Argentina Memories of 'priest of the slums' who took the bus

Before he left Argentina and moved to Italy to become pope, Jorge Mario Bergoglio would visit the country's villas miserias, not in a car flanked by security guards, but by bus - and this is what his people remember.

- Harriet Barber

"He would come here, kiss our feet, the feet of the people," said Aida Bogarin, 44. "It was everything to us."

For decades, Bergoglio was dedicated to working in the poorest areas of Buenos Aires, earning him the nickname the "priest of the slums".

In the Argentinian capital's Villa 21-24 neighbourhood, locals have gathered for months to pray for the pontiff, as he experienced a serious case of double pneumonia. But on Monday, the Vatican confirmed Pope Francis had died.

"It was a privilege when he came here to us," said Juan Ramon Congo, a 60-year-old cook, speaking at the Virgen de los Milagros de Caacupé parish church in Villa 21-24.

Ramon Congo was confirmed by Pope Francis - then an archbishop - in the late noughties, he said, flicking through photos of the pair shaking hands. "He would walk around, listen to us, it helped us a lot. I miss him being here, eating chipás [cheesy buns], and sharing mate [an Argentine tea]."

Bergoglio was born in 1936 in the working-class barrio of Floresta to a family of Italian migrants: his grandparents had emigrated on the steamer Giulio Cesare in 1929 for new opportunities and to escape the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini.