A week of bird's eye views....

From our new balcony:

The view out our kitchen window with the river and Uruguay on the horizon....

Back towards city center...

The old hospital grounds across the street:

Uptown:

Down Las Heras calle:

We did finally leave our new view and visited friends Robin and Eric's apartment view above Recoleta Cemetery:

We also got out to see the Mapplethorpe exhibit at MALBA...

And had lunch at MALBA's fancy restaurant ....this was a small starter taste of shrimp au gratin....

That night, I  had a "submarino" (hot milk served with a rich bar of chocolate that one mixes in) at a fancy coffee bar near our new place....One big screen TV had sports on, and another had fashion ....so everyone was entertained.

Our new view!

In between packing to move to our new apartment "up town," we managed to squeeze in a trip to the city museum in Montserrat....these great cars were in the old toy section.....

Dave wanted to see the last world cup futbal game at a Holland bar he found, so we went a couple of hours early to get a good seat...but we were way too late!  this is the scene outside the pub, complete with TV crews and lots of people in strange orange costumes...

Friends Robin and Eric from Canada were down to visit BA again and inspired us to do a night on the town...We finally got to go to Torquato Tasso for a show....we had gone several times before to find shows  sold out....we got to see a great double billing, with Mariano Otero's jazz group to start it off.  He is a wild base player, also head of the Jazz music department in Rosario...

Sexteto Mayor followed..what amazing tango music!  and the two very old violin players were my favorites...

But the star by far of this week is the first night's view from our new apartment!   the apartment is pretty tiny, but the balcony makes up for it...we are on the top of the building, 15th floor....I have never lived above the second floor in my life!

To celebrate, we went out to dinner with friends Mike and Alicia despite 0 degrees Celsius (it even snowed the next day in parts of Buenos Aires Providence) !

This was a return trip for all of us to family run Dobar Tek (San Juan and Bolivar in San Telmo), and it was just as yummy and hearty as the first time.  Great rich Croatian food, with all kinds of home made streussels, sauerkraut and sausages.....The family closes this restaurant in the hot weather and opens up their Patagonia place so try it before summer.

A week of Architecture and Art

In our search for our next apartment, we have been spending some time in the Congreso barrio...what great architecture it has!

We have gawked at the building behind the red cupula for quite some time, and decided to investigate...

this is the back entrance!

And this is the main lobby.  Turns out it is the Palaco Barolo, now home of the facility of Architecture and Urban Design of the city....a fitting match I would say.

This is a church on Defensa right near our old apartment ....that's Christopher Columbus on the lower left.

Here are some building details from around town....

Now for Art....every year Buenos Aires hosts a huge exhibition of the top gallery's art with more sales happening in that week than the rest of the year combined  (ArteBA).  Last week I showed you the "best of show."   These charcoal drawings were my second pick.

But my favorite place to see art is still Central Cultural Recoletta....they always have a great mix of up and coming  plus established artists.   This first piece is three dimensional,  layers of photos and paint.

The other great thing about Central Cultural Recoletta is that the place is huge, with lots of rooms, so each artist gets a lot of space for display...

Food shot for this week:  Forget the fancy restaurants!  nothing beats a barbecue on the 4th of July!  Friend Kevin invited us out to his country place for asado on the grill to celebrate with other Yankees.  

a week of ART (and futbal too, of course)

I know I usually end posts with my favorite food shot of the week, but last night, I had the BEST and most amazingly artful meal of my life!  So I am starting off with small restaurant, Aramburu I found on line in the Oleo restaurant guide.   It turned out to be just 4 blocks away from our apartment in Montserrat.  The menu for the night was "samplers," 10 small courses, each one more surprising than the last.....

First course:  The small glasses had "hot and cold" soup...(the top was a warm squash soup, with cold mandarine splash in the bottom)... The bent spoons held two kinds of pate, duck and beef.  The rock on the left held different shaped chips of mandioca with pimento de murcia cream in the cone shaped ones.

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Second:  A "breakfast course of poached egg in an amazing sauce, with mini hash browns, ristreto and bits of ham "parma," accompanied by a mini toast and jelly sandwich...

course 3:   It was so amazing, I forgot to take a picture!  Rabbit cooked basque style for 8 hours at a very low temperature, with pine essence and other amazing stuff that I can't remember 'cause I don't have the pic to jolt my brain....

course 4:  "Salad of the sea,"  bits of salmon and other seafood in grapefruit rosado, toped with sea foam...

course 5:  this plate was making all sorts of sounds when it was delivered...turns out there was a blazing hot rock on the plate that sizzled the langostinos in Sauvignon sauce to prefection.

course 6:  Black Merluza fish from Patagonia waters ....

Course 7:  the pork course with a fruit sauce

  Course 8:  The asado course...one of the best bites of tenderloin I have ever had , accompanied by sweatbreads, a strong garlic roll, grilled vegatables..

Course 9:  the first desert....

Course 10:  the second desert....(the crumbled bits were super cold (done with dry ice?) pistachio

And a bonus course of spun sugar with frost of cardamom, homemade marshmallow on a stick, and a chocolate drop to finish ....

Here is the staff of Aramburu (since they were so creative with my meal, I decided to take creative liberties with their photo)....I hope you can visit soon....email me and I will go too!

Where the passion has been this week is Futbal!!!  Dave watched the German England game with limey friend Daniel at the Sugar Bar (that's the Germans in front...they wooped England)

And we watched Argentina tromp Mexico at  Nuevo Gogy (that's our favorite waiter on the right getting ready to jump across the room)

In finale, is my pick of the best showing at ARTEBA2010, the yearly presentation by the best art galleries in Buenos Aires.  Reportedly, they sell more art here than in the rest of the year combined.  Nicola Constintino's project lasted more than 9 months, from finding out she was pregnant, to delivery of the baby.  After she found she was pregnant, she made an exact replica of herself with moving parts.... made a movie and still shots....truly amazing...google her up to see more (and excuse my poor photo with light reflections off the glass)

can you tell which is the artificial nicola?