We spent 4 days in Buenos Aires touring and walking. As with the other large cities - Lima and Santiago - we saw a lot but didn't take too many pictures.
Our first day we went on a Jewish Tour that included a visit to the new AMIA building (Mutual Association Israelite Argentina). The original building had been bombed in July, 1994. The new building is set back from the street and has a courtyard between the building and the wall that surrounds it.
In the courtyard is a sculpture by the Israeli artist Agam. It is a marvelous piece and the pictures below don't really do justice to it. The sculture consists of 9 individual panels that when viewed from different angles show different Jewish themes.
In the picture on the left you can see the Star of David. The center picture depicts a rainbow and in the third picture you can see a menorrah.
After our tour of the AMIA building, we went for a short walk around the neigborhood and visited one of the old synagogues. The security around the Jewish sites is quite extensive. When I as going to take the picture of the sign seen below, our guide told me to wait until I was away from in front of the synagogue.
This is just one of many signs for kosher restaurants. I was intrigued with this one because it was kosher parrilla and it also had sushi.
From this section of Buenos Aires we went to see where the Israeli embassy uset to be. It was bombed in 1992. The area is now a park with a memorial.
We also took a 1/2 day city tour that went to various districts of the city. We visited shops of crafts people and of course we had to see the colorful area of St. Elmo.
The city is famous for Tango. As you can see in this picture, the tango is done in the streets and is a big tourist attraction. Look at the signs on the shops along the street - everything is Tango!
No trip to Buenos Aires would be complete without going to a Tango Show. Click here to see a video of the Tango Show.
We walked a lot in Buenos Aires. It is a city of wide streets and beautiful architecture. Our guide the first morning said that Buenos Aires was a French city populated by Italians who spoke Spanish. The city also has a lot of parks.
Below is a typical Buenos Aires street. This is not one of the REALLY wide ones.
On the right is one of the parks we passed. There was a show on at the park with a lot of heart sculptures. I don't know what the show was about but the sculptures were interesting.
One day we walked to the Japanese Gardens. On the way we passed the United Nations Park where we saw the Floralis Generica sculpture. This is a large flower made of aluminum and steel. At night the petals close and during the day they open.
On our way back from the Japanese Gardens, we stopped at MALBA - Museum of Latin American Art. These are some scupltures on the patio at MALBA.
We also visited the famous Cafe Tortoni. It seems that every tourist visits this cafe that was founded in 1858. We only had a cup of coffee but I understand the food is forgetable.
What's a Japanese Garden without some koi?
