Santiago: founded in 1541, downtown core with neoclassic
architecture and winding streets, capital city for
centuries, currently a modern metropolis and the largest city in Latin America with
a population of 6.3 million. I am overwhelmed. There is no way I can do justice
to this place in a single blog entry after having merely wandered its streets. (However, there is even less way that I can post blog
entries about my other life, my life at home.)
I arrived safely at Santiago
airport after a 10 hour direct flight from Canada. I am on my way to go sailing. I like having the
wind blow me around. I like the traditionalism and tranquility and cleanness of
sailing yet cannot ignore the fact that I have flown so far to do so, polluting
the atmosphere with jet fuel, possibly contributing to non-reversible climate
change that will prevent my grand-children’s grand-children from having the
luxury to sail, or even, should things get bad enough, fly.
I make it to my hotel on a
public bus, check in, then immediately go back out into the heat – dressed now
in shorts and sandals, sunblock and sunglasses – and book a seat on another
bus, two days hence, to take me from here to the port I will be sailing from.
After that I negotiate the subway downtown and successfully find the Museum of
Pre-Columbian Art, my stated goal for the afternoon, only to find it is closed
on Mondays. I like this in a way, it gives me permission to mosey about, almost aimlessly, with my camera. Like the woman in Carol Sheild’s Encounter, however, I find myself searching for something to remark
upon and finding the most remarkable thing is the unremarkability of it all.
Even in the old downtown I pass a Starbucks, and a Burger King, and two Bank of
Nova Scotias. The red, blue and yellow playground equipment tucked into a city
park looks like it could come from Toronto, maybe does. The colonial architecture
is distinctly non-North-American but so similar to so many other European and
South American cities I have been to that it hardly gets a note. Even the Farmacia’s,
the palm trees, the many shoe-shiners and peanut-sellers, do not strike me as
exotic.
Drawn to water, as ever, I
check my map and head towards the Mapocho River. I am expecting to find the
reason the city was built here, the original transportation system, but instead
there is a mere silt filled stream that one could kayak down if they didn’t
mind bumping and grinding the whole way. I take my first self-portrait and
continue on. What gives me the right to choose to travel here? It is a huge
privilege. What are the associated responsibilities? I head to the top of the
hill to see the statue of Mary looking out over the carpet of city below. I
wish I had her serenity, wonder if it is the open space around her, or the time
that she has, that has given her her perspective. ‘I hope you find what you are
looking for,’ my friend Pam commented before I left. I hope I do to. Maybe on the
boat, with space and time about me, I will find at least a bit of Mary’s peace.
At the moment I feel, instead - as usual - as conflicted as the ‘graffiti girl’
I saw on a random wall far below.
At 7 pm, the sun still high in the sky, I decide to head back to my hotel. The subway trains, running every 2 minutes, are full, and the platform is lined with employees in neon-yellow pinnies who help jam even more people into each car. I stand and watch this process for a couple of cycles before participating. 6.3 million. Wow.
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| Our tour visits the cemetery where coffins are stacked so high that there is a sidewalk half way up. |
My second day in Santiago I
go on a three hour guided walking tour in the morning through 5 markets and the
cemetery and it is so fantastic that I sign up for the afternoon one which focuses on architecture and neighbourhoods. By the end I have
been given a smattering of Chilean history, politics, culture and current
issues. I am starting to feel at home here. It is with a certain reluctance that
I board my bus and leave.
