Buenos Aires, Argentina
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
I awake to a city that is alive. My first view of the real BA. I wander around the Recoleta Cemetery. Amazingly elaborate tombs. Eva Peron's is the most popular but pretty plain. The oldest go back to mid-1800s but the most interesting are early 1900s. Each is very different. Most are meant for general viewing on the inside with glass doors or windows. Some are immaculate. Others, even some of the most elaborate, are falling apart. It is clear that responsibility for upkeep falls to the family. Half of the tombs were falling apart with many years of neglect. Glass windows and roofs were broken. Inside coffin lids were separated from the coffins, concrete from the ceilings were all over the floor ... I expected to see bodies hanging out but, fortunately, did not. The other half were immaculate.
