Argentina
Los Argentinos decienden de los Barcos. The Argentines descended from the boats. A country of immigrants, Argentines speak Spanish, their food and culture is influenced by Italy, the country name has its roots in the French or Italian word “silver,” even though silver is not a major resource, and Jewish and Welsh immigrants are part of the country’s mix. There are about 35 indigenous groups, most intermingled in the European melting pot as Mestizos. Spanning roughly the equivalent distance of Calgary, Canada to Mexico City, Argentina is a country with almost every imaginable landscape: brilliantly colored hills, towering jagged peaks, jungles, waterfalls, palm trees, lakes, deserts, cacti, beaches, cities, cattle ranches, red rocks, fields, vineyards, calving glaciers, whales, nesting penguins. Ice, sand, ocean, lake, salt, river, desert, tundra, mountain. Everything in one politically erratic country.
My son spent nearly two years in its capital, the second largest city in South America and one of the top 20 in the world, Buenos Aires, which has a distinctive international flair. Early in his time there, my son emailed that it was like Paris and New York had a baby and moved to Houston.
The people are passionate and given to revolution. Family is most important to Argentines and in spite of economic difficulty and a great divide between wealthy and poor, they are generous with what they have. If they don’t feel like doing it, they don’t do it: eso me da fiaca. When they do, there is no half way.
Caudillo, strongman leader Juan Perón first became president in 1946 and the impact of his leadership carried into the 21st century through a political phenomenon called “Peronism” with proponents both on the left and the right.
His second wife was Evita, the nickname of Eva Perón, First Lady of Argentina, who championed labor and voting rights until her death from cancer in 1952. A musical and a movie were made about her life, both called Evita. Another movie about Eva Perón’s life tells the story from the Argentine perspective, digging deeper into the politics of the time.
In 1955, Perón was exiled to Spain when the government was overthrown, however, Peronism continued. He returned from exile in 1973 to serve as president once again, his wife at the time was vice president and took over when he died only to be overthrown, which ushered in an era of military dictatorship and state terrorism.
From 1976-1983, fear-driven politics led to the disappearance of at least 30,000 people suspected of opposing the ruling dictatorship. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo is a movement created by mothers seeking their disappeared children. Their symbol, a white scarf, is painted on the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires.
One of the country’s most famous mythic revolutionaries was Ché Guevara, a Marxist acolyte born in Rosario, Argentina who, heart-broken by human suffering, spent his life looking for a fight while traveling the world to consult with every political leader and powerful writer he could. He fought as a revolutionary with Fidel Castro in Cuba in 1955, in the Congo briefly in 1965, and again in Bolivia in 1967 where he was executed. He left behind the travel diary he wrote at age 23: The Motorcycle Diaries: Notes on a Latin American Journey.
The symbol of all that is noble, brave and generous in Argentina is the Gaucho: a rural rancher, brave and unruly, a skillful horseman. In the late 1800s, Juan Manuel de Rosas was the quintessential gaucho; he could throw his hat on the ground and scoop it up while galloping his horse without touching the saddle with his hand.
In the late nineteenth century, La Literatura Gauchesca brought the language of the gaucho to the forefront. One of the great works of this era is El Gaucho Martín Fierro by José Hernández in 1872. Follow the link in the title to read the epic poem. Read it in English at Martín Fierro The Gaucho. It begins:
Here I come to sing
To the beat of my guitar;
Because a man who is kept from sleep
By an uncommon sorrow
Comforts himself with singing,
Like a solitary bird.
For magical realistic journeys through labyrinths, mirrors, libraries, and dreams, read the short stories and essays of one of the world’s great writers, Jorge Luis Borges. Born in Buenos Aires in 1899, his best known works are Ficciones (1944) and El Aleph (1949). English language readers can find many of his works under the title Labyrinths. Select the story titles to get a taste of the Borges universe: The Garden of Forking Paths and The Circular Ruins dedicated to Victoria Ocampo.
There is a Labertino de Borges (Borges Memorial Maze) at Finca Los Alamos in San Rafael, Argentina that spells Borges forward and mirror image in a sculptured shrubbery maze you can walk. Remember to always turn left.
Writer Victoria Ocampo published the work of Borges and other writers in her literary magazine, Sur. Borges called her la mujer más argentina and she did a great deal to further the careers of many Argentine writers.
Another major figure in Argentine literature is Julio Cortázar, who was born in Brussels in 1914, but grew up in Argentina. His novel Hopscotch jumps around to various chapters in different possible sequences with multiple endings in a mental and physical reading maze. The novel also reflects the relationship between Buenos Aires and Paris. Considered a master of the craft, one of Cortázar’s short stories was made into a film in the 1960s with the English title Blow Up. Select the title to read Cortázar’s The Night Face Up.
Emerging from the barrios de barcos of the Rio de la Plata in Buenos Aires, tango is a style of music and dance made popular by Argentine singer Carlos Gardel in the 1930s. For more about his story, choose the link on his name and also read Steve Huey’s biography at AllMusic. Argentine composer Astor Piazzolla brought the tango to the concert stage and is revered in the music world. Cellist Yo Yo Ma made recordings of Piazzolla’s works. Listen to Piazzolla’s haunting and beautiful Oblivion played by violinist Zachary Spontak, violin and Juliana Osinchuk, piano:
A characteristic instrument of tango music is the bandoneón, which sounds a bit like an accordion and is a small-buttoned concertina. Choose the name of the instrument to read more about it and watch the very interesting video of Astor Piazzolla talking about how to play the bandoneón ending in a performance of his jazz composition Zero Hour. Fascinating!
