Santiago, The Sequel

I began my seven-week trip in Santiago, Chile.  I had visited Santiago in 2016 on my gap year, and spent a good amount of time there.  I fell in love with the city:  modern and clean with efficient transport, great restaurants, world-class museums, and a level of safety likely unrivalled anywhere else in Latin America.  None of that has changed for the most part, but there have been some other events that have altered the city.

For those who don’t keep up on the news, there have been protests in Santiago and around Chile since mid-October.  The protests were triggered by a nominal hike in the price of their metro (subway) fares.  Despite being a small increase, it appears to have been the straw that broke the camel’s back.  Chile is a very successful country, but with success has come problems, most notably a growing level of inequality.  Chile is the most unequal country in the OECD.  I have quite a few friends in Santiago, and they all seem to agree that there are problems and that many – but not all – of the protestors’ demands are reasonable, and it appears that change is on the way.

The protests, however, have often turned violent – more riots than protests, complete with looting, arson, vandalism, and several deaths.  Many argue that they wouldn’t have gotten anywhere without the violence, which very well may be true, though the extent of the violence seems unnecessary.  Metro stations were destroyed and buses set ablaze across the city, leaving people unable to get to work (often those who most need the income).  Other buildings have been torched and some riots have certainly gotten well out of control.

Despite all of this, Santiago remains safe for tourists, though a bit of extra vigilance is warranted.  I had ticked off many of the big-ticket tourist items on my last visit, but there were a handful that were new or that I didn’t get to last time.

Bahai Temple

The Bahai Temple of South America has newly opened since my last visit.  I had visited the main Bahai Temple in Haifa, Israel, back in 2008 and toured its exquisite gardens.  Unfortunately, it’s the dry season in Chile – compounded with a drought – so the gardens here were lackluster, but the temple itself was absolutely stunning.  It’s an architectural marvel, perched gloriously on the side of a mountain overlooking the entire city.

Museo Ralli

This art museum – which also has locations in Uruguay, Spain, and Israel – focuses on works by Latin American artists.  The collection had some brilliant pieces, and was neither too big nor too little.  I don’t know how I missed this last time around…

Cajon del Maipo

Wanting to get out of the city a bit, one of my Chilean mates – Ronny – drove my cousin and I out to the Cajon del Maipo – a gorge just outside Santiago.  The area has some great hikes, but at nearly 40 degrees Celsius, we opted to skip those.  We attempted to drive to a major dam and reservoir which is apparently very scenic, but it was unfortunately closed due to rock falls.  The restaurant we wanted to eat at was also closed, but we found ice cream so at least that was something.  I will try to visit again on a future trip, maybe in a cooler season.

Food

I had done pretty well with local food last time, but there were still some things to be eaten!  Of course, I had an empanada, and visited my favourite ice cream joint: Emporio La Rosa.  My opening meal was at a brilliant Peruvian restaurant called Sarita Colonia (Peruvian food is super popular in Chile as it’s considered the best in South America).  The décor was eccentric and fabulous, and the food delicious.  They even did a little Aussie-Peruvian fusion with a pavlova de chicha morada (a purple corn drink).  Yum!  Elsewhere, I had pollo a pil pil (a spicy chicken dish), sopapillas (which are similar to the ones in the USA but not sweet), and even a new type of wine:  carmenere.  It was too sweet, but when in Rome…

Family and Friends

I actually have a cousin in Santiago.  How random!  She and her husband moved there from San Francisco nearly a year ago and are enjoying it despite the protests.  It was brilliant getting to hang out with them every day and getting the expat view of things.  I also have a few good mates in Chile whom I hung out with:  Claudio (and his mother!), Ronny (and his mother too!), and Sebastian.  Claudio’s mom was sort of my “host mom” when I visited last time, and she continued to fulfill her duties by feeding me a full lunch (just after I had had lunch).  Ronny’s mother was also very motherly and provided some outstanding Christmas cookies!  I did not meet Sebastian’s mother but she surely would have loved me too!

Jewish Christmas

Speaking of Christmas cookies, it was indeed Christmas while I was in town, which meant traffic was heinous and the main mall was a zoo.  Lucky for me, I wasn’t on my own while all of my Chilean friends spent time with their families:  Karen (my cousin), Matt (her husband), and I (me) had a very traditional Jewish Christmas… with Chinese food!  We had Chinese on Christmas Eve (because there was literally nothing else open), and then booked ourselves into a very fancy Chinese-American restaurant on Christmas night.  I feel like the Jews of Australia don’t have this tradition – likely because the Chinese food down under is too authentic – but I was happy to keep the Jewish-American Chinese-food-on-Christmas tradition alive while with other Jewish Americans in South America.

Next stop:  Punta Arenas!  (not to be confused with Puta Arenas!)  But first, let me Claudio take a selfie.

Me with Claudio’s mother, Claudio’s brother, and (of course!) Claudio on Christmas Eve.

So, Facebook has now disabled the links to share a photo album with the public, which is really annoying.  So I won’t be sharing any more albums apparently.  Maybe I’ll switch to a Google option in the near future.  If you're my Facebook friend, you can view my photos there.