2010-03-08
Our arrival in Santiago was a hectic mix of joy and more lineups. The ministry of agriculture here seems obsessed with controlling the arrival of vegetal and animal products. The hour wait to proceed through customs was basically a search for undeclared food. There was a bit of head scratching concerning my maple syrup, but otherwise things went smoothly if slowly.
We finally got our freedom around 7pm and were lucky to have L’s cousin waiting for us at the gate. He gave us a mini tour of Santiago as we drove towards Nunoa.
Santiago is a beautiful, living city. Everywhere you look, there are gree spaces with actual people in them, reading, smooching, walking their dogs… there is movement everywhere. The traffic is heavy and borderline crazy, but drivers seem curteous enough, even if they all drive as if they were late for an appointment. This is no place to jaywalk—two minutes on foot were enough to convince me to respect the signaling in this city.
Nunoa is a lot more, let’s say, ghetto. Graffiti and garbage litter the sidewalks and it has an air of rundown, but not abandon. We went to the corner store to get some cervecas around midnight. There were clumps of people absolutely everywhere. Hanging out by the stores, sitting in their gated yards, walking apparently aimlessly.
I’m told that most of the people in the area are all descendents of descendents (etc.) of those who built the original homes. Everyone pretty much knows everyone els/e. That might explain the ambiance, which is lively and a bit intense, with music and fires going everywhere, but still friendly.
We talked (well, L did most of the talking, whereas I’ve been spending my time in smile-and-nod mode) into the late hours with L’s cousin and I spent my first night south of the equator in the tiny back room of a little house in the middle of old-school Santiago.