La Boca, a tourist area of Buenos Aires, was originally a largely Italian area of the city. It is on the mouth (boca) of a river which served as a port at one time. The ships would come in with wrinkled steel sheet for ballast which they needed to discard when they loaded with cargo. The Italian immigrants, who worked as dock workers, would buy the sheets and build homes from them. It was all they could afford. A typical house would be home to several families, pets and small livestock (chickens).
Many of these houses have now been painted and this area is an artist colony of sorts. Other than a few streets in the artist area, it is still a very poor area and a rough neighborhood.
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