The San Telmo Market is Totally Worth It

This Sunday, I stepped out to the San Telmo market for the third time since being here with a couple friends. The guidebooks tell tourists to make a determined effort against any obstruction to get to the San Telmo market to see the makeshift stands that line the streets peddling tons of dumb little things, the tango, and to be surrounded by 5,000 of your closest friends from back home in the States. I sound bitter in these first two sentences, but I actually do enjoy the San Telmo market. I like to take a day to lazily walk around and look at stuff. And look at stuff, we did!

Our mission this day was to hurry up and find all the gifts that we wanted to take back home (don’t get too excited, readers, I spent sparingly). The first thing you think when you arrive at the San Telmo fair is the sheer number of vendors on Defensa street and the variety in things they sell. Most vendors are artisans who sell their hand-made art, jewelry, and other crafts. Some vendors specialize in goods made from Argentine leather. Of course, the street is littered with vendors selling mate and its accoutrements. Then there are the guys who obviously rounded up some old junk from their house and scattered it out on a piece of cloth to make a few extra pesos. No, sir, nobody wants to buy your old-timey casino dealer’s green visor.

Besides all the things you can buy, you can also find some good eats. Yes it’s possible in San Telmo, but we certainly didn’t find any this Sunday. We sat down outside of a quaint, mom-and-pop parrilla (barbecue) ready to stuff our faces with tasty asado and french fries. We were all expecting a whole side of a cow because that’s what we’ve had before at places much like this one. But the waitress brought out a small plate of huge, charred cuts that had almost no meat on them. We had to scratch around the bones like dogs to get enough. Once the food was gone, we sat talking to each other trying to fill up on conversation. Suddenly, on this very sunny day, all three of us felt simultaneous drops on our arms and heads. It wasn’t raining. It was bird poop. We were absolutely disgusted. The guy at the next table laughed with us and said that he was hit, too! We were all sitting a reasonable distance from each other, and yet all four of us were victims. My question now is, “was it a planned attack by four separate birds, or did one bird just have explosive diarrhea?” Then we handed over 80 pesos for that crappy meal.

After lunch, we took back to the street for some more shopping. The guidebooks always mention the tango as an attraction at the San Telmo fair. I have to warn all readers not to expect fabulous tango at the San Telmo fair. You’ll find couples in a tango get-up that charge for pictures with them. This Sunday, I found a man that attached a life-sized doll dressed in a tango dress to his person and danced the man’s part. You have to pay for good tango in a theater. You just do.

I and my friends came away with some very cute souvenirs from the San Telmo market and I definitely recommend it to anyone visiting Buenos Aires. I just wanted to publicly edit the guidebook entries you may read about the attraction.