It's pretty easy to meet new people here when you go out at night, either because people are that friendly or because everyone wants to talk to an exotic-looking foreigner (there's no blending in for me in Argentina...). So, for either reason, I have got to meet several Porteños when me and my friend Michael go out at night, including Carolina, who used to work for an airline and speaks English pretty well.
Wednesday night, Michael and I were invited to celebrate her feliz cumpleaños at her house in Palermo where we met her friends from work, school and her childhood. Most of her friends are not originally from the city, most are from small towns in provinces around it. In particular, one of her friends was named Paulo, and was from the northernmost province, Jujuy. He was a musician and sang a haunting song in Spanish about a mythical creature that roams the mountains of the northwest called "La Cocaina."
"La Cocaina" is a short, gnome-like creature with the face of an old man and a distinctive hat. It has one arm covered in llama wool and its other arm is made of steel. Wherever it goes, it carries a bulge of coca leaves (which are common in the Andes) it its mouth, thus giving it its name. The legend has it that when hunters lose their way in the mountains for several days, and lose all hope of finding their way out, that they often lie down and give up. Eventually one of the Cocainas finds them, and encircles them with a red string, in order to put their souls at rest or help it find its way onward. The end of the story matched the end of my comprehension of it, so if anyone knows more about the story, please share it, for me, what I did get of the story was a small triumph of translation.
Changing gears a little bit, I finally got to experience one of the best-known nightclubs in Greater Buenos Aires, Sunset. Unfortunately, the government here has still not recovered from the horrific nightclub fire tragedy of the new year, and clubs inside the city are still closed. However, at 3 a.m. Saturday night/Sunday morning, myself and a group of people, including my friend Roland from Iguaçu, spontaneously decided to jump in a cab and head for the suburbs and Sunset.
You would think that leaving for a danceclub at 3 in the morning may not be worth it, or that it could even be closed, but things in Argentina are very different. When our cab reached a point within a quarter-mile of the club, it was bumper-to-bumper traffic. At that point, we decided to walk from there and entered the sprawling club with several more people coming behind us.
Sunset has two huge dance floors, at least 4 bars, terraces, and an expansive open-air patio. When we arrived, there were at least 1000 people dancing, some to a mix of Argentinean and various Latin music in the indoor dance floor, and others to Electronica and House underneath the covered canopy outside. Neither were my first choices of music for dancing to, but the lively atmosphere and the fact I hadn't been to a dance club for too long a time easily made up for it. This crowd, like every one I've experienced in South America, was raucous and fun-loving. Forget machismo, anyone and everyone is liable to get hit on or picked up at least a few times during a night there. Aside from those expected outlets, Sunset is particularly well known for its troupe of female dancers, who were all beautiful and quite fit. Between the dancers, the dancing, and all of the happenings in between, we hardly noticed when the sun came up, and neither did anyone at the club. It was a singularly unique experience for me to be with hundreds of people on a dance floor in the clear bright of day.
Even as we left the club at 7 a.m., it was still way more than half-filled, and didn't look likely to slow down anytime soon. As we passed many clubgoers who had stopped off to grab a bite of breakfast, I had to decline. By this time, all I wanted and needed was the comfort of my bed.
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