Yawn : - O

  Santiago, Chile
Tuesday, February 5, 2002

Yesterday was Super Bowl Sunday, I watched the game at the hostel lounge with a few other guys there, while Juliette chatted with other girls at the hostel. It was her first experience in American sports/pop culture, even though we were in South America, and it wasn't the best experience by the looks of it. So she got to see a different side of me -- a small town Canadian who loved football and ice hockey. The New England Patriots beat the St. Louis Rams (in a huge upset) to win their first ever Super Bowl.

After a slight hangover this morning, we did some usually sightseeing around. The city of Santiago, at the foothills of the Andes, had nothing special. The buildings are not as historic as Lima, the people are not as friendly as Mexicans, the prices of goods are the most expensive we have encountered during our trip. Without any great historic landmarks to speak of, we just hung around the pedestrian mall for most of the morning, until noon when the Siesta started. "Come on" I complained to Juliette, "These Chileans are so f%#king lazy; bunch of intellectuals!" I wish the military dictatorship was back as we tried to find somewhere to go to pass the heat of the day.



We climbed the San Cristobal Hill. At the top, the view of the city and the distant Andes was quite beautiful. We took the cable car down, walked around the nearby park, the river, and the very wealthy residential district with private security at its front gate. We bought some groceries at the supermarket and cooked a nice pasta dinner when we got back. It was our first cooking since Christmas, and the kitchen at the hostel was full at dinner time. We hurriedly swallowed our food, clean the dishes and just in time to catch the movie Vanilla Sky at a nearby cinema. The dark streets of the city center were little scary, but I reassured Juliette that we have been through Tegucigalpa, Panama, Quito, and more, so Santiago was hardly a death wish in comparison.
The theatre was modern, but the Tom Cruise movie sucked goats!! Our whole day in Santiago had been a "vanilla sky", pretty much nothing special.

YAWWWWWNNNNNNWe went to sleep as the sound of an acoustic guitar was playing in the lobby.