Angela, the guardian of Tafí's culture

Tafí is legacy, tradition, and living culture in every step we take.

And there is one person who safeguards all that ancestral knowledge: Angela Romano, daughter of shepherds from the Tafí hills and granddaughter of a man who, from her earliest childhood, instilled in her a love for agriculture.

At Angela´s house, her business located in the Rodeo Grande area, she has a 100% self-sustaining organic eco-garden where no agrochemicals are used. Visitors from all over the country and the world come to this place to meet her and share with her the experience of planting and harvesting the land.

The experience involves touring her plantations and cornfields while this extraordinary hostess describes each of the crops and the techniques she uses. Throughout the tour, she invites visitors to experience the aromas of various plants and herbs, such as molle trees, queñua trees, and elderberries, while sharing their medicinal properties and the knowledge passed down through generations.

According to Angela, her plants thrive thanks to a very special ingredient: her joi joi. This is a high-pitched, traditional song in the form of a couplet, used in rituals by the valley's indigenous communities and accompanied by a drum. The seeds are life, and the song gives them joy and positive energy to grow. The couplets, or joi joi, are a prayer, a song of gratitude, released to the wind to be carried through time and space.

The experience offers a day filled with emotion and good vibes thanks to the stories and memories of its hostess, who conveys her love for the land, her philosophy of life, and the beauty she finds in nature's simplicity. Of course, there's no shortage of mate cocido to warm the soul, especially during the Tafí winter, accompanied by tortillas made with wheat from her own harvest.

Ángela considers herself the "guardian" of the native seeds she uses in her daily farming. Thanks to them, she says, she was able to raise her five daughters, preserving a legacy that she continues to share with those who visit her.

A Distinguished Woman

In 2024, Angela was nominated for the award recognizing rural women in Argentina, within the framework of the First International Forum on Gender and Rurality. That same year, in April, she represented the country at the World Meeting for People's Health, held in Mar del Plata, where she shared her experience with representatives from 67 countries.