santiago – Veuillez Decrocher

March 27, 2010

Concrete and darkness

2010-03-14

After an awesome breakfast served up by our friends at la Casa Roja (include real, yes real, coffee!), it was time to hit the road. We decided to do a little exploring in the eastern part of the city, the Las Condes and Providencia barrios.

Both of these neighborhoods are a little more on the upscale side of what we’d seen so far. Las Condes is the economic powerhouse of the city, home to banks, insurance companies and a familiar place to anyone comfortable in a suit and tie.

Coming out of the Escuela Militar metro station, we quickly noticed that this was a bubble of corporate America. Familiar fast food chains greeted us as soon as we walked out and the metro itself was tied into a posh mini mall, including an MTV store and a high tech, polished, banos (still a paying bathroom, though). They take their Sundays seriously here, and pretty much everything was closed.

We walked west on Avenida Apoquindo, which morphs into Providencia Ave further towards the city. The sun was shining, as always, the air was still and the streets deserted. Monstrous sidewalks on either side, anticipating the rush of polished shoes and firm handshakes, were empty and silent.

It was something of an alien landscape, like walking through an archaeological dig for some civilization of giants who had banked themselves to death, everything shiny and big and lifeless. Most of the buildings seemed to be trying to impress, if not crush, their neighbors with their magnificence and the elegance of the tasteful art. One, an insurance company I believe, even had a mote. It was all very dry.

Providencia looked more human and habitable, but only barely. Mainly consisting of malls and residential buildings, it was also rather devoid of life due to the fact that most stores were closed. We headed north, across the rio which winds through the city, to the Parque de las Esculturas.

Crash landing in Parque de las Esculturas

Appropriately, this is a large park which is home to big, shiny objects. It’s actually a very nice place, and it felt good to lie in the grass after all that time on cement. Though I played a bit in the sculptures, we were out of gas from our previous evening and long walk, so we headed back down into Providencia in search of calories.

We found them at Bravissimo, a restaurant chain with all the style of a Chucky Cheese but some good meals, ice cream and coffee at lowlow prices. It’s aggressively colourful and “family oriented” so don’t expect a candlelight dinner there to be much of a success, but it was tasty, satisfying and actually had some vegetables with the meat. If you’re in a mall, you’ll probably find one and it’s better than having Shopdog/Doggys/whateverDog hotdogs all the time.

We returned to Nunoa to get ready for our road trip, for real this time as the plan was to climb the country almost to its northern tip in search of L’s farther. We had a cell number and last known location (a small town called Taltal) to go on, but not much else. No answer on the cell as of yet, but we would keep trying as we moved up the coast.

That night, shortly after emptying our luggage, the power went out. Nunoa was completely dark. Cells were down for a bit but landlines were still operational, and calls were coming in from all parts of the city. “Do you have lights?” It turns out, about 90% of the country was without power.

People were anxious, was this another earthquake, a consequence of the last ones or yet another problem the country would have to face? Dogs were barking and howling, the only source of light being the occasional passing car.

We decided a stroll in the darkness would be appropriate. Nunoa is filled with back alleys and miniature pedestrian walkways between the tightly packed rows of houses. We stayed on familiar routes, as it would be too easy to get thoroughly confused in the darkness, and head towards the subway.

The stars! Stars everywhere, on a moonless night, we could see the milky way clearly. It was an awesome sight, a foretaste of what we hoped to see in our travels out of Santiago.

Those stars disappeared as we approached the subway entrance, since it was running on emergency generators and powering the street lights 400 meters out. Oddly reassuring, we loitered around the entrance for a bit, watching streams of people exiting the tunnel. They’d been rescued by the fire department, and had to walk the tracks to the exit.

We returned to the pitch black streets of Nunoa and found some candles to finish off the night. By the next morning, power had been restored. Apparently, an important transformer had blown and the system, possibly fragile because of the quakes, had dominoed into oblivion. We got some rest, we needed to prepare for our trip and my vacation was officially over: from here on out, I’d be working remotely on my trusty netbook, and needed to find a way to keep my lifeline to the internet open, which was turning out to be a lot more challenging than expected.

March 25, 2010March 27, 2010

A little time out of Nunoa

2010-03-13

Tonight, we planned to be living it up in Barrio Brasil’s home of the traveler, la Casa Roja. First, we wanted a good breakfast and some supplies so we headed out for a second attempt at locating the local Lider.

The Lider chain is one of the big players in the supermercado business, along with Jumbo (who’s logo incorporates a Dumbo-like elephant), Unimarc and the smaller (and somehow grimier) Santa Isabel.

