How to Fix an iPhone in Buenos Aires

  I stood there in the middle of leafy Palermo soaked to the core. I watched as my new acquaintance of 5 minutes rode off into the distance on his motorbike - with my mobile phone. I was left behind with an already sopping piece of paper faintly showing an address. I'm pretty sure this was the opposite of the situation I was meant to be in when in a South American capital city.

  Wet, phone-less, clueless.

 Let's go back to the start. After my photo-loss drama at La Bombonera I decided enough was enough and I needed the battery changing. I visited the 'Unofficial Official' (I know right) Apple Store and they told me my battery was broken. I could of told you that mate. He then told me to Google a local shop to fix it. I hate to think the horrors of difficulty that this guy went through to get this job as 'Unofficial Official' Apple helper. 

La Bombonera - The Beating Heart of La Boca

  As I read footballing magazine FourFourTwo a few months before I departed for Argentina, my excitement to travel to one of the Mecca's of the Beautiful Game grew only stronger. In a list of the World's best stadiums, I read through the impressive list enriched with sporting history, poetry and glamour. Camp Nou. El Estadio Azteca. Wembley Stadium. Yet these iconic arenas only acted as the supports acts for the main event, voted #1 football stadium in the World - La Bombonera, home of Club Atlético Boca Juniors. The rock star of South American football.

Photos taken by host Mum but
I can assure you I was there...

   From this moment it became an immediate goal of mine to visit this famous stage. I wanted to see Iguazu, Patagonia and the variety of natural wonders that Argentina possesses, but they all came second to La Bombonera. It may seem odd that a football stadium would surpass these other natural miracles but it was a personal thing. I've always had a passion for visiting stadiums and on my prior travels it's always been on the itinerary. The Bird's Nest in Beijing, Stadium Australia in Sydney and Yankee Stadium in New York have all been prior trips that have left a positive impression. Where they regarded as the best football stadium in the world though? No.

  That was La Bombonera.

Onto Pastures New (An Ode to Gualeguay)

  As I waited at Gualeguay bus terminal the view was sub-optimal to say the least. The area was scattered with a variety of the 101 Dalmations extras that roam the streets of Argentina. One was lying-down looking as though it may never get up again. One scratched the persistent fleas from it’s mangy hair. Another did a piss against a bin. It was hardly the glamorous send-off that one might have expected. I mean I did appear on local TV a matter of weeks ago for a grand total of 3 minutes, where were the paparazzi and adoring fans? Judging by the looks of other passengers towards me, I was less David Beckham and more Katie Hopkins.

Gualeguay in all it's glory

  Despite the modest farewell, it didn’t distain my mind-set and my admiration for this little town. I had loved every second of my month in Gualeguay and I was touched by a tint of sadness that my time here had come to an end. I remember being shown the location of my first placement and being (wrongly) disappointed. A remote town three hours north of Buenos Aires that required a fair amount of zooming on Google Maps before the name popped up. My journey from Buenos Aires consisted of 3 hours of grey wetlands, it looked like I was entering an apocalyptic zone, but how wrong I was.

Would You Like Some Dulce de Leche With That?

It’s the traditional British post-holiday question that often leads the conversations with family, friends and colleagues alike after a week away in the sun.

“Oh how was the food? You never quite know what the food will be like in these places...”

  We’ve all heard it. Anyhow, I suppose when the week away in Benidorm is replaced with a trip to the other side of the world it is quite an intriguing question. When that place is Argentina, world-renowned for its steaks and quality of beef, it’s a topic high on anyone and everyone’s list of inquisitions.

  I’m not traditionally a foody. I eat and I enjoy what I eat but the food is generally not a make or break element of any trip I take. As I’ve mentioned a few times since I’ve been here, in Socratic pensiveness, ‘comida es comida’. You eat it, it fills the spot, it might give you a nice taste along the way. Anyway this all accumulates to the fact that from this article you should expect more Gregg Wallace and less John Torode*.

Flags, Pizza and The Mafia - A Trip to Rosario

  As a football fan, the mentioning of Argentina produces an instinctual reaction of one name to come to mind - Messi. The Greatest of All Time represents something of a religious figure for fans of the beautiful game, and subsequently a pilgrimage to his home-city of Rosario was an essential on my Argentinean itinerary. In addition to Messi, Rosario also boasts the title of the birthplace of the hipster's favourite revolutionist Che Guevara - that makes up quite the fantasy tea party if you ask me. To top it all off, Rosario is known as the most dangerous city in Argentina, rife with the trafficking of both narcotics and human beings...

  If that doesn't scream tourism honeypot I don't know what does.

#StopCumbia2016

  The langauge. Leaving my family, friends and girlfriend behind. Getting myself involved in drug cartel business. These were all things that bounced around my head pre-trip. You know those nights where you lay awake and speculate exactly what lies in wait for you for the next six months. They’re the ones. Anyway, one thing that definitely did not enter this zone of precaution was music.

  Why would anyone worry about music? The music is usually not a defining feature of a place, let alone a country, and is rarely something to use as Trip Advisor-esque judgment factor. As well of this I class myself as a fairly flexible music fan. My taste ranges from Drake to Red Hot Chili Peppers and even stretches to a bit of 1D – I’m an ‘accept all sounds’ kinda guy. I could cope with everything. That was until this lovely type of music that the South Americans call ‘Cumbia’ came along and hit me as nicely as a slap in the face.

  I was crammed in the back of a car with 7 other people at 2:30am on a Tuesday night when the true horror hit. We had been driving around Gualeguay – a small town – with no particular destination for about 45 minutes and I wasn’t understanding the conjoined plethora of gossip being shared frantically amongst my fellow passengers. The only thing I had to listen to was what was blaring out of the stereo. Cumbia.

The Wonder of Mate

I thought I would very quickly explain why the title of this blog is what it is. At first glance it appears completely irrelevant and one would probably question why I have avoided every possible Argentinean stereotype (Let's Get Messi and The Hand of Blog were close contenders). However I decided to go with something that has epitomised Argentinean culture from the moment I landed to the moment I write this post....

The Elements

The Mate.

Just to get it out the way, 'The Mate' is not the bloke you go down the pub with or that person you vaguely know that you bump into in a club. In Argentina, 'The Mate' is life. Mate is a hot drink that is consumed at all times of the day, no matter the activity or social occasion.

In class? Mate.

With your friends? Mate.

Driving? Mate.

It's nuts how crazy everyone here is about this drink. But what is it?

The Buzzcut Epiphany

  As I heard the incessant buzzing of the Argentine barber's clippers attacking the back of my head, I waited in nervous anticipation for the revelation of exactly how short he was cutting my hair. I had asked for short, and my usual is a close cut 0.5 on the back and sides so how much of a disaster could it have been? Yet in the moment, rationalism goes at the window replaced with the images of being a social outcast with my terrible new haircut. Eduardo - the gentleman whose hands my life was in - started clipping the back of my head with the combine harvester-esq tool and left me hanging before coming to the sides and into my vision. It was in that exact moment, as I waited second-by-second the buzzing to reach the side of my head, that I decided to write this blog.

  

  Now I never planned on doing a blog. I had a whole year away ahead of me and in my mind there would just be too much to write about (a brief glimpse into the minimalistic work-ethic of a university student there). It would just fade into a memory of something that promised so much but gave so little - much like the careers of Joe McElderry and Freddy Adu. Yet the best blogs are not the ones that are forced but the ones that are fuelled by an accumulation of events that just can't go without sharing*.