I may not be the most devout fútbol fan, but I always know when there’s a Boca game.

In the early afternoon before each match, I’ll pass clusters of people in blue and gold on the streets around my San Telmo apartment, some carrying drums, others drinking from topless liters of Coca-Cola. Then at night, the sounds from the stadium will come pouring into my bedroom from my balcony windows.

I had never actually made it to a Boca game, but not for want of trying. Everything was always sold out before I could get my hands on tickets, in part because so many of the seats are already purchased through season passes. It was looking pretty hopeless.

But this past Sunday, I finally had a chance to go to the stadium myself. As it turns out, it’s not so hard, so long as you use a ticket procuring service like the one at LandingPadBA.com. Essentially, they pay to borrow member cards or buy special tickets for games, after which they resell them to common expats like you and me. I hadn’t – and haven’t – heard of any other services like this, so I was excited at the prospect of finally going to a game after all.  LandingPad has a full listing of games and tours to attend! 

And the service doesn’t stop with just the tickets. They also arrange a van to pick you up and take you home, which is important as the Boca Juniors stadium is, of course, in La Boca. It’s not the safest part of Buenos Aires and even less so after sundown, should you go to a night game.

You’ll also have a tour guide. Ours was Matias, who is actually a River fan (shhh!). He did an excellent job patiently answering our questions about the Boca-River rivalry and the best players to watch, among other things.

Also, had it not been for Matias, we definitely would’ve gotten lost in the maze of entrance barricades, pat-downs, and security-check turnstiles – four of them, actually – before we climbed what he endearingly called “the most longer staircase in your life” until the top of the stadium. Our seats were at the very top of the very top, and the stairs were steep enough that I was afraid – irrationally, of course, but still – that one of us would somehow tumble all the way down to the center of the field in one big arc. The view was excellent, though.

Before the game, Matias shared a few more interesting tidbits. For example, I had no idea that four hours before and after the game, no alcohol can be bought or sold within a twenty-block radius from the stadium. It doesn’t matter if it’s beer or liquor, a bar or a grocery store, a guy in a jersey or a family of four – no alcohol. This is, of course, in an effort to prevent brawls between the fans. There’s also a rule that gives visiting team supporters thirty minutes to leave before the Boca fans, which wasn’t actually put into effect on the day I went, but it’s there. These measures have helped curb the number and severity of fights, to be sure, but they haven’t stopped all of them. Again, I was glad to be with Matias.  

Sure enough, by half time, the Boca fans directly across the stadium from us lit firecrackers and started throwing them on the visiting team supporters down below. Firecrackers – and lighters, for that matter – are prohibited, but that hadn’t stopped them. It didn’t look like much, i.e. no one was burning or screaming, but it couldn’t have been pleasant either. It’s just that fútbol fans here are so loyal, maybe too loyal, easily getting caught up in everything and finding trouble. 

But it also means that they cheer from the first whistle to the last, with only a break for half time. That’s over an hour and a half once you add in the time players spend faking twists and sprains. And let me tell you – is it impressive. There is nothing to show their shared interest and sense of unity like the strength of their voices reaching across the entire stadium in chorus, or feeling the shaking of your seat as they beat their drums harder and harder, as though if they chant hard enough, they can will the Boca Juniors to win.

In the end, the game ended in a 0-0 tie. But finally – finally – when all my yanqui friends ask if I’ve been to a soccer game yet, I can say yes.  If you’re looking for the ultimate soccer experience in Buenos Aires, and a great tour, check out Landingpad.com. 

The works presented in Casi boyitas have their origin in a multidisciplinary river expedition that in 2010 united the cities of Buenos Aires and Asuncion via a boat that crawled along the Paraná and Paraguay rivers at a cruising speed of 3-5km an hour.

On joining the expedition, the artist’s thoughts began to flow in the direction of the river, carrying with them memories of things lived, read and heard. He began to reflect on that which the river carries away and that which it returns. He considered that just as light alters its speed as it passes through water, something similar must happen with time: everything in life is fleeting, everything flows, but under the surface everything is slower, denser and darker. Time that flows, trapped inside the river, flows in a different way. He began to form a concept of the river as a frontier, not between one bank and the other, but as a border and passing place between the surface and the depths; a crossing between two worlds, two different memories and two systems of time.

The 10 works in acrylic on paper and the 6 watercolours that form this exhibition are a part of the work were realised in the cabin of the cruiser Paraguay during the expedition. Later the drawings found the poetry of Gilda Di Crosta and the series received its name: Casi boyitas [Almost little buoys]. Both drawings and poems have been brought together in a book of the same title, which will also be on exhibition and sale in the gallery.

