The Recoleta cemetery is one of Buenos Aires’ big attractions and we can understand . The place is large. About 12 hectares and it is crammed full of private mausoleums. We joined an American mother and daughter and engaged an English tour guide on a ‘pay what you think is fair’ basis. He had been married to an Argentinian and has lived in Argentina for 20 years. He really knew his stuff and was very interesting. He looked pretty sick though and was cold to the bone by the time we finished. I’d guess some type of liver disease. Anyway, the place was first established when the original order of monks got pushed out and replaced by a convent. The vacant vege gardens were turned into the first public cemetery. The mausoleums go down metres into the ground and families pay a reasonably substantial monthly rental. People still get added to the family crypts today but there are many that have fallen into disrepair and there is no one to charge for upkeep or any way to sell them.
Most are marble and have several floors above and below ground. Many are adorned with beautiful sculptures of all types and styles. The grave of Eva Peron is quite underwhelming compared to many. Very sad actually. When repatriated to Argentina she was claimed by the family of her illegitimate father. They didn’t want anything to do with her until she was famous. Her former husband is buried outside the city but the families and man that were responsible for kidnapping her body in the first place (she was whisked off to France and hidden ) are all buried nearby at Ricoleta.
There are cats everywhere and they are pretty healthy looking. They get fed each day and seem to live in and around the crypts.
Although originally a catholic cemetery it is now multi denominational and our guide was able to point out the signs for Masonic ones – with a slanted cross or a pyramid or 5 pointed star. Many of the tombs had personal stories to the incumbents and it was all quite fascinating.
The tour took about an hour by which time it was cold and starting to drizzle so we hailed a taxi out on the main avenue. Little did we know that our driver was a complete lunatic. It is impossible to describe his driving without sounding like exaggeration. Think – a ‘Jason Bourne’ movie and you are about there. He was overtaking on double yellow lines in rush hour traffic and would scream along between lights at 80 – 100km/hour for a distance of about 400m. We think he was trying to scare us so we’d say something but we were determined not to. We were both a bit worried that might make him worse actually. We have looked closely at all other drivers and have travelled in a number of taxis and have never seen anything like it from another driver. Because of the traffic he didn’t end up any faster than if he just drove normally. Jen wondered if it was something to do with the meter but that stops when the car stops so he just ended up screaming along and then stopped at lights. I lost count of the number of pedestrians that we nearly cleaned out.
It was a relief to get back to the hotel and we both had an hour long rest before our next adventure – the tango show.