Day 42 - Santiago

Wednesday, 24 September 2014

Breakfast at 9 am. Again, I was pleasantly surprised; for the money I am paying for this place (USD33 per night) it was quite an abundant and delightful breakfast.

After breakfast I first gave some of my clothes to a nearby laundry. Then I walked to the nearest Metro station (Manuel Montt) and bought a Bip card, it's something like our Touch n Go card but you can only use this card for the Metro and town buses. Very luckily for me, the Metro is very similar to our LRT in Malaysia so I didn't have any problems figuring out how to use the Metro and where to go. Pursuant to information given to me by my hostel host, I stopped at a station to go to a mall to buy a camera. At this mall, it was like being in a mall back home. The same brands, the same layout, in fact, Santiago reminds me a lot of Kuala Lumpur - the roads, the buildings, the Metro, the people (city people). Here I bought a Canon camera but I had to charge the battery for 8 hours so no photos for today. Then I walked around the area that I was in, and went back to the hostel. 

The weather in Santiago is not that cold, about 18 to 21 degrees Celcius during the day if it is sunny, and about 16 to 18 degrees Celcius if it is cloudy. At night it gets pretty cold, about 12 to 13 degrees Celcius but thanks to the minus zero degrees that I have been in, Santiago weather is manageable for me.

At about 2 pm I started out again, to take the Metro to Plaza de Armas to join a free walking tour, they only survive on tips. The guide, Felipe, was very nice and full of stories about Santiago. He told us that 40% of Chileans smoke cigarettes. I think in Malaysia it's probably about the same. 

Unfortunately the Plaza de Armas and the Cathedral was closed for restoration, for almost a year. It is due to open again in December or January. When the Spanish took control of South America, the first thing they always built was a plaza de armas, with a Cathedral overlooking it. This is why everywhere in Ecuador, Peru and Chile there is always a plaza de armas in every town. The Spanish used to use the plaza de armas as a place to keep their weaponry, in case of an attack by enemies this was sort of like their command centre. Chile has a very wide income gap, the third widest in Latin America after Brazil and Mexico. The plaza de armas is a place where the rich and the poor mingle together, so you can see businessmen in suits walking around, and also artists, street musicians, students etc. This place is really the heart of Santiago.

There is a statue of Pedro de Valdivia, the Spanish conquistador who arrived in Santiago in 1541 and founded the city. He was not a nice man, he killed many of the native people and ruled with an iron fist. But he founded the city of Santiago so there is a statue to remember him by.

Across the road from the main square or the plaza de armas was a building long ago inhabited by the rulers of Chile, but now has been turned into a post office. It must be the fanciest post office in the world, it looks like a palace! Next to this building is the National Museum, and next to this building is the City Hall building. A few steps away is the Pre-Colombian Arts Museum, which was highly recommended by Felipe to be visited, as it showcased the life, history and culture of the native people of Santiago before the arrival of the Spanish. The biggest native community in Chile is a tribe known as the Mapuche, there are still some pure Mapuche people in Chile still fighting for their native rights against the government, such as land disputes etc. This is parallel to the plight of the natives in Malaysia. 

From here we passed by 2 other buildings, the Old Congress Building and the Ministry of Justice building. Here we also passed by several coffee houses, known as 'coffee with legs' or 'cafe con piernas' because they close at certain hours, and only male customers are allowed, where lady baristas dressed in revealing outfits serve coffee to these customers and the men get to flaunt their ego while talking about their jobs, life and flirting with the baristas. There are still some coffee houses that practice this today, but it is an open secret.

Next, we walked to the Palacio de Moneda, which is the seat of the President of Chile. Moneda means coin, and this place used to be a minting house for coins, hence Palacio de Moneda. During the reign of President Manuel Bulnes, it was converted for use as the presidential seat. 

In 1970, a man named Salvador Allende became the President of Chile through democratic elections, although he was a communist sympathiser. He was also a doctor and was well known for his big black spectacles. During his reign, he made many good social changes to the national policies in Chile, such as nationalising major industries such as copper mining and banking, government administration of health care system and education, giving back land to the natives, giving scholarships to the natives, and restoring diplomatic relations with Cuba, among others. However, there were economic and racial turmoil during Allende's reign, suddenly the economy was bad, everyone went on strike, and the people were calling on the military to do something about their plight.