Feliz Día de la Patria! Or, How the Argentine Military Spends Their Money
Feliz Día de la Patria, everyone! Today is one of Argentina's two (yes, two) independence days. 201 years ago today, the Argentine people declared independence from Spain; the other independence day is July 9, the anniversary of the Congreso de Tucumán, where they... declared independence from Spain... apparently, again. (I don't really get it.) After some Wikipedia searches, my rudimentary understanding of it is as follows: in late May 1810, the Spanish junta, to whom the Viceroy in charge of Argentina at the time was loyal, got overthrown; the result was all kinds of political upheaval in Buenos Aires trying to figure out whose authority should be followed, and eventually they succeeded in installing a Primera Junta of citizens elected by the people. So that is what today was celebrating.
There was a huge and really impressive celebration in the Plaza de Mayo, which was part carnival and part concert, and tons and tons of fun. Lots of flag-waving, lots of souvenir things being sold, lots of people making choripan and hamburgers and candied nuts and popcorn right there in the plaza, the Casa Rosada was lit up beautifully in all different colors, the music was wonderful (once they were done with the children's entertainment, anyway), there were kids walking around with their faces painted blue and white, people selling balloons, people walking around drinking maté. Really awesome.
There were news crews there and one reporter came up to me and my friend Sara and asked us if we wanted to have a brief interview and talk about what we thought of the celebrations. Sara told her, "No, sorry, we're not Argentine, we're not from here," and the reporter got all excited and said, "That's even better! Then we can show that there are foreigners here enjoying it, as well!" And before I know it I'm on camera talking about how much fun the celebrations are and how I'm enjoying Argentina. I think I'm probably the only American they interviewed, so I have a feeling they may put the footage on their site somewhere-- that's probably just wishful thinking, but just in case, the site is http://www.telam.com.ar/home.php.
The other really fantastic thing about the 25 de Mayo celebrations was the hot chocolate. Sara and I are walking around and we see all these people with these Styrofoam cups of hot chocolate, and we wonder where it's coming from. Then, we see all these military trucks, and uniformed soldiers are outside handing out free hot chocolate from huge metal official-looking vats. So naturally we get on line to get some, and as this soldier is handing me this cup of hot chocolate, I ask him, "What are these used for when they're not holding hot chocolate?" And the guy told me that is actually their only purpose. So from this we understand that the Argentine military is actually spending part of its budget to design and produce giant vats of hot chocolate, whose only purpose is to provide free hot chocolate to the masses on national holidays. To this, I say: Rock on, Argentina. You are clearly doing it right.
There was a huge and really impressive celebration in the Plaza de Mayo, which was part carnival and part concert, and tons and tons of fun. Lots of flag-waving, lots of souvenir things being sold, lots of people making choripan and hamburgers and candied nuts and popcorn right there in the plaza, the Casa Rosada was lit up beautifully in all different colors, the music was wonderful (once they were done with the children's entertainment, anyway), there were kids walking around with their faces painted blue and white, people selling balloons, people walking around drinking maté. Really awesome.
There were news crews there and one reporter came up to me and my friend Sara and asked us if we wanted to have a brief interview and talk about what we thought of the celebrations. Sara told her, "No, sorry, we're not Argentine, we're not from here," and the reporter got all excited and said, "That's even better! Then we can show that there are foreigners here enjoying it, as well!" And before I know it I'm on camera talking about how much fun the celebrations are and how I'm enjoying Argentina. I think I'm probably the only American they interviewed, so I have a feeling they may put the footage on their site somewhere-- that's probably just wishful thinking, but just in case, the site is http://www.telam.com.ar/home.php.
The other really fantastic thing about the 25 de Mayo celebrations was the hot chocolate. Sara and I are walking around and we see all these people with these Styrofoam cups of hot chocolate, and we wonder where it's coming from. Then, we see all these military trucks, and uniformed soldiers are outside handing out free hot chocolate from huge metal official-looking vats. So naturally we get on line to get some, and as this soldier is handing me this cup of hot chocolate, I ask him, "What are these used for when they're not holding hot chocolate?" And the guy told me that is actually their only purpose. So from this we understand that the Argentine military is actually spending part of its budget to design and produce giant vats of hot chocolate, whose only purpose is to provide free hot chocolate to the masses on national holidays. To this, I say: Rock on, Argentina. You are clearly doing it right.