La Boca

Nate and I recently went to La Boca, a barrio near the port in Buenos Aires. It’s perversely one of both the poorest and most touristy areas of the city, a combination that always makes me somewhat uncomfortable. Located near the port of Buenos Aires, the neighborhood was originally populated by poor immigrants. Lacking money, they painted their houses with any spare paint they could beg off the ships in port. Over time, the neighborhood became a patchwork of brightly painted shanties and conventillos, and is now an extremely popular subject for postcards.

It’s still an extremely poor neighborhood, and our guidebooks warned us not to stray off the two “tourist” streets. These tourist streets offer much to the tourist: waitresses who are so argentine they wear high heels and dance tango even while waiting tables, and aggressive minstrels who will serenade your table endlessly.

However, our objective in La Boca was not to be found on the tourist streets. Because the thing that La Boca is most famous for is its soccer team, Boca Juniors. Even though Nate and I hate soccer with a passion shared by all good, red-blooded Americans, we are sports fans in general, so we wanted to see La Bombonera. La Bombonera is the stadium where the Boca Juniors play, and is so named because apparently it looks like a chocolate box. I have posted a picture so you can judge for yourself whether this is a reasonable statement. It’s famous for being the stadium where Maradona had some of his greatest triumphs, and for the incredibly rowdy and raucous crowds. We were vaguely thinking of going to a game sometime, but apparently the Boca Jrs. are kicking ass this year and tickets are not easily available. Also, I may have mentioned this before, but we hate soccer. -EMW