Argentine folk music is called folklórica or folklore. The group Los Chalchaleros from Salta is among the most well-known. Choose the name to hear and see the Chacarera, a typical piece of folklórica.
My son reports that the importance of mate to the average Argentine cannot be overstated. He’s seen motorcyclists drinking mate while driving. Yerba Mate is a kind of herb tea that is typically drunk from a gourd-like vessel with a metal straw.
Argentine food is influenced by Italy and cattle. People gather frequently to have an asado, a barbecue where meats are grilled over live coals. Beef and chorizo are common meats to cook on the parrilla, an iron BBQ grill. Brocheta, a skewer kebob of grilled meat and vegetables, is also common.
Milanesa is thin breaded meat covered in salsas or mayonnaise.
Povoleta is a grilled cheese dish.
Empanadas are fried or baked bread dough stuffed with meat
Choripan is a sausage in a bread bun topped with salsa or Argentina’s own chimichurri green sauce made with garlic, herb and vinegar.
Dulce de leche and Alfajore cookies are common desserts.
Pato, meaning “duck” in Spanish, is Argentina’s official national sport, and much like ancient sports in central Asia, Pato involves riding on horseback and getting a live duck to a goal. Modern versions of the game substitute a ball for the duck and the game resembles polo.
The national sport that glues the nation to stadiums and TV screens is Football (aka soccer). The country’s national team is one of the top in the world. Diego Maradona is a past hero of the sport. Many consider Argentine Lionel Messi to be the current best player in the world.
Jorge Mario Bergoglio from Buenos Aires became Pope Francis of the Catholic Church in 2013.
Following is a walk through the regions of enormous and diverse Argentina along with highlights and links to find out more:
NORTHEAST (Mesopotamia or Littoral Region) tropical jungle
Iguazú Falls, on the border with Brazil, the largest waterfall in the world, a system of about 270 waterfalls
NORTH CENTRAL
Gran Chaco or Chaco Plain, semi-arid
NORTHWEST
Cerro de los Siete Colores (Hill of the Seven Colors) in Purmamarca (purma:desert, marca:city in Aymara language)
Salinas Grandes, large white salt flat 65 km west of Purmamarca
Salta, colonial churches, Tren a las Nubes (train into the clouds)
Salar de Arizaro, large salt flat between Tolar Grande and Caipe with a sandstone pyramid: Cono de Arita
Puna de Atacama, pumice fields
Los Cardones National Park scenic rock formations and giant cacti, near Cachi
Cafayte, Spanish colonial town
Quebrada de las Conchas
MOUNTAIN VINEYARDS (Cuyo Region)
Mendoza, vineyards, Estancia Los Alamos creates Malbec wine
Finca Los Alamos with Labertino de Borges (Borges labyrinth)
BUENOS AIRES
Plaza de Mayo
Pirámide de Mayo, oldest national monument in the city
Casa Rosada or Pink House: the executive mansion and office of the President of Argentina
Palcio San Martín
Calle Florida: popular pedestrian shopping street, historic from 1580
Teatro Colón: opened 1908, designed by an Italian architect, acoustically one of the five best concert venues in the world and one of the top ten opera houses in the world, enormous chandelier, perhaps the largest in the world, with 700 light bulbs
Museo Nationale Bellas des Artes
La Recoleta Cemetary
THE PAMPAS (from Quecha word meaning “flat surface”) grasslands
Córdoba, second largest city, industrial hub
Rosario, the third largest city
Mar del Plata, beaches
PATAGONIA: THE LAKE DISTRICT
Bariloche, on the shore of Nahuel Huapi Lake, Bariloche means “people from behind the mountain”
Nahuel Huapi National Park, oldest national park in Argentina surrounds Nahuel Huapi Lake
Villa el Chocón, dinosaur fossils, fossil footprints
Cueva de las manos, cave with ochre-ink art hand prints made by Toldense people about 9,000 years ago
PATAGONIA: ATLANTIC COAST
Peninsula Valdes, Whales and penguins (Sept-Mar, best Dec-Jan)
Gaiman, Welsh community: Y Wladfa Gymreig, Welsh tearooms
Punta Tombo, one of the largest magellanic penguin colonies in the world (Sept-Mar, best Dec-Jan)
PATAGONIA: GLACIERS
Los Glaciaras National Park
Glacier Perito Moreno, continuing to expand
Monte Fitz Roy
El Calafate
TIERRA DEL FUEGO (named Fireland by Magellan because he saw locals lighting fires)
Ushuaia, mountain fjord town, fin del mundo
FALKLAND ISLANDS (Islas Malvinas)
Argentina and the United Kingdom dispute sovereignty over the islands the Argentines call Islas Malvinas in the southern Atlantic. A war in 1982 did not resolve the matter, however, most of the islands’ residents are of British descent and the official language is English. The islands are self-governing with Stanley as its capital. The land area is 4,700 square miles (12,000 square kilometers) and includes two main islands and 776 small islands. There are roughly 50 settlements.
ARGENTINE ANTARCTICA
José María Sobral was the first Argentine to arrive at Antarctica in 1902. Roughly 564,326 square miles (1,461,597 kilometers) belongs to Argentina, about two thirds of that area is land. Argentina has thirteen stations in Antarctica, six permanent and seven summer only. As of 2010, there were 230 inhabitants at the six permanent bases.
