Pulpería

Sunday 1 April 2007

The picture isn't the greatest, but this was definitely the highlight of the day, so I thought I'd show it. After lunch on the ranch today, the owners took Ryan and I around town so he could photograph local attractions that guests may want to visit - the golf course, the river, the playground, the old train station, etc. Our last stop was a traditional and authentic old pulpería, which is like a saloon or cantina of old Argentina. In the days of the gauchos (Argentine cowboys,) these were the local watering holes and general stores. It was quite fitting, in fact, because for my Spanish class I am reading two classic gaucho books ("Martín Fierro" and "Juan Moreira") where the characters are always going into pulperías to drink, and usually fight. You can see the evidence of the fighting in this picture - they put the bars up to protect the bartender from the brawls.

This particular pulpería is really impressive. I was talking to the owner (who was a little shy) while Ryan was taking his pictures, and he told me that it has been a working pulpería continuously for the past 150 years. To this day, it serves regular working gauchos in the afternoons and evenings. Most amazing of all, however, was the fact that he and his brother have been running the place for the past 52 years! And their father ran it for 30 years before that! I was awed at the thought.