Santiago & Pichilemu (11/16-11/24)

Santiago: the puking episode
After a tearful goodbye in Punta Arenas, Scott and I caught a very early plane back to Santiago, where we'd arranged to spend the night at some strangers' house. I'd found the two Chilean brothers through the website Couchsurfing.org, which helps travelers connect with locals willing to give them shelter for one night or several. We'd used CS (as it is familiarly called) before, in France and Morocco, and I'd initially contacted this pair about staying with them in early November, before we met up with our parents. However, getting stuck with no money in Calama and taking 20-hour bus rides in Bolivia caused us to arrive later in Santiago than anticipated, so it wasn't until we returned from Patagonia that we finally met the guys with whom I'd been communicating for weeks!

Slimy mushroom pizza on left

We learned from a brief stop at an internet cafe that our hosts wouldn't be home until 3pm, and since it was only 10am or so when we arrived, we decided to get lunch and hang out in the Plaza de Armas for a few hours, to watch the setup for a free concert that night. Ever since we'd arrived in Chile, we'd seen signs for TelePizza, a chain with appealing deals for cheesy, mouthwatering pizza. So, unsurprisingly, lunch brought us to TelePizza, where we each ordered a medium pizza with one topping. I chose mushrooms (bored yet? I swear, it gets better). When I got the pizza, the cheese tasted a bit gluey, and the mushrooms were greenish and sweating. But I was starving, and ate the whole thing anyway. I was to learn that gluttony has its consequences...
A bit later, lounging in the boiling sunshine of the Plaza and chatting with the guy with a "Turistik" sign attached to his head (who later yelled at a little boy for asking him where to find a subway station, since he was not a tourist information booth, but rather a guy advertising a city bus tour by the company Turistik - how confusing), I began to feel unsettled. The Turistik fellow was telling us about the education protests in throughout Chile, and how there was to be the large monthly protest in Santiago in just two days.

Our couchsurfing hosts

The situation in Chile is such that for the last five or six months, students - both high school and university - have been occupying their schools in order to protest government negligence of the Chilean public school system, as well as the high cost of legitimate education. But our new friend also told us that 17 million people live in Santiago, though, so who really knows where he obtained his facts? We did see students throughout the city protesting and asking for donations, so we hoped that he was right about the coming large protest, which I wanted to see. Throughout our chat, however, I began to feel sweaty and thirsty, and increasingly uncomfortable. I thought it was just the heat, so we got some water and sat in the shade. I put my head down on my backpack while Scott watched a chess tournament, and for an hour I felt okay. As soon as I stood up to leave, however, I began to feel very nauseous indeed. I looked so pathetic that a nearby couple took pity and gave me a suggestion for some medication at a nearby pharmacy. On our way, Scott stopped to ask the man putting in a new trash liner on a garbage can if there were any public bathrooms; while he was answering, I projectile vomited into the can in front of them. Thank goodness he'd already put a liner in...a moment later I felt obligated to deter a homeless man who was reaching into the can in search of bottles...
We began walking, because I was nervous of puking in the metro, but we stopped for frequent rest periods, and for me to vomit in various public places. When we finally arrived at the couchsurfers' house, it was nearly 8pm. We chatted (in Spanish); I felt ill; the boys made dinner; in what I can only assume was incredibly lucid Spanish, I talked to the pet guinea pig about how delicious he would taste; Scott drank some gin and gingerale, a beverage he invented on the spot; I projectile vomited in the toilet; and we found out both our hosts could speak English, but didn't really feel like it today. Santiago is famous for an alcoholic beverage called a Terremoto (earthquake), and when our hosts found out we'd never tried it, they took it upon themselves to buy the ingredients and whip some up. Unfortunately, the combination of white wine, pisco, grenadine, and pineapple ice cream didn't exactly help with my stomach.

The peaceful part of the demonstration

The next day, we wandered through the city, stopping at a park where a homeless man shoved nails in his nostrils and Scott gave him 200 pesos; we also stopped at the funky, artsy Bellavista area surrounding the Cerro San Cristobal. We made friends with a group of girls who deterred us from climbing the Cerro (hill), claiming it was too dangerous. Since I was still feeling sick, I agreed with them, and we spent some time with them learning Chilean slang (incredibly different from any other country we'd visited; for instance, they put the syllable "po" at the end of any sentence to add emphasis) and laughing about cultural differences. Back in Bellavista, we stumbled upon an International Tango Festival, oddly located in an upscale shopping mall. Among those dancing were backpackers in Tevas, 80-plus-year-olds, and an incredibly intoxicated girl who threw herself at anyone unfortunate enough to make eye contact with her.
We finally made our way back to the CS house (a rather loooong walk), where we found our hosts waiting nervously in the kitchen for our safe return. Their worry melted into delight when they saw we'd brought groceries for dinner, and we enjoyed some gingingerale together. Casually, I asked about "the whole Pinochet/Allende thing," and what followed was an incredibly detailed lecture on Chilean presidential politics and economics for the last 50 years. While fascinating, it was a bit more than we'd bargained for, and we fell gratefully asleep immediately afterwards. The following day was the protest.
We weren't exactly sure where or when to find said protest, and were concerned when we arrived at the city center to find business as usual. Was it a small protest? Had it already happened?

