Winter in Buenos Aires

Yes it´s winter here, but you wouldn´t really know by the temperature. The last few days it has ranged between 15 and 25. The strange thing is other than the temperature it actually seems like winter, the leaves are off the trees, the sun goes down at around 6pm and everyone is bundled up. Everyone except for me that is, which leads to weird looks on the street because I am walking around in shorts, sandels and a t-shirt while some people have scarves and winter jackets on.

Another thing about BA is the traffic, which I guess is true with any large city. Being a pedestrian here certainly isn´t like Canada though, as the crosswalks are more like suggested crossing areas than any indication that the cars will actually stop for you. Someone from BA said it´s best not to run across the roads as the drivers will take this as a challenge. I don´t know what sort of challenge that would be, in a duel against a car i´m 83% sure that the car would win, that is just a rough estimate and I don´t really want to find out if those odds are actually higher.

Someone said that Argentinians are Italians who think they are Spanish living in England that they think is France. I´m not sure if this is the correct quote, but i´m sure it is just as confusing, that is unless you have actually been here. It basically tries to sum up their culture and all the influences the different countries have had on it. This seems true because Buenos Aires has a very european feel to it, but as if it was all mixed together with it´s italian cafes, parisian parks, spanish language and english infrastructure.

Yesterday I did a walking tour and learned some interesting history which always makes the city seem more than just buildings, traffic and busy people. Then last night I had dinner that someone cooked at the hostel, splurged on a $5 bottle of wine (this was far from the cheapest, and it was good wine) and had a multi-lingual jam session (lucky for me everyone´s common language was English). Today I wandered around town by myself and did a preliminary investigation of my exit strategy, which will be by bus, now all I have to do is pick and town, a day and choose from one of the 20 different bus lines. Tonight is Friday night and i´m told Argentina is much like Spain where people go out for dinner at 11pm, have a few drinks and pack it in early at around 3 or go to a disco until about 7. For myself I don´t really know what the night has in store.