#85 Colorful Caminito - A City a Story Contest "Colors" 多彩的文化街区

Hey my Steemit friends! In this post I'd like to show you a place full of colors and culture value. That is - Caminito in Buenos Aires! Caminito means "little alley" in Spanish, and it is located in the ghetto barrio La Boca. This traditional alley is a colorful street museum with great cultural significance.

今天我要带大家看看阿根廷首都布宜诺斯艾利斯的一条多彩街道 -- 卡米尼托（El Caminito），意思是“小通道”。这条街位于贫民区博卡区，以街道两边五颜六色的波纹铁皮和木板房而著称。

It's this place that inspired Juan de Dios Filiberto to compose the music for the famous tango "Caminito" in 1926. Thus it's claimed as the birthplace of Argentinean tango. Today, plenty restaurants and bars here offer tango and folk dance shows to visitors. Besides that, you can also watch visitors who dressed up to try out this famous dance on the street(see the picture below). Not at the same level of course, but you get the feel! ;)

Later in the evening we went to the traditional cafe - Cafe Tortoni to watch a tango show, which included several different performances. All of them were truly impressive - I should do a video post about this Argentinean gem someday(it will probably come to my mind again when there's a contest themed DANCE...).

Juan's relative, the local artist Benito Quinquela Martín also used the buildings as his canvas to create paintings. Nowadays, more vivid and vibrant artworks by local artists have incorporated as part of the Caminito.

这个街头博物馆和传统胡同因为其多重文化内涵，在布宜诺斯艾利斯的历史上和当今时代都具有重要意义。因为这块地区激发了诗人胡安·迪奥斯·菲利·贝托的灵感，从而于1926年创作出著名的探戈舞曲 -- “卡米尼托”。所以这里也被认为是阿根廷探戈的发源地。

历史上由于这里靠近港口，渐渐聚集了多家为船员服务的餐馆、酒吧、旅馆、色情服务场所。如今街道两旁的色情服务场所变为鳞次栉比的画廊、纪念品小店等。而且几乎每家餐吧门前都有探戈表演，我也在路过时简略地看了个大概。

当天晚上我们又专门去市内的Cafe Tortoni观看了整场精彩的表演，这家历史悠久的传统餐厅名气很大，带有舞台剧场，具体细节我以后会写到（估计如果将来我看到个跟“舞蹈”有关的竞赛活动，我这健忘的脑子会再度想起这一茬儿）。总之非常受震撼，阿根廷的探戈果然名不虚传！

At the end of the 19th century, around 3 million Italian (another 3 millions from other countries) immigrants arrived in Argentina, among them a significant number came from Genoa. Most of the Genoese immigrants stayed in this port area (La Boca) in Buenos Aires. So the exciting new life began!

But with all these immigrants pouring in, there weren’t enough homes for everyone. To solve this problem, their traditional housing - Conventillos came to the rescue. These communal buildings had only one street entrance opening onto a patio interior that accessed a few tiny rooms. And the immigrants had to build many of their dwellings on raised foundations or piles due to frequent flooding. Imagine how crowded and hard it was to live in that environment!

To build their Conventillos, these poor new residents went to the docks/shipyards to collect thin corrugated sheet metal and wooden planks. And the materials were painted with the leftover paint used for the ships. As a result, the houses became a colorful patchwork when they didn't have enough paint of the same color to cover an entire house. That's the first version of these colorful houses in Caminito.

Later in 1950s, some locals, including the above-mentioned Argentinean painter, Benito Quinquela Martín, restored this neighborhood, with Benito's initiative of painting the houses in more bold colors. In 1959, the government built a street museum with the name given by the well-known song "Caminito".

19世纪末期，约有3百万意大利移民涌入阿根廷（还有另外3百万来自欧洲其他国家），其中大部分来自热那亚。这些热那亚人聚居在布宜诺斯艾利斯的港口区（博卡区）。充满希望的新生活就要开始了！兴奋！激动！然而人多地少，这么多人怎么住得下？于是他们便着手建造了来自家乡的传统民宅Conventillos，这种集体房屋含有多个小房间，可供大批人聚居，只有一个大门通向窄小的街道。而且为了防洪还要搭起高台。

刚到一块新大陆，怀揣满满的憧憬，但是一穷二白的现实生活显然没有那么容易。这些房子一般由廉价的木条和铁皮边角料建造，是从造船厂里捡拾而来。而粉刷墙面的也是造船厂里刷各色船只用剩的涂料，因为东拼西凑而来的涂料不够刷完整面墙壁，于是色彩各异的房屋外观雏形就诞生了。

到了上世纪50年代，在博卡区出生的著名艺术家贝尼托 · 金克拉 · 马丁（他也是探戈诗人胡安的亲戚）带领一些当地人在原先建筑的基础上进行改进，提倡用更大胆的色彩来装饰外墙。他还以这一区域作为灵感来源，创作出许多绘画作品。他不仅在废弃街道的墙上做画，还搭建了一块跳探戈的临时舞台。1959年，当地政府把这块街区建成了街道博物馆，以胡安那首著名的探戈舞曲 -- “卡米尼托”为街道命名。

这里也随之涌现出大批模仿贝尼托风格的画家，建立艺术工作室，展示出售自己的作品。各种画廊、街头即兴创作给这里增添了更浓厚的艺术氛围，也给我们这些游客购买纪念品提供了各种多姿多彩的创意选择。

Caminito reminds me of many other places in Latin America which boast colorful architectures and decorations. You may think it's too dramatic or effusive if you see this flow of colors on some other continents, but here, it just works. You feel the wild imagination and vibrant vitality, and it's contagious, well, at least to me. I was strolling in this bright-colored neighborhood with a cheerful mood. =)

Though this cultural site is more of a tourist attraction now, let’s not forget that this neighborhood used to be built from scratch by the poor immigrants, and it housed a whole community's hopes and dreams.

写到这里，我联想到拉丁美洲很多地方的建筑、装饰色彩都是如此浓烈鲜艳，如果放在别的大陆，比如以性冷淡风格著称的北欧和日本，你可能会觉得有点恶俗，但是在这里，这一切仿佛都找到了自己的归宿，和谐地向路人展示着肆意奔放的生命力和想象力。而且，身处其中的你会自然而然地被这份狂野的美所感染。好吧，至少我是被感染了，走在这些多彩的街巷，心情也是格外缤纷。

虽然这块街区现在是个文化遗址和旅游景点，但不要忘记它曾经是大批穷困的新移民亲手建造的家园，是一个群体共同的希望和梦想之地。