Santiago: the protest episode
We asked around, and finally gave up and began walking to a metro stop. All of a sudden, we came across a police barrier, with what appeared to be army tanks guarding the blockade. Our Turistik friend had explained to us the different types of vehicles utilized by the riot police, and from his descriptions we recognized a guanaco (name for an animal that is related to a llama and spits) - a large tank with turrets on top designed to squirt water from pressure hoses at protesters (get it? it spits!); a zorrillo (skunk) - tiny, quick tank that ejects tear gas from its underbelly while in the midst of rioting crowds; and something that looked like a large size Volkswagen bus with bars on the windows - a mobile barracks.

A zorrillo, covered with protesters' paint

We followed the barricades down the road to where we could hear chanting, then turned left and could see a critical mass of people marching down the center of a boulevard. As we neared and then began to pass alongside the crowd, we realized we were viewing nothing less than a parade, celebrating the freedom and right to education. There were groups doing intricate marching dances in front of drums and brass bands, people singing, chanting, and waving banners, flags, and signs. They ranged in age from perhaps 15 up to 75 years old, but shared a common joy as they reveled in exercising their right to support something in which they believed fervently.
Scott and I kept moving right up the column until it turned onto a vast, several-lane avenue, where tens of thousands of demonstrators were pooling at a police barricade at the avenue's end. We kept weaving through the crowd until we reached the end fence where the parade had stopped, and it was here that we had our first hunch that perhaps not everyone had peaceful intentions. While we were snapping pictures, a quarrel broke out between students on one side of the fence and police on the other, and suddenly everyone was pulling on gas masks, covering their faces with bandanas, and running frantically away from the conflict. Scott and I ran as well, and maintained our distance, even though the skirmish appeared quelled.

Guanaco, "spitting" at protesters

After about a half hour of wandering the crowd, who was milling about, alternately buying soy burgers from the many opportunistic vendors and gathering in small groups to pass around lemons (for tear gas) or a joint (because their parents weren't around), we decided we'd had enough of the peaceful protest. We left the corralled area of the masses (where many people were watching a stage with music and positive messages), and looped around to the police side of the lines. We found ourselves in a new crowd of a completely different variety - we were suddenly immersed in a mismatched crew of younger students, worried parents, rubbernecking onlookers (us), and several agitated media crews. All eyes were trained on the short block ahead, where protesters wearing T-shirts tied over their heads were squaring off against a whole cohort of police vehicles. The protesters were throwing chunks of rubble from the broken street at the tanks, while the police would intermittently rush the assemblage and blast them with tear gas from the zorrillos or charge them aggressively with the guanacos. Since we were located behind the police side, we found ourselves dodging the furthest of the rock launches, and at the same time catching whiffs of the peppery tear gas. Additional riot police managed the spectators, warning us when the rocks got close, and trying to block the news crews from charging ahead with the guanacos for choice footage. This went on for close to an hour, with occasional arrests made by the riot police, who brought the young perpetrators back to the moving barracks and roughly locked them in. It occurred to me that the people opposing the riot police at this point were not necessarily doing so for their education rights, and may not have even been students. Instead, I guessed that they were simply the "hoodlum" type - the angsty kind who expressly look for opportunities to defy authority. I thought it a shame that what had been such a peaceful, positive protest had devolved into this frenzied melee.

Post-conflict: black mist is smoke, blue mist is tear gas

Finally, the police organized a final charge, and broke through the leading ranks of the protesters, who began to flee around the corner of the block. They reassembled at the next block, and the whole standoff moved accordingly. When we arrived at the scene (spectators were now occupying the space previously held by the protesters), we saw that one of the zorrillos had been upended and was flaming. We watched as the protesters threw new rocks, and the police retaliated with their water cannons and tear gas. The protesters with their T-shirt masks looked like terrorists on foot defying military might; the whole scene was an apocalypse.

