Morcilla, chinchulines, y riñones

I think I can categorize my experiences of last night as being truly Argentine.

I woke up around 4 pm yesterday and joined Cailey at the gym. I went back home and ate 'lunch' around 6:30. Cailey and I took the subte to an upscale shopping mall in Palermo. I'm on the lookout for some leather boots, but this place was just a little more expensive than I'm willing to pay. I encountered the second Starbucks that I've seen in the city. The other one is on a pedestrian street called Florida that is very geared toward tourists, go figure.

We then made our way to a theater called Teatro del Perro (Theater of the Dog). The theater occupied a street corner, but there was absolutely no sign to identify the building from the outside. We arrived around 10:30 but were too early for the show. We found a restaurant where we could eat dinner, but they didn't have very much of what was listed on their menu actually available. After trying to order chorizo (sausage), the woman explained that they could put together a sampler plate of the cuts that were on the grill. We were sitting right in front of the grill and as I watched the man prepare the meats, I decided I had absolutely no desire to know what 'cuts' they were. When the food came I could identify the chorizo, blood sausage (morcilla), some very fatty chicken, something very tubular, and something that tasted like chicken. The very tubular 'meat' ended up being chinchulin (intestines) and the meat that tasted like chicken was in fact riñones (cow kidney). At least I've tried enough to know that I'll stick with only the chorizo in the future. We also had some very delicious pure de calabaza (pumpkin), which is a popular side dish.



We returned to the theater so watch the show. It was mainly featuring a tango band of 10-12 people, but a few couples put on their dancin' shoes and joined the show. The venue was a large room with a bar on one side and a dance floor covering the other half of the room. There were chairs lining the wall, but we sat on the floor in front of the band and the space left for the dancers. This was the first time that I've seen tango, but it was much less rigid than the stereotypical image of tango. It was incredibly fun to watch and well worth the 15 pesos it cost to enter.



Tomorrow is the day that the death of General José de San Martin is observed so I'm getting an extra long weekend. According to Wikipedia, San Martin helped liberate Argentina as well as Peru and Chile. I'm about to get ready for the day and go shopping in the leather district of BsAs.

¡Chau! Y feliz día del libertador José de San Martín!