The Gardens

One City, One Month

Destination: Buenos Aires

Travel Dates: January 5^th – February 5^th

Date: January 8, 2009

Travel Journal: The Gardens of Palermo and Another Unfortunate Event

In which our heroine and her valiant beau spend time in dark and verdant spaces.

Buenos Aires in January is hot! The sun is bright and glaring and average temperatures are in the nineties. Excepting a few bent and dusty magnolia trees, San Telmo is not a well-shaded neighborhood. So, my valiant beau and I decided to brave the subway system and travel to someplace a little more shaded and lush.

We picked up the C line (blue) at Independencia and transferred to the D line (green) at Diagonal Norte. We got off at Plaza Italiana, directly across from the Botanical Garden in Palermo. Designed by French landscape artist, Charles Thayes in 1898, the Jardin Botanico features a variety of neatly labeled plants and trees from across Argentina. There are several greenhouses, including a delicate Art Neauvu structure with rippled glass windows and curling iron work. Marble and bronze sculptures preside over lily ponds and peek out from groves of trees.

The Botanical Garden is free. Palermo residents sit on park benches, reading books and newspapers and sipping cups of mate. Locals also use the Botanical Gardens as a place to sunbathe. In more sunny parts of the garden women read books in their bikinis or take naps on beach towels spread across the lawns. The Botanical Garden is also home to an impressive amount of feral cats. They tip-toe through the violets and doze at the feet of bronze generals.

Adjacent to the Botanical Garden is the Jardin Zoologico, which is free for children, and therefore positively cluttered with them. From behind the vine-covered walls that obscure the zoo, you can hear the sounds of hundreds of kids, all of them shrieking, laughing, and talking at once. My valiant beau and I decided to pass on the zoo.

We continued walking past the zoo up Avenida Sarmiento and turned left on Avenida del Libertador until we reached the Jardin Japones. This more recently built garden was gifted to the city by its sizeable Japanese community in 1967. Unlike the Jardin Botanico which has something of an overgrown, city park atmosphere, the Jardin Japones is exquisitely maintained. Large ponds filled with greedy koi are criss-crossed with lacquered, red bridges. Slender streams of water bubble over artistically positioned clusters of volcanic rock. At one end of the park is an exhibition of Bonsai trees. Adjacent to the Bonsais is a tea house/restaurant which serves sushi at lunchtime.

Around 4:00 in the afternoon, the teahouse stops serving sushi and offers beverages and a variety of pastries and Japanese deserts. Prices at the café were somewhat expensive, so my valiant beau and I passed on desert and sipped lemonade and melon water. The Jardin Japones also has an ice cream and fast food stand and a garden gift shop with displays a variety of overpriced Asian trinkets which could be more cheaply found in the Chinatown of a large, American city. The Jardin Japonse charges a small entrance fee of 6 pesos a person.

City Girl Recommendation: Both gardens are worth a visit and provide a welcome and restful break from the summer heat.

Travel Tip: Public Transit

When traveling, I am a firm believer in public transit. Not only is it a cheap and convenient way to get around, it is also a great way to see a city. For example, for a mere $0.90 pesos, our eventful 92 bus winds through La Boca, passes through San Telmo, and gives you an excellent view of Plaza del Mayo and all the government buildings.

Buenos Aires has an excellent subway system. Argentenians refer to their subway as the Subte. And for a mere $1.10 pesos, you can travel all over the city. The subway system uses paper tickets instead of tokens. (Interestingly enough, most Subte tickets are also discount coupons for McDonalds). In order to pass through the turn-style you need to collect your ticket from the automated slot. It doesn’t activate until the ticket is retrieved.

Subway stops are numerous and frequent and many Buenos Aires residents do not own cars. There is no charge for subway transfers and transfer points are well labeled. It’s important to note however that although titles and signs are colored-coordinated to the appropriate subway line, the subway cars themselves are not. Yellow cars pull up at the green line, green cars pull up at the red line.

All subway directions are identified by their last stop. On the green line, for example, you’re either traveling toward Cathedral or toward Congreso de Tucuman. In front of each Subte entrance is an enormous city map which overlays the Subte map over an intricately labeled street map of the city, so it’s easy to double check your destination.

Another Unfortunate Event: Iglesia San Ignacio de Loyola

On the way to the gardens, my valiant beau and I decided to stop in at a church to offer up our thanks for a safe journey. We chose San Ignacio de Loyola, an old, reputable-looking Catholic Church with ornate side altars. After a few moments of prayer near the front of the church, we wandered down the dimly-lit side altars and stared up at morose statues of saints. In the last of the side altars, near the exit to the church, we were approached by a heavy-set man in his fifties with a huge tumor at the side of his stomach. He lifted up his shirt to show us the growth beneath his skin and gruffly asked for money. My valiant beau and I refused him. As I began walking toward the exit, the afflicted gentleman cornered my valiant beau in the altar alcove. He showed him a newspaper wrapped around a knife and pointed it at him. “Trust me,” he said, gesturing with the newspaper, “God will pay you for this.”

My valiant beau wisely reconsidered our decision not to make a donation to the gentleman’s recovery and gave him the 5 pesos he had been keeping in his pocket for the beggars at the church entrance. Upon receiving the money, the gentleman put down his newspaper and left. My valiant beau emerged from the dimly-lit church alcove with grisly, traveling story to tell me.

Lesson Learned: Don’t lurk about in dark corners.