Chile: First Trip to South America
To be honest, I have never thought of traveling to Chile. In fact, I never wanted to travel to Latin America (the why is a whole other story). Actually, that’s a lie, I want to go to Cuba, but again, that’s another story. Anyway, there was the possibility of traveling to Chile for a conference —yay work!— I did not know much about Chile, aside from the fact that it is located in South America, it is long and narrow and it goes all the way down to the south of the continent to Tierra del Fuego, a territory shared with Argentina.
Once I knew I was going officially, which was like a month before, I started researching Chile. I did not want to go to a country before reading about it (in hindsight I should have done the same with Iceland as well). I was also traveling two days before to be able to sightsee, go to different towns, museums, etc., all before the conference, since I was not going to have time after. But back my research, oh the things I learned! I read about Chile’s dictator Augusto Pinochet; I had heard his name, but would not have been able to associate it with Chile. Long story short, in 1970 Salvador Allende, a socialist, was elected President of Chile. This did not sit well with a lot of people, —the US included—, so the latter invested money in the opposition so Allende would not win and/or unseat him. They were even involved in the coup d’état of 1973 by military general Pinochet and for 16 years he ruled. I am limiting my opinions on this since I want to talk more about the sights. But I might get into the politics later.
TRAVEL DAY (Thursday)! I had everything ready, I was running some last errands before going to the airport, I had to be there at 4pm, but at 2pm I get a message that the flight might be delayed. We rush out and try to call the airline on our way and they say that they could put me in the 3.30pm flight but it was 3 by then and I was still 30 minutes out, in summary, I was NOT going to make it. In fact I did not make it. Once I get to the airport all flights to my connection are cancelled. Yay! They were “trying” to help but truthfully, they were not being very helpful by telling me that the only flights out would be the following Monday or Tuesday, meaning I would get there Tuesday or Wednesday, respectively, effectively missing a good part of my conference and my sightseeing days. There were various flights out, but they were all supposedly First Class (though I could purchase economy through their website, so they could have been lying). They put me on standby for Friday, but they were not sure of multiple things: 1. That that flight would even make it out 2. That even if it did, I could get on it. So, after hours and hours on the counter and telling me she could not bump me to First Class, she booked a First Class ticket for Saturday. On Friday I had to drive to the airport, again, where they told me that there was no way I was getting into that flight, there were 15 people in front of me on standby, so that left the Saturday flight: FIRST CLASS! To be fair, it was glorious, the lounge, the showers, but in all honesty, it is over rated: too much money, for relatively cheap stuff. The seat in the plane was comfortable and the food as well, but it is still airplane food.
A few months ago I wrote about hating the 6hr flight to Iceland… well, this time it was a 14hr flight. At least it was not a direct flight, first flight was around 3hrs, I had a 5hr layover and then 8hrs directly to Chile. I got sick on the plane, had to sleep for most of it and I couldn’t eat anything. So finally, I made it to Chile, the plane landed in the furthest gate ever (they are reconstructing and it was a new wing, so they are kind of forgiven) , I swear it probably took me like 15 minutes (or more) to get to the front. Here, the Carolyn stories started. I planned on Ubering to the hotel, little did I know that I could not get an Uber from the airport, so a taxi driver took me, he told me the amount, but I was still getting used to the currency and he scammed me off… a little bit… To be fair, he did take me to exchange currency, but from a normal $28 fare, he charged me almost $55 and made me tip him which made it a total of almost $60… At least he did not rob me, I thought. I got to my hotel but I could not check in yet, it was 10 am. Ok, I am a little embarrassed to say this, but I read a lot of stories of people getting robbed in Chile that I was scared of going out by myself, so I basically stayed in until they let me check in. Afterward, people from my cohort (they arrived days earlier), told me that they were taking a trip up to The Andes and I could not say no to that trip. I’ll say a few things, it is not for the faint of heart, or for people that get dizzy with curves (cough, cough, which I am). But it was SO worth it.
This was basically the road up the mountain, a one way line, except for a few places, and mountains right and left. Once you drive for around twenty minutes, you find yourself in front of about 40 curves, or more, they count up only to like 23-30 but I counted more (maybe they are just counting very narrow curves or something).
This video was very early on our way up, if you notice one of the curves, there is a ‘5’ sign, they are counting the curves as we go up…
This is what you start to see as you go up… yup… buildings. Not what I expected either, you would think they would keep that as sacred patrimony, but eh, what do I know? It is a stunning view, nonetheless.
For a moment I thought I was in Europe, this looks very European, but then I remembered that Chile has a lot of European immigrants due to various reasons, for example Germans seeking refuge after WWII. Apparently they are the largest immigrant group in Chile after Bolivians, Peruvians, Spaniards and Italians.
We keep going up, we are not at the top yet.
Winter was over, which is why we do not see any snow on here, but to be honest, I did not expect it to be a dessert. I guess I thought mountains, and I thought about the ones back home which are green and full of life (there is life here as well, of course), but it is two different weathers and ours would not survive a winter like the ones they have here. By the way, one of the places we stopped at, it was so quiet that you could drop a needle and hear it. I am definitely not joking.
