La Plata - Culture

La plata is the capital city of the Buenos Aires district. La plata has everything. Museums, Galleries, and places to visit as a tourist. Good entertainment and night life all over the area, offers to tourist real action. Dining seriously, and meals can easily last a few hours. Main courses usually consist of an asado, a barbecue of excellent quality beef. Beef is dominant, and it also comes in the forms of bife de chorizo (sirloin steak) or empanadas (meat pies). The local wine is also good, especially the reds. You also might want to try mate, the traditional gaucho drink. The national deserts are dulce de leche, a milk jelly, and alfajores - Argentine sweets made from dulce de leche. The tango originated in society's underbelly--the brothels of turn-of-the-century Argentina. As immigrants from Europe, Africa, and ports unknown streamed into the outskirts of Buenos Aires during the 1880's, many gravitated toward the port city's houses of ill repute. In these establishments, the portenos (as they were called) could drown their troubles in a few drinks and find some companionship. They looked desperately for a distraction to ease their sense of rootlessness and disfranchisement as "strangers in a strange land." The first two decades of the new century, the tango took Paris by storm. The blessings of the Parisians, in turn, made it a staple of Argentinean high society. Tango was reigning supreme in the cabarets and theatres frequented by the rich. Out of this culture, the tango musician became elevated to professional composer status. A pioneer in this genre, Roberto Firpo, created the typical tango orchestra--rhythm played on piano and double bass; melodies played on the bandoneon and the violin, with strong counter melodies and variations. The stars of this era were Osvaldo Fresedo and Julio de Caro.

The La Plata dolphin or Franciscana is endemic to the coastal waters of the central western South Atlantic and one of the rarest and most poorly known South American dolphins. This team of Argentineans from Fundación Cethus and the Universidad de Buenos Aires will work in the Northern Patagonian Natural Reserve to assess the Dolphin's status, ecology and behaviour in Bahia Anegada and implement a conservation campaign aimed at fishermen and local people. In the longer term the project team intends to resolve and improve protection laws for this species in Argentina