2. La Recoleta Cemetery - Buenos Aires
La Recoleta Cemetery is a cemetery built in 1732 located in the Recoleta neighbourhood of Buenos Aires, Argentina. It contains the graves of notable persons, including Eva Perón, presidents of Argentina, Nobel Prize winners, the founder of the Argentine Navy and a granddaughter of Napoleon.
In the middle of the 1870s, following the epidemic of yellow fever which ravaged the municipality, a lot of upper-class Buenos Aires neighborhoods fled San Telmo and Montserrat and migrated to the northern part of the city, Recoleta. By growing to be a high class neighborhood, the cemetery has become the last resting place of the peoples of supreme authority as well as power of Buenos Aires.
The entry to the cemetery is through neo-classical gates with high Classical greek columns. The cemetery consists of many sophisticated marble mausoleums, decorated with statues, in an array of architectural designs. The whole cemetery is set up in section similar to city blocks, with wide tree-lined primary walkways branching into sidewalks containing mausoleums.
Even though many of the mausoleums are in fine condition and well-maintained, some others have fallen into disrepair. Several can be found with broken glass and littered with rubbish. La Recoleta is one among those cemeteries where the tradition of engraving a death date however no birth date.
Stories in the Recoleta Cemetery
The tale of the ghost keeper
David Alleno, who served as caretaker in the cemetery from 1881 to 1910. Obsessed over his last resting spot, he kept his entire life to prepare the sculpture of him self for the piece of land his brother purchased for the family. He was so desperate to finalized the construction and planned to be buried at that place, that once the sculpture arrived in 1915, he went straight home and committed suicide. The night watchmen that worked over these years in the cemetery are talking about his ghost. The set of keys that he uses to check out the graves create a tinkling sound and give away his presence.
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Story of Rufina Cambaceres
In a corner area of section 13 lays Rufina Cambaceres grave adjacent to her familys. This poor girl could possibly be the female ghost that strolls around the cemetery when night falls.
Rufina died unexpectedly at the age of 19, in May 1902. She was placed in the family tomb, however several days later the cemetery keepers detected that the coffin got fallen so they contacted the family. Once they opened it they identified the girl covered in bruises and scratches. It is believed that she woke up in the coffin. Apparently her mother used to give her a tranquilizer every night to ensure that the daughter would certainly get to sleep while she enjoyed intimacy with her lover, who was also used as Rufinas boyfriend. The night of Rufinas alleged death her mother might have given her a double dosage. A year later the family had an art nouveau tomb constructed. The statue of Rufina is at the entrance and her hand is on the door handle, as though she was now capable to leave. Her tomb is the only one created from just one piece of marble stone from Milan in the cemetery.
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The Lady in White
Luz Maria Garcia Velloso passed away in 1925 of leukemia when she was but 15 years old. Her tomb lays on the right of the primary track in the cemetery. There lays a statue of a beautiful young girl dead on bed.
Due to desperation her mother slept for several months at the feet of the statue in a small space behind the bars.
According to the story a young man going for a walk next to Recoleta Cemetery experienced an encounter with beautiful young lady dressed up completely in white. The most popular version states this lady then go along with the young man to a bar, Suddenly she feels cold so he lends her his jacket, she spills some coffee on the jacket & take the jacket with her when they said goodnight.
The following day the young man somehow contacts her mother to get the jacket back & she explains that the young lady has already dead! In anxiety, he visits the cemetery & finds out his jacket draped over the effigy.
The story was taken twice to the cinema. Once in 1942 with the title "Ghost of Buenos Aires" and then in 1950 as "A woman has entered" directed by Carlos Hugo Christensen.
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