Beef

Nothing beats a good juicy steak, and the Argentines certainly know how to do that. The quality in Argentine beef stems from the various strains of cross-bred cattle which feed out on the vast ranges of the pampas and around Buenos Aires, producing some of the finest quality steak in the world. Unlike British steak, there was no BSE contamination, and unlike American steak the quality is much higher. Thus, the result is a highly juicy, thickly cut, perfectly cooked, melt in the mouth steak. Add on to this an extremely favourable exchange rate, and you can be out dining on a very tasty steak, in a nice and fancy restaurant, with a good bottle of Argentine wine, all for under a tenner. Big ones for sure.

Since my last post I’ve been receiving various concerned comments from both friends and family alike, inquiring about the state of my health. As far as I know, on Tuesday evening of last week I came down with a strain of the dreaded H1N1. From where I was contaminated I am not sure, as the rest of my family and friends are all fine, and to the best of my knowledge I have not come into contact with any sick people. The one thing I do recall is that as we were preparing to board the flight from France (we came to Argentina with Air France via Charles de Gaulle) I pointed out to my mum and sister a woman who was coughing and sneezing all over the place, and jokingly said “if she’s on the flight, we’ll all have swine flu by the time we get to Buenos Aires”.

Where I got it from is mostly irrelevant, as it was more important that I got better. We were due to head South on Wednesday on an 11 hour overnight coach trip to visit one or my mum’s friends. Unfortunately, we had to postpone the journey until this Thursday while I got better. So instead, I spent Wednesday evening in a cold sweat, shivering with a 40+ fever. I almost passed out on one of my trips to the toilet, and no matter how often I took the medication, I was throwing it up again within half an hour.

Luckily, as the days progressed, my headache disappeared, my temperature went down, and by yesterday I was pretty much my old self save for an annoying cough. That being the case, it was decided by the adults taking care of me that I was better enough to brave going outside. A trip to a nice neighbourhood was planned and I was invited out for lunch by one of my uncles and his family. Following that we went on to do a bit of light shopping and general touristy things, before heading back to my grandmother’s apartment in time to be picked up and taken out to dinner.
Though it wasn’t initially planned that way, I treated this meal as my “well done on beating swine flu” shin-dig, and treated myself to one of the fanciest looking steaks on the menu. The food was great, the conversation, pleasant, and after having my fill of steak, wine and banter, I was driven home where I proceeded to crash out in a deep slumber.

That has been pretty much it since getting better. Today, I accompanied my mum and sister doing some shopping (which proved to be a big mistake – I forgot how tedious taking women shopping can be) and I have now been invited to another uncles’ house for dinner. Like I said earlier in this post, our journey south has been postponed until tomorrow night, and while it is still in the province of Buenos Aires, there is a definite change in temperature in Bahia Blanca, the “white bay”. Today, though it is the middle of winter, it was 16 degrees with bright sunshine here in the capital – how’s England doing?

Take care folks, and I’ll talk to you soon. Hells.