Santiago

If I can say so myself, finding my way back to Santiago was a bit epic (as far as riding a bus goes). I pulled into Mendoza on Friday morning, over 50 hours after making the decision to come back this way in the middle of the night. I went from the heat of the jungle, near the Brazilian border, to a cold rain in Buenos Aires, and now heavy snows in the Andes had kept the pass to Santiago closed for almost a week. Karla had been staying with an Argentine girl she met on the bus over, who was happy to show us around the town a bit when I joined them.

As luck would have it, the Paso de los Libertadores opened Saturday morning for a few hours, as road crews managed to get ahead during a break in the snow. Towns high in the Argentine Andes were full of trucks waiting to cross the pass – over 6,000 by some reports. By the time our bus reached the peak of the pass, where border formalities are carried out well above 3,000m, a heavy snow was falling again and buses inched along the steep switch-backs taking us back down the Chilean side of the cordillera. For Karla, who had never seen snow before, it was a taste of what will welcome her when she makes the trip up north.

It’s raining in Santiago – one of the only days of the year – and I’ve got my bag packed to head back to Canada tomorrow morning. I’ll leave reflections on the trip to the forthcoming idle days in Ottawa. There’s no doubt in my mind that the last six days have been well worth the voyage.

Retiro, Buenos Aires

I think I’ve been through this bus station eleven times since arriving in South America. With 75 platforms and over 200 ticket booths, it’s the country’s hub and probably one of the largest stations in the world. It’s the setting for just about every theft story I’ve been told by fellow travellers, a place where you need to not only watch your bags, but keep one arm through each of their straps at all times. It’s a dividing point in the city, representative of Buenos Aires’ economic situation. On one side, a shanty town in which men, women and children spend idle days on their fire escapes watching buses go by. On the other, the gleam of the Sheraton Hotel and Retiro’s trendy shops and cafes. On the more fortunate side sits Plaza Canadá, in which a large totem pole proclaims the inclusive and equitable aboriginal history our country is so renowned for.

I’ve got nine hours to wait in the capital for my bus connection this evening, and since I don’t have much desire to walk the 10 blocks into the centre of town, I’ve decided to take my chances and let my guard down a bit to write a blog post. There hasn’t been much activity on Increasingly Unclear in the past few months. People have asked if it’s because I’ve been too busy having a good time. The answer is: yes and no. Yes, I’ve been having a good time. No, that’s had nothing to do with not writing blog posts. To be honest, I just haven’t felt like it; haven’t known what to write.

After staying in Buenos Aires almost two weeks, Karla and I had said a difficult goodbye and parted ways here at Retiro Station, me heading north towards the Iguazú Falls and the Brazilian border, and she back towards Santiago. I got off in San Ignacio, about 1,200km north in the province of Misiones, to relax and have a look at the impressive ruins of an 18th century Jesuit mission.

I’ve travelled alone on this trip enough to feel comfortable with solitude. But as I wandered around the old settlement in the warm jungle, quite amazed by the workmanship and historic ambiance of the place, I had a definite feeling of “this isn’t where I want to be at the moment”. The famed falls – much larger than Niagara and in a much more interesting setting – lay only 3 hours up the road, but I felt absolutely no desire to head that way.

Reason was overcome in the middle of the night, at which point I packed my bags, left a 20 peso note on the bedside table and trecked out to the highway to catch a bus back to the capital. I sat on a patio, drank Coke to beat the heat, strummed some tunes and chatted to the well-organized folk who hopped on pre-booked buses throughout the day. I had to wait 12 hours for a bus with space to pick me up, but it’s remarkable how setbacks don’t faze you when you know you’re headed in the right direction.

The trip back to Mendoza and, if the snows stop and allow the Pass to reopen across the Andes to Santiago, will take me over 48 hours in total. But I have no doubt it’ll be worth it. Maybe I’ll catch the Falls from my window-seat on the flight up to Sao Paulo next week.

Buenos Aires

Nearly four months after entering Chile for a 5-day detour, I’m back in Argentina. Santiago was a difficult city to leave, having grown familiar after a great stay, but Karla has joined me for this part of my trip home, making leaving easier and the bus rides feel shorter. It’s amazing how different the atmosphere is from one country to the next – immediately obvious that we’re back to uncontrolled intersections, lazy service, and dreadful food compared to well-organized Chile.

After spending four days in Mendoza, sipping wine and wandering tree-lined avenues with the Andes dominating the western horizon, we arrived in the Argentine capital this morning on the overnight bus. I’m looking to get to know the city a bit better on my third stay here, before finally heading north on my way to Brazil to catch my flight home.

Santiago

Having spent four years immersed in the unilingual bastion of the English language that is UBC (unless you speak Cantonese of course), this trip has been a bit of an adventure in languages for me. Being emersed in French during my time in Patagonia was the first “shock”. Besides weekend calls to my mom, I haven’t spoken my mothertongue in years, and was surprised when I couldn’t really express myself as accurately as I’m used to. As my mind started working in French again, it felt a bit like I was going back to the seventh grade. Living with French friends in Pucon helped me get it back, but technical language is still lacking. Oops, where’d that degree go?

