By César Augusto Hernández Salazar Student mastery
" landscape, environment and city " on
UNLP
La Plata, Argentina. Foreign nationality inevitably brings about who experience a critical attitude inevitable, since the outsider is constantly making comparisons of what you see and live in the country that receives them in his tenure with the customs of the land from which it comes. The author of this article, Colombian nationality, with a strong cultural influence paisa (1) who has more than twelve months living in Argentine territory, shared some of his thoughts and impressions of the region La Plata River and reminiscent of landscapes (2) to which it belongs.
author photo: The Rock and El Penol de Entre Rios, Antioquia, 2005.
Definitely I agree with those who claim that even when not taken away from the place where children, school, friends, family, early youth was part of all that it means is difficult to disentangle the features that you identify as belonging to a particular culture, with all that that entails, enorgullecerte of singular nobility but also recognize those spots which unfortunately is what stands out. But then you conclude that in spite of many obvious differences may also recognize cultural patterns that make us equal, since no escaping the human condition.
At another country, it takes much the others say: "this guy is not here," , you read it in their eyes, and it is not necessary to elapse long time to feel that you're somewhere else, somewhere else. The accents of the language as it is referred tunes here, the complexion of your skin, curly hair and how I express myself definitely reveal that my background is different from strangers that Argentines are accustomed to seeing on the bus (bus), in the bar (coffee shop) or walking down the sidewalk (the sidewalk). "You American center? Does Venezuela or Panama?, that they will target some of my background dare to throw up some potential countries to identify my nationality. No, I'm from Colombia ... I say some sometimes after hearing my response continues with a long silence, which the gesture interpreted in different ways, or in the vast majority of occasions hardly hear the name of my country say: ahh ... how nice !!!... What are you doing here in this cold? ...
Colombian in Argentina are becoming more, not only demonstrate that the nationals of that country but also that it took months here a prolonged stay. You see them for various reasons, tourism and university or postgraduate studies are the more I appreciated when I crossed and I see one reason for their presence. So now it is becoming easier to identify us among the large number of mostly Latino immigrants in Bolivia, Peru and Paraguay, all with the same language but noticed differences in how to treat it and use it to communicate with others.
When you hear yourself on the use of language and immigrants who speak Castilian, from more to more educated layman appreciates the outstanding treatment that the Colombian language makes over twenty countries have as their official language.
photo author: Young Colombian company of a Brazilian and two Argentine Italy Park of the city of La Plata, 2007.
The paradox of this is that if only we made a comparison between Colombians and Argentines, without regard to the marked regional differences in each country, Argentina is definitely a country lawyer, ie I dare say this knowing that I make no finding that the average Argentine much more than read the Colombian, even aseveraría are the southern most have been immersed in novels such as One Hundred Years of Solitude Garcia Marquez's Nobel that mention his countrymen more as we celebrate the star's championship football team to which he is devoted.
But just as the Argentines in general are good readers, although many are skeptical that the trend will continue, due in great part to historical and cultural reasons, because for this vast country could be governed and administered by progressive generations (3) appealed to nineteenth-century literature as a manager in the construction of national identity, amazing work thus although no cause of this essay to go into it, the hitherto Argentina identity construction was accomplished in less than a century on the basis that there were some hordes of immigrants from the old continent, not just Italians as simplistically infer from the outside, but from other northern countries and even Eastern European (4) Those who had the momentum to build a new nation attending the slogan govern is to populate and thus opened the doors to immigration by their varied backgrounds and thus different beliefs and languages, with public school and compulsory education in Castilian settlers generations led to frequent and reading transmitida a las generaciones posteriores.
En Colombia que el logro de la escuela pública es muy posterior a la de Argentina, y que aún registra un índice menor de desarrollo humano según PNUD 2004 que la patria con la que establezco el parangón, paradójicamente el colombiano se presenta en la región como una persona culta, pues muy a pesar de su condición social, incluso en las que carecen de educación básica, se aprecia en muchos un trato adecuado del idioma. Muchos académicos y entendidos en el tema que atribuyen esta particularidad a la relación directa que tuvo la región denominada por la corona española en el siglo XVI como Nueva Granada, para ese entonces nueva división administrativa separándose del virreinato de Lima. Analistas dicen que a pesar de la fragilidad que manifestaba este virreinato existía una relación cultural muy directa con las regiones de España donde mejor se hablaba castellano, pues de allí provenían los administradores encomendados por la corona que como en el caso de la República Argentina posterior a estos hechos se sirvieron de la instrucción obligatoria en el idioma con el mismo fin práctico, gobernar y controlar.