Teary, unable to see

Finally, the police broke the ranks again, and it was over. Back on the main avenue, a few stragglers hucked bits of debris halfheartedly at the vehicles, but most had turned and fled. Smoke was everywhere, with burning piles of trash and noxious bouts of tear gas filling the air. We stared, helplessly, as a lone protester ran past in front of us, and a riot cop carefully aimed a tear gas bomb directly at us. It detonated perhaps 20 feet from where were standing, and I immediately began to run...it was too late. We'd been exposed to small quantities of tear gas almost constantly up to that point, but this was different. I began coughing, my throat on fire, and had to squeeze my eyes shut against the crackling pain inside them. I turned the corner and stopped running blindly, leaning against a wall with my hands over my eyes. I couldn't open them. I could barely breathe. It felt like someone had pulled my eyes out, then squeezed lime juice in the sockets. Scott - who was somehow less affected - took a picture of me. A stranger handed me a lemon, and urged me to suck on it to ease the effects of the gas. It eventually subsided, and I felt better, but that is something I hope never to experience again.
We started back towards the city center, ready to be out of the war zone. We came across a small group of teenagers who had overturned a giant recycling pod, and were gathering the bottles to throw. Far down the avenue, we could see the conflict continuing. We figured we were safe, and sat down to rest. Moments later, a zorrillo, stink glands flaring, came zooming down amongst us, scattering the bottle-collectors.

Escaping the tear gas

Scott and I leaped to our feet and began sprinting in the opposite direction, the other teenagers following suit. I glanced back to see the zorrillo had abandoned pursuit, but before I could heave a sigh of relief and slow my pace, a guanaco, pregnant with water in its cannons, came screaming around the corner. In pure flight mode, Scott and I sprinted hard away from this spitting monster. As it bore down upon us, another running adolescent grabbed my hand and pulled me down a small alleyway and behind a car. Scott followed.
When we emerged from our hiding place, the street beyond was drenched. Perhaps a dozen students, who'd been wandering empty streets only a minute before, stood frozen in their tracks, entirely soaked with water, and shivering pitifully. I felt wronged; Scott and I, and for that matter many of these students, had been far from the front lines. We decided we were probably the only tourists in this part of town today, and chose to make a swift departure from the area. In the metro, on the way back to our temporary CS home, many of the riders were clutching lemons and rubbing their eyes.

Pichilemu: the scene

Scott was ready to get out of Santiago. We packed our bags, cleaned the kitchen, left a note for our hosts, and caught a bus to Pichilemu, a surf town a couple hours south of Santiago. In typical fashion, a couple hours turned into five and a half (no movie), and we arrived in Pichi well after dark, disoriented, and hungry. A man met us as we disembarked, and offered to walk us to his friend's hostel. Wary as we were, this time we weren't scammed; the hostel was cheap, clean, and charmingly decorated with seascape murals of whales, seaweed, and the like.

Glad to be back on the coast

We'd initially heard of Pichi from the San Franciscan girl, Carolyn, we'd met on the trail in Patagonia, so it was only a little surprising when, the next morning, we ran into her at a bread shop. She'd arrived about two minutes earlier, having taken a 52-hour bus ride directly from Punta Arenas, so we acted the guide and brought her back to our hostel. We spent the day surfing, lying on the beach, and taking advantage of the personal kitchen we'd discovered in the (surprisingly large) rambling hostel.
In keeping with the Chilean tradition of mixing wine with juices and sodas (red wine with Coke, white wine with Sprite), we also invented "juice boxes," which involve buying a 500cc box of wine, adding peach nectar, and drinking the concoction out of the top of the box with a straw. These kept us from getting too thirsty when we tried the Pichilemu delicacy of HUGE empanadas stuffed with cheese and your choice of crab, olives, heart of palm, chicken, tomatoes, basil, etc., which we ate at least one of almost everyday.


Pichilemu: the camera episode
We spent five nights in Pichilemu, the most memorable of which was the night we invited a Chilean man we'd met and his friend to come play American drinking games with us in our hostel room. One spoke fairly good English, and the other one only spoke Spanish, so we had a good time explaining rules, chatting, and sharing cultural differences. The next morning, when I awoke, I noticed my camera was not on the table, as it had been the night before. I looked through my things, and couldn't find it.

