Smile Please

Although aching for the vast emptiness of Patagonia, I had to taste a bit of the city life in Chile. From Mendoza in Argentina I went straight to Valparaíso on the coast to stay for a bit. I´m writing this now from Chile´s capital, Santiago.

When I arrived in Valparaíso, it felt more than a bit like home. Walking to the hostal, I took one of the many 100 year old "ascensores" up the hill and looked down... I saw the sea again ! And the seagulls flying around the harbour area where multi-coloured stacks of containers where waiting to be loaded onto the freighters. Behind me two street performers were playing something. I could swear it was
"Ketelbinkie"...

Valparaíso (number one on the coolest town names list) counts a few hundred thousands souls spread over the many "cerros" (hills) of the city and the small strip separating the heights from the unforgiving sea. The cerros are dotted with a century old houses of any colour imaginable, most of them a bit on the scruffy side. My hostel was on Cerro Allegre, the happy hill, which felt like a bohemian version of San Francisco. There were mirador walkways, old cast-iron elevators - the ascensores - to get up and down quickly for a few coins and friendly street dogs lying around.


The hostal I was in, Luna Sonrisa, was small and welcoming, with fruity breakfasts, a cold fridge to cool my milk, and the best beds I slept in for 4 months. Just perfect. There was much rejoicing with the others in the hostal, a ragtag gang of Europeans to wander around with, taste a sample of the nightlife and study the interesting mating behaviours of the street dogs. As an added bonus, the hostal owner happens to be the guy who writes the Footprint Chile guidebook, so there was also much interrogating about southern Chile (he actually talks like a guidebook as well).


Santiago is very different. Six million people strong, it seems to be a model capital city: efficient, sterile and a bit boring. For me the biggest attraction was riding the metro :-). It made me think of a rich version of Lima, with suburbs in stead of shanty towns.

So what about Chile ? I have been told, it is the richest and most capitalist country of South America , and it looks like it as well. You can see it in the cars, houses, department stores and I certainly feel it in my wallet. It´s almost twice as expensive as Argentina here. But the people ... people, please try to smile a bit ! After two weeks in Argentina it almost feels like I walked into a funeral. They are correct and polite though; it´s the first country here where cars actually stop for pedestrians (being the total opposite of granny-scooping Peru). They even weigh the bread and if you ask for a short haircut, you really do get a short haircut. But a bit of happiness seems hard to find. Maybe it all trickled down south. I´ll let you know ;-)