Polo (Persian: chogān) is a team sport played on horseback. The objective is to score goals against an opposing team. Players score by driving a small white plastic or wooden ball into the opposing team’s goal using a long-handled mallet. The traditional sport of polo is played on a grass field up to 300 by 160 yards (270 by 150 m). Each polo team consists of four riders and their mounts. Field polo is played with a solid plastic ball which has replaced the wooden version of the ball in much of the sport. In arena polo, only three players are required per team and the game usually involves more manoeuvreing and shorter plays at lower speeds due to space limitations of arenas. Arena polo is played with a small air-filled ball, similar to a small football. The modern game lasts roughly two hours and is divided into periods called chukkas. Polo is played professionally in 16 countries. It was formerly an Olympic sport. Polo originates from ancient Persia. Its invention is dated variously from the 6th century BC to the 1st century AD. Persian Emperor Shapur II learnt to play polo when he was seven years old in 316 AD. Naqsh-i Jahan Square in Isfahan, Iran, is a polo field which was built by king Abbas I in the 17th century. The modern game of polo is derived from Manipur, India, where the game was known as ‘Sagol Kangjei’, ‘Kanjai-bazee’, or ‘Pulu’. It was the anglicised form of the last, referring to the wooden ball that was used, which was adopted by the sport in its slow spread to the west. The first polo club was established in the town of Silchar in Assam, India, in 1833. read more…
San Carlos de Bariloche, usually known as Bariloche, is a city in the province of Río Negro, situated in the foothills of the Andes on the southern shores of Nahuel Huapi Lake. It is located within the Nahuel Huapi National Park. After development of extensive public works and Alpine-styled architecture, the city emerged in the 1930s and 1940s as a major tourism centre with skiing, trekking and mountaineering facilities. In addition, it has numerous restaurants, cafés, and chocolate shops. The city has a permanent population of 114,000. The name Bariloche comes from the Mapudungun word Vuriloche meaning “people from behind the mountain”. The Poya people used the Vuriloche pass to cross the Andes, keeping it secret from the Spanish priests for a long time. read more…
Córdoba is a city located in the geographical center of Argentina, in the foothills of the Sierras Chicas on the Suquía River, about 700 km (435 mi) northwest of the Buenos Aires. It is the capital of Córdoba Province and the second most populous city in Argentina after Buenos Aires, with about 1.3 million inhabitants. It was founded on 6 July 1573 by Jerónimo Luis de Cabrera, who named it after Córdoba in Spain. It was one of the first Spanish colonial capitals of the region that is now Argentina (the oldest city is Santiago del Estero, founded in 1553). The National University of Córdoba is the oldest university of the country and the second to be inaugurated in Latin America. It was founded in 1613 by the Jesuit Order. Because of this, Córdoba earned the nickname La Docta (roughly translated, “the learned one”). read more…
La Plata is the capital city of the Province of Buenos Aires and of the partido La Plata. It has a population of 740,000 and its metropolitan area has 900,000 inhabitants. La Plata was planned and developed to serve as the provincial capital after the city of Buenos Aires was federalized in 1880. It was officially founded by Governor Dardo Rocha on 19 November 1882. Its construction is fully documented in photographs by Tomás Bradley Sutton. La Plata was renamed Eva Perón City (Ciudad Eva Perón) between 1952 and 1955. La Plata is a planned city, urban planning paradigm of the late 19th century. It is also an example of “hygiene”, which was becoming important in that time. Rocha decided to erect a new city to host the provincial government institutions and a university which had already been planned. Urban planner Pedro Benoit designed a city layout based on a rationalistconception of urban centers. The city has the shape of a square with a central park and two main diagonal avenues, north to south and east to west. In addition, there are numerous other shorter diagonal streets. This design is copied in a self-similar manner in small blocks of six by six blocks in length. For every six blocks, there is a small park or square. Other than the diagonal streets, all streets are on a rectangular grid and are numbered consecutively. Thus, La Plata is nicknamed “la ciudad de las diagonales” (city of diagonals). It is also called “la ciudad de los tilos” (city of linden trees), because of the large number of linden trees lining the many streets and squares. read more…
San Salvador de Jujuy, commonly known as Jujuy and locally often referred to as San Salvador, is the capital city of Jujuy Province in Argentine Northwest. It lies near the southern end of the Humahuaca Canyon where wooded hills meet the lowlands. The city lies on National Route 9 that connects La Quiaca 289 km (180 mi) with Salta 120 km (75 mi), and it is 1,525 km (948 mi) from Buenos Aires. Tourist destinations not far from the city are Tilcara 84 km (52 mi), Humahuaca 126 km (78 mi), and the Calilegua National Park 111 km (69 mi). Jujuy is located near the Andes, at the junction of the Xibi Xibi River and the Río Grande de Jujuy, 1,238 meters above sea level. The weather is humid during the summer and dry and cold during the winter. Temperatures vary widely between day and night. read more…