Lider has locations scattered throughout, regular sized stores are “Lider express” and giant behemoths that rival and surpass IKEA are “Hiper Lider”. They are big.

I always find it interesting that it’s in the cases where things are almost the same as at home, but not quite, that I feel the most perturbing sense of culture shock. I think it’s that the familiarity lulls you into an impression of the known and you let your guard down, then suddenly something surprises you, or just doesn’t jive. Add up enough of these little events, and my brain seems to react by assuming it’s in a dream state and feeling like I’m in some pseudo-reality, a little disconnected and giggly.

Obviously, the selection and branding are different. Would you like some GROSSOs (Chicle Globo) with that? How about some Lays french fries (stacked alongside the other chips but microwaveable), or some comfort for your butt?

It’s impossible to find milk—I mean fresh milk, not in a box made to last forever—but yogourt and cheese abound. It’s impossible to find coffee—I mean coffee grains, used by many to make coffee—but Nescafe and 50 brands of instant 100% arabica are available everywhere (even coffee shops are few and far between).

The hand baskets are like small luggage, with retractable handles and wheels. They’re really cool. The cash registers never have scales, so there’s a fruit&veggie guy somewhere who’ll bag and tag everything you want to buy in the section, even if it’s just one lemon, before you head to the cash. Same thing for the bakery section, though it’s another guy.

We headed back to HQ and packed up for our road trip trial run, and set out for the red house.

La Casa Roja, situated in the heart of Barrio Brasil at Brasil and Augustinas, is a hostel in a huge restored casona. I have no idea how many rooms it has, but there are many, and it has loads of common spaces: TV rooms, internet center with workstations, living rooms for lounging around, tables in inner yards, a back yard with a swimming pool… all in a beautiful setting, a slight creak and breeze following you everywhere you go, with wood and ornamentation everywhere and windows and patio doors open on the beautiful weather at every turn. I’d say we liked the place.

We rented a double room (with bathroom) for about USD35 a night: a steal for the quality of this place. The room was clean, private and comfortable, but much of the fun happens in the halls and yards.

One thing Santiago is lacking is swimming pools and, though most locals consider the summer pretty much over, on 25 to 30 degree sunny days we were itching for some splashing. So the first thing we did was to take a dip in the back yard pool.

Not an Olympic swimming pool, but a nicely designed on with a smaller Jacuzzi-type basin feeding into the deep end, with a bar providing service in the water on the other end. Ah, enjoyable.

We spoke to a few travelers, students globe-trotting before getting tied down to another semester or real life and the like, and avoided a few others (namely, a group that were obviously from the same spot in the world as ourselves—we didn’t come all this way for more of the same, it seems).

By the time we had supper, Saturday night was upon us and it was time to dive into the action. Inquiring with the staff about suitable venues for our escapades was a bit of a disappointment. Having particular tastes, our choices seemed rather limited as a few of the bars we were relying on had disappeared or sold out to the 80s trend.

We were told that Oxido, a place we had both mentally bookmarked prior to arrival, might be of interest, and so we were off… to the other side of el centro, into Bellavista.

Oxido is a small club, with a smokey pub type tables-and-chairs section in front and a showroom in back. The ambiance is a noisy relaxed that is quite enjoyable with a good Russian beer ($1000 pesos for a litre!) and tar stick. A great spot was available, slightly elevated in the corner of the room, but only because it was a table with no seating. L asked two guys whether we could take two of their chairs and they promptly invited her to “take a seat, no problem, yeah!” Sorry, just want the chairs and we got a comfortable spot from which to observe the fauna.

We (really L, because with the noise I could hardly understand a word) struck up a conversation with the neighboring table. Turns out Ramon, a sixty year old with a good vibe and lots to say, was out having a beer with his youngest son and waiting impatiently to get a look at the show that was setting up in the other section. In the meantime, we all chatted about the state and future of Chile and the western world—Ramon seemed to have a worldview very much like our own, which is probably related to how we ended up in the same place on this Saturday night and was an all around cool guy.

After a good talk, and a few liters of Russian ale, we decided we weren’t going to close the bar on this night: turns out, on the weekends at least, the bars in the area close at 5 AM. W00t!! That’s a last call I can live with, just early enough to avoid the sun on your way back!

So we took walked back down across the rio, caught our first cab in the city(fast, so cheap and safe because tracked by GPS… uhm, hm… anyway, was cool) and headed back to our room in the red house. As we entered, we were invited to join the ongoing party at the bar in the back yard. Wow, I want to work in a hostel. A liter of Heineken later we’d had enough—the ambiance was cheerful and the people cool, but we were looking forward to some alone time followed by sleep uninterrupted by noise or light seeping in through paper-thin curtains and holes in the seems of the house.

