Back to Buenos Aires

I squeezed out every minute at the hotel that I could. In the end I never left the property. I was so wonderfully content there that I saw no reason to leave. As it was, I stayed until the very last minute until it was time to take a taxi to the port.

Too bad I hurried! The boat was an hour late showing up.

Ah well, I had time to finish the final book of The Hunger Games trilogy. Phew! Those books consumed me. All I wanted to do was read...which is actually a great feeling that I didn't dare challenge.

Now it's time to start working on my verbs again. Time spent with Carlos and Javier who don't speak English reinforced that, although I did quite well. I also want to start into the kids' book Tales of Beedle the Bard, in Spanish. That's my goal for this week, my last week (gulp!) in BA in addition to checking out the museums I haven't made time for yet, getting down to Boca, hitting a few milongas, chilling with Guille and savouring my last few days of this amazing trip I'm on.

So tonight was my big night out at Teatro Colón. I was so excited to go see a show in the newly remodelled, famous city landmark. The building was stunning. It was a real treat to get to see the inside of it and experience a little culture along the way.

But...I'm just going to say it...I found the experience of sitting through an opera to be more like an endurance test.

It was too warm in the balconies, the seats were too close together, the quarter of the stage the singers spent most of their time on was obscured because of the seating arrangement, the girls beside me seemed clueless that every time they leaned forward they blocked my view of the stage and the subtitles (even in Spanish they're a big help) and I kept falling asleep. Every time I snapped out of a mini nap it seemed that the subtitles always read the same - god have mercy, save me from my pitiful life. Oh, and there was a whole song on how great war is. They were definitely different times when Verdi wrote "La forza del destino"!

And I paid good money to come here tonight to see a show. I think it's fair to say it was mostly for the architecture!

I began to wonder what key element about appreciating the show I was missing since the crowd seemed to be going wild -even those standing through the whole performance, poor things! Loud bursts of 'bravos' came at the end of each song. The place was packed and this was just one of a dozen nights this show runs for. Porteños like their arts. I guess I'm not as cultured as they are! ;o)

Sadly, this photo represents my favourite part of the show!