Argentina's immigrant past and present.

Today I had orientation at the University and we got a bus tour throughout the city. Our tour guide was great at explaining everything about Argentina's history and the reason for the way everything is the way it is (to put it in a round-about kind of way).

Back during the late 1800's, early 1900's, about the same time of the great wave of European immigration into Eliss Island in New York, a similar and some even argue an even bigger wave of immigration was flowing into the port of Buenos Aires. Most of these immigrants of Spanish and Italian descent, the Italian influence is BIG here, the food, the hand gestures, the intonation of the Spanish spoken by Argentines and especially porteños (name for inhabitants of Buenos Aires, lit: people of the port), and even the ice cream. There were also many people of British descent that went to Patagonia, in fact the largest Welsh speaking community outside of Wales is in Argentina, as well as Germans like the village I visited explained in my last post.

The city's most famous Barrio is la Boca. It's in all of the travel guides and it's the typical picture you're shown when someone is talking about Buenos Aires. Colorful houses, Tango dancers, etc... This barrio was actually the port where these immigrants arrived to (think Eliss island, only not an island and in Argentina). Many stayed in this Barrio, mostly Italian immigrants, and lived here for many years. There were so many people from Italy living in this barrio at one point, that they actually tried to become the "Independent Republic of La Boca," and of course Argentina's national congress just laughed at them, but they were serious. To this day you can see signs or references to the neighborhood as "The Independent Republic of La Boca." However, most of these Italians have since moved on to the rest of Buenos Aires' nicer neighborhoods, today la Boca is still inhabited by immigrants. This time of a new variety: the South American kind.

Argentina has seen a growing immigrant population (some illegal, some legal) since the 90's from neighboring poorer countries, mainly Paraguay, Bolivia, and some Peruvians. (Actually Cristina, the cleaning lady of my apartment is from Peru).

So waves of European immigrants that form what is now a great portion of what makes up Argentina's ethnicity, and now a days waves of Latin American immigration that could change that whole ethnic make up of the country.... Sound familiar to anyone?

It's crazy to me how similar many parts of Argentina's history is very parallel to the United States. (They've even kicked out and fought off the British... they're still technically fighting with them... but that's a blog a little later down the road).

I know leave you with some photos of La Boca:

The houses were originally painted all of those colors because it was from whatever left over paint they had from the ships coming in to the port, and the houses are made from old ship parts and whatever scrap they could find. (Now I'm pretty sure they keep up the colors for the tourists). Further more... although this looks like a cute, nice little tourist area... it's not recommended to find yourself here after 6pm, which is when everything closes and it gets a little sketchy around there.