Every year the people of Argentina celebrate el Dia de la Revolucion de Mayo or the Day of Revolution that falls on May 25. In fact, the whole week – May Week is celebrated to remember the week of May 18-25 in 1810 that lead to the revolution which helped achieve independence from Spanish rule. People throughout the country are celebrating in many ways including: marches, parades and concerts.

Yesterday, some of my classmates and I visited the Plaza de Mayo in the morning when we had some free time to see these marches, parades and concerts in action.

Some of us in Plaza de Mayo

Of course the first thing you notice is the amount of people that are gathered in this single Plaza. It is eleven some in the morning when we arrive and already there are thousands there. Then you notice what these people are wearing, saying, and carrying. This celebration involves a lot of politics – everyone is wearing wardrobe to represent their parties and balloons are up in the air displaying their messages and logos.

Balloons from various parties.

We are told later that only a fraction of the parties in Argentina are represented there even though it feels like very many. If you notice in the picture on the right their is a face. That is none other than their president Cristina Kirchner. Many of the political party posters contain the phrase “con Cristina” meaning they support the Kirchner administration. This is not so surprising since the president was to speak at 6:30pm that afternoon and many of her supporters were waiting to see her.

Kirchner’s face

One party I noticed that was particularly prominent at the Plaza with supporters young and old was Campora. This party is both Peronist and supporters of Kirchner. To provide an idea of the magnitude of Campora’s party size and the idea of how people were celebrating in other parties, I have included the following video:

Taking a slight break from the holiday action, our group visited Malba – a modern art museum. I have actually recently discovered a new appreciation for art and have been painting on canvas myself at home recently. However, this museum showed things I have never seen before in an art museum. On the first floor there was an exhibit of Latin American art from the 20th century, these pieces were interesting, colorful, and used many different mediums including paint, metals, and moving pieces.

A view paintings from the first exhibit

The other exhibit currently showing at Malba is called Infinite Experience. This exhibit had live works; for example, there was a woman who had words drawn on the wall behind her and she was speaking into a microphone. There was a man who had many wires connecting himself to an object suspended in air that moved when he moved. There was a man who walked around with a mask made of glowing lights that completely covered his face. There was a room covered in signatures where you could as yours too. Finally, there was a group of people who acted as a revolving door in a circular room to leave the exhibit into the hallway.

One piece in the exhibit – woman speaking into a microphone

Room with the signatures

As Yonni, Gabby and I walked downstairs to the main section we overheard a lot of noise generating outside of the museum. We left briefly to check it out and to our surprise a sea of red covered the middle of the streets. It turns out that the River Plate fans paraded in the street. Soccer here is no joke and the rivalry between River Plate and La Boca is substantial – bigger than OSU vs the team up north! These fans seemed to be walking by endlessly. After what seemed like 10 minutes of watching them walk by (and still missing some who walked by at the beginning), they had several buses packed like sardines bringing up the rear. Many of the fans had bottles in their hand that looked like coke but suspiciously had their labels removed and were most likely a combination of coke and fernet, their favorite local beverage (which I personally dislike a lot).

River Plate fans in the street

As if we hadn’t seen enough parading and chanting, after a brief stop at the hotel, some of us returned to the Plaza de Mayo. Concerts were going on from 4 until late to celebrate. At this point we are packed in tightly – tighter than in the morning. We had no hope seeing the stage or Cristina when she came out later, but we had a chance to listen and dance with the locals who also sang along. Below is a video of some music played from the stage in the morning. I never got a video from the afternoon, but this gives an idea of how it was setup.

Many would see the 25th of May in Argentina comparable to the 4th of July back in the United States. I had a great time seeing the Plaza in action and getting a better idea of their attitude towards politics. We are lucky to have the timing of this trip when we did so we could experience something integral to the Argentine history, and I only wish I had captured more of the experience to share with you all!

I had been looking forward to this event way back before we had even left for Argentina, and the trip did not disappoint! A brief history of gauchos and estancias in Buenos Aires began in the 17th century after cows had been found around the Pampas. These gauchos (not named until later) established estancias (large cattle ranches) there and became well known for being great horsemen. In the next century, the gauchos used the leftover cattle meat to eat and prepared it over fire in a way that is now known as asado.

After a quick breakfast at the hotel, the group hopped in the charter bus and, much to our tour guide Adriana’s dismay, slept for the whole hour and a half ride to the estancia Santa Susana located North of Retiro. However, as soon as we arrive we are awake and luckily greeted with empanadas and either white wine, red wine, or orange juice. (While I was eyeing the wine, I stuck with the OJ and it tasted just like Sunny-D.) We were given a brief tour of the house located on the estancia. The house had colonial style architecture on the outside, but was filled with many pieces of furniture, toys, and pictures from many decades seen around those parts. There was also a church where people living on or near the estancia could be married. The last house we visited was one were servants or slaves stayed, but inside had outfits with matching hats, handbags, and other accessories from throughout the 1800s-present day. I saw a pretty groovy print dress sandwiched between 1950 and 60.

After our tour we walked over to finally check out the horses that of course you expect to find on a gaucho farm. There were a couple dozen for us to ride, and I was eager to jump back on a horse after not getting on for several years. (I used to ride horses at summer camp for a few years growing up.) We patiently waited for our turn because there were a few other groups visiting the farm from all over the globe (China, Chile, Spain, Netherlands, England, Russia, and more). This was not a boring wait because some of us took the opportunity to ride a horse drawn carriage. Others took in the surroundings when funnily enough we noticed an unsaddled horse who appeared to be wearing a tshirt sort of thing and just roaming around. She was very silly and ran around in circles and sprinted at top speed to nowhere purely for our entertainment it seemed. A few of us named her Susan (after the farm).

Finally we get to mount the saddles and walk around the estancia’s trail with the gauchos in the lead. My horse did not have a name as far as I know, and he was an old fella. I don’t know if he was grumpy or just did his own thing because at one point I was being lead into a different section of fence and was almost ran into a tree. Luckily I could stop us and a gaucho brought him back on the trail. I really missed riding horses – this was definitely my favorite part of the day.

Michael (Professor Newell’s son), Patrick, and Claudia waiting to ride

My trusty steed

But the day was not over! We were moved into a lovely dining room for lunch and were fed a huge amount of food starting with drinks and salad. Next came the meat where gaucho after gaucho came out to provide us different types. First we tried the chorizo sausage which I found to be fairly tasty, but what followed pretty much scared me completely. BLOOD SAUSAGE. Our lovely Victoria tells us that blood sausage is her favorite and takes two pieces. I opt for one since I had never tried one and… well I’m never having one again. (It was a texture thing.) A few pieces of steak and chicken followed which was all good and finally we ended with dessert – flan.

Dinner is nothing without a show, so following dessert we watched a couple perform different dances with different costumes and live singing! (I have included some videos – I apologize in advance for the poor video shooting.)

Our last experience at the estancia was watching the gauchos show the crowd some tricks. First, they herded horses in groups in an interesting way. Then, three gauchos competed in trying to catch small rings hung in the air using a pen shaped object while galloping straight at them. If you were lucky, they would give you the ring as a gift. Lastly, the girls had a chance to ride on the horses again, but this time accompanied by a gaucho who took you full speed on the horse.

Pictures of the horses getting ready for the show.

I enjoyed myself today very much, I will always remember the time I rode horses in Argentina. Not many people can say they have done that! This trip is amazing and I can’t wait to see what will happen next!