De la vida cotidiana

There are a few very common words and phrases that have come to be my absolute favorites in all of the Spanish language simply because they are so heavily used by porteños, and used in the most porteño ways. Here are second runner-up, first runner-up, and first prize, respectively:

3) "Qué sé yo?"

2) "¡Miravos!"

and the best of them all,

1) "BUENO,...."

3) The first one people generally say to mean the equivalent of something like the English "Who knows?" or "What do I know?". The reason I like it is that when anyone around here says it (particularly my gloriously dramatic Urban Fictions class professor) it of course comes out as the Castellano Rioplatense "Qué sé sho?", and it's accompanied by exaggerated hand gestures, usually something along the lines of the waving or circling of the hand back and forth near the chin or neck, which I believe is generally (maybe?) associated with Italians, with a face that looks something like this:

2) "Ah, Miravos" is used as an expression of mild surprise, sort of along the lines of "Oh, well look at that!" or "You learn something new every day!" It usually comes with a nice interested nod of the head and a politely surprised look in the eyes, like this one:

1) Bueno, the word "bueno", basically the most versatile word, and my favorite, in the entire Spanish language, is used in similar contexts to those which use "well" or "so" or "ok" in English. It is appropriate at the beginning of almost every sentence you can possibly imagine, and it can be said nonchalantly, to fill a gap in conversation, with intentions which can be expressed using the face- "Bueno, que vamos a encontrar para hacer esta noche?" AKA "So, what are we going to do tonight?" (see photo 1), to show skepticism, or to indicate disapproval or criticism- "BUENO, que vamos a hacer con ese conjunto desastroso? ¡Por Dios!" AKA "Well, what in heaven's name are we going to do with that disastrous outfit?" (See photo 2). The word "bueno" is usually pronounced with heavy emphasis on the "BUEN" syllable, with the "o" sort of using the momentum of the first syllable to bounce down a fraction of a pitch lower. Like most of the daily discourse here, it comes out sounding very song-like. The only way I know to describe it is, again, Italian. Basically, think of the classic pronunciation of the Italian "Mama mia", apply the resulting inflection to the three phrases above, and there you have a fairly accurate representation of the sound of Spanish in Buenos Aires.