"Como si fuera Gardel"

Here's a little taste of Argentine culture. The big tango legend in this town is/was a guy named Carlos Gardel (who died in a plane crash in Colombia in 1935)... he's part of the general lexicon now. If someone is asked how they're doing and you hear "it's as if I were Gardel", it's basically like saying that they're the king of the world and couldn't be doing any better.

A few weeks ago, by happenstance, I had the odd experience of being at his grave in Chacarita cemetery on the 72nd anniversary of his death. It's really funny... in Argentina they celebrate the DEATH of someone, instead of their birth. When I tell them that, as a foreigner, celebrating the death of someone ("and good riddance to you!") instead of their birth is really funny to me, they usually don't get the concept. Ah well, chalk it up to cultural differences and what not. Kinda like in the summer, when all the pregnant women walk around here bare-bellied in half shirts... now THAT'S funny.


Anyway, it was humorous watching all the Gardel fans at the tomb. They played/danced a bunch of tangos and there was a guy on top of the statue maintaining "the eternal flame", aka a continuously lit cigarrette in the fingers of the statue. Apparently ol' Carlos was quite the chain smoker and if the plane crash didn't get him, the cigarrettes would have. Somewhere out there, I know an MSG-phobic, health food nut that could learn a lesson here... no matter how often you eat at Whole Foods, the plane crash might take you out instead!

But after leaving this little gathering and walking through the cemetery, I noticed a bunch of little green parrots all over the place (about 3x the size of parakeets). The locals call them "loros", which I always thought was your standard Polly-want-a-cracker macaw parrot. Well, this lady in her mid-70s notices me watching the parrots and launches into a story about her youth in Madrid. The good news is that I understood it. The bad news is that I understood it... it was exceedly long and lacked anything resembling a point.


The gist of it was how she enjoyed all the "gaviotas" (seagulls) in Madrid just like here... although she kept pointing at the LOROS. I became fixated on the fact that maybe I didn't understand which bird was called which name until finally, at the end of her lonnnnggggggggggggg story, I asked her "but aren't these birds called loros"?? She just shrugged her shoulders and responded "who knows? birds are birds." Anyway, it was sorta funny. Pointless but funny.


In conclusion, here's a great little place to crack open the books when it's warm... the Plaza de Mayo. Many a revolution (and tyranical dictatorship) began here. Also, it was here that Madonna besmirched an entire nation, and the cinematic world in general, with that horrible movie "Evita" whilst singing "Don't cry for me Argentina" from the Casa Rosada in this plaza.