Cemetery Fun

Yesterday I did some touristy things and went to the Cementerio de la Recoleta. It's this huge cemetery for Buenos Aires' rich and famous. I didn't realize however, that unlike the cemeteries that I'm familiar with, here there are tombs; people aren't buried in coffins under grass, but rather their coffins are kept in compartments.
Also I'm very glad I went here in the afternoon and not at night--it's a fun place during the day but I'm sure it's very spooky at night.

It was actually rather frightening--the statue on the right was looking straight down at me.

  Families own a tomb and place many (I saw up to a dozen) coffins inside. The tombs have aboveground monuments but also go about three meters into the ground. I went with a friend/contact but I've made a decision to not include the names or pictures of any of my contacts in this blog, and so all you'll see are pictures of me having fun.

Probably the most famous person in the cemetary is Eva Perón. She is the only one with flowers perpetually in front of her family tomb.

Afterwards, we went to the closeby Facultad de Derecho (Faculty of Law) building of the Universidad de Buenos Aires. Closeby, there is a the Floralis Genérica. This giant steel statue of a flower actually closes at night and opens during the day.

Descending into a tomb

I felt very touristy--someone actually started speaking to me in English, which is a first here in Buenos Aires. But although areas we visited are frequent tourist destinations, but it felt good to see some of the landmarks of Buenos Aires.

Facultad de Derecho

The flower statue