Winter is here. The past few mornings the temperature has been near 0 degrees celsius. A far change from where we started this trip but we were ready.
We spent the last few days with Lisette Matamala, our guide from Abercrombie & Kent who guided us on a quick tour of Valparaiso and Santiago. She filled in the history and structure of Chile in a great way. One of the first things she said I found interesting was Santiago is not one large city but 37 separate communes working together. Each has a mayor who is a peer to all other mayors, none is above the other. Decisions that cover the entire Santiago urban environment come from the Chile government. Very interesting IMHO. Another item she mentioned was Chile has “more rules than the Pope”, i.e. rules that no one wants but are enforced and obeyed. For the example she showed us a newly painted building in a Santiago bohemian district that apparently had a remarkable graffiti mural on it that was much beloved. The rule say graffiti murals can only stay for two years so the rule was enforced and the building was painted. Sigh. Lisette covered so much and gave us what it was like to live here past and present, I cannot do her credit.
Some of the places Lisette took us include Palacio de La Moneda (Presidential Palace) and the Centro Cultural Palacio la Moneda (which is underground in front of the presidential palace), Santiago Metropolitan Cathedral and Mercado Central de Santiago filling us with history. And food, great empanadas at Emporio Zunino and wonderful ice cream at Emporio La Rosa. I will need to exercise when I get home. Thanks Lisette!
One thing I liked about Chile is its rich history of immigrants, people came from many places to make their fortunes here, Italians, Croatians, Germans. One of the leaders of Chilean independence was Bernardo O’Higgins if that tells you anything. I had no idea.
After 2+ weeks on the road we are worn out on restaurant food and resorted to an old habit of ours, hitting up the local grocery stores and making our own meal. We started this habit on our first trip to save money but as it turns out we really enjoyed doing this because it gave us a chance to see what local life is like so we kept it up. The nearest grocery store to us is Jumbo, a “you can buy (almost) anything” type of store. Very large and had the widest selection of yogurt I have ever seen. Walking to the store in the cold winter air Kim (who is never cold but was wearing two jackets) mentioned she thought it was odd we were out shopping in Santiago. I responded it was bound to happen sometime.
Time to go home.