30 Oct 2016 Brisbane to Auckland, New Zealand to Santiago, Chile
Today was a very long day, it was 48 hours long! I couldn’t believe that were already heading to South America. South America felt such a long ways away, I considered it the “End of Our Trip”. Now though, I count the number of countries to go I realize how much more there still is to explore, and also, don’t forget Antarctica!
I knew I would miss the Tim Tams that were only in Australia! They were my favorite! I loved to see all the different kinds of wildlife in Australia. It is so different from our animals. I cheered myself up with the fact that on this flight I could catch up on the movies I had missed. I watched things from Finding Dory to Ice Age Collision Course. During the flight, it was weird to watch the map. Our route would go through a sunrise, a night time, and an evening. It was cool to see the colors change outside.
We landed in Auckland for a transfer. I was very nervous about the next flight ahead. These flights always seemed like forever. To my fortune, I fell asleep through most of it. Also, the rest of the time I was occupied either by one of the 4 meals, or I was watching a movie.
When we finally landed in Santiago. The whole time I was at the Airport, I felt like I wanted to throw up. When we got outside, I felt much better. I also asked for the jacket because apparently, Chile is quite chilly.
Once settled down in our apartment, we walked outside. The neighborhood we were in was Lastarria. We walked around a bit. I noticed that there was a lot of street art, like Europe. I really liked some of them. There were concrete balls to block cars from the sidewalk, and at one spot, someone had painted all of them an emoji. We also passed by a very green park. There were huge trees, it seemed almost like a jungle in the middle of a city. We decided to go there later.
In the meantime, my eyes were about to close every second we stopped walking. I don’t think I have ever been that tired before. Also, it had gotten pretty cold. We resolved that no matter what, we would always bring a jacket, we can always just carry it.
31 Oct 2016, Santiago
Happy Halloween! It seems like the aftermath of Halloween for us, we woke up at 11:50 am! It was funny to have breakfast, then to have lunch at Mercat Central a few minutes later. At the market. I didn’t like this market as much as the ones in Europe. There WAS the similarity that it was very busy. I felt very dizzy. We were also hoping for shellfish that we could buy and cook at home but was disappointed to only find fish. We were lucky though to find clams sold too. Also, we were encountered by a giant barnacle, the size of 2 of my fists stacked on top of each other. I peeked inside the tiny hole, there seemed to be 2 hooks. I wonder what those hooks do. I also wonder how they taste, maybe like a clam.
We continued to the main body of the market. We realized that all the restaurants had pushed the actual market out. It was almost like a food chain. The restaurants made the most money so they were in the middle, the seafood stalls were on the rim, and the fruit stands were actually pushed outside!
It was interesting to pass by stores having “Horror Discounts” and seeing people decorate their stores, I wonder if there will be any Halloweeners tonight. We even passed by some during the day! When we got back home, I took some blankets and made myself an Arab trader in the desert. I even got a chocolate bar! That night, I looked outside. . .no trick-or-treaters.
We also went to check out a nearby park called Cerro San Lucía. In front of the park was a fountain of two people. I wonder if they are Poseidon and Aphrodite. Inside the park, we visited the Castillo Hildago, a well-positioned fort. It was built in a way so that it fits with the irregular rocks. We climbed to the top and had a great view of the city. How beautiful. The fort was very complex, there were even fountains!!
1 Nov 2016, Santiago
It felt like Europe as we strolled through Plaza de Armas, a square in Santiago. There were Statues, churches, and even relief maps on the ground. We decided to go to a church that overlooked the square. It was huge!
Inside of the church was very intricate. We found a niche for Mother Teresa, a person that was just announced a Saint. It was amazing to see how much had been done in such quick time. Also, a few days from now it will be her first Saint’s day. I wonder how decorated her niche will be. Inside the church, we also found a dome. Outside, we saw a tower on top of it. My mom thought it was another church because it felt so far away!
Also in the square was a stage. Today, there was a puppet playing rock. It was actually pretty good. He sang all the originals, many of them were very catchy. In the square, there was a statue of San Pedro. I know a little bit about him, but I wonder if he found or founded Santiago.
We were walking along when we found something on the ground. It was a plaque that showed the map of Santiago. It almost looked like some sort of ancient carving.
We then started to get hungry, even though we had breakfast at around 11 again! We walked toward Mercat Central. On our way there, we saw a shopping mall. We were looking for undergarments required for Antarctica. Eventually, we found a place, we all got our necessities. Though, we also walked away with the loss of USD $120!
We finally had lunch near Mercat Central, but most other customers were probably coming for dinner because it was 5 pm!! We were going to have 2 meals today!!!
2 Nov 2016, Santiago
It was a new experience as we strolled the busy streets. We had finally recovered from our jet lag and woken up at a decent time. We were walking to another market that we hadn’t gone to before. It was called La Vega. On our way there, we crossed the river. It was amazing to see how fast it was. Yet, it seemed to be very shallow. I wonder if we are wrong, and it is actually very deep.
At the market, we were surprised at how large it was. Mercat Central was an ant compared to this market. The shops ranged from plants to spices to meat. I wonder if Mercat Central is meant for just seafood, because, here, there was only one seafood stall that we saw. We finally could get some ingredients that rivaled those of the European Markets. We returned home and had a great lunch.
After resting at home for some time, we decided to go to the Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian art. At level -1, we saw more of the primitive art forms. I was very interested, but my mom was a little disappointed. As we ascended the levels, the art forms got more and more interesting. It seemed that the tribes did not paint that much. We mostly saw small, clay, statues, pottery, and fabric.