March 19, 2010

Being Touristy

2010-03-12

Today we decided to be honest-to-goodness tourists and visit Cerro San Cristobal. It is a small mountain which stands in the north-east corner of the city, just at the top barrio Bellavista (which gets is “beautiful view” name from the cerro’s capacity to deliver it).

We journeyd out of Nunoa earlyish, passing a few signs of the damage caused by the recent quakes, including a few encampments of displaced residents. People fearing for the safety of their residences, or those forced out of their homes and hosted by friends and relatives, have setup small communities of tents in backyards and parks in this residential neighbourhood.

Fuerza, Chile! Reconstruction efforts under way.

Getting off at my favorite subway station, Baquedano, we crossed the rio Mapocho into barrio Bellavista to make our way to the mountain. But what’s the first thing a good tourist should do? Inject some plata into the local economy, of course. So we stopped at a small market of handicraft shops, to checkout the wares.

The merchant all have their own little box, which can be locked down when closed and is a unique work of art in its own right. They are organized along decorated paths, which are as twisty as the roads of Santiago, and offer a mix of handicrafts, jewelery (in large parts ornamented with, or crafted out of, lapis lazuli, the beautiful azure stone which is a local specialty) , musical instruments and trinkets of all types. If you are into penguins, condors, or the giant heads of easter island, you are in for a treat. Some of it is nice and unique, some is mass produced handcraft and some is plastic crap. Almost all of it is very inexpensive.

With a short walk, we cut through the patios of Pio Nono and headed straight to the Cerro San Cristobal. A few shops adorn the base of the mountain, selling snacks or junk that says “I’m a tourist, take me for a ride”.

The real attraction here is the Funicular, a vehicle that’s pulled up the side of the mountain on tracks at a somewhat vertigionous 45 degree angle at about 100 meters per minute (for a total run of around 450 meters). There are two of these little boxes in operation simultaneously, in oposite directions, that cross paths half way up and leave every fifteen minutes. In each of the tilted vehicles, there are five platforms arranged in a stair-like fashion and each can carry about eight people comfortably, though the top and bottom platforms are obviously the most popular.

We rode up and disembarked at the first stop, a little passed the halfway mark: the Zoo! Yes, there’s a zoo in Santiago, and they built it on the flank of a mountain overlooking the city. That’s cool. It is quiet, up there, and it’s quite a panorama for the animals, be it permanent resident or paying customer.

The funicular stop, and zoo entrance, are at what is almost the highest point of the zoo, which is arranged as a series of terasses similar to the aboriginal plantations of old in the Andes. As you wind down the mountain, you can gawk at both local (like the rabbit-horse-pig thing who’s name I’ve forgotten and the Condor, the national bird) and imported (we loved the white tiger family, and there are polar bears when it isn’t too hot).

After a good time with all the animals, and an engrossing conversation with a parrot, we walked back to the base of San Cristobal to take the contraption back up, this time, all the way to the top.

If it weren’t for the smog, which sadly masks the Andes from the city, the view would be heartstopping. Still, it is a stricking panorama and worth the trip.

View of Santiago from Cerro San Cristobal

At the highest point, there is some type of amphitheater which is used as a church. With a setting like that, I might be inspired too. Ok, no. But still, it is an impressive place with soft religious music and signs asking visitors to keep it down.

Overlooking the city is a large white statue of some lady. There were a number of people sitting silently around the base, facing the city and either being uplifted by divine power or just chilling, I couldn’t tell which.

There’s nothing to be worried about, though, as it appears the lady is coin-operated.

Under the statue is a type of sanctuary, where people burn candles and leave messages related to fallen loved ones. There are puddles and drips of wax covering everything, the scent of paraffin in the air, and it’s all rather sad.

We shook of the gloom and hopped on the funicular back down, glad to get back to the living. It was early evening on a Friday night in Bellavista. The sun was setting and the place was getting packed, revellers getting the party started.

It was enjoyable, but we were burned out and chose to get a little rest . The next day would be fun: a room was waiting for us in la casa roja, we’d be right in the middle of barrio Brasil just in time for Saturday night!

March 15, 2010

First day in the city

2010-03-09

Front yard in Nunoa, with view on the Andes through the smog

This was a day of firsts for me in Santiago. We took the Metrored from Nuble to Baquedano, which is a big station in el Centro (downtown) and the connection between the important green and red lines.

Feeling proud outside of Nuble metro, in Nunoa

We made our way to O’Higgins, which includes one of the nicer parks I’ve seen in the city so far right between the two directions of the boulevard. Once again, I was impressed by the sheer amount of life going on… maybe it’s just that I’ve been trapped by winter for too long, but this city seems to pulse with activity everywhere you look. Bustling business men, gaggles of penguins (as they call college students in uniform) and couples strewn throughout, being romantic like there’s no tomorrow.

At 30 degrees Celcius, I spent most of the day hydrating with my new favorite: aqua con gas—bubbly water. I did indulge in a little cafeine, though, in the form of a Coke Light. Seems that here, “diet” just wouldn’t fly and I must say it is less embarrassing to order a Light with your papas fritas (fries), than a diet.

Park on O'Higgins, near Baquedano station.

Without a single cloud in the sky, the sun was a force to be reckoned with. I’m definitely not complaining, but my melanin-poor skin was feeling the power. We stopped in una pharmacia, for some protection, and two things popped out.

The first was that all the sunscreen available was SPF 50 and up. A definite hint that I should’ve creamed up before heading out. The other was the fact that every single article was behind the counter. You pretty much have to know what your looking for as there isn’t much browsing to be done in most stores around here.

It seems Chileans have a reputation as thieves. I don’t know how warranted that is, but store owners seem to take it seriously because almost every store we visited thereafter was the same.

Now that's a metro station entrance. Salvador station, one east of Baquedano.

We then crossed the rio Mapocho, at this time of year a shriveled version of itself with turbulent brown waters rushing westward (I think), and headed to barrio Bellavista. This felt a lot like old Montreal, with handicrafts for sale behind expensive windows. The restaurants were inviting but the entire area felt like something of a tourist trap, so we skipped over most of it and head back to the center.

After a long journey through a busy but rather standard downtown area, we hit Plaza de Armas. It is a large plaza, with street performers and a fountain enjoyed by many as a source of quick cooling action. L and I partook in the joy of getting soaked, then headed down a pedestrian street packed with vendors, tourists and locals.

We had mote con huesillos, an odd mix of boiled peaches and oats served cold, that was tasty, refreshing and provided some much needed energy. We turned off, back towards el centro, in search of barrio Brasil which rumour indicated was a bit more bohemian and real.

After stopping off at one of the many internet shops, to buy a little time and let everyone know we’d actually made it down here, we proceeded haphazerdly towards Brasil.

After about 30 minutes of walking, we were melting in the afternoon sun, from which our only protection was a layer of smog that masked the Andes most of the day. Breaking down, we stopped to have a look at the Lonely Planet book for directions. The maps within, though helpful, aren’t all that detailed but, as we sat there scratching our heads, a man passing by groked our predicament and indicated that we were actually only a few streets away from our goal.

Chucrut, a sweet little pation on Brasil Ave.

On Brasil, we found what we were looking for: palm trees and patios. We took our first real break off the street, in a german-themed bar with tables on the sidewalk, Chucrut. With a litre of Escudo in hand, we absorbed the buena onda (good wave/vibe) of this popular little place and the area.

We’d read about the casa roja (red house), which is backpacker central and a combination hostel and restaurant. It looks like a cool place, and we’re considering staying there a few nights but instead headed to Las Vachas Gordas. It’s unclear whether the name, “The Fat Cows”, refers to the source of carne or the clientele, consider the insane size of the portions of protein.

Smoking in a packed restaurant: barbaric and so much fun, muahaha!

Though rather fancy, we walked in dressed as pattiperros (backpackers/hoboes) yet were treated as kings. I’m glad I ordered the ensalada with, what I thought was, a steak because the little roast that arrived in my plate was enough for four. Linda had hers “al pobre”, i.e. With fries… and two eggs dumped on top. One meal and you have enough protein for three days. Cooked to perfection, an impressive feat considering the thickness. Highly recommended, if your in barrio Brasil.

After that, we wandered back towards the metro slightly intoxicated and after another little tour of Santa Lucia, headed to our temporary home base in Nunoa.

As I type this in the front yard, behind the fence everyone has around there house, L and her cousin are having a convesation. I get a good portion of the spanish, but far from all of it. Since I wasn’t paying attention, I was startled when L, her cousin and her cousin’s son, jumped up and headed towards the house while L stood guard in front of me. “What’s going on?” “The police… they shoot people here, they do whatever they want.”. Hmm, ok. Maybe I’ll keep my nighttime wandering out of the ghetto for now.