I was in Prague over the summer when Germany won the World Cup. In Riegrovy Sady (a park in the eastern part of the city) a bunch of beer & food stands had set up around a bunch of projection screens and TVs to watch the championship game. Earlier that day, I'd flown into the Czech Republic via Frankfurt; while in the airport there I picked up a Deutschland national team jersey. I've liked the team since 2006, granted in the most poseurific way possible, but still, call me a fan.

As I'm posted up in this park sporting my real-deal Germany jersey, surrounded by legit Germans, an Argentinian feller in a Messi jersey approached me and asked where I was from. Apparently despite the fact that I was there solo and not opening my mouth to speak any English or order three beers, he spotted an imposter.

I was informed that this was not just Germany vs. Argentina, this was Europe vs. the Americas. I was letting my fellow post-colonials down with my soccer jersey. Germany won in the end, but I ambled back to my hotel with a sense that I was no-man, my allegiance granted to no country, no greater movement, no shared history. Having obliterated my association with pan-America and unable to be claimed European, I was nothing.

A month later, I was in Buenos Aires. I was on a business trip, sure, but in a deeper sense I was on a sort of American urban walkabout. Truthfully, I've always loved my time in Latin America. The cities I've been to are typically unremarkable in terms of sightseeing or those hallmarks of hipster dipshit culture that I can so easily seek out in North America and Europe - cafes, dive bars, live music, what-have-you. The appeal of Latin America for me is how proud people are of their country and culture and the lengths to which their hospitality will extend to share it with you. Urban life down there otherwise doesn't do much for me.

Buenos Aires is a different story. My hotel was in Palermo Soho, a really cool and walkable neighborhood with tons of great restaurants, bars, cafes, and boutique clothing stores. It may be the most impressively cosmopolitan area I've seen in any city. Other than a requisite visit to Colonia in Uruguay as well as a few hours in Recoleta, I didn't stray from Palermo. Highlights:

- Best steaks of my life at La Cabrera and Cabana Las Lilas (the latter is in Puerto Madero, a 20 minute cab ride from Palermo). I'm not really a steakhouse person - it's just an overpriced piece of meat, which I usually find to be uninteresting and a little pretentious - but these were fantastic.

- Nicky's New York Sushi has excellent sushi and a 1920's-New-York-style speakeasy in the back. Just ask your waiter to see it and you shouldn't have a problem getting in. Get a negroni.

- Burger Joint has really excellent burgers and is insanely popular with the young'ns.

- Angelin is a dive-y pizza place that is quite on-point and a local hit. I think being from Providence gives me enough credibility to make that statement meaningful.

- I sat for a bit in LatteNte on a Sunday afternoon with a latte and a book and it was sublime.

- Magdalena's Party is a nice gringo bar worth checking out for brunch and drink specials (I went with 2x fernet and coke).

- The Ateneo bookstore in Recoleta is in a converted theater with four floors to peruse. It's an incredibly impressive place, but I ended up buying a book on Argentinian history from Libros del Pasaje in Parlermo, though, because they had an English translation.

Also, while I was in Colonia, I stopped in at Buen Suspiro, a wine shop and restaurant with a terrace that I sat in for awhile reading a book with a glass of malbec and a cheese plate in beautiful weather, and it was what I wish life was always.

I've never been so caught up in a neighborhood like I was with Palermo. Buenos Aires reestablished my seemingly lost American identity and has undoubtedly become my favorite city in Latin America and one of the best I've ever been to. Buenos Aires out-Europe'ed Europe. Hopefully that says more than a jersey ever could.