Aunado a la mayor precisión del colombiano al castellano viene what that stand out as an accent, a gentle tune, some say slow, with a rate that looks more like a song. But I also want to emphasize that in my capacity as foreign as I miss most about my city, my neighborhood and other places where I spent my earlier life, is respectful and cordial established with the neighbor with the doorman of the building where she worked with the driver of the taxi, bus or collective, although it was not generally in my experience I say that exceptions are more aggressive and disrespectful treatment that happens daily in the most common places where urban life happens Colombia.
not want to give the idea that Argentina offers a bad deal, because as an immigrant policy best condition I can not ask, but fails to amaze me repeatedly as the most common daily activities, like go to a kiosk (store) in a bar (coffee shop in Colombia), in a butcher shop or take a taxi, the treatment is usually terse and often comes to be unfriendly. Exceptions exist, but I notice that many Argentines, confined to the Greater Buenos Aires and La Plata, interpret a gesture of good attention manifest servitude remains a country that for decades has fought for the rights of workers, which largely held, but I regret that such a tradition confuse this as being unworthy among people.
Photo by author. Argentineans drinking mate in the Plaza Italia.
Ciudad de La Plata. 2007
hear is customary in cities like Medellín, Bogotá the capital itself, the warm Cali, among other Colombian cities to hear expressions like: "To order" "What I can I serve?" "Sígase no more", "It was with pleasure" and many others Moreover, as a gesture of friendliness and service that we have held daily and not interpret it as a humiliation. This seems ridiculous, irrelevant to mention, but it's just that everyday dealings in the street, the stranger, one of the strangest aspects of the culture that formed me as a person.
AQUIPero as cultures in many different aspects, Colombian and Argentina, as most similar is their greatest contradictions, because if River Plate Buenos Aires and the first impression given by the image of people sullen and laconic, it vanishes completely when the "ice-breaking social-cultural, you are called to be part of the ritual of mate (5) or holding a barbecue (6) .
When you are part of two great traditions, the truth Argentines make you feel like a
more between them, and more bitter than the herb is known to take a metal nozzle sucking happened in the cases under six different mouths who understand the value of ritual and meaning of inclusion that this entails, we separate any preference to taste and scrupulous stipulations, and unite ourselves to the perhaps more weighty gesture of collective action to share more than a drink that can be registered in Latin America. And if it is a roast, in addition to the indescribable qualities of taste and texture of beef from the pampas of Argentina, accompanied by good wine mendozino and entertaining and fun talk, sometimes extended you felt the distance becomes more palpable sense of being at home.
For my country, Colombia is also an incredibly significant contradiction, because if at first proved to be correct to speak, kind of treatment, but also something we do not try to is the spontaneous joy and great sense of humor, you can not understand why we do not use those strengths to try to bridge differences that polarize and keep insisting on an internal conflict that threatens to be imperdurable.
The distance you take in your home, the girl who would be the block, neighborhood, your city, and large, the entire Colombia, as in my case definitely feel more in Colombia is impossible to identify with her, I am proud to recognize their values , but also prompts me to wonder about the reasons for their problems, therefore, take part and take care, responsible for its past and present. My current status in a foreign country so different from mine as I can only thank Argentina, in addition to its opening as an immigrant, the opportunity to have this distance to recognize the difference as part of another culture invaluable in one direction and contradictory other side and take a national position more critical, but despite the difference, giving me the opportunity to be part of their history, without which these ideas could never have taken place or time. Thanks Colombia .... Thank Argentina.
- ROMERO, José Luis. Brief History of Argentina. Editorial Fondo de Cultura Economica 1996.
- SARMIENTO, Dominic. Facundo. Grupo Editor Altamira
Recommended links
- Educar.org: History mate.
- tourist Argentina: Asado rural.
- Saber.ula.ve: historical processes.
[1] Paisa is a cultural type nickname which refers to people coming from the central Andean region of Colombia, which largely in the Departments of Antioquia, Caldas, Risaralda and Quindio most surrounding areas of Valle del Cauca and Tolima. It is said that in the process of colonization of these territories, the first settlers in this land called paisas people who shared the same landscape, often mountainous.
[2] understand the concept of landscape that not only alludes to the physical and geographical features, but integrated into it, the cultural groups that have built a network of customs and links.
[3] enough to mention the work considered foundational literature Argentina: Facundo by Domingo F. Sarmiento who will become president of the republic in the late nineteenth century and who succeeded in this book deal after literary events in the first half of this century with a strong ideological influence.
[4] addition to a strong Italian immigration after she saw the creation of Scottish colonies in 1853 and then intensified favorable policies in this regard after 1880 in which people arrived from Germany, Spain, Slovenia, Poland, among others.
[5] This typical habit of the countries of the Río de la Plata. This infusion was used originally by the Guarani Indians, who used the yerba mate. The Jesuits, who settled in the area now occupied by the province of Misiones, improved cultivation, so the best are located there yerbatales.Actualmente the grass (chopped leaf yerba mate) can be purchased in packs of 1 / 2 and 1 kilo, and in the production region, divided into bags. See "History mate" by Educar.org.
[6] The famous roast is cooking in different parts of the cow on the coals, is spread throughout the country and is a typical meal in Argentina.
usually begins with a sausage and a sausage before it hits the meat. It may also be accompanied with kidneys, sweetbreads, liver and chinchulines, which make up the guts of cattle. It is also often include chicken and pork occasionally. Cf Asado Argentina's rural Turística.com.
