I find when traveling that my perception of places changes on return visits. The first time we went to Puerto Rico we did not like the place at all. We braved a second visit and something changed, us no doubt not the island and we enjoyed our second visit a great deal. A third visit, a stop over en route to the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico felt pleasantly familiar.
I wondered if, on our second visit Argentina’s vast capital city might let us down but I find I still like it more than any other large city we’ve visited in South America.
Officially three million people live in this city founded in 1536 but 17 million live in the whole metropolitan area of the capital and its residents known as “porteños” act like big city residents anywhere, all hustle, no eye contact, social impatience. Yet the city is beautiful, clean, and in the wealthier center safe to walk day or night we find, with a massive police presence promised by the government to cleanup a city plagued by a history of street crime.
It’s a vibrant city, packed with cars and lacking parking so we left GANNET2 at the campground half an hour away where US$5 a day to park our home safely seems like a bargain. Cabs run on meters and Uber is everywhere, so we are not going to figure out the copious and complex bus system.
The town has a multitude of statues, unmarked many of them and some even with street names attributed to them. How did I know the statue was a person call Alvear?
There are parks everywhere too including the United Nations park with the extraordinary Floralis Generica sculpture that Rusty and I admired.
It put me in mind of the Chicago Bean but this thing opens and closes with daylight and is illuminated at night.
I looked it up the old fashioned way and got a delightfully clunky translation from the Spanish.
It is said there are more dogs per capita in Argentina than in any country in the world and I can believe it, yet the sidewalks are clean you may be surprised to know. I am not alone in walking Rusty with a plastic bag…
These curious benches look like they are stuffed cloth seats but they are moulded cement which sounds uncomfortable but you would be surprised.
The city is full of life, stores everywhere not yet replaced by delivery though online Mercado Libre is available. The city thrives with small business commerce and people doing things. The first thing we did was go to the vet to get Rusty his exit papers for Uruguay where we have to go next to replace a battery under warranty. Uruguay requires a blood test for leishmaniasis some obscure disease that only Uruguay worries about. The result will take ten days to arrive the vet told us in her fluent English.
Rusty took the needle as unfussed as ever, and we were not surprised by the $120 charge to get his papers together though a two week wait did seem excessive. In Brazil the vet did an instant test but shortly after we got that the Uruguayans changed the rules requiring the more laborious test. Oh well.
Old age has slowed Rusty down and his walks these days last fifteen or twenty minutes, a block or two from the Airbnb building’s front door. When he’s ready he walks right back to it because he still knows exactly what he wants. The walk is his time as long or as short as he wants.
We park him in the apartment and leave him snoring on his favorite rug which gives us time to go out and explore the city. In this case Layne was missing her Jewish roots so we tried an Argentine bagel. It was a bit too bready but the sandwiches were good enough.
If you don’t believe me how disorienting it is to be without your phone and it’s applications, try it next time you are in an unfamiliar city.
Google Translate - gone. Uber - gone. Maps? Forget that. Your books? Nope. And so forth. I did have my camera (a Panasonic GX9 with a 24-64mm lens) which if I fidget with the controls can give me the time. But it is useless for mapping.
After we got our phones back we decided some museum time might be in order and we took an Uber to the Museo de Bellas Artes not sure what to expect. It’s free with a $4 “donation” payment if you don’t have the balls to press no on the credit card machine. We’re tourists so acting like impoverished students or elderly locals seemed churlish.
It was a surprisingly busy place but it’s open till seven thirty at night which seems civilized to allow workers a chance to check out the place. Balzac by Rodin:
What surprised us was how European most of the collection seemed to be. More Rodin:
Gloomy and fearsome Goya donated by two men in 1958. Good friends probably. 
Penitents above had war below. Life was much harsher back then I guess.
The impression I got was that a hundred and fight years ago when Argentina was a leading economic powerhouse a lot of wealthy locals must have made grand tours through Europe and come back with some treasures, as you did in those days. Then they donated them to the public. It’s an astonishing collection but we rather failed to find the local art. 
12th century sculpture of you can believe it:
And we got some Argentine contributions before we had to go home. A slave sculpted in 1882 in I think Brazil where slavery persisted longer than other places: 
Poverty in Argentina:
This one had a QR code, “Without bread or work.” 
The walk home seemed as crowded as the museum. 
You may have heard the Muslim mayor of New York made a stir by putting out trash cans. That cold hat in Latin America. “We pick up between 7pm and 9pm. Neither before nor after.”
Then we stopped for some expensive fruit. Argentina is no longer the cheap country but once was. A small bag of quality fruit cost $30.
And this stuff is never heard of was translated by Google to “summer squash:”
And himself was ready for his third walk of the day. 
Thursday in Buenos Aires.
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