Once at my Grandparents’ house, I came across a book about Greece, which contained a giant color photograph of the Oracle at Delphi.  I stared at the picture for a long time, amazed at how the oracle had fallen into ruin.  It wasn’t the misty, mysterious place I’d imagined, with a priestess in seclusion translating confusing messages from the gods.  Instead the photograph showed three standing columns, once part of the sanctuary, set against a sunny sky and impossibly green, mountainous background.  I was enraptured with this one image, and I never forgot it.  I wanted so much to see this magical oracle in person.

The expectations to see a place you have dreamt of your entire life are set high for failure.  But Delphi and its crumbling ruins exceeded my childhood dreams.

Delphi is on the slopes of Mount Parnassus, a truly monumental, awe-inspiring mountain. Arriving by bus we slowly ascended the narrow switchback roads leading us to the small village.  The town is touristy, loaded with hotels, yet still maintains its unmistakable Greek character.  We stayed at The Hotel Parnassus, a clean yet unadorned hotel with cheery yellow decor.  After checking in we went for dinner at an unassuming restaurant where we could see the sunset over the beautiful mountainous scenery.

I loved that Delphi is so high up on the mountains; the air smelled clean and fragrant.  After dinner we slowly meandered through the streets, walking in the middle of the road, only having to move for the occasional moped.  Bouzouki music played in cafes where people sit and drink coffee for hours.  Occasionally a united uproar could be heard from bars where people go to watch the Euro Cup game.  I wish I could capture the air so you could smell it, or blow the wind so you can feel how it was soft, but strong enough to be refreshing.  I wish you could hear all the foreign chatter of birds and bugs engaged in their own conversations, playing harmony to the sounds of multilingual exchanges and television commercials.  I know this is all ordinary, but in Delphi, it seemed magical.

History confirms my sentiments, as magical events have become part of Delphi’s legacy.  In 480 BCE the Persians tried to loot the oracle but a timely earthquake started a landslide, which resulted in a giant rock destroying the temple to Athena, so that nothing could be taken from it.  The rock is still there to this today.  Another legend recalls when the Celts attacked Delphi in 278 CE and ancestral ghosts appeared to frighten them away.  It is a very mystical place indeed.

We started our next morning early with breakfast in the hotel lobby. Greek continental breakfast is identical at every hotel we have visited on the voyage thus far.  It consists of bread, yogurt, ham, cheese and hard-boiled eggs served with coffee and orange juice: a consistent culinary masterpiece.  After breakfast we walked out of town down the road to the archaeological site, starting early to avoid the unbearable heat of the late afternoon.

Delphi possibly comes from the Greek word ‘Delphini’ meaning dolphin. The ancients worshipped the god ‘Apollo Delphious’ here since the archaic times. The god Apollo arrived relatively late to the Greek Pantheon.  Before Apollo, the goddess Gaia was worshipped here by Neolithic cultures.  Late Neolithic finds have been found at Delphi, including paraphernalia of the Pythia – a female symbol, or trademark of Gaia. These Neolithic religious activities involving Pythia occurred in the ancient cave, the Korykeion Antron, which is still being excavated. A giant snake protected the cave, until Apollo arrived and conquered it: a symbolic death of the Neolithic religion. The tradition of the Pythia continued however, this name was used for the priestesses at the oracle who intercepted messages from Apollo.

Delphi was not only important because of the oracle. This magical place was recognized by all of the Greek city-states. We first visited lower Delphi, which was dedicated to Athena. There is the remaining fragment of the Tholos monument that I’d seen in the picture so many years ago, along with a gymnasium.  The Tholos was just as great as the picture in my grandparent’s book, and all the excitement came rushing back to me.  Only three of the original twenty columns stand today.  Round buildings like this are really unusual and therefore special. Prehistoric people often used circular buildings for initiation rites.  The archaic version of the Greek letter Θ (theta) was just a circle with a dot in the center, and possible it comes from the word Theos- meaning god.  So this circular shape is intended to be sacred and holy.

After exploring lower Delphi we made our way up the slope of the mountain to upper Delphi to see the remains of the enormous temple to Apollo.  Treasuries of the Greek City States are scattered around the temple, where the offerings to Apollo would be kept.  Worth mentioning is the Athenian treasury with its Doric order resembling the temple to Athena Nike on the Athenian Akropolis.  It has been completely reconstructed from original parts, so we can see it standing today.

