instead we found a museum with a small and unimpressive permanent exhibit and a temporary exhibit called "Esas cosas cariñosas que algunos se llaman `kitsch´" (Translation: Cute things that some people call "kitsch."). That´s right. Somebody thought it would be a good idea to put a bunch of random tacky crap in a museum and call it an exhibit. I have a hope that there was something else going on, like maybe their next exhibit is going to be "Fotos de gringos confundidos en un museo." (Photos of confused gringos in a museum). In that case, kudos to the Argentines for pulling a fast one on us. Unfortunately, I think the only fast one was the fact that we paid 30 cents to look at trinkets.

-My Spanish has gone to mierda over the last 3 years. It´s very sad.

-Cow kidneys are slimy yet tasty.