Rosario: ALL U CAN EAT

I took a day trip to Rosario with Graciela a few weeks ago, just to get out of Buenos Aires. My impression of the city was that it was beautiful and I wish I could've spent more time there under different circumstances. I bussed it up there with Graciela and her ladies group, and spent the better part of the day being pushed around by old people in a casino. Part of our ticket ($100 pesos) included a buffet lunch at Argentina's biggest casino, which was a weird place: hundreds of flashing machines, tables of craps and roulette, and a horrible sense that the whole operation was run by dirty government money. We met up with Graciela's daughter Marisol and her husband and baby son, and after cleverly stealing a few meal vouchers (the Porteña way-both of us went back through the line in disguises and grabbed a few for Marisol and Juan Manuel), the four of us tucked into a huge meal that included pasta, asado, salads, meat&cheese, desserts galore and bubbling cauldrons of what was called "ethnic food." So basically I lapsed into a meat coma just as we broke from the group, crammed ourselves into JM's tiny car, and took a city tour through downtown Rosario. Everything was so clean and white and beautiful, especially Boulevard Oroño. We stopped at a cafe right by the Monumento a la Bandera, which is really an impressive tribute to the Argentinean flag, and spent the afternoon drinking coffee and brandy and watching the Rosario Central game, and sweating because it was so hot. We went back to the Casino, loaded ourselves on the bus for another tour of Rosario, back through DT and to the Monumento to check out the nighttime lights and the eternal flame, and walk around the Cathedral. We drove around a bit before heading back to BsAs. Graciela's invited me to go on a similar trip with her to Cordoba...um, as long as there's a buffet included?