Since returning from Easter Island seven weeks ago, I’ve spoken English or French face-to-face a handful of times. Thoughts have started occuring in Spanish, and now I find my vocabulary at a grade-four level… Here I go again. Good enough to read the equivalent of the Ottawa Citizen or Vancouver Sun, but that doesn’t exactly provoke interesting ideas, does it. Sometimes I feel like it’s just too tiring to think through anything even remotely complicated. If you don’t know the words, can you have the thought at all?

But it’s been great, to be honest – forcing me to take it easy and live in a different headspace than I was used to in Vancouver. I’ve realized that most things that are really important to me don’t require many words to describe, and that people can know me without hearing my thoughts on economic policy or urban ecocide. Focusing on the communication that takes place with your mouth closed.

Thinking about and sitting down to write this blog has been a grounding exercise all the while – where I get to think something through without getting interrupted by lack of vocabulary. Without sounding too dramatic, I’m looking forward to meeting the person I’ll be when I get back.

Santiago

So my Chilean visa has officially expired, and I’m still here. Life in Santiago continues to please, getting myself used to this extremely livable capital city. We rode every ride at the amusement park, running from one gate to the other like kids with A.D.D. high on ice cream. Got caught out more than once by the unreasonable strength of Chilean cocktails. And finally, the field trip to the seedy part of town for a terremoto sampling that turned awry.

A bit dizy from my third ice-cream-white-wine-and-anonimous-other-booze beverage, distracted by a blind man laying down a fabulous improvised folk-rap that had everyone on their feet, I managed to get my bag, jacket, and wallet stollen by a couple of women sitting at our table. I was set to leave for Argentina the following morning, but crossing the border without cash or cards didn’t strike me as a good idea.

The Chilean extranjeria suggested I remain in the country illegally for up to 30 days while I wait for my replacement cards to arrive at the Canadian embassy here in Santiago. They’ve agreed to issue me an exception given my circumstances, at no cost. Visa has taken responsibility for the gas-station shopping-spree the girls went on with my card, mom wired me some cash, and CIBC tells me my new plastic is on a FedEx plane as we speak.

So I lost some stuff, but I’m not too worried. I told myself when I left Canada, having sold or given away everything else I owned, that what I brought with me on this trip was likely to get damaged at sea, lost or stollen. I guess my stuff will be put to use by someone else – I have the luxury of swiping a card and replacing the lot whenever I want.

And besides, it means I get to stay here a bit longer.

Santiago

Having travelled through the night, I’m back in the capital to enjoy the balance of my Chilean visa. Was I not so short on time before the authorities remove me from the country, we could easily have stayed longer in wonderful Valle del Elqui.

We rode up an isolated valley on rented mountain bikes of questional mechanical soundness. Parked said bikes behind a hole in a fence and walked beneath endless colourful autumn vineyards to a quiet stream, fed my Andes snowmelt and natural springs. On the long ride back down the valley, with hands off the handlebars and gravity doing the work, had one of those welcome “I couldn’t stop smiling if I tried” moments. The task of going back uphill towards town proved over-demanding, and we ceded to the temptation of flagging down a passing pickup instead.

The next day, we walked and hitched our way 15km up the valley towards the Andes and the Argentine border. As tiny towns gave away to more and more remote adobe-thatch houses, we came across a couple of men loading up a mule with bananas to take to market. Within seconds of hola, we’d been asked into their modest but comfortable home for bread and pisco. Sitting in the living room, we took turns playing tunes on the guitar, an elderly man singing a tango from across the border, and our host laying down the rhythm of traditional Chilean music. After some initial relunctance, excuses of aching joints, Karla had a 77-year-old man up and dancing the Cueca as though it was 1962 and Chile had just qualified for the World Cup semi-finals.

Heart rates up, hands clapping, everyone was having a blast. Before we knew it, 26 ounces of premium Mistral pisco had evaporated and the conversation was gradually becoming more slurred. Stories of Pinochet murders and life in the valley saw us through the afternoon, when we excused ourselves from our extremely friendly – and now properly drunk – hosts and ambled back down the valley in search of another ride that would let us catch our connections in town back to Santiago.

Pisco Elqui

Morning light was already glowing through the curtains when she crawled into bed. Lo pase super bien – dancing salsa all night at Valparaiso’s largest club, she still smells sweet despite the tobacco smoke in her hair. I had stayed home, listening to my “better judgement”, sleeping off early signs of a cold in the hopes of keeping healthy for the remainder of my time in Chile. Ten minutes (or an hour?) later I’m awoken by the sound of crumbling and feeling of walls swaying. Quickly, the unsettling realization that I’m no longer at sea and that this kind of motion isn’t normal around here. But the old turquoise house hangs on, sticking to its perch overlooking the bay as it has for the past century.

