I am writing this with the knowledge that it will publish on the day I should be arriving home from our grand tour of what is often called the Southern Cone of South America. If all goes as planned, you will see this in your inbox as I am dragging my sorry ass off the plane in San Diego, having just gotten back from Buenos Aires. While I have been in BA many, many times, that was mostly more than thirty years ago at this point, so it seemed appropriate for me to quote Andrew Lloyd Webber (actually, his collaborating lyricist, Tim Rice) and invoke Patti LuPone (or Madonna) from Evita by asking the rhetorical question, what’s new, Buenos Aires?
I will start by declaring that I LOVE the show, movie and soundtrack of Evita. I literally know much of it by heart as I have listened to it numerous times while riding my motorcycle around the world. I will even admit to having been a bit starstruck once when visiting BA in the mid-90s while Madonna was filming Evita and, since I stayed at the same hotel, my room balcony looked down on her terrace where she would do her yoga every morning preparing for her next scene as Eva Duarte. I guess that makes me a bit of an Evita voyeur. I believe what attracts me to this particular musical (besides its obvious world class quality) is the theme of a populist uprising that takes a country by storm and finally fails as the world realizes the self interest that underlies most populist regimes and certainly did for Juan and Eva Peron…all narrated by Che.
During the late 80s, I was in BA regularly trying to find ways to swap our considerable Argentine sovereign debt for anything possible before the junta government saw fit to abrogate it altogether. My biggest deal came in the form of a JV with Banco Rio de La Plata of BA. We tried and tried to do deals together and kept failing for the strangest reasons. One time we just missed a deal because our representative failed to get some critical documents to the Finance Ministry on a rainy day. When I asked the Eton-educated aristocratic gentleman what happened. He said he was “unable to go for meteorological reasons”. Well, today it is also raining here in BA, but I will be venturing forth despite the meteorological conditions.
The visit I made to BA in early 1990 had me spending three weeks at the then elegant Plaza Hotel. In 1990, the Plaza Hotel in Buenos Aires was located on Florida Street at the corner with Plaza San Martín in the Retiro neighborhood, in the downtown area of Buenos Aires. The hotel was (and still is) facing the beautiful San Martín Square, which is one of the city’s most elegant and historic public spaces. The Plaza Hotel was opened in 1909 and was considered one of the most luxurious hotels in BA. Its prime location near the financial district and high-end shopping areas made it popular with international visitors and business travelers. it wasn’t where I regularly stayed on business trips, but that trip was on Robert Maxwell, who took a full floor for the three weeks for his entourage (of which I was his senior banker, due a strange series of circumstances that are not worth repeating here). What I will say about those three weeks is that we went everywhere and saw everything in BA and its environs….all on a first class basis. I wish I could say I remember it well, but it was a bit of a whirlwind.
From those days on I have always had one view of Buenos Aires. To me it is the flashy town that Evita took by storm and that was always all flash and only so much substance. I always compared and contrasted Buenos Aires with Santiago. While I saw Santiago as a serious city, I saw BA as a playground for the rich and famous that was always likened to Paris for its charming architecture.
Tim Rice said:
Fill me up with your heat.
With your noise, with your dirt, overdo me.
Let me dance to your beat.
Make it loud, let it hurt running through me.
Don’t hold back, you are certain to impress.
Tell the driver this is where I’m staying.
I can already tell from the skyline I can see from the port that Buenos Aires has changed rather dramatically in the last 30 years. I see an entire section of 60+ story buildings that simply weren’t there 30 years ago from what I can tell of our tour today, most of it will be in the traditional “fancy“ part of town that I was used to near the Plaza San Martin and Recoleta. We’ll see whether the tour shows us anything of Buenos Aires that I haven’t seen before many times. I must admit it’s always fun to go back to someplace you haven’t seen in a while to see what’s new.
Beautiful town—I love you.
Stand back, Buenos Aires
Because you oughta know what you’re gonna get in me.
Just a little touch of star quality!
I recognize that this may be my last time in Buenos Aires not for any reason other than I can’t imagine why we might find our way coming back this way with all the other places in the world to visit. I have fun memories of Buenos Aires, but they are mixed memories. Lots of stories float back to the surface and I’m sure Mor will be recollected as we go around town today and tomorrow. We will be going to see a tango show at a nice dinner venue tonight. Nothing can be more Buenos Aires than that. Then tomorrow, when we check out of the ship at 9am, we will have a black van and driver with Ann & Chris to run around for the day to the places that Kim and Ann have selected to visit on our own before heading to the airport. I know that one spot they have picked to visit is the burial crypt where Evita is buried. Imagine, with all the rich history of this country, the “country of the future” for the last 100 years, it’s a populist actress who dithered for 6 years in the Casa Rosada that draws the tourist crowds 70 years later. What does that say about us?
What’s new Buenos Aires? Nothing.