today I'm really excited to explore la boca one of the most famous neighbourhoods in Buenos Aires
you'll recognise this place from pictures because it's incredibly photogenic with
the colourful buildings but it's so much more than just an Instagram backdrop outside of the
small tourist cluster la boca is a real living breathing working-class neighbourhood in fact
the vast majority of la boca consists of areas that tourists will never go to so in this video
I'll try and do my best to introduce you to this neighbourhood as it really is not just
what you see on these few screens [Music] we've just sat down for breakfast we are at this very
touristy but very nice cafe in the corner and this right here this is Giselle she is an amazing
photographer which is why we met up she took some really lovely pictures of me where can people
find you when they're that portrays in tic-tock Instagram you can just Google my website um yep
um everyone so yeah I think you're gonna find me easily nice we got a very classic breakfast
of cappuccino and media Lunas media Lunas are like Argentina's response to croissants I would
say maybe maybe just maybe they're better because they're sweeter but I realize this is going to be
controversial like many dog areas around the world this is historically and also presently A working
class neighborhood and this right here is its most famous street for the tourists this is Caminito or
the little road and until the 1950s the cabinet was largely abandoned and that is when a group
of locals decided to renovate the area and one of these neighbors was a local artist called Benito
Martin who decided to use the tenements as his canvas and turn them into the colorful Marvel that
you see nowadays and this man Benito Martin was the owner of Caminito but then he decided to sell
it toward the end of his life under one condition and that is that only artist from la boca would be
allowed to sell their art in the area and that to this day is true or does have to present a license
if they want to sell their art but this isn't just color for color's sake or because it's pretty
although that was definitely part of the rationale there is a historic precedent a lot of the initial
immigrants to this area in the late 19th century came from Genoa and they came on the ships they
settled in these docks when they started building their houses or conventils as they're known here
law convents they decided to use materials that they had at hand and so from the ships and the
boats that they found in the dog they scavenged a lot of materials like wood and Chic metal and
they use those to construct their dwellings and so the commentators were just low cost housing born
of convenience but when it came to painting their houses they also just used what was on hand and
this again was the materials used on the ships and so they had little leftover bits of red paint and
blue paint and these really beautiful colors that you'd normally use on the wooden hole of one of
those boats and as a result what we get is this a patchwork of colors because as they would run out
they would just move on to the next bucket you might notice a lot of the houses are built on
raised foundations and that's because the area being so close to the water was really prone
to flooding in the past I'm going to show you the lessoric floor side of la boca in the second half
of this video and take you to a local milonga that's a place where people go to dance tango
here in Buenos Aires but while we're wandering around I'd like to tell you more about the history
of Tango which is really important to this area the Argentine Tango originated in the streets of
the city as well as neighboring Uruguay in the 1880s and it developed in places like this the
port areas which are home to European immigrants former slaves and other working-class residents
and the dance really started in local bars and brothels it's very Central and provocative and
as it began to spread further many people found it really inappropriate Tango was deeply influenced
by a dance called kandumbe which belongs to the descendants of freed African slaves the
local black communities and this was another thing people outside of those areas weren't
used to and the dance really struggled during the 20th century under Argentine dictators and it was
performed secretly in underground clubs but since the 1980s it's been gaining popularity again and
in 2009 Aid was added to the UNESCO intangible cultural heritage list and oh I just think it's
brilliant they could definitely argue that a lot of the area nowadays is very tacky but the
original reconstruction of the Caminito has definitely served its purpose I mean look at
the crowds here it's actually insane this is the busiest street that I have seen in Buenos Aires
hands down and for me today that's been incredibly noticeable because I got here at 9am when it was
completely empty and I've watched it gradually fill up with stalls and with Travelers and people
taking pictures and people trying to hassle you in the street to take a picture with them so you had
tacos touristy but it's definitely worth visiting for the history which I think is absolutely
fascinating and I mean it's not really up to me to decide what's tacky and what's not and there
is a lot of artists still working in the area you can see them in the streets they're selling
their beautiful paintings and their drawings and another art form that you're definitely going to
notice in this area is the Tango there are tango dancers everywhere they've got shows that they
put on again these are pretty touristy but there are some milongas that I've heard are very very
nice in this area another famous side that you'll find in this area is which is a stadium where Boca
Juniors play very very famous Argentine table now we're approaching the end of the touristy side of
la boca you see that there aren't as many fridge magnets around me and so I'm gonna stop vlogging
like this because it's very ostentatious I don't want to draw attention to myself as I walk toward
lava Monera and then further towards San Elmo which is where I'm staying so I'm gonna check out
the situation I might not even film from what I've read online the area over the years has become a
lot less rough a lot less dangerous but it's still not an area that I'm gonna advise you to visit
so I just want to have my wits about me and I'm gonna suss out the situation and see how it feels
but I've never heard sweet call shows especially if you're a solo female Traveler I always like
to read books by local authors when I'm traveling and I'm currently about halfway through the Tango
singer by Thomas Eloy Martinez and I'd like to read you a short passage in which the main
character describes Buenos Aires as he's seeing it for the first time because I think it really
encapsulates the city's character on both sides of the highway leading into the city the landscape
changed from one moment to the next a still soft Mist hovered over the fields but the sky was
clear and sweet sense wafted through the air I saw tall ugly buildings with lines of colored washing
hanging out the windows like a little late I saw a ravine filled with miserable Shacks which might
collapse at the first gust of wind then came the imitation European suburbs deserted Parks tower
blocks like aviaries churches with bell towers crowned with statues of the Virgin Mary houses
with huge satellite dishes on their roof Terraces Buenos Aires didn't look like Kuala Lumpur in fact
it looked like almost every place I had ever seen meaning it didn't look like anywhere else [Music]
okay so this is unrelated to the video but I am so [ __ ] happy right now my um my grandfather's
been in hospital and my mom just called me and um the operation that he was in for went well and
um and also can I just say it's all like pouring out of me because I feel like this giant boulder
has been lifted off of my back but hey life is short go travel take that trip whatever all
those cliches and number two travel is amazing but also travel sometimes sucks because you're
gonna be far away from the people that you love that matter to you and sometimes these
horrible situations arise and you're not there and yeah that just feels really horrible and like
I just feel so guilty about that and I don't know if there is a way of balancing the two I frankly
don't think there is like whatever choice you make in life something about it is going to be good but
it's going to have so many downsides and it's up to you to pick the path that you think is best but
whatever you do you're gonna be doing something right and you're gonna be doing something wrong
that's just life but yeah this doesn't really go with the tone of the rest of the video but today
is a good day and um and enjoy the day because you never know okay cool um yeah anyway we are
officially out of la boca we are back in San Telmo Ramstein we are in parque what's the name
one two three four five six seven eight yeah I feel prepared
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