Argentina

My main feeling about Argentina is, and I believe will always be, meat. This word takes on extra meaning as soon as you enter the country. Being a vegetarian here couldn’t possibly be any fun as you’d miss out on half the conversations. Vital daily topics including beef, lamb and pork, chats about ribs, backs and thighs, about different types of sausage, about using wood or coal on the barbecue, about that last steak you ate. It may seem quite boring to spend so much time talking about these things but when you can still taste that succulent lomo medallion in your mouth, how you hardly had to move your arm to cut through it, and then how tender it tasted as it slipped into your mouth, and how even just thinking of the memory brings back the initial thrill. Then you will understand that to be obsessed by meat is a divinity we could all do with having.

This is also a country with a great football heritage and I believe some of the most-educated football fans you will meet. Whereas Brazilian football fans seem to have the beautiful game flowing through their veins, they quite often know little of their team except maybe the top scorer and playmaker. In Argentina, it is quite common to meet fans who know every single player, every new transfer, every Argentinean playing overseas. It is as if the chip that has been sitting on Maradona’s shoulder his whole life has transferred itself to the collective consciousness, urging them to study up on the game and prove they are true fans.

Articles

• A Week in the Life of Russell (that’s me!) – this is a short account of my time in Argentina learning how to make honey
• How to use Couchsurfing.org in South America
• WWOOFing Organic Farm Work in Argentina
• 3 Places In Argentina You’ve Never Heard Of

Links

Blog Entries

• A selection of recommended and not-so-recommended books about South America
• Argentina and Uruguay to host 2030 World Cup?
• Sounds and Colours – a magazine about South American music and culture
• When Couchsurfing does not seem like the best idea in the world
• Post-Christmas Blur in Buenos Aires
• Las Baludas de Catamarca
• Catamarca – the land of dust
• Argentina: North to South, from frostbite to sunburn
• Chalk this one up (Couchsurfing gone wrong)
• Another sleepless night (getting used to the siesta)
• Well thanks, but I'm okay actually (the joys of hitch-hiking)
• It's a hard road, but someone's gotta walk it! (Punta Lomo and Punta Tombo)
• Refuelling
• Take me to the river
• How not to write a subject heading article wotsit?
• To Bee or Not To Bee
• A New Line in Theme Parks
• Argentinean Delights
• What a load of old cobblers!
• Velez are Campeones
• The last day of football approaches
• Don Eloy
• La Pulperia / Gauchito Gil
• Dulce de Leche
• Granja Las Ondinas
• Biodynamics in practice!
• The Day of the Cow
• Cheese Cheese Cheese Cheese Cheese!
• Down at the Farm