My name is Enriqueta Corina Duarte and
my mother’s last name is Ibarra Garcia.
I’m a Piscis!
I was born on February 26th, 1929.
I feel at ease swimming.
I feel better in the water than on the ground.
I’m the fifth Enriqueta in my family.
My grandmother was Enriqueta Tucci
and her mother was Enriqueta Rodriguez.
My mother Enriqueta, my daughters Enriqueta...
It just so happened that when I got married
my mother-in-law’s only name was Enriqueta! So…
- And what’s the name of the man who stole your heart?
Well, Enrique!
He was my greatest love, my impossible love.
ENRIQUETA
I met Enrique on a ship.
We were coming back from the London Olympics
with a group of twenty people, we all became great friends.
We spent the whole day together on deck
and after dinner, we went to concerts or dancing.
Enrique and I were inseparable!
I mean, we spent seventeen days together there
and we established a lovely bond of understanding.
The Olympic helped us to become great friends.
Since everybody saw us as a couple,
they told me "Enrique is married."
So as soon as I saw him I said:
"Look, I've been told that you're married."
"No", he said. "I'm not married, but I have a commitment."
If he's got a commitment it's because he's in a relationship
a he's made promise.
I was very serious and righteous.
Yes, religious education
since I was little, in second form.
He had a commitment, so comply with it.
So he says to me: "Can't we still be friends?"
I told him: "No way."
"With what we have, we can't.”
He was a P.E. teacher at military school.
He finished his lesson and ran off to the telephone to call me at noon.
I had already finished my lunch, dressed to go to school,
where I was a teacher in Barracas.
He had a beautiful handwriting,
beautiful letters that I threw away, I threw them away…
Enriqueta Duarte was the first and only South American woman
to swim across the English Channel.
She accomplished this feat together with Abertondo.
In that event organized by the London Daily Mail.
When the competition opened,
1500 applications arrived from the world's swimmers.
I got chosen.
Eva Duarte de Peron sent me to cross the English Channel.
When I left for England, Enrique wrote a letter to me!
Can you imagine?
He was aware of me, of all my things.
I crossed the English Channel on August 16th, 1951.
It took me 13 hours 26 minutes to swim across the English Channel.
So, I held the Latin American record for men and women.
The next morning, at 8 o’clock I went to the hair salon.
The absolute worst that a man could have,
my husband had it.
He was Abertondo’s coach or leader.
I got engaged in March.
We got married on October 30th in a civil ceremony,
and on November 12th in the Church, in 1953.
We went to Bariloche for our wedding trip.
But it wasn't a honeymoon.
It was a bitter moon, bitter!
We only shared the pillow and the toothpaste.
He wasn't a husband in my home, nor a father.
He was a pensioner!
Every night at midnight, he came home drunk after attending barbecues.
And he didn't sleep in my bed!
He tried to kill me. He tried to strangle me.
Since I'm a Catholic I don't get divorced.
I got married and that bad thing happened to me.
Well, I had to stick with it.
I lived in Acassuso, married with three children.
Enrique was five blocks away from my house,
married with three children.
We were voted to form
the Argentine Olympics Associates' commission.
Enrique was the president and I was the secretary.
So we both had to sign the papers.
The first Monday that we had to work at the office,
as we went down in the elevator,
Enrique told me: "Coca, do you need a ride?"
I told him: "No, Enrique, I've got my car."
"Oh, okay."
Next Monday, he told me:
"Did you really have your car last Monday?"
Yes, Enrique, I did. But not today."
He asked: "Shall I drive you home?” and I said: "Yes, Enrique."
And he did.
He drove with one hand, and held mine with the other.
Like this! It was such a thing!
And one time I told him:
"Enrique, had we been together
we would have owned the world."
Because we both had such strong personalities
and we understood each other so well.
I didn't fight for Enrique.
Because I controlled myself.
Maybe I could control my desires,
and I did.
March 2nd, 1963.
I arrived in Neuquen
and my dad told me:
"Look Coca, everybody says that you're not going to make it today."
And I told him: "Look dad, today I'm going to try it."
It's been forty years,
and many swimmers have tried and couldn't make it.
A mayor told me: "Enriqueta,
whatever is done in Bariloche, in any sport,
nothing will overcome what you did."
Of course, such an unusual thing!
Consequently, I organized
the International Nahuel Huapi Lake Crossing,
in which you join by swimming two provinces:
Neuquen and Rio Negro.
Swimming was good for me...
physically...
mentally...
spiritually.
To deal with people...
To be an honorable person.
To overcome... overcome many challenges
and to accomplish many things in life,
concrete and spiritual.
...God, you take away the sins of the world
have mercy, have mercy on us.
Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world.
have mercy, have mercy on us.
Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world.
Grant us peace, grant us peace.
Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world...
To this day, I remember Enrique's skin...
and the beautiful back of his neck.
Let me tell you this...
In September, 1950, we went to
some University Olympics in Tucuman.
I had breakfast with Enrique right in Tucuman's downtown.
We finished breakfast and he told me:
"Let's go to the cathedral!" And we did!
We leaned in the prie-dieu where you commune.
He held my hand.
And there we were, both of us knelt in the cathedral!
Many years later, one day I told him:
"Enrique, what did you ask for there? What did you pray for?"
He wouldn't tell me then. "No, I don't remember, Coca. I don't."
God knows, God knows what.
- And what did you pray for, Coca?
Well, I’ve must have prayed for us to be together.