In the mythological glory days of ancient Greece, rich and powerful people received messages from the priestesses.  Poor people would come to visit Delphi and sleep outside, hoping that Apollo would visit them in a dream.  After paying homage to his temple, I wondered if Apollo would make an appearance in my dreams, but no such luck.

The Delphi excursion ended and we headed back to Athens.  On the way back we stopped to visit a Byzantine monastery, called Hosios Loukas.  This serene and picturesque monastery is still occupied by Orthodox monks today.  We visited the chapel, which was dark and mysterious, lit only by candlelight. I passed around a corner and bumped into the glass coffin of Loukas himself! His face was covered but you could see his skeleton hand, black with rot but still recognizable and reminiscent of the Grim Reaper.

We spent some free time at the monastery, sitting peacefully in quiet and enjoying the scenery, before getting back on the bus and returning to Athens.  It was an interesting way to end our visit to Delphi, going to a Byzantine monastery, but both places were very mystical and old, and had similar ambiances of ancient importance that has faded in history, but is not forgotten.

This post was originally written by Vivi in 2008, during her summer study abroad in Greece.  

As Lisa Besserman, 28, lets me into her apartment, she tells me she’s had a long night. Despite the feriado, she stayed up until 5AM working on a promotional video for her new company, Startup Buenos Aires (SUBA). “It’s great working for yourself, but it’s not always easy,” she says.

“You’re your own boss, but you’re also your own slave?” I suggest.

“Exactly.”

And Lisa has a lot on her plate right now. Not only is she the founder of the brand new Startup Buenos Aires, but she was also recently chosen to speak at Internet Week in New York City, an event hosted by Joan Rivers and Randi Zuckerberg. (Her topic? “Taking Your Work Mobile: The Art of Living and Working Abroad.”)

Like most expats, Lisa only planned to stay in Buenos Aires for a few months. At the time, she was working remotely for a mobile app development company. Unlike most expats, though, Lisa decided to quit her job in order to start her own company here in Buenos Aires.

Lisa had been active in the New York startup community, so she was excited to see what Buenos Aires had to offer. Unfortunately, she found nothing.

“The startup community is here, but it’s so fragmented,” she says. “Chile and Brazil have government support and funding for this kind of thing, but we’re lacking those resources in Argentina. This city has such a strong entrepreneurial spirit, so there’s a real need for it.

Despite the lack of a structured, centralized startup community – or maybe because of it – Lisa found herself networking and making connections for people almost immediately. People needed websites, people needed new logos, people needed projection charts. When she knew the right person for the job, she introduced them.

At a friend’s suggestion, Lisa decided to take the plunge. She quit her job and began to devote herself entirely to SUBA.

“It’s natural to have feelings of, you know, ‘oh God, what did I just do,’“ she explains, “but that was a driving factor for me. I had to quit so there was nothing to fall back on. I knew I needed to commit myself fully to this project in order for it to work.”

Now, SUBA is well under way. It aims to be a mobilizer for entrepreneurs in Buenos Aires, a place for them to network and find the resources they need. It’s also completely free.

For now, SUBA is mostly meetings and networking events, but Lisa has much bigger plans in mind. Soon, SUBA will also include a talent database organized by industry, and classes taught and selected by its members on skills ranging from Excel hacks to mastering social media.

“It’s people helping people. You get back what you put in,” she says.

When I ask Lisa how she plans to monetize SUBA, she laughs. “Everyone always asks that, and it’s a good question.” She explains that SUBA will be supported by domestic and international sponsorship, but a large part will also come from the SUBA internship program. Universities will hire SUBA to set up internships for select students, pairing them with local startups according to their majors and interests. Each intern will also receive housing, Spanish lessons, and cultural immersion activities. The first intern will arrive next month, and he will work alongside Lisa herself.

In the meantime, SUBA is continuing to grow, using local graphic designers for its logo, local web developers for its site, and local lawyers, of course, for all the other fun stuff. In turn, they become a part of SUBA’s trusted network and are referred to anyone who might need a similar service. When the talent database is built, they’ll have even more exposure.

“We have a very aggressive global PR plan,” Lisa says. “It’s just a matter of getting the word out, getting people involved, letting them know it’s real and it’s happening. SUBA is going to be huge.”

Look for Lisa the next time you’re out and about in Buenos Aires. If you don’t know her yet, you will soon.

Want to get involved? 

Startup Buenos Aires will hold its first public meeting on Monday, May 13 at The Founder’s Place, a Google-sponsored office. There will also be two guest speakers from Silicon Valley. You can find more details on the SUBA Facebook page.

