Adventures in South America

A LATE night on the Town

Last night we had our first going out, Boliche (night club) experience here in Buenos Aires. The majority of the Boliches here have been closed since December 30th, when the tragic event at a club called Republica Cromagnon occurred. During a rock concert at this locale, a flare was lit inside resulting in a fire. There were well over 1500 people in the club and many of the doors were kept locked to prevent people from entering without paying. This also resulted in people not being able to leave to escape the fire. More than 175 people died as a result of this tragedy.

Immediately following the government closed down all night clubs. Regulations have since been established requiring the clubs to pass fire safety rules in order to be reopened. At this point in time a growing minority of the clubs have reopened. Last night we went to a place called Asia de Cuba. It is a restaurant in Puerto Madero that becomes a night club after 1am. Seth, Jenn and Carlos (my friends visiting from Boston this week), Desiree, her husband Gabriel, sister Vanesa and friend Sergio made up the rest of the group. Our dinner began around 10:30pm. The restaurant soon began to become packed with other late night diners. Around 12:30am a belly dancer circled the restaurant entertaining the patrons and getting people in the night club mood. Around 1am, the tables on the lower level were cleared out to make way for a dance floor and the loud electronica music began thumping through the club. By 2am the dance floor was packed. In general night clubs here start late; they open at midnight and don't fill up until after 1am. People here stay out dancing until the sun comes up. Almost all of the music that was played was electronica.... which I am not a huge fan of, but it was definitely fun being in the midst of such an energetic crowd. Around 3:30am they played a short, very whack hip-hop set which consisted of the following songs: Ice Ice Baby (Vanilla Ice), Can't Touch This (MC Hammer), Informer (Snow), Jump Around (House of Pain), Yeah (Usher), PIMP (50 cent). I am embarassed to admit that after several hours of electronic music I was grateful for any hip hop related music we could get and danced my heart out. The selection of songs were ones that probably would have caused the DJ to be booed out of his stand in most clubs I have been to in the states... but here, you gotta take what you can get. After the 20 minute reprieve it was back to the throbbing bass of the neverending electronica song.

We left a little after 4am (we were early birds!) and at some clubs we drove by on the way home, there was a wait to get in. After getting such a late start on my nights sleep this morning (5am!) I am definitely a little groggy. But we had a good time and I look forward to my next boliche experience here.

posted by Kathy T @ 6:52 PM