Photos by Sol Castro and Marc Van der Aa, text by Fernando Cwilich Gil.


To create a remarkable pool of talent on a societal level, you need a comprehensive youth system. This is true in ballet; ergo the Russian dominance in classical dance. The same applies to football, thus the heralded Dutch system’s factory of young talent. The Chinese thrive in Mathematics not by chance – but by systematic design. Exceptional individuals are not exempt from this law: Los Beatles proved it, Bill Gates owes his empire to this very notion. Malcolm Gladwell dixit: you need 10,000 hours of arduous training to get from nothing to un grande de verdad.

Now let’s forget about work for a moment. Have a drink.

Consider this: What if those 10,000 hours of training weren’t spent huddled in a Beijing classroom absorbing algorithms, but in a Palermo nightclub learning the intricacies of going out.

Buenos Aires has a youth system for nightlife, and it produces phenomenal results. For the young Argentine, “Vamos a bailar” is as de rigueur as “vamos a la escuela.” As a preteen, one is groomed in the decorum, the nuance, the look, the tricks, the essence of going out. It’s called the matinee. Many clubs in Buenos Aires offer it. A sort of early bird kids menu for partying, sans booze.

The end result is a class of defacto nightlife professionals, a mass of experts versed in the finer points of nocturnal interaction. This collective ability, in turn, creates a pretty remarkable scene. A dynamic ecosystem of packed, sweaty, glorious boliches inhabited by highly-skilled club-savvy porteños. This is why the Buenos Aires night is what it is. This is science, pure and simple - with a healthy splash of Ferné.

Of course, one can debate the merits of a society that trains its citizens to go out on the town from an early age, as opposed to say, accounting or engineering. But debating is a sucker's con. It's 2 a.m., you've eaten dinner, taken your disco nap, showered, and your friends are waiting downstairs. Vamos a bailar.