 And despedidas bring with them a lot of powerful emotions.

And sometimes, if you’re lucky and unlucky, you fall in love.

I didn’t fall in love.

I fell in mate. 

My friend Mateo loved mate. He loved mate more than most yanquis. We would always drink mate together, until the time came for him to go home. 

He told me: “Te quiero, but I’m leaving. Maybe I’ll come back.”

I didn’t want to wait for him, so I said: “come visit me in my dreams”.

He said “OK”, and then, he gave me a wooden mate gourd.  It was a parting gift to remember all of the good mates we had shared, and I loved it.

It was stable and sturdy,

It was warm and deep:

A vessel for a sacred herb

A hollow space, filled with tea.

It was a heart,

a cask for love,

hollow chambers filled with blood.

Mate was the blood

that pumped through my heart chambers.

The tea passed through the thermos vena cava,

infused the yerba leaves in the right atrium,

and then was sucked up through the bombilla pulmonary artery,

into my own system,

where it become a part of my blood.

Valves and atriums.

Mates and bombillas.

They all flowed with love.

And I thought, this mate is our heart.

Until one day, the mate gourd fractured.

I felt the water seep through a very small crack and leak on my hand.

Is it his crack, or mine? I wondered.
 My friend Mateo and I didn’t talk, and he didn’t visit me in my dreams.

I was sad and the crack got bigger and wider and deeper and leaked, until I just couldn’t take it anymore. So I washed it and put it away on a top shelf of my kitchen, so I couldn’t see it.  I went weeks without any mate.

Then, one Thursday, I listened to love songs.  I went on a love song binge, right before bed.  I fell asleep, awash in borrowed sentimentality, and fell into a dream.

In my dream:

I was sitting on a stool, surrounded by strangers in a strange place filled with stools, when I noticed that Mateo was next to me.

He was turned away from me and he didn’t see me. I elbowed him in the side and shook his knee and tried to get his attention.

He turned and acknowledged me. “Hey, V!”

I woke up.

I felt that painful ache of when you wake up from a dream when you’d prefer to remain. So I closed my eyes and fell back asleep, and into another dream.

In my dream:

I was sitting on a picnic blanket on a grassy hill overlooking a river.

I took in the beautiful view, and Mateo walked over and came to join me on the blanket.

It was temperate and sunny and peaceful.

We sat in silent meditation, and then I woke up.

I tossed in my bed until the arrangement of my pillows allowed for my body to lay to rest and I fell into another dream. This dream was tense. My parents were there and they were angry with me. Mateo was there again too, but we were arguing.

I woke up, disappointed that our dream sequence had turned sour. I fell back asleep and met him in another dream.

In my dream:

I revisited the past, the night he gave me the mate gourd. I closed my eyes and I placed my hand over his heart and I saw him without my eyes. He was skinny and weak, he looked like a skeleton. He was incomplete and imperfect and unafraid to reveal himself to me.  I saw a red cord that started in his big beating heart, and flowed through the palm of my hand, through my arm and connected to my own heart.

In the dream I opened my blue eyes and I looked into his brown eyes and I saw that he was many people that I love. Dream identities often blur.

His brown dream eyes were his eyes, but they were also my mother’s warm eyes, they were my high school sweetheart’s teasing eyes, they were my best friend’s coffee-colored eyes, they were the eyes of friends I had yet to meet.

I saw -

We are all the same, we are all connected by cords of love.

It wasn’t Mateo’s heart I saw, he showed me my own imperfect heart, my own weakness to love. Love is just a big mirror, and when I looked with my heart, and not my eyes, I saw the mirrored reflection of our universal soul.

In the morning, I woke up smiling. I often dream of the people in my life, but then I knew that everyone, in dreams and reality, is a mere reflection.

As the poet said; “If I am I because I am I, and you are you because you are you, then I am I and you are you. But If I am I because you are you, and you are you because I am I, then I am not I and you are not you.”

No, but rather, I am she as you are he, as you are me, and,

We are all together.

I layed in bed for a minute, and then I got up because all of a sudden I was really thirsty for some mate. I went into the kitchen and looked on the top shelf for my wooden mate gourd. I brought it down and held it up, turning it and examining and admiring it.

The crack was gone.

There are two kinds of people in the world: those that like PB&J and those that don’t.

Although it’s not how I generally start conversations with: “Hello, I’m Kevin and I’ve never eaten a peanut butter and jelly sandwich”, I’m proudly a part of the latter community. Sometimes I’m a fan of peanut butter on its own, but I don’t cry about its absence in this city as I do with, say, sourdough bread, or pepper jack, ice cream sandwiches, chimichangas, or sushi menus that only have one Philadelphia cream cheese option.