We’d been wandering Valpo for the past three days, getting lost in it’s endless network of meandering streets. Hundred-plus-year-old three-story houses, painted in bright colours (although not always very recently), cling to the rim of steep hills surrounding the bay, all earning their magnificient views of the Pacific. The city shows it’s age, many of the buildings crumbling from disrepair, the streets dirty and tattered, but it all adds up to one thing: character. Proud to be distinct from the inland capital – rent is super cheap, bohemian hipness is the norm rather than the exception.

We scramble from bed, through the shower, and out the door by 9am. The distinction from the modern Transantiago transit system is pronounced. Once flagged, stubby old Mercedes micros swing open their doors and slow down just enough for you to hop on, accelerating back up to full speed before you’ve got both feet through the door. The driver makes a mockery of the Velocidad Maxima 50km/hr sign stuck to the window as he drives the old stick-shift with one hand, while with the other handing you your change and wishing you buenos días. It feels like a ride on the Hogwart’s Express as the crowded bus sprints along the winding streets, shooting down steap hills as it drops down to the industrial port; tearing through the centre on our way across town to the terminal.

Typical of distances in this part of the world, the bus ride north took all day, passing stunning coastline and classic Chilean towns along the way. We arrived in the Valle del Elqui – home to Chile’s national spirit, pisco – after dark. Here, in this small town in a lush valley surrounded by arrid cactus-covered mountains on either side, the stars shine bright and everyone knows everyone else by name. The vibe couldn’t be different from one day to the next, another side of this fascinating country.

I met Dad at Santiago International airport yesterday, where he stopped in for a coffee, much appreciated chat, and quick trip to the mensroom before continuing on his journey from Ottawa to Easter Island. There he’ll meet Jeff and Ralph, take up his place on my old bunk aboard Tom Bowling, and sail into the Pacific towards French Polynesia. It makes me immensely happy that he’s taken this on, and I hope you’ll join me in sending on good vibes and best wishes for fair winds on his maden voyage to distant and tiny Pitcairn Island.

Resupplied with a tin of maple syrup (Premium No. 1 grade, Fabriqué au Québec, merci beaucoup), a copy of The Economist and yesterday’s Globe, and so glad to have been able to see him for the first time in almost a year, I returned to town and b-lined for Vive Latino. The outdoor show featured 34 bands from Latin America, plus Keane, the British one-hit-wonders who were invited to close out the lineup for some inexplicable reason.

We dug our way to the front of the mass of human bodies. Every band that came was a fav, as thousands sang out choruses and swayed in unison. It was the feeling of going completely limp and allowing yourself to be moved by the crowd, where no matter what way you lean it’s impossible to create a void in space in which you might wipe the sweat off your face or stop your shirt from being pulled off your back. Moving to the rhythm, up and down, side to side, without asking your muscles to do so. Latinification by osmosis in three dimensions.

Santiago

I’ve been back on the Chilean mainland for several days now, welcomed back to the continent by a very becoming host at Santiago International. Most of my time has been spent waking up unreasonably late and wandering around the streets with no particular action-plan in mind.

For the past several months, I’ve only heard negative things from travellers about Santiago… Just another big city. Nothing special to do. Stay a few days and move along. Perhaps it’s just good company, but first impressions of my third South American capital are all top rate. It’s clean, lively, politically active, has a modern transit system that puts anything in Canada to shame, tree-lined avenues, great trendy neighborhoods, lots of parks, and views of the Andes. Shit, they even recycle. Well, sort of…

Needless to stay, I’ll be here longer than a few days. Happily set alight by la chispa latina after a month at sea; certainly not lost in translation, but enjoying its ambiguities.

Santiago de Chile

Some of which you may already know, and others which you likely don’t.

1. Hango Roa airport has one of the longest runways in the world, at over 3.5km in length. In an agreement between the United States and Chile, NASA funded its construction to provide a place for their shuttles to land in the Pacific.

2. Around 4,000 people live on the island at the moment, and they’re easily outnumbered by the horses that roam around freely. At it’s peak in the early 18th century, the Easter Island population is estimated to have been as high as 30,000.

3.The Coca-Cola company provided all the island’s residential garbage-disposal bins, which seem to be hand-me-downs from various American cities.

4. It’s the world’s most remote settlement, but the aforementioned runway allows LAN Chile to service the island using a large Boeing 767 that carries 40,000 tourists annually as well as nearly all the island’s cargo.

5. A law prevents continental Chileans and foreigners from owning land on the island, so that real-estate prices remain low for the local Rapanui.

6. The island’s discotheque goes off on Thursday nights (among others), where young Rapanuis and the odd foreigner groove to a mix of traditional beats and standard world music.

7. Do not wash your hands in said disco’s mensroom. While using the urinal, you will likely be visited by a local dude who smiles at you deviantly and then goes to work filling the sink.

8. By far the best empanadas on the island are served by the self-proclaimed Reina de las Empanadas, a lively transgendered Rapanui. She’ll dance around her restaurant while you eat and has no quarrels with you bringing your own beers as long as you offer her one.