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Hello from South America! Well Chris and i arrived safe and sound to Santiago airport, if not a bit jetlagged! We somehow arrived in Chile, at an earlier time and date than when we left Auckland thanks to crossing many time zones along the way. To be honest, we were both more than a bit nervous about our time in South America because of our lack of Spanish and i have quickly realised that my 10 week College of West Anglia ´Spanish for Beginners´was definately NOT enough to communicate effectively here. Everyone speaks so quickly and when you mix that with dozens of ´chilenismos´(common slang) it has left me pretty much speechless. However, despite our language skills being replaced by flamboyant hand and body gestures, we somehow manage to arrive at our first hostel in Barrio Bella Vista, which is surrounded by colourful streets,snazzy bars, restuarants and cafes. After our massive splurges in New Zealand our finances look a bit lack lustre so we decided to stay in dorm rooms as much as possible in South America. But...after our first night being disturbed by slamming doors, lights being switched on at 2am and people laughing in their sleep, we decided that sleeping in rooms with other people wasn´t for us. Maybe it´s our age, maybe it´s our English stiff upper lip that prevents us from telling people it´s rude to turn the light on when 4 other people are fast asleep, but either way, we decided private rooms for us now all the way. Number of nights in a dorm room = 2.
On our first full day in Santiago we decided to to a ´tour for tips´walking tour to help us get our bearings of the city. As we arrived at Plaze de Armas early, we decided to get a coffee and picked an innocent looking cafe on the corner of the plaza. Within a few seconds Chris and i realised something was strange but we took a seat anyway. As we looked around some more i realised i was one of the only women in the cafe and that the majority of the other customers were cigarette puffing, middle aged men. Then i realised why....the waitresses were hardly wearing any clothes!! Many of the men seemed to be fairly friendly with the women and a kiss on the cheek and a little bum squeeze seemed perfectly acceptable.Hmmm....As i looked at Chris (who was smiling by the way) i nodded furiously at our surroundings and we agreed to drink up make a swift exit. What was that all about? More on that later....
We made our way towards the meeting point for our walking tour and i have to say the whole thing was brilliant, our guide Franco was really passionate about the city and gave us a great overview of Santiago and some of it´s turbulant political history. On the tour we explored Santiago Centro, and the bohemian neighbourhoods of Lastarria and Bellavista. It was interesting to learn about some Chilean history and and it made us realise that despite the country being isolated for centuries, destroyed several times by earthquakes and repeatedly enduring financial meltdowns, the city is has undertaken quite a dramatic transformation. Half way through the tour we walked past a cafe with blacked out windows. It was then that we learnt about the famous ´coffee with legs´ cafes across the city.
The coffee in Chile is AWFUL and apparently the idea of using skimpily dressed women in coffee shops evolved some years ago to attract more people into the cafes. It worked!Despite Chris insisting he liked the coffee and we should go for another, i managed to convince him otherwise. If you are interested, you should ask us about the ´happy minute´ coffee shop concept when we get home, another interesting way to get men into coffee shops! All in all we really liked Santiago, it was smoggy, bustling and had a really interesting history. We weren´t to keen on the Chilean food, but thanks to a friends (Jenny) recommendations, we did find a couple of fun places to eat and especially liked the Mexican restaurant Agua para Chocolate. The rest of the time we pretended to be students and hung around Pio Nono drinking Escudo beer and eating cheap pizzas and hotdogs.
After 5 days we decided to move on and headed over to Chile´s most famous port town and cultural centre of Valpariso. Valparisio was very different to Santiago, a much poorer area with victorian houses and ramshackle old buildings literally clinging to the hills which are lined by 15 of the oldest functioning funiciular lifts. The streets are lined with beautiful graffiti murals, vibrant markets and cobbled streets. We stayed in a lovely hostel called Luna Sonrisa which sat on one of the hills overlooking the port. We spent 4 days exploring the UNESCO national heritage site in Valparisio and the neighnboring upmarket seaside town of Vina Del Mar. We loved it...many people have differing views of Valparisio because of the run nature of many of it´s streets and the visable poverty in some of the communities in the hills, but we thought it was beautiful and vibrant.
During our second to last night in Valparisio we were awoken at about 12.30am to a strong earthquake. This completley freaked me out because during the day i had noticed many tsunami evacuation signs downtown and was aware of the tsunami of 2010 which wiped out huge sections of the Chilean coast and came as a result of a earthquake. It seemed to last for ages and the whole house shook, with noise coming from rattling pictures and loose objects around the house. Chris and i sat up and was a bit unsure what to do...my heart was pounding...when it ended we heard people moving around the hostel and talking about what just happened and whether we should get out the house. We didn´t, but we felt several smaller aftershocks and later found out a section of the coast was evacuated as a precaution and the earthquake measured 6.7 on the richter scale. The earthquake which caused the tsunami in 2010 was over 8 but it still left us feeling a bit shaken! Anyway, Chris and i are now in Mendoza in Argentina and will be leaving for Buenos Aires in about 2 hours for a 14 hour night bus...whoop whoop.
Chris will update you soon on our time in Argentina so far.
Lots of love from us both..Becci xx
- comments
Helen Hey I'm glad you survived the Chilean earthquake and Jeni's advice kept you feed and watered whilst you were there. We're off to Seville in 3 weeks and so will keep her updated with your progress. Hen weekends all booked so can't wait to party with you soon!!! x
Cliff Didn't like Chilean food! Fish, fish fish!!!