This side of the mountain was gracious enough to keep some of its snow for show for us. Gorgeous, is it not? Some people were still skiing!
Probably my favorite picture I took in Chile, the difference left and right, snow and no snow, the shade, the blue sky, the snow below. I love it.
And since capitalism never fails, HOTELS! They are stunning and aesthetically pleasing, but still, my “save the planet” feelings could not help but be crushed.
To be fair, if it did not take a million curves to get here, I would probably want to live up here hahaha.
Just some evidence that I was, indeed, at 3,000 meters (they use the dot as we do commas. As a matter of fact, they do in most (if not all) of Latin America. It’s just that PR is so colonized that… I am stopping) aka roughly 9,482 feet.
Next day we head to Valparaiso, where I was supposed to stay my first two days, before my flight got cancelled. Beautiful town, so lively, though some people kept staring at us and I was afraid they’d rob us hahaha. To be fair to them, I was in Chile with another Spanish-speaking individual and two English speakers so we were speaking in English, and that turns heads in any non-English speaking country.
As you can see, there are paints on a lot of the walls, very colorful, so pretty. I loved this so much.
We got to go to the Federico Santa María Technical University. It looks like a castle, and it is an old building but it is oh so nice and it has that amazing view of the Pacific (which I fully intended to take a dip in -at least a toe-, before: 1. My flight got delayed and did not spend any time in town 2. Temperatures were in the 50s with lots of wind).
That day in the afternoon we were taken to the host’s house for the “opening celebration”, let’s call it. This was the view from his house… Freaking amazing! It was more impressive in person, to be honest. This picture does not do it any justice.
The following day we were taken to a wine tasting. It was ravishing as you can see. We got to see an old wine cellar, where they kept barrels (old ones as they only use them once or twice) and tasted three different wines, I even brought one back home, which I am dying to taste but am saving for a special occasion, Chilean wine will not be easy to come by now :'(.
Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, where the conference was held. I took some other pictures, but I loved these buildings! A copper building and a ‘Y’? And also, what is up with the outer glass ‘skin’ thing that building has got going on? Love it, love it.
But of course it is not a trip if I do not make some friends along the way. I met someone from England, though he sounds Scottish, I do not have a well developed ear to know the difference. I was just happy I could understand anything. I met a French, something interesting about accents actually, the French guy speaks Spanish as well. In Spanish, he does not sound French. In fact he sounds Mexican. But in English, he has a typical french accent (can you guys tell that I really love accents since I am making a whole paragraph on people’s accents? Ok). I met someone from the US, Mexicans and of course, Chileans. Funny thing about Chileans, we were told non-stop that they often ended their words/sentences with ‘po’, to be honest, I spend a good chunk of my time trying to find it and for the life of me could not. Then I heard it, I was low-key proud of myself, but the thing is, they speak so fast and say it so subtlety that you miss it. And talking about accents, I was at a restaurant shamefully speaking in English with the people I came with, while talking in Spanish to the waiter and at one point he says to me: your Spanish is really good! I go: “Well, I am from Puerto Rico”, he goes: “No wonder! I was going to say that it even sounds Latin!” For a moment I did not know wether to take it as an insult… I decided to just laugh and not think too much about it.
Yes, mom, I am -most of the time- the only girl. Mom, I work in a STEM field, by definition there are not that many girls and I was in Latin America, which means even fewer. Mom, they are good people. Yes mom, I was careful.
To end this. I need to go back, need to see museums that I meant to. According to Google, they have the oldest Museum of Fine Arts in South America. Plus, I know people over there now. I can bother them when I go back and can try and get them to join me to places. But Chile was amazing, delayed trip, scared of getting robbed and little sightseeing included.
Wait! I got one more story… two actually. So this one day I am trying to get an Uber back to the hotel, my phone died. The person I am with is trying to get me one as well, Uber was not working. So they walk me to the train station and leave me there, I was not 100% sure of the train stop, I did remember someone said which one it was and I prayed to God that was the one. I asked a cop in the train station, but he did not know. I took the train and when I get off, I am not sure which exit to take so I just walk to one. Once outside I start shitting my pants because I do not recognize anything and I was afraid to look lost hahaha. Finally, I recognized something so I start walking towards it and see a cop and I ask him if he can direct me to me hotel. He looks confused/clueless and turns and points up to the huge flashy “Crowne Hotel” sign. I was like: “Oh, how do I get there?” And he goes: “walk a block and it will be on your left.” He probably had the laugh of the day.
The second story is that I took an Uber to the airport and apparently they are not legalized yet. Somehow, the driver was unaware of this and dropped me off at the entrance of the airport and when I got off the car, a cop stopped me and asked me all sorts of questions. In that moment I swear I thought I was going to get arrested or something, with like 3 hrs left to leave! They let me go but it was a huge scary moment.
Ok, now I am done.
P.S. I saw some good-looking Chileans. I would be willing to break my Cuban-marrying rule!
Carolyn