So when Vivi proposed that I develop a recipe using peanut butter from the BA-based organic peanut butter company Mil Mantecas, I thought I was entering a world of hurt. I reluctantly agreed.

I googled for two straight weeks and sorted through all kinds of recipes. What it all boiled down to was figuring out how to make the peanut butter spicy, which for me was non-negotiable. Most of the recipes recommended simply adding paprika or cayenne pepper but I wasn’t convinced that the tastes would genuinely play with one another or the contrary, that one spice wouldn’t be diverse enough to complement the peanut butter.

I threw out pies and cakes because I’m not much of a baker and the idea terrified me. I considered spicy peanut butter balls and peanut butter cups, but thought the chocolate might compete too much for the attention. Then I came across a blog post about peanut butter cookies with sriracha. It was the first recipe that suggested something besides paprika and it struck me as absolute genius.

Cookies it was, my favorite dessert. I decided to mix this Siracha peanut butter with my favorite cookie, the oatmeal raisin, in part because the oatmeal would help thicken out the liquidly natural peanut butter but mostly because I wanted to be able to announce the cookie by its proper title: The Spicy Peanut Butter Oatmeal Raisin Chocolate Chip Cookie.

You will need the following to yield about 2 dozen large cookies:

• 1 cup unsalted butter (softened)
• 1½ cups peanut butter (or approximately one jar of Mil Manteca)
• 2 cups brown sugar
• ¼ cup Gochujang
• 2 Eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2¾ cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1½ teaspoons baking soda
• 2 cups oatmeal
• A few handfuls of seedless raisins
• 1 bar chocolate (I used dark), crushed into little chips

I don’t happen to be a big fan of Sriracha, I find it too overwhelming for my personal taste. I instead chose to go with my new household staple, gochujang, a Korean red chili paste that you can purchase by the tub in both Barrio Chino and Floresta. This is the biggest purchase but can be used later on to add spice to soups, marinades or alone as a salsa. I like it with steak or to dip raw veggies.

In three separate bowls place the butter, peanut butter and sugar, the gochujang, eggs and vanilla extract, and finally your dry ingredients, the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

First, cream the butter, peanut butter and sugar. This is going to take quite a bit of bicep muscle unless you’ve got cash to throw and own a mixer. Mix until there are no more chunks of butter and it takes on a smooth consistency.

Now slowly add the gochujang, eggs and vanilla. I did this in two parts. I began with ¼ cup of gochujang and added more a spoonful at a time until it reached my desired level of spice which was a total of 5 heaping spoonfuls. Once you are happy with your batter, add the dry ingredients and mix. Now that you have your dough fold in the oatmeal, chocolate chips and raisins. This is a matter of personal taste.  I added an entire bar of chocolate (which I hammered into small chips), about three handfuls of raisins and two cups of oatmeal.

Mix everything thoroughly, cover and set in the fridge for about 30 minutes to firm up.

Form into little golf balls, lightly press them with the palms of your hands or with a fork and put onto your baking sheet. I gave the baking sheet a light coat of butter but found that it wasn’t necessary to continue to butter the pan after the first batch.

Cook in the oven for 10-12 minutes at 350°. You want the top of the cookie to be soft to the touch but not mushy. Take out of oven, let it sit on the pan for a few minutes and scoop onto a cooling rack. The cookies will firm up on the outside while still remaining gooey on the inside.

That first bite tasted like the peanut butter had reproduced with a ginger snap. It was soft on the inside with a slight crunch on the outside. The gochujang gave a gentle kick of spice and paired with the peanut butter it had morphed into an oaky cinnamon or nutmeg flavor rather than a deep red chili paste. I dipped it in some milk and my baking fears washed away. And just when I thought I had discovered all the tastes I could feel the flakey texture of the oatmeal, the juiciness of the raisin and the subtle dark chocolate. For a recipe with such a hodge podge of ingredients everything worked together, not a single flavor fought for my affection at the expense of the other.

So even though I’m not quite ready to start slapping pb and marmelada together, I am now a legitimate peanut butter fan.

It all started when Linda Neilson tried to buy prints for her baby’s nursery here in Buenos Aires. To her dismay, the high-end galleries were not only expensive but also limited, and the low-end shops tended to have nothing more than cheap Disney reproductions. She couldn’t find anything in between. She wanted something both reasonably priced and high quality, and it was the discovery of this niche that gave her the first idea for Galeria Mar Dulce – an intimate gallery with well-made, affordable art.