I learned that most of these tribes all seemed to honor felines and women. They made morphed figures to show that they were in transforming into a feline. The women were usually depicted pregnant and had their eyebrows and nose connected into one “T” shape.
There was a section that was just about fabric. I noticed that most of the designs had a pattern. We were checking out all the cool rugs and shawls when my mom pushed a button. A drawer automatically rolled out and showed us all sorts of styles of weaving. There is much more to weaving than I thought.
There were many kinds of pottery. The older ones were black, while the newer ones were brown and red. Most of the pots had designs on them, but some of them were shaped like animals. We also saw flutes, toys, weapons, and funerary masks.
One of my favorites is hard to describe. It is almost like a miniature stage about the dimensions of an open computer. There are 2 columns on the front corners, they are like small totem poles. In the back wall is a huge face with a rig through its nose. I am amazed at how intricate it is. Another scary thing I saw was a god. It looked very interesting. At the hands, there was a hand, with a hand coming out of it. At the feet, there was a foot with a foot coming out of it. I thought It was some kind of weird ape because the feet were like hands. I then read the description, and found out it was a god that had skinned a defeated enemy and put the skin on him, he even put the head on!! I was amazed that these tribes thought up of this. It would take a long time for me to make up a god like this.
When we got home, we were all very hungry. In the hall, we smelled something burning. We opened our door, and to our despair, surprise, and disgust, we realized our food had burned! It was super smoky. It actually took many DAYS for it to go away! Luckily, one of the doors were closed, so my parents wouldn’t sleep in smoke.
We had to walk out and find another restaurant. This time, we treated ourselves to a fancy dinner.
3 Nov 2016, Santiago
The trumpets blared, the drums beat, and the symbols flared in the sun. It was a sunny day in Chile, the presidential palace was performing the changing of the guard. The two platoons stood on each side. The large band stood in the middle. There was even a cavalry of horses. The lieutenants both yelled orders to the band, to the riders, and to the soldiers. Everyone moved at the same time and did the same thing. It was a huge event, it took 30 minutes, yet felt like 3.
We then walked around the palace to a museum under it. As we were walking there, we saw a huge flag. It was so big that everything it did was in slow motion. There is also a large fountain there. It almost like a pond you have to cross to get to the palace. We walked down to the museum and found out that it was exhibiting things from the Chinese Forbidden City. It was a bit funny to think that we came here to see Chinese things. Though, it was still cool to see the numerous scrolls, jewelry, painting, and even the emperor’s writing office was brought over. There was also an exhibit on chairs! Too bad we didn’t get to go to the activity area, it had VR machines in there!!!
We then got very hungry, we barely had any breakfast. We bought some groceries and headed home. At home, we had lunch and rested a while. My toe still hurt from when I stubbed it while in the museum. It was actually bleeding underneath. We had to fix it up a little when we got home.
We then got ready again and set off some shopping. My dad said that he had found many sports stores on the map. We went to that area, and realized that sports stores in Chile were gun stores! It was amazing to see how many guns there were, from rifles to pistols to spearguns to fake ducks. We were looking for gloves, jackets, beanies, and socks for our Antarctica cruise. We found gloves, but they were mostly for hunting and were not insulated. We kept on going until we finally found suitable gloves. So we went on, and little by little, more and more things were off the list. Finally, after around 20 stores we found everything, except socks.
4 Nov 2016, Santiago
I lay down on my bed. I had just got home from Pablo Neruda’s house that was across the river. It wasn’t our original plan to go there, we were going to go to San Cristobal first. It was fun to think about the past events that happened. Especially when we found out that San Cristobal park was closed due to STRIKE!! I lay there thinking about what I had learned about strikes at school when I felt like it was shaking.
“Dad, are we shaking?!”
I asked.
“EARTHQUAKE!!!” my dad and I yelled.
My mom was busy cooking and amidst the fan noise. She finally heard our warning, and we all hid under a doorway. The earthquake took about 20 seconds, luckily, nothing was broken and no one was hurt. This was my first major earthquake.
By the time we had finished dinner, we were exhausted. We had planned on renting a bike, but I was a bit sick so we took it easy. We went to San Cristobal, and as I said earlier, there was a strike. We weren’t allowed to go inside. Also, when we were walking, we could see burnt tire marks from protesting. There were all for the same reason, too low of a retirement payment. They were getting about USD $0.30 a day!! The law was made in the early 1900s and back then, that was a lot. But due to inflation, the money is worth that much.
After lunch, I took a few naps. Then I just rested a while. Soon, it was dinner. We had our dinner early so that we could do things after dinner, and so we did.
We walked down to the park called Cerro Sta Lucía. There, we visited Neptune’s fountain.
5 Nov 2016, Santiago
San Cristobal
6 Nov 2016, Santiago
As we biked along the river, we passed many exciting things. We rode all the way to a tall building called “Gran Torre”. It was very tall. Quite fancy too. On our way there, we traversed through the closed off roads along the river. Next to us was the river. I was surprised to see how many people were biking. Not only that, there were skateboards, rollerblades, rollerskates, scooters, and more bikes!! There were many stoplights, as perpendicular roads had cars. We then came up to a gathering. There was a lot of people, and exercise music was playing. It looked like a free dance class! It was cool to see so many people move at the same time. Overall, it was amazing to see the whole city out and about all at once. When we finally reached the tower, I felt dwarfed by its size. Also, when afar, its silhouette dominates the skyline.
