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| Santiago! |
We were surprised to discover that our red-eye flight from Lima to Santiago was only three hours, thanks to the 2-hour time difference. It was not much of a night's sleep, so we were thrilled to be able to check into our hotel early (at 6am) and go back to sleep. Afterward we tracked down some lunch and coffee near our hotel in the downtown Las Condes business district and explored the neighborhood a bit. There is a 6-floor mall in the Gran Torre Santiago, the tallest building in Latin America. Nik read that there is an observation deck, and we were excited to check out the view, but alas, the mirador will not open until March, we learned. We were able to secure SIM cards for our phones and visit the huge grocery store in the mall. We were giddy at the sight of all the (cheap) Chilean wine!
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| Tree-lined high-rise view from our hotel, the Versalles Suites. Reminded us of downtown Portland. |
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| Bike share? Check. A sign of a cool city! |
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| A little smoggy and no snow in the mountains this time of year. It's summer! Santiago sits in the central valley between the Andes and the coast range. |
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| Plaza/ park near our hotel |
We had one full day in Santiago (not counting our arrival day, half of which we slept through), so we took the metro to the Parque Quinta Normal that had been recommended for it museums. Founded in 1842, this was apparently the first pubic park in Chile and in South America.
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| Riding on the metro... |
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| Museo National de Historia Natural |
This was a Sunday, and we found the natural history museum, one of three national museums in Chile, to be free on Sundays. We really enjoyed the main exhibit showing the diverse "biogeography" of Chile. This was the perfect introduction to Chile for us. It surely felt like we were in a foreign country on a foreign continent seeing all of the strange and wonderful things found here. From the Atacama Desert in the north (driest non-polar desert on Earth) to Antarctica in the south; we learned that Chile is one of seven countries that claims a slice of Antarctica as a territory.
Chile is 2600 miles long and only 110 miles wide on average. It extends from 17 to 56 degrees in latitude, or all the way to the south pole if you consider the Antarctica territory. Accordingly a broad selection of the Earth's climates are found here.
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| Nik and the relics |
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| Cute gorilla pair |
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| "Goodwill" moon rock and the Chilean flag that traveled to the moon on the Apollo 17 mission. These were presented to each country in the world in March, 1973, by President Nixon. |
After enjoying the museum and our picnic lunch in the park, we visited the outdoor railway museum (Museo Ferroviario), another of a handful of great museums in Quinta Normal park. For Charlie and any other train buffs who might be reading, here is a web page that has pictures and info of all of the locomotives! http://www.lcgb.org.uk/html/santiagomuseum.htm
Apparently there are two art museums in the park as well, but our kids were not interested. We'll have to save those for another visit.
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| Enjoying some park time |
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| Museo Arte Lein |
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| Sully under the steam engine in the Museo Ferroviario |
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| Lagoon with paddle boats and swimmers! |
Next to the park is a beautiful and heartbreaking museum, Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos (Museum of Memory and Human Rights). The museum commemorates the victims of human rights violations during the military regime lead by Augusto Pinochet from 1973 to 1990. I heard of the museum and wanted to visit it to learn more about this time in the history of Chile. The museum was inaugurated in 2010 by then-president of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, who had herself been a victim of torture during the Pinochet dictatorship.
The museum shows the timeline of Pinochet's dictatorship, including the September 11, 1973 coup, during which the president of Chile at the time, Salvador Allende, died (apparently by suicide), in the presidential palace that was bombed that day. Chile has its own September 11. The exhibits, which are beautifully (yet painfully) presented, show the human rights violations committed by the Pinochet regime. According to the Commission of Truth and Reconciliation, 28,000 people (suspected leftists) were tortured, 2,279 were executed and around 1,248 continued as Disappeared. In addition about 200,000 people were exiled from Chile and went to live in many different countries. The worst violence occurred in the first three months after the coup, but as of 1975 there were apparently still close to 4000 prisoners being held in the National Stadium in Santiago.
The