As luck would have it, family friends of her husband were looking for the very same
thing, though for a different reason. They had recently converted a piece of property
into three apartments they’d been renting to tourists, but they needed something
in the front room to add value to the rest of the space. When they approached Linda
and her husband about opening a small gallery there in 2010, they gladly accepted.
The only catch was, they’d need to have it all up and running in two months.

Somehow, they did. What was once a living room was transformed, almost overnight, into the bright, inviting space now called Galeria Mar Dulce. Though small, the large windows and white walls lend it a feeling of openness, and the refurbished shelving and working fireplace make it easily the most welcoming gallery I’ve ever seen.

It now houses two collections – the main exhibition, which is currently a whimsical set of paintings called Parallel Universe by Decur, and the “plus collect,” which is a series of smaller rotating pieces by various classic and contemporary artists, all of whom are Argentine or Uruguayan. “Because the space is small,” Linda says, “it’s important that all of the pieces work together in form and color.”

The pieces also need to be small-format to avoid overwhelming the space. This works well, though, as the art is more affordable this way. Plus, it’s appealing to tourists because it’s more manageable for traveling. Linda has also found that well- known artists will seek out Galeria Mar Dulce precisely to show their small-format pieces, great works of art that would otherwise be pushed aside by bigger galleries.

Though Galeria Mar Dulce was conceived in a very short amount of time, the responsibility of owning a gallery is not too much for Linda, who has always had a strong interest in art. While in her native Scotland, she studied sculpture and spent time working in a photography gallery. She found she enjoyed the administrative side of the art world better – like meeting with art councils and applying for grants – so she set aside her personal work to study for a Masters in Cultural Policy. At the time, she told herself the break was only “temporary,” but she has yet to pick it up again. This is fine, though, she says, because she married an Argentine printmaker and, according to her, “one artist in the family is more than enough.”

When she first moved to Buenos Aires with her husband in 2006, Linda says she decided to avoid expat circles for a while so she wouldn’t rely too heavily on them. “You’re always going to be a foreigner unless you make a conscious effort to immerse yourself,” she says. Today, she feels at home here and finds people only recognize her as an expat when she forgets her sunglasses. “It’s my pale eyes.”

Now, three years since its opening, Galeria Mar Dulce has six big shows a year, featuring artists as wide-ranging as Decur, whose fantastical paintings currently hang on the walls, and Juan Carlos Romero, who relates Spanish Civil War photographs to great works by Goya.

Galeria Mar Dulce also recently finished their third annual Sweet for My Sweet exhibition in December, which is comprised of both originals and limited prints by talented illustrators. “It’s a great opportunity for them to show their work,” Linda says, “because it’s beautiful but is often overlooked by the bigger galleries.”

Linda loves it all, of course, and says she sometimes feels attached to certain pieces, promising herself to buy them at the end of the show but hating to see them go when, invariably, someone else falls in love. A few special others, she admits, she has taken home. But no matter whether you’re interested in buying or just seeing what’s available, “anyone is welcome to come in a take a look.” Galeria Mar Dulce’s doors are wide open.

Hierbabuena has a brunch. Hierbabuena, my favorite restaurant in all of Buenos Aires, maybe ever, has a brunch.

Unfortunately, I had never been able to participate in this Eventful Meal because I was never quite willing to part with all the pesos. Fortunately, however, my mother came to visit over her spring break, and I shamelessly took advantage of her status as a tourist, i.e. 1. that she was willing to eat out anywhere because VACATION!, and 2. that she still considered the exchange rate quite nice, having not yet had a chance to experience first-hand the ridiculousness of the ever-rising inflation.

So we went, my mother, my boyfriend, and I.

The waitress gave us our brunch menus and we looked every option over, taking our time to decide what, exactly, we would order. But when it came time to tell the waitress what we wanted, she looked confused. “Oh, no no no,” she said, “You don’t choose one thing. You get all the things.”

WHAT?!

She warned us that it was a lot. And then she warned us again. But we decided to throw caution to the wind, and for that, we paid dearly — pun intended. For $180 pesos/person, I guess it makes sense that we were served so much, but seriously, eating the whole Hierbabuena brunch is not humanly possible, I don’t think.

Here’s what we got:

Here we have a fairly innocent first course, a fresh fruit and granola yogurt parfait. I stupidly ate the whole thing because I forgot that I was in a marathon, not a sprint. (I also admit to eating a piece of bread at the table before we even ordered. Delicious, but DO NOT DO THIS no matter how hungry you are.)

