Intermission

This post comes to you from a wholly nondescript internet cafe in the basement of the bus terminal in Santiago, Chile. We just booked our tickets for La Serena, which is a coastal town about seven hours north of here. The bus leaves in an hour and a half, which leaves us with a not-so-rare bit of free time.

Dylan has chosen to spend his time researching Brazilian soccer stars. As a matter of fact, he has recently declared his intent to become a full-fledged soccer fan. All he needs to do, according to him, is pick a team. I don't have the stomach to talk with him about it.

As the culmination of our long-standing bet with Kelsey regarding the availibility of good seafood in Santiago, we went to the Mercado Central for lunch today, which is essentially a giant produce and fish market that happens to house a few restaurants. Unfortunately, the lines of communication between the two of us and Kelsey broke down, so she wasn't able to join us.

The smell of fish overwhelms you upon entering, just before you are overwhelmed all over again by the army of waiters and hosts clamoring for your attention, explaining to you why their particular restaurant - with the same prices and menu as all the others - is vastly superior. To make things even more comfortable for the modern American traveler, all these salesmen have learned just enough English to cross the line from being interesting, if loud, elements of a foreign experience to being unreservedly obnoxious pests. Once we finally selected one of the cheaper-looking establishments, I proceeded to look at a menu I did not understand. Well, let me rephrase. I wanted steamers. You know, steamed littleneck clams - in their shells - with melted butter to dip them in. I basically tried to import that dish on the spot, and I thought I had gotten my point across to the waitress when she left the table with a smile. What I got in return was a bowl of cold clam soup complete with a pound of scallions and a liter of lemon juice. It was, in a word, terrible. After pretending I liked it for five minutes, including twice confirming to the waitress that "¡si, me gusta mucho!", I made a desperate confession to Dylan, who just looked at me and, even after tasting my dish and agreeing that it was terrible, had no suggestion as to what I should do. To sum up, I didn't eat lunch today. Dylan loved his meal, though, so we still win the bet.

Our food fare yesterday was not especially noteworthy, although, feeling incredibly lazy, we did have our quiet night punctuated by a dinner of two medium pizzas and a 2-liter bottle of Coke at the Chilean equivalent of Dominos (except way better than Dominos).

The most remarkable thing about yesterday was San Cristobal, which is a giant hill in the middle of Santiago and home to the famous statue of the Virgin Mary that overlooks the city. We took an acensore (think poor man's ski lift) to the top of the hill that I would charitably describe as "rickity". The view from the top, though, was really something to see. Urban sprawl for as far as the eye can see, all surrounded by a thick ring of pollution (which I noted was mostly concentrated at the exact altitude of the top of the hill we were on). Beyond the sprawl and the smog are mountains, mountains, and more mountains in every direction. Some are nothing but grey rock and white snow, others nothing but lush, verdant monuments to nature's dominance over even the most impressive of human cities. We sat on the top of the hill in the shadow of the statute for a good while, until the cold wind became too much to justify staying to watch a rather disappointing sunset.

Leaving Santiago, we note that this is the last real city we'll see until we reach Lima at the end of our journey. The rest of our trip will be made of mountain towns and, when those are unavailable, just the mountains themselves. I am essentially more of a city person than a mountain person, and so it won't surprise me if, in four weeks, I find that I enjoyed the first four more than the second. That being said, the next four weeks will be unlike any others in my life and I can hardly wait to get on with them.