Recoleta Cemetery
My family and I are staying in Buenos Aires for a week. From the first day we arrived, I knew I was going to love it.
We started with a walking tour — of a cemetery. The graveyard is called Recoleta Cemetery. You might know this name because this is where Eva (Duarte) Peron, the former First Lady of Argentina, is buried. Even though she is probably the most famous person buried there, she does not have the most interesting story.
One of the people with an interesting story is Liliana Crociati. She and her husband had just gotten married and they went on their honeymoon in the Swiss Alps. Sadly, there was an avalanche and more than half of the building they were staying in collapsed. Miraculously, her husband survived, but she did not. Her father decided to decorate her mausoleum like her bedroom and brought in all of her favorite things, including her dog! The dog is buried with Liliana, even thought it is illegal. There is a legend that if you rub the nose of the dog statue, it will bring you good luck. That’s why it’s still so shiny.
Another interesting story is the one of Salvador and Dona. The story goes that Salvador was very rich and his wife was determined to spend all his money. She was always off on shopping sprees. Eventually, he got sick of it, so he decided to put a full page ad in the newspaper. It basically said that if she comes to your store, she can’t buy anything because he wouldn’t pay for it. She was embarrassed and angry, and as a result, they didn’t speak to each other — for 21 years! Salvador passed away, but that wasn’t the end of their feud. They still share a mausoleum because it was already planned that way, but their statues (and their bodies) will forever be facing away from each other, because that is what Dona demanded.
The third story I found interesting was about Rufina Cambacérès. She had a condition called catatonic epilepsy. On her 19th birthday, her mom thought she died. She even confirmed with three doctors, who all agreed she was dead. She was buried in the cemetery. The guards at the cemetery heard weird noises that night, and Rufina’s parents wondered if her mausoleum was being robbed because she was buried with jewelry and expensive things. They went to the mausoleum and saw that the lid of her casket was slightly off from where it had been. When they opened the casket, they saw that she had bruises from her fingertips to her elbows, and noticed that there were scratch marks on the lid of the casket — on the inside! She had been buried alive!
There are over 4,000 mausoleums at Recoleta Cemetery, and probably even more interesting stories buried with them. EL FIN.