The second course, a homemade French toast with coconut milk and fresh fruit.

Next up, potatoes with garlic-herb butter and a balsamic reduction.

And then an egg on toast, over sautéed onions and mushrooms.  At this point we had eaten 3.5 full-sized meals in a row, so we got the last two dishes to go:

Nutella waffles with bananas and a Caesar wrap, respectively.

When we ordered the last two things to go, our waitress basically said, “I don’t want to say I told you so, but…” Then she asked if we wanted our mimosas, and even though I thought I was going to pass out, we all said yes, because mimosas are mimosas. And mine had blueberries in it.

To recap: Hierbabuena’s brunch is delicious, just like everything else at Hierbabuena. But do not go unless you are starving and you have the entire day to sit there and eat a marathon. I’m serious. And eat slowly. I was probably good after just the yogurt.

Additional notes: Hierbabuena’s brunch is only available on Saturdays, Sundays, and feriados. Also, the price is set at $360/ 2 people, but they’ll let you order half a brunch if you have 3 people. Basically you can’t go alone, which is probably a good thing. Also, they will not under any circumstances allow you to share. CRUEL.

Nestled in the middle of its block in Palermo Hollywood, Home Hotel is a small oasis amidst the hustle and bustle of Buenos Aires. When its owners Patricia O’Shea and Tom Rixton began drawing up plans, they wanted to create an intimate space, a place where guests would feel at home even away from home.

That they did, and with great success! Since its opening in late 2005, it has received the Reader’s Choice Award from Conde Nast Traveler Magazine and was named the Best Boutique Hotel in Argentina.

The Look

Natural light streams through just about every open space and carefully placed glass windows and doors. Coupled with a lush garden and ivy-covered terraces, you forget you’re in a city altogether. Inside the hotel, white-walled and wooden-floored simplicity blends itself perfectly with occasional splashes of ornate, vintage floral wallpaper brought in from France.

The Room

Home Hotel offers a selection of room, suites, and lofts at various prices.

I stayed in The Pool-Side Suite, a large, open room with floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall glass doors that opened out to a personal ivy-covered terrace complete with wood-burning stove, two lounge chairs, and a wooden patio set. Behind the king-sized bed was the Home Hotel’s signature French wallpaper, hand-painted in 1926.

The windows were so well-placed that I hardly had to turn on the lights during my entire stay, but when I did, they were just as beautifully done. Small garden lights illuminated the ivy on the terrace, and the large hanging lamp gave the whole room a soft glow. My favorite time of day was in the morning, though, when the light saturated the entire room and streamed over the bathroom mirror from a hidden skylight.

As I took pictures, the hotel cat, Mulata, slipped in to keep me company. Home Hotel, indeed.

The Small Things

Though the hotel is well designed and decorated, the true pleasure of your stay will be that you do, in fact, truly feel at home. Between the matchbook-style personal amenity kits and the kind of herbal gels and shampoos I’d gladly pay for, I’ve never felt more comfortable staying in a bed that was not my own.

With your stay, you’ll also receive The Home Guide, a pocket-sized booklet of valuable information. It’s updated twice a year with the sort of thoughtful and offbeat recommendations you’d expect from your closest friends. It also includes an artfully rendered map of the area and an appendix for referencing different cuts of beef, something I wish I had learned long ago!

The Spa

The Home Hotel spa is an oasis within an oasis. It’s tucked at the foot of a white staircase in the middle of the hotel – which is somehow, of course, magically bathed in natural light – but it feels as far removed as the private suites.

Once inside the doors, the soft lighting and clean neutrals immediately put me at ease, and even the receptionist had a sweetly relaxing voice. There were clusters of rooms – some with massage tables, another with a rose petal bath and small white candles, and also a sauna.

I only had time for an hour-long Thai Shiatsu massage, but I wish I could have passed the whole day there in my terry-cloth robe and slippers, taking advantage of the special scrubs and facials, too! Luckily, it seems there are products for purchase at reception, so you can take some spa home with you.

The Resto-bar

In the back, next to the garden and pool, is the heart of the Home Hotel: the resto-bar. Everyone comes and goes through this space – on their way to their suites or to the pool, some taking their time to sit and read, others ordering a few tapas.

During my stay, I ordered two tapas – both of which were delicious – but the real treat lies in the signature cocktails. Two recommendations: the Satori GG, which is sake, ginger ale, crushed grapes with blond sugar and ginger, and the Red Chapel, which is malbec, balsamic reduction, red berries, and sugar. They were both so delicious, I could barely stop myself from ordering a third.

The complimentary breakfast was equally enjoyable. It included coffee, a medialuna, scrambled eggs, various fruit juices, and a basketful of bread with a tray of spreads: dulce de leche butter, an orange marmalade, and a bit of spreadable dark chocolate which I used, naturally, to make my own little pain au chocolat. Oh, and did I forget to mention there was also chocolate mousse?

No matter how long you’ve been living in Buenos Aires, I don’t think anyone ever gets entirely accustomed to the pace and stress of the city. I certainly haven’t, at least.

In the past, I’ve tried to get away from it all by going to the reserve or taking a short trip to Uruguay, but my stay at the Home Hotel was a reminder that staycations can actually be more rejuvenating – not to mention easier. I left feeling more refreshed than I have all year, and all it took was throwing a few things in my tote bag and taking a short trip across town!

Stay for a while, too, and you’ll see that the Home Hotel is exactly what its name implies and more. The perfect retreat – and/or your second home – is only a few blocks away.

Claire and I were standing near the doors in the B line.  In between the Carlos Gardel and Puerredon stations, a homeless child, who was juggling balls for spare change, came up and addressed me while pointing at my stomach.  It was my first month in Buenos Aires, and I couldn’t understand his Spanish.  I was confused as to why he was speaking to me, and a young man jumped up to give me his seat.

“Estas embarazada?” (Are you pregnant?)  The young man asked me.

“No.”  I responded in shock.  “No, no.”  I shook my head, not my finger.

He sat back down.  Claire comforted me.  “It’s a flowy dress, you don’t look pregnant.”

The second time someone asked me if I was pregnant on the subway, I was impressed.

It was 14:00 on the dark E line during winter.  The Independencia Station was crowded, and I didn’t get a seat.  A man stood up and asked me loudly if I was pregnant and tugged my elbow gently to sit down.

I shook my head and smiled: “I’m not pregnant, pero, gracias.”

He nodded and sat back down.  I couldn’t tell if he was relieved to be relieved from his chivalric duty.

‘Does this coat make me look fat?’  I wondered to myself.  

The third time someone asked me if I was pregnant on the subway, I was devastated.

My first year living abroad was a whirlwind of powerful emotions, and on this day I was feeling particularly low.  It was 20:30 on the D line, I was in transit to meet my amigas for dinner in Palermo.  

“Estas embarazada?”  A seated young man asked me quietly.

“Que?” (What?) I couldn’t hear him.

He jumped up and asked it louder this time.  ”Estas embarazada?”  Everyone looked at me.

“No.  No estoy embarassada!”  (No, I’m not pregnant!) I said, and my emotions got the best of me.  Hot, angry tears spilled out of my eyes.  I felt terrible about myself.  I was so sensitive about my appearance.  I had lost twenty pounds since I had arrived in Argentina, and apparently I still looked fat.  I couldn’t stop quietly crying.

A woman looked at me, sympathetically.

‘She probably thinks I’m crying because I WANT to be pregnant.’  I thought to myself.

That was not the case.  I just wanted people to stop implying that I looked fat.  The man who had offered me a seat looked very uncomfortable, and avoided eye contact when he got off at the next station.   

Once I was in a crowded bus when a man quietly offered his seat to a woman next to me.

She sat down and pulled out her phone.  The bus was crowded, I was tightly packed between several people.  I could easily read the messages this seated woman was sending on her blackberry.  I read them because I’m a verified voyeur with an insatiable curiosity.

‘A man just gave me a seat on the bus because I look pregnant.  I’m never going to eat again!’

It was all I could do to stop myself from putting my arm around her and telling her I understood.  How dare that bastard use chivalry to imply his thoughts on her weight.  The worst part was that he was sincere!  Of course I remained quiet, only because I didn’t want to admit that I had read her private text messages.  

The last time someone asked me if I was pregnant on the subway, I was wearing my green raincoat.

It was misty outside, and my skin was dewy and my hair was frizzy.  I stood holding the rail facing the seated passengers.  A middle age woman caught my eye.

“Estas embarazada?  Quieres sentar?”  (Are you pregnant?  Do you want to sit?) She mouthed to me, and made a hand motion to offer me her seat.  

“Do I look fat?”  I asked her, making my expression clear that I was teasing her.

“Nooo, nooooooo.”  She smiled at me.  ”Your skin is glowing, and I couldn’t tell what was under your coat.”

“Aaahh por supuesto. Sos un amor.”  (Oh, of course. You’re a sweetheart.) I winked at her.