Language Barriers, Randomness and Britney Spears
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Santiago,
Chile
Saturday, March 8, 2008
Today has been an interesting day and it started with a slightly unorthodox wake up call. Having had a heavy night out I was woken at 1130 this morning by the female Chilean equivalent of Manuel (I will call her Manuella) and literally turfed out! It turned out that the staff at the hostel were so incompetent that they forgot to extend my stay and that I didnīt have a bed. The same thing also happened to another guy in the hostel and now we are situated literally on the main plaza of Santiago, where processions and protests are lucidly organised, a testament to Chilean planning was the way the transition that took place when the square, half occupied with Catholic preaching dispersed minutes before a Hare Krishna (as I write I think the Krishnas are outside again singing, its either that or I am becoming spiritually converted and its all in my head) parade spilled onto the same plaza, being all set for a classic clash of the religions I was disappointed to find a rare moment of genuine South American organisation.
The journey here was the worst so far. With Poland (confused? see previous entry) determined to cut every single corner we were on the cheapest night minibus to Santiago. Having reconvened at the hostel in Santiago we were told that there was no space. This took a long time to establish as Manuella could not speak English but could speak French and I made the mistake of saying that I had studied it (A LONG TIME AGO) so a terrible Sitcom-esque 10 minute exchange of Spanglish, Frenglish and Sprench continued but after a bit of Polish persistence, two beds magically became available.
Since then I have done a bit of culture-vulturing involving a visit to the tremendous Japanese gardens (now there is much chanting going on outside, if a revolution is taking place, I love you all very much and will try and make it to the embassy safely) where I was accustomed by two very friendly Chilean īstudentsī who told me a lot about Chile that I already knew (talked about England: "best music in the world amigo, Coldplay" "Coldplay mate? you mean The Beatles?" "O Si the Beegees they are great too") and then wanted donations for their endeavours, being on my own and suspecting a potential mugging I gave them both 30p and they were very chuffed I was under no illusion that the money was going to a good cause when the last thing they said to me was if I smoked weed!
Santiago has also proved to be the first place where I have actually met other gappers since Rio but the first place where we have formed a majority, refreshing given that I have spent the past month and a half generally being the token gap year kid. It turned out that 2 of the gappers went to Hills Road in Cambridge and their mate is from Devon however he went to a certain Primary School called St Edmunds and used to be best friends with a mate and work colleague of mine (we had 4 friends in common facebook) and then to top it off one of the other girls is going to Kent University in September!
On the subject of firsts last night was also the first time since Rio that I went clubbing and it was good fun. We went to an "Indie" club where one room played the likes of Joy Division, The Clash and The Smiths to name a few whilst the other room played an eclectic mix ranging from the Spice Girls to modern dance. There was what appeared to be a Britney Spears tribute act (I like to think it was THE Britney Spears on a desperate PR drive) and a live singer. What was most noticeable was the fact it appeared to be an integrated club, gay and straight alike and it was genuinely not too hard to distinguish, the first sign being that Homosexual men can generally dance.
So far I have loved the city of Santiago. The architecture throughout
the city is stunning high rise corporate buildings etch over the top of
gems of Spanish Colonialism and the people here (in comparison to
Argentina) are far more Gringo friendly. They also seem to be a lot
more enthusiastic about Salut-ing (cheers-ing) each other but I am not
sure whether theis a genuine cultural thing or if it is just the fact
they drink a lot. The only catch has been the cost of living here, damn
their booming economic situation! I hope that this stays the same way, well a recession wouldnīt go amiss.