Giant empanadas

Having been robbed of my camera last year in the infamous Moroccan Tent-Slashing Episode, I immediately assumed the worst of our guests. Carolyn and Scott were sure the camera was somewhere within the room, so we each disassembled our packs, then moved them outside, then took apart the room while looking for it. It was only then that they were convinced. Carolyn called Manuel (*not his real name), who'd given her his number the night before, but he didn't answer. Juan (*also not his real name) had mentioned that he was only in town temporarily, and was working to set up the new Movistar shop. We sought him out (the shop was literally across the street from our hostel - great sleuth work), but the sincere, doe-eyed kid with the unfortunate haircut didn't know anything about the camera. We asked if he could vouch for Manuel, but he claimed he'd only met him a day or two before, and couldn't be sure he was an upstanding character. We recalled Manuel saying something about owning a brewery, so we set out to find it, meanwhile discussing various tactics for the confrontation. Carolyn was all for "droppin' mugs," and causing a scene, but we were all hoping it wouldn't come to that. After following various peoples' directions, none of which brought us anywhere near anything remotely resembling a brewery, I began to wonder if Juan could help us further. We returned to Movistar to find Juan squatting over a bucket of mortar paste. It wasn't until I was poised looking down at him, hands on my hips, and opened my mouth that I realized I intended to interrogate the kid.
"Robaste mi camara," (You stole my camera) I accused him, fairly aggressively. At first he smiled, thinking it was a joke, but as he continued to meet my steely gaze, his huge brown eyes welled with tears, and he shook his head vehemently. He maintained that he knew nothing about my camera, and even before he offered to let us search his room, I believed him. We declined, I apologized perfunctorily, and we went in search again of Manuel, the undeniably sketchier of the two.

Drinking juice boxes on the beach

Our sleuthing took us all over town, including into a falafel shop where a chastened-looking teenager informed me she knew Manuel, but was unable to tell me where he lived. Our luck changed when we ran into Mauricio, the dueño of our hostel, for whom we'd left a note of the incident. He informed us that Manuel did not, in fact, own a brewery, and instead simply brewed beers at his home, in a residential area just outside of town. On our way there, we stopped to ask directions at a police commissariat, at which point we realized we were at a police commissariat. When I explained to the police that we needed directions to track down someone who'd stolen my camera the night before, they kindly asked if perhaps I did not want directions, but instead would like their professional assistance. This seemed like a reasonable idea, so we gave the policemen Manuel's phone number, and they dropped him the proverbial line. Now, I must assume that most people are unaccustomed to receiving cold calls from the police, and further have come to assume that Manuel's intentions were never malicious, merely opportunistic. The poor guy came rushing into the police station 20 minutes later, claiming he had not taken our camera, but had been able to get it back from "the guy who stole it." We asked no questions. He led us back to the hostel, where he'd stashed his bike before walking to the police station. Bafflingly, he told Carolyn to put her hand into the goal pocket of the foosball machine, and when she withdrew it, there was my camera (he explained he'd stashed it there moments before, since walking into a police station with stolen goods was not his idea of a fun Sunday)!
We knew Manuel had taken the camera, but I believe that he simply saw an opportunity and - without thinking - took advantage of it. When he was given a chance to make a different decision and rectify the situation, he did so, at a personal risk to himself. He could easily have told the police he had no idea what they were talking about, or said he would come to the station and have stayed away. He knew we would be gone in a few days, and I feel both lucky and proud that he would choose to voluntarily correct the ills he had committed. Later that night, in a gesture both admitting his guilt and assuaging it, he gifted us two bottles of his much-discussed artisanal brews.

Pichilemu: the Thanksgiving episode

"Turkey"

When we met an American, Mat, in the mines of Potosi, Bolivia, we'd chatted casually about meeting up for Thanksgiving, as we hadn't met many Americans traveling in South America. Mat's additional draw of being a self-proclaimed turkey-cooking expert solidified the deal. We'd exchanged a few messages about meeting up for the holiday, but Scott and I were pretty sure we'd still be in Pichi. I went to send Mat a message about our whereabouts, only to find I already had a message from him, informing me that he would be in the "small beach town of Pichilemu" for the holiday. I know this keeps happening, but it never fails to astound me.
We met up with Mat and friends a few days before Thanksgiving for some surfing, tandem-bike-riding, and juice boxes, but strangely didn't end up actually having the holiday with him. Instead, Carolyn and I decided to have Thanksgiving the day before the actual holiday, since Scott and I had plans to WWOOF in a few days (I'll explain soon).
Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, since we only had a three-person gathering), it is impossible to purchase an entire turkey in Chile. We ended up settling for a luscious chicken, and simply called it a turkey throughout the day.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Menu
-stuffed "turkey"
-cranberry stuffing
-Aunt Kit's avocado/ grapefruit/ pomegranate salad
-gravy
-mashed potatoes
-bread
-mulled wine
-fruitcake (Scott's addition - who likes fruitcake?)

It was truly divine. We finished early enough that we were able to catch the bus back to Santiago that evening, laden with Ziploc bags full of our leftovers. Then Scott and I said a quick goodbye to Carolyn and snagged an overnight minibus across the border into Argentina, to our next stop, Mendoza.