Cordoba, Argentina

This second largest city in Argentina is a university town and center of a large agricultural area. It is not a tourist destination except for Argentines, however, we would have not missed our time there!

Cordoba was founded by the Spanish in 1573, and soon became a center of commerce. The Society of Jesus (Jesuits) settled there and founded 5 estancias (large, self-sustaining communities) in the surrounding countryside as well as a university in the city center.

Today, there are 120,000 students attending the public university in Cordoba - college is free for anyone with a solid command of Spanish. Along with the public university there are 6 other colleges in Cordoba.

We stayed near the colonial city center. The first morning we took a walk which took us to the Capuchin church and two museums ending at a large city park. The church was beautiful and one spire is unfinished, on purpose, so as to acknowledge that man is not perfect.

There was a beautiful art museum in an old mansion near the park which featured the work of artists from Cordoba. Many of the artists studied with the impressionists in Europe and their work shows that influence. A former women's prison was turned into an exhibit space along with several restaurants. There was an exhibit of Tango art on display the day we were there.

The streets are tree lined and the town bustles with young people. We enjoyed the energy and people watching.

We took two tours over two days, both very informative and enjoyable. The first, a city bus tour with about 20 people was bilingual (we were the only ones om the US), and gave us a 4 hour overview of the city, parks, university. It ended at the Jesuit Block where the original church and library are being restored. One room in particular was fascinating -- when a student was ready to graduate, he stood and was grilled (oral examination) by all his professors. His family was usually in attendance, along with friends, so you can imagine the pressure. After the test, the student left the room and the dozen professors determined if he had passed. One professor was then designated to meet with the student afterward. If the word "Doctor" was included in the conversation the student knew he had passed. If the word "Doctor" was absent from the conversation, it was back to the books for another year!

The library had beautiful old books including 14 volumes which contained the Bible in 7 different languages including Samarian!

We found a good restaurant for dinner (we eat much earlier than the Cordobans) that we enjoyed so much we went back the a second night. Great pasta! Unfortunately, we walked past lots of bakeries - the Argentines love their pastry and there is even a national cookie - the alfajor. We both tried as many as we could -- all were too delicious.

The next day we had a private guide, Steven, who really brought the Cordoban experience to life. We visited Alta Gracia, a charming small city about 25 KM from Cordoba, and toured the Jesuit extancia there. Each estancia had a special purpose which they shared with the others -- in this case it was blacksmithing.

In the Museum there was an eerie art installation, showing clear plastic "ghosts" of the black slaves who were brought from Africa and did much of the labor on the estancias. The Jesuits took a radical stand and insisted that these black Africans and the local indiginous people had souls and this caused a great deal of unrest, resulting in their expulsion from Spanish America for over 100 years.

The church is still in use and we were impressed with the ingeniousness of these priests (only 3 priests were actually on the Alta Gracia estancia) in developing a self-sustaining community in this strange land.

After the estancia, we went to the Che Gueverra museum...kind of a surprise as we would not have put it on our list, but Stephen felt we should see it. It was Che's childhood home - his parents moved him to Alta Gracia for the climate as he was asthmatic. We saw a very interesting film about his life, fleshing out the person that in our understanding was simply a terrorist. He became radicalized during his famous motorcycle trip through South America. Originally many of his causes were just but in the end he truly did become a terrorist for whatever cause took his fancy. His famous motorcycle was on display.

One thing we noticed about museums in Argentina was the lack of gift shops -- souvenirs were not a focus. Kind of nice.

After Che we headed to a quaint residential neighborhood and the home of Manuel de Falla, a classical composer who studied with Debussy and lived in Spain before moving to Alta Gracia for the climate, as he had TB. The home was charming and on display were handwritten original scores as well as household items. Sr. de Falla took a vow of poverty and chastity and was cared for by his sister until he died at the age of 84. After his death, the sister also in her 80's entered a convent as she had always wanted to be a nun. We were able to buy a CD of his work...beautiful music.

We passed the Alta Gracia golf club - a manicured 9 hole course (the second oldest in Argentina) and home to the best restaurant in Alta Gracia.

So, in the three days we spent there we experienced a great deal. We truly enjoyed our time there...we knew it would be interesting but didn't have any real idea of how interesting and charming it truly was. It was really the surprise of our trip.