What better way to spend a birthday that running around Buenos Aires, drinking in all the sights and sounds of life on earth? After mourning the replacement of the elegant old destination board with a giant digital monstrosity at Centro Congresso, our souls are soothed with a train trip to sleepy Barracas where art and industry comfortably co-exist (for the moment, anyway) down by the riverside. In the late afternoon, we meet Mauro for his shoot at Ex ESMA, the former government detention center turned hub for an incredible array of human rights organizations. The ability of the human spirit to transcend and transform the most horrific crimes committed by “the state” is almost unfathomable but you really feel it here and it is hugely humbling. In the evening, it’s on to Recoleta where Macarena films fancy architecture before we convene with some pals for an impromptu outdoor empanada picnic and the late night BIFICI premiere of El rudio son las casas, a film about the Buenos Aires avant-garde noise music scene by Super 8 Club members Luciana Foglio and Luján Montes… Added bonus: sitting next to Argentinian experimental cinema legend and recent EPFC guest Claudio Caldini! End the day with a crowded bus ride to Maca, Gerry and Junior’s for a brief nap before it’s time to go go go again!
