Buenos Aires, Argentina - day 2

Buenos Aires has 16 million people and many neighborhoods, each with its own culture and character and multiple ethnic and religious groups. Millions of immigrants came here in the 19th Century. We visited the LA BOCA area (mouth of the river) of Buenos Aires and enjoyed all its color and jibe. This area called Caminito comes from the Tango "Caminito" (by Juan de Dios Filiberto). Tango originated in this area of Argentina. Immigrants, mostly from Italy (45%) and Spain (30%), came here and built homes. Many worked on the docks in ship building and these colorful homes come from the leftovers and parts they accumulated from this construction. By the mid-1890s, there were 2,249 tenements in this area for the 94,743 tenants that lived here. In the early 20th century (with the arrival of Europeans) the Argentine population increased 10-fold and made this even worse and the growth in this area of small temporary expensive housing. There are still over 45,000 people that live in this “shanty- town”. From there we went to the main square, the downtown, where government offices are located.

Most of the first day (2-25) in Buenos Aires we spent focused on Eva Peron (see Karen’s posting), the economy / poverty / inflation and the history of Argentina (and of course hearing about the World Cup). Today was focused on this area as well as a private Jewish-focused tour.Read more