Why, it's not Chilly here at all!

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  Santiago, Chile
Friday, March 2, 2007

Imagine my surprise when I discovered that my bag hadn't accompanied Cierra and I to Santiago.  Hers was waiting patiently for us there, having arrived 2 hours ahead of us, but the agent was able to offer only vague assurances about mine.  "It'll be on the flight tomorrow." she said. 

Chile requires Americans to hand over $100 each on arrival as part of a reciprocity tax.  Not sure what we charge their citizens for the right to visit the states, but having listened to other people talk about the cost of our visas, it's probably fair.  Doesn't make it any easier to hand over that crisp bill, though.  We forged ahead through the immigration and customs process, then out and onto a bus into the city. 
"Los He-ros?" I said hopefully.

"Los He-ROE-es" the driver said back.  Ah, yes.  Spanish.  My clutch must be broken.  That would explain why sparks fly every time I have to switch language gears.

The transportation system in Santiago is top notch, and we're whisked on the Metro to "El Golf", a short walk from the apartment of Rodrigo, a friend of my little brother Sawyer's.  He's on his own vacation currently, but agreed to let us use his place for a few nights while we explore Santiago. 

Ravenous a few minutes after we got there, we set out for some food and found that Sunday means the town is totally shut down.  Desperate, we finally settled for a Pizza Hut.  I would say I'm sorry, but you know what? I'm not.  That was some delicious pizza.     My taste buds awoke from a long coma and rejoiced at the sensations.  After Africa, everything seems crazy expensive, and we stopped off at a grocery store to get cookables to keep our costs down.  I was craving a salad, so we bought what we thought was a head of lettuce in a thick plastic wrapper.  Turns out it was cabbage, a huge globe of cabbage that I would cook for each of the 3 nights we were here and still leave half for Rodrigo and family.

Monday, most of the museums are closed, so we decided to check out the parks.  Santa Lucia, the first park we entered, had been a pit stop on our favorite reality show, the Amazing Race.  Another place where Phil and Company had trod! The entire park was built on a steeply sloped hill jutting out of the downtown area, with beautiful piazzas and stone paths crisscrossing the whole place.  At the top, a little brick arch and parapet, and a plaque commemorating Charles Darwin's visit to Santiago.

We stopped for lunch at a cheap sidewalk cafe for some roast chicken.  I got mine with fries on the side, which arrived cold, greasy, and translucent.  Ugh.  No more foreign fries, I resolved.

The park that really looms over Santiago is on a mountain to the north of town, with a statue of the Virgin Mary gleaming white at the summit.  Both feeling a bit sickly, we took our time getting to the top, and discovered that it's not just a statue, but an entire church up there.  A church congregating in a city park... there's something you wouldn't see back home.  The statue was placed here 100 years ago or so to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the dogma of the immaculate conception.  Wow, seems like it was a while before anybody came up with the idea that Mary was a virgin in the first place.  Perhaps 1400 years later, none of Mary's friends were around to snicker when the church official read out the decree.  By the time we found our way back down the other side of the mountain, it was time to head back to Rodrigo's and cook up another mound of cabbage.  My bag hadn't arrived yet, and the person at LAN says that it's now scheduled to come in tomorrow.

We kicked off Tuesday with a visit to a museum of cultural history focusing on the pre-colonial era in Central and South America.  I was surprised to see the sophistication of the art on some Incan pottery.  These drawings looked like something that might have been on the cover of the New Yorker, done over 1000 years ago.  The history of the Incan empire was also intriguing.  Faced with the task of governing a vast empire with no information infastructure, they created recording devices out of string.  Oficials would use different knots to signify certain things, and the lengths and colors of the strings tied onto the main string would fill out the details of the report. 

Lunch was at a greasy spoon cafe across from Chile's congress building.  We ordered an empenada, which turns out to be a greasy pastry with next to no taste, and a sandwich called a completo.  We had no idea what that would be, but definitely weren't expecting a footlong hotdog.  It's called a completo because it comes out with about a pound of toppings.  Tomatoes, pickles, ketchup, and around half a bottle of mayo on top.  We scraped off the mayo and ate with gusto. 

Later, we picked through bins of used clothes and bought berries at the market.  In a park, a couple of gypsy-looking women offer to tell our fortunes.  We refuse, and continue to blindly wander.

What a change, to be in this culture after the wild differences of Africa.  I feel as though I've been on a different planet, like an astronaut who has completed the difficult slingshot manuver around Jupiter and is now destined for home.  South America, Australia, New Zealand.  Culturally closer from here on. 

We visited the Museo de Bellas Artes, with a decidedly lackluster collection of paintings and sculpture housed in a georgous building that reminds of a cross between a greenhouse and a train station.  I watched a little brat run around with his toy school bus, ignoring his mother and bashing it into the sculptures.  Maybe I'll get to see this kid break a masterpiece.  Though on second thought, that might require a visit to a different building.  Still, watching him drive his mother crazy, I started to think about my own desire to have kids.  Do I really want to do this?  Will my kid be this out of control?

We returned to Rodrigo's place to find that my bag was still MIA.  This was ridiculous! I now hadn't seen my bag in 5 days, since checking in on our flight out of Tanzania.  My clothes were smelly and I was feeling like a homeless person.  Worst of all, unless I could get my bag on the flight to Easter Island the next day, I'd be in the same clothes for at least 5 more days.  I spent 2 hours calling every number I had for LAN, but nobody would pick up.  Cierra went to a nearby LAN office to try to get help from a person while I continued to call.  Finally, I realized that I was getting so frustrated that I could either start cooking some cabbage and forget it, or have a stroke.  I started cooking some cabbage and midway through, the phone rang and a person at LAN informed me that my bag was stuck in customs and would be available for pickup tomorrow morning before I checked in.

Cierra returned from her walk ready for a nap.  But we'd contacted a member of Hospitality Club here in Santiago, and she'd arranged to meet us for coffee, so I went in our stead.  I ended up shocked that I was meeting with one of the original 5 members of Hospitality Club.  She'd had tons of guests over the years and was really well connected with hosts in South America.  She also kept me entertained with some good stories about the club and disputes between the members. 

In the morning, we cleared out early and got to the airport in plenty of time to retrieve my poor lost bag.  Hogtied in white customs tape, it lay abandoned in the hallway near Customs, and I had to walk in to the restricted area, against the "Do Not Enter" signs and past the security guards, to retrieve it.  I waved my little baggage printout at the guard and he peered at it, asked me a few questions, then waved me through. On to Easter Island!

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