Jardín Pushkin

“Dearer to me than a host of base truths
is the illusion that exalts.”
― Alexander Pushkin

The Jardín Pushkin (Pushkin Garden) is a city park on the east side of the colonia Roma, and just west of the colonia Doctores. A Metrobus station on line 3 shares the same name (Jardín Pushkin). The park is also accessible from Metro Niños Heroes (on Metro Line 3).

The park had been named Jardín Jesús Urueta by president Álvaro Obregón. Urueta, who’d died in 1920, only a few days into his service as Ambassador to Argentina, had campaigned to get president Madero elected in 1911. He then worked tirelessly against the Huerta administration during the Mexican Revolution. He was already an established writer, journalist, and scholar.

The name of the park was changed only after the Government of Russia made a gift of the bust of the great Russian writer Pushkin (pictured). Pushkin is largely credited with inventing Russian literature. It’s often said that Pushkin’s poetry can’t be ever quite adequately translated out of the Russian language, so deep was his feel for his native tongue. This was despite the fact that his grandfather had been born in central Africa.

A 2016 remodeling of the park was widely criticized for replacing too much earth with too much concrete. It’s still a space widely valued, open, and green. For residents and visitors to the neighborhood, it also takes on parts of the Sunday tianguis that overflows from the Avenida Álvaro Obregón. It’s also a very popular welcome to the neighborhood when arriving from the Metrobus already mentioned.

Works cited on this page:
http://kajanegra.com/remembranza-del-antiguo-parque-jesus-urueta/