I got to start my second day in Buenos Aires with a treat: mass at the Catedral Metropolitana! I woke up and walked over to Plaza de Mayo and found a pew. Before mass started I was looking around and something immediately caught my eye; a girl a few pews in front of me was wearing a Texas A&M sweatshirt! I wanted to talk to her after mass but I wasn’t able to catch her before she left. But as usual, mass was gorgeous and I was really glad that I had had the opportunity to go. Afterwards I walked back to the hostel and the other girls were almost ready. We left a little before 1:00 and took the subway to Recoleta and went to MALBA, Museo de Arte Latinamericano de Buenos Aires, which is the really famous modern art museum in Argentina. Although I’m not a huge art person it was still very interesting and had a lot of cool things to look at. Afterwards, even though they weren’t exactly close, we opted to walk through Recoleta in the direction of the famous Cemetario de la Recoleta. We were definitely in a nicer part of town and it was a lot of fun just taking in all of the architecture, the beautiful plazas, and the various monuments on the way. We had heard that the cemetery was really cool but I honestly had no idea what to expect. However when we got there I immediately knew what people had been talking about! The graves aren’t underground; instead, all of the tombs are above ground and elegantly formed out of various types of stone. The place is like a maze, and the family plots are packed side-by-side and rise way about your head. Some of them have glass in the doors and you can actually see the coffins and other random things that have been buried with the people! The cemetery is of course for wealthy and famous people, and although we weren’t familiar with most of the names there were some that I actually recognized. Evita Peron is buried there and we looked for her family’s plot for a while, but we eventually gave up. The whole place is extremely unique and it’s difficult to fully express what it’s like to visit there; therefore, we all agreed that we would tell people that it’s the one thing you absolutely can’t miss if you ever get a chance to visit Buenos Aires! After we left the cemetery we went on another walk to find a famous bookstore. Although it wasn’t marked on any of the tourist maps that we had been given, it was a place in Rachel’s tourist book that we all wanted to go see. It used to be a big theater that has now been converted into a bookstore and, now that I have had the privilege to go there, I can say that it is just as awesome as it looked in the book! It still has all of the original architecture complete with the huge velvet curtain, the painted ceiling, and the gold accents. The traditional theater décor contrasted against the rows of bookshelves was really cool! The theater box seats that encircle the perimeter have been converted into little reading nooks, and if we would’ve had more time I think we could’ve spent much more time in there! After that last stop on the other side of town we got back on the metro and headed back to San Telmo to spend a little time in the famous San Telmo antique and artisan market. Every weekend the streets are shut down to cars and converted into a big market where locals set up booths all over the place. It was a lot of fun to look around and enjoy the atmosphere. After a little over an hour we went back to the hostel in time to make our bus that would take us to our tango-filled night. We had been told that if there is one thing that you have to do in Buenos Aires it’s to experience tango, so we reserved a special package deal through our hostel. The bus came and picked us up and took us across town to a famous tango place called Sabor a Tango. We met some other American students on the bus, one from Minnesota and one actually from Dallas, and had fun getting to know them and comparing our studying experiences. Then, once we got to the place, they first took us downstairs for an hour lesson. Although we’ve been taking tango lessons in Córdoba we still had a lot of fun! In Córdoba, since we are going every week, it is focused more on us doing the steps correctly and fully learning all of the basics. However, in Buenos Aires, it was a class for tourists so we just had fun! Rachel, Lara, and I were some of the only girls who didn’t come as a couple and we all were randomly paired with the few single men in the group. My partner was from South Africa and his name was John and he had to have been at least sixty years old. He was super nice and we had a great time! After the lesson we went back upstairs to the big, elegant theater where they had our dinner tables set up. The three of us girls enjoyed our five-star meal and being treated like royalty! The food was great (I ordered steak since I figured I couldn’t go wrong with that here in Argentina) and we all had a great time. After dinner the show started, and we were entertained for over an hour with awesome traditional tango dancing to live music, singing, and an act by some gauchos. The entire night was wonderful and we were really glad that we had decided to go! After the show the bus dropped us off back at our hostel and, after such an amazing day, we were ready to go to bed.
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