A modern Charon
In Greek mythology, Charon is the ferryman of Hades who carries souls of the newly deceased across the rivers Styx and Acheron that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead.
Meet Leo
“I think anyone who works in a cemetery has a particular relation to funerary questions.
You realise that today you are alive and tomorrow...no more. I mean it’s not a reason to be scared but live the best you can!”
Meet Miguel
“It’s like the nurse at the side of an agonising patient, she suffers too, because she can not save him. She can’t do anything… But she witnesses it. It’s the same here, we receive their pain.”
Meet Victor
“I admire the architect’s work. If they were here I would ask them: How did you get the idea ? Where did it come from? Why not use the height, using the whole space? But it would not have been as beautiful… It’s beautiful isn’t it, from above.
”
The spanish term “Cuidador”- in english means caretaker or carer - the person who takes care of another person or a place.
The Cuidadores of the Sexto Panteon are responsible for the cleaning and maintaining of the graves where coffins and the ashes of the deceased rest. In the cemetery of Chacarita, their services are not provided by the cemetery but instead families decide to either take care of it themselves or to hire a cuidador directly.
As an independent worker, the salary of the Cuidador is proportional to the number of graves he manages.
Spread across the different tunnels of the subterranean necropolis and only composed of men, the workforce is of about hundred Cuidadores. Each of them is responsible for about 700 crypts.
They usually have started working at the cemetery through a family connection who has previously worked there, and most of the cuidadores have worked there for decades.
Each Cuidador with his contact to mourning families bares a particular relationship to death and assumes the role of psychopomp.
*A psychopomp is in mythologies or religions a guide for the deceased's souls towards the underworld.