A VISIT TO THE PINK HOUSE

So between jaunts out of the city to other exotic places, Rachael has been taking me about locally to see a little of what Buenos Aires has to offer. No visit would be complete without a visit to the presidential Casa Rosada, the Pink House; the Argentinian equivalent to the U.S. White House, except of course for the color and also for the fact that the President doesn't actually live there.

Evidently the building was painted pink at the request of President Domingo Sarmiento in the 1860s. It is said that he chose pink to defuse political tensions by combining the colors of the two opposing political parties, the Unitarians (white) & the Federales (red). While I guess pink IS a soothing color, I have to admit that I am glad our own country has not adopted this idea as our White House would be a lovely mixture of blue and red, thus the Purple house. And while it is perhaps apropos that our executive office be the color of a bruise, the Purple House just doesn't have the same ring of unblemished puriity as the "White House". But I digress. There is also a rumor that the reason the Casa Rosada is pink, is that the paint was mixed with pigs blood to prevent damage from humidity. Go figure...

When we arrived, pretty late in the day as we had to lay low to escape that same high humidity and summer swelter, we had missed the last tour, but the guards were still hanging about doing the important job of posing for photo ops with tourists so we were able to wander around a bit on our own and check out the digs.

The interiors are NOT pink, thank goodness, but are tastefully painted in muted pastels (maybe they mixed the paint with blood from the Easter Bunny) and there are two grand staircases, the Francia stairs of honor and the Italia stairs of honor.

NOT OUR STAIRCASE

I didn't see any Estados Unidos stairs of honor though, so perhaps we are relegated to the dumb waiter, or MAYBE we get to ride in the presidential elevator which is all polished wood and mirrors and a velvet cushion the size of a twin bed to perch on for that long ride up to the presidential balcony on the second floor. This is the balcony overlooking the Plaza Mayor, from which the president makes speeches, and where of course Evita told her people not to cry. No one was making any speeches the day we visited, but the guard on the balcony did look as if he might like to say something when he caught me taking his picture. Luckily for me, I still don't "hablo español".

The Pink House is full of halls (not to be confused with hallways) and I wanted to pose for a picture in La Salon de Los Escritores y Pensadores (the hall of writers and thinkers) but somehow they doubted my credentials(?!) so alas I had to pose elsewhere.

There were also halls honoring Argentinian scientists, painters and women. There was a salon de los bustos (hall of busts), which I thought sounded like a room full of Victoria's Secret mannequins, but actually housed the heads of the heads of state fashioned by international artists. My favorite hall was the Salon Patriotas because here were portrayed the Argentinian patriots through the ages, but painted by more contemporary artists so that everyone didn't look like something out of a stale 7th grade history book.

PERON

EVITA

ANOTHER FAMOUS PATRIOT WHOSE NAME I CAN'T REMEMBER

A MEDALLION CELEBRATING THE ARGENTINIAN TRUCE WITH THE WARLIKE SMURFS

After we had had our fill of the open house, Rachael and I went back outside to watch the guards lower the biggest flag I have ever seen. I can see why it took so many participants to protect it!

Then we meandered over to the Museo del Bicentenario, a new musuem behind the Pink House and inaugerated in 2011, built on the remains of the original Buenos Aires fortress. It is a beautiful building and houses artwork and artifacts of Argentinian history. There is an amazing and moving photographic walk through recent history with video clips and interactive displays, and I was impressed with how candid it was about some of the more shameful events in Argentina's more recent past.

ART DEPICTING THE ARGENTINIAN CALVARY?

And of course, a museum visit is never complete without a gander at the gift shop where some of the weirdest artifacts are usually found. We weren't disappointed. We found some wonderful handmade dolls of some of Argentina's most famous people. Rachael bought a Christina Kirchner
doll (the current president) so she could manipulate her into making extravagant promises from the balcony,

"I PROMISE A BEEF IN EVERY POT!"

 and I wanted a dolly too so I bought Carlos Gardel, the famous tango singer whose grave I visited in an earlier post. Since Carlos is dead, my doll has angel wings so I christened him my "Gardelian angel" and now I feel well protected.

CARLOS IS GRUMPY BECAUSE HIS CIGARETTE ISN'T LIT.

TANGO PARTNERS? CARLOS DOESN'T THINK SO.

RACHAEL PUTTING CARLOS THROUGH HIS TANGO PACES . . .

. . . AND FORCING CHRISTINA TO DRINK MATÉ.  NOW WE KNOW WHO'S REALLY IN CHARGE!

Since we were in the neighborhood we decided to inspect a few other important buildings nearby including this one with a door knocker weighing more then my daughter.
Probably it was put there as a discouragement for door to door salesman; the Avon lady would have to be a real brute to lift it!

Then it was on down the road to Avenida 9 de Julio, the widest street in the world and known as one of the 7 urban wonders, to see if we could cross it without getting run down.

 Though it's 300 feet wide and crosses 12 lanes of rushing traffic, when we arrived I discovered that though you could barely see the other side, there WERE traffic lights at various stopping places along the way so it was hardly the long distance sprint I had anticipated. Nevertheless, with me clutching my "Gardelian angel" in one hand and my camera in the other, we stepped off the curb and tempted fate. I actually videoed our whole way across but a 3.5 minute video of crosswalk while I am wondering out loud if the video function on my new camera is working
really doesn't capture our harrowing journey so you will have to use your imagination instead.

Avenida 9 de Julio

View Larger Map

Let's just say we lived to tell the tale.

OLYMPIC CROSSWALKERS IN TRAINING

After catching our breath we photographed another famous landmark, El Obelisco (the obelisk), which stands proud at the intersection of Avenida 9 de Julio and Avenida Corrientes.

 Made of concrete and white stone it stands 67.5 meters tall and has a lightning rod at its top. It was built in 1936 at the request of the mayor and in 1938, under the jurisdiction of a new mayor, it was ordered demolished for safety and aesthetic reasons ( seems reasonable) but this act was vetoed. In 2005 it was covered with a giant pink (what is it with pink?!) condom to commorate World AIDS day, which might give you an idea of what this monument most resembles.
(Of course, not to be outdone, the U.S. has an even BIGGER column, the San Jacinto monument in Texas of course, measuring in at 172.92 meters, but that's for someone else's blog.)

Finally, exhausted tourists that we were, we decided to head on back to Rachael's apartment. Lucky for us this meant a ride on the A train, the oldest subway in Buenos Aires. It has beautiful old wooden cars and seats polished to a high shine by one hundred years of butts.

 I noticed that our car sort of torqued and swayed sideways every time the train went around a corner, which I guess was more of an issue than we suspected, since the very next day it was announced that after over a century, the A train was being retired as unsafe and the gorgeous cars replaced with shiny new ones made in China.

HMM...WHAT IS THAT UNUSUAL SWAYING?

CHRISTINA ANNOUNCES THE END OF THE A LINE

 I felt honored to have shared a part of Argentine history and also glad that Rachael and I didn't BECOME history on our ride home.

Ciao for now,
J


View Larger Map