Donde esta el pato?

I'm now pleased to welcome a special guest blogger, my brother James, to tell the story of when we tried to watch Pato in Argentina. I can't really add much to this. Enjoy.

- Patrick

How to Almost See a Game of Pato

I highly recommend making an effort to see some pato while you're in Argentina. It's a unique experience and not completely un-fun. So do some research and plan a day around it. And visualize success. For the month or so before your trip, just think about how fantastic it will be, and play out the events in your head. That will give full effect to the let-down of not seeing any pato, and you won't want to miss out on that.

The sport of pato (horse-ball) is not the national pastime of Argentina despite what certain websites dedicated to the sport would have you believe. At least not near Buenos Aires. I say this because only a few people we asked had even a vague idea of what we were talking about, let alone where we could find a game, and that's assuming they knew we were referring to a sport and not a small animal (pato means "duck" in Spanish). Although we're pretty sure we came very close to the pato grounds, and an online schedule indicated that a tournament was going on the day we were there, we never actually saw a game, and thus sadly never experienced the thrill of live pato action. Here are some excerpts to give you an idea of what we missed:

The curious sport of pato can perhaps be described as a cross between polo and basketball. Originally a duck was used instead of a ball, and the sport basically consisted of two teams of men on horseback doing whatever they could to get the poor animal back to their "goal." Without much in the way of rules, the whole affair often descended into violence. Banned repeatedly by the authorities, it finally won respectability in the 1930s when some rules were thrashed out, and modern pato emerged.

…the ancient game’s practices consisted of throwing a duck upwards and two teams of horse riders got trampled under foot while fighting to grab the duck and place it in a net.

So you can see why we wanted so badly to see a game, and why we were so disappointed when we didn’t. In any case, it was a fun experience, so for future interested travelers, here's how to almost see a game of pato (we think).

There supposedly are pato grounds at or near a military complex called Campo de Mayo, which is located about 30km west and a bit north of downtown Buenos Aires. To get there, some guidebooks recommend taking a taxi, but we were able to get there in about an hour by taking one of the subway lines to the end and then Urquiza line almost to the end, to the "Campo de Mayo" station. If you choose this route, when leaving the station, continue in the direction of the train for half a block or so and then turn right and walk a short distance to the entrance of a sporting complex. If there are some guys hanging out by the entrance, talk to them in awkward conversational Spanish. Try to use the words "estadio", "pato", and "juego" in some semi-coherent way. If you are lucky, one of them will hear you correctly enough to know that you are in the wrong place and give you some long-winded directions for how to get where they think you want to be. Go there. It's about one station back in the direction you came on the Urquiza line.

Here you will find a bridge over the train tracks. Look for a large sign saying "Estadio de pato" that is bent and has come loose from it moorings. This will give you no indication of which direction to go. But you might as well take a picture of it, because that may be the closest you'll come to evidence that you tried to see a pato match in Argentina. Across the bridge, you will find the entrance to some type of military complex. Meander slowly towards it with a bit of a confused but hopeful expression on your face. The guard may stare you down. Put together another question-like phrase using the keywords mentioned earlier. He probably will have no clue what you are talking about and may think that you lost your duck. He will probably point you to the head guard booth just to the right, mostly to wipe his hands clean of the situation as soon as possible. Approach this booth, and knock gently but purposefully on the door. When the head guard opens the door, you know what to do. You should be getting good at this by now. This will likely be the most knowledgeable person on the sport of pato that you will talk to on the trip. He will vaguely know that a sport with that name does exist, and that it is played nearby. Focus on the ensuing response with absolutely 100% concentration. The stakes are high. If you are to have any chance of ever seeing a game a pato, you will need to understand at least the gist of what this guy is saying. So focus on all that Spanish floating around your head, whether it's from high-school classes, or a week and a half of listening to language lessons in your car and watching Los Simpsons episodes before the trip. In our case, we are pretty sure he said something resembling, "Si, [pato] esta aqui, pero no hoy." In other words, nice try fellas, but you ain't seein' no pato today...consider this an end to your journey. Come back and try again in 10 years.

If this happens to you, you will probably feel a mix of emotions relating to the anti-climacticness of the moment. You will want to at least get a glimpse of the field. A picture of that that weird little round thing that the duck goes through represents the ceiling of joy and fulfillment that you can hope for at this point, especially if you missed taking a picture of the broken sign. So go ahead and take a walk through the complex. It will make you feel 5% better. It will. If you go all the way to the back of the complex, you may find a guard with a gun standing near the entrance to an area that you can just barely see through line of trees. Approach him confidently. If you are like me at this point in the trip, you would take a bullet for a small chance at seeing an empty pato field. Rattle off one of your trusty lost-duck questions just for fun. Even though he is a guard in the only facility to feature pato games in the greater Buenos Aires area, he is very unlikely to have ever heard of the sport. As you start to head back, take a look back through the trees at the area he is guarding. It’s just a run-of-the-mill, overgrown and irregular-shaped field. Who knows what goes on there, but definitely not pato. That's ok though. Start up a game in your head. Imagine a team of highly-skilled horseman at full gallop, weaving through defenders and deftly passing the elusive duck, while guys are getting trampled under foot left and right. Put yourself in the action...he shoots, he scores!!! Savor the moment, because this is it. You're going home now and you've accomplished basically nothing today. On the way home, it is normal to feel deflated and extremely disappointed. When you get home, I recommend writing a long-winded, and hopefully semi-amusing story about the experience, just so you can feel like something positive, however small, came out of the whole thing.