Matadero

One Sunday, Mario drove me to the Street Fair at Tigre, a Northern suburb of the city of Buenos Aires.

I wanted to buy a Hostein cow skin from Tigre, but I had no luck. So on my last Sunday in Buenos Aires, Claude took Linda, Laurie and me to the street fair at Matadero, which is South of the city, hoping I could find the cow skins there.

This scene reminded me of La Boca. The restaurant was empty inside as there was a black-out.

Killer Balls!

The stalls sold typical arts and crafts items, casual clothing and leather goods etc.

At the leather goods' stalls, I found these balls that I called the Killer Balls. Two heavy wooden balls cladded with leather are connected by a string made of woven raw hide. They were once used as weapons by throwing them at the enemy's neck, the spinning weights around the neck would choke the enemy to death. Now, they use them to harness wild horses and cattles.

These bottles were adorned with copies of artwork by Van Gogh.

There were stalls selling food items, from arrays of beautifully decorated jars and bottles that contained preserves, honeys and vinegar; to cups of lustrous cherries in season; to mountain-high of cookies.

I noticed 2 interesting items .

I spotted some tamales, which were rare in the city of Buenos Aires that is heavily influenced by the cuisines from Italy. It makes sense to find them here, as one can find more native Indians living further away from the city centre.

I noticed the logo for the local soccer team there resembled that of the Bulls basket ball team, and on top of it, the team is also called Chicago.

Besides the market stalls, I also found great entertainment. Here, we watched a typical gaucho games where the gauchos, while riding their horses down a runway, is supposed to capture a metal ring of 1.5 inches in diameter from a hanging post at the end of the runway, by poking it through with a stick to the size of a pencil. It requires horsemanship and hand-eye coordination. We saw this kid, who looked barely 5, boldly challenging his older friends at the game on his pony.

The entertainment went on.... At the open stage in front of the City Hall, there were live music too. Here we saw a kid of around 6 years old performing gaucho dancing. Spectators also came to dance chacarera on the pavement.

Although Linda and Laurie quickly disappeared into their shopping frenzy, four of us were able to rendavous at this Cafe in the late afternoon..

All the customers were sitting outdoor because the entire district experienced a black-out. That Cafe turned out to be a restaurant with folk dancing and live music. We saw this couples dancing most lovingly, with or without their twirling handkerchiefs.

Our tired tour guide Claude.

Lauri and Linda had purchased enough to last two Christmases, while Linda amazingly managed to take a lot of pictures at the same time. Four of us celebrated the end of this most enjoyable day trip by uncorking a bottle of wine. Well, it was a hot afternoon, and with some alchohol.....

I was slight disappointed that I could not locate the Holstein cow skin, in fact, any cow skin. There were plenty of sheep skin though. So to console mself, upon our return to the city, I at least took a picture with a small piece of the cow skin, which was painted at a beautiful wall mural of the Subte's platform.