“The first person who finds out that there is white smoke should notify us”
, the two journalists and the Clarín photographer had agreed.
The idea was to go as quickly as possible to Saint Peter's Square to be able to enter and thus attend the announcement and see the new Pope.
It is that there are always many who go to the Vatican when the white smoke that warns that the election has taken place begins to rise.
The journalists - there were around 5,000 accredited - had an assigned space, but we had to arrive before the crowd was compact and impeded the passage.
The notice came on the second day of the conclave, after the last vote of the day.
And we left quickly.
It was late afternoon -cold and rainy- on Wednesday March 13, the streets of Rome were getting congested, but we laboriously reached our post.
Between the result of the scrutiny and the rituals until the announcement on the balcony of the basilica almost an hour usually passes.
The vaticanistas (the journalists who cover the information of the Holy See) had not detected a firm candidate, which increased the uncertainty.
Suddenly, the curtains were drawn, the doors opened, the protodeacon cardinal (the youngest),
Jean-Louis Tauran, appeared, approached the microphone and exclaimed: "Habemus Papam", provoking an ovation.
Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran announcing that Jorge Bergolgio was the new Pope: March 2013. Photo REUTERS
Immediately, Cardinal Tauran spoke the first names of the new pontiff, which were practically inaudible at the end of the square where we were standing.
But the last name rang loud and clear.
Our surprise and joy were enormous: a compatriot, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, had become Pedro's 266th successor
.
But he is also the first Latin American and the first Jesuit to be elected Pope.
The audience celebrated that the Church had a new Vicar of Christ, but - except for a small group of Argentines - they wondered who was the protagonist of such a singular election.
Francisco immediately captivated everyone because he opted for a colloquial greeting.
“Brothers and sisters, good afternoon”, he began by saying in an Italian learned in the house of his Piedmontese parents and grandparents.
Immediately, with a smile, he said that the cardinals had dared to elect a cardinal "almost from the end of the world."
It was very good that he prayed for Benedict XVI.
And that after the Urbi et Orbi blessing, he asked for the first time as Pope that they pray for him.
"Good night and good rest", he said goodbye.
In Argentina, the news surprised many in the office, the street, the school, the factory, in a means of transport because it was a weekday and around four in the afternoon.
But it expanded with lightning speed, fueled by cell phones and social media.
Like the Argentines who were in the Plaza de San Pedro, here too the great surprise was mixed with enormous joy.
Not a few were moved to tears.
While the horns will be added to the ringing of church bells throughout the country.
The steps of the Metropolitan Cathedral in Buenos Aires were the meeting point for many Catholics who came spontaneously to celebrate.
There were Argentine and Vatican flags, songs and cheers for the new Pope.
“Francis, first;
The whole world loves you!"
It was one of the many songs that were improvised.
It didn't take long for a mass to be celebrated inside the temple in thanksgiving to God for the election of Jorge Bergoglio and for the Lord to accompany him in his pontificate, which was full of tremendous challenges.
But in the world of politics the jubilation was not unanimous.
President Cristina Kirchner -who at that time was in great conflict with Cardinal Bergoglio, as was her husband, Néstor, who considered him "the spiritual leader of the opposition"-expressed a false satisfaction for her election to the find out during an act in Technopolis.
In fact, she could not mention his name, instead she said that "for the first time a Latin American Pope had been elected."
Her words were followed by whistles from her sympathizers.
In the Chamber of Deputies the reactions were mixed.
The news broke when a tribute was paid to Hugo Chavez who had just died.
The owner of the camera, Julián Domínguez, was the one who gave it.
The election was applauded by the PRO, the dissident PJ, some radicals and Patricia Bullrich.
Then, opposition deputies asked for an intermission room to listen to Bergoglio, but it was rejected by the Front for Victory.
"Resentful, rude!" snapped the Democrat Omar de Marchi.
Later it would be known that, among other gestures,
Francisco would call his newsboy so that he no longer took the newspaper to the archdiocese
.
In addition, he would ask those Argentines who were planning to go to his inauguration on March 19 - the festival of San José, of which Bergoglio is a devotee - not to do so and that the money saved go to the poor.
Before, he would hold a meeting with the thousands of journalists in which he would surprise with his austere black shoes, leaving aside the characteristic red ones of the pontiffs.
In his speech he would also make an impact with a concept that would become one of the pillars of his pontificate: "How do I long for a poor Church for the poor", he exclaimed.
It was not by chance that he had taken the name of the Saint of the Poverello of Assisi.
As in great events, Argentines will not forget where they were when it was announced that an Argentine would become Pope.
The emotion leaves a strong mark in the memory.