Friday, August 15, 2008

La vida cotidiana

There is so much about Buenos Aires that is charming, it's hard to know where to begin. Maybe with the most important meal of the day - breakfast. I've already found my regular café, just across from the school, where I can start the day with a leisurely café con leche, a pastry, and the day's copy of El País.

Charming aspects of this encounter:

  • Pastry names: a simple croissant is a medialuna (literally a "half-moon", a slight misnomer, as they are unquivocally crescent-shaped), and can be ordered "dulce" or "salada" (salted). A more complex, stickier, pastry can also be had - this is known as a factura. A name which I find hilarious, as factura also means "bill", or final reckoning. I think it's kind of cute to be reminded of the final reckoning as one orders that sugar-laden, artery-clogging, buttery, flaky, pastry.
  • That one gets served a refreshing glass of cold seltzer with one's coffee.
  • The price: a standard breakfast "deal" is coffee with three small medialunas for 6 pesos, that is 2 US dollars*.

*: Since the dollar sign '$' is used to denote both pesos and US dollars, I will try to avoid using it, to prevent possible confusion.

1 comment:

Adam said...

Seltzer, coffee, and buttery OR sugary pastries. It sounds like David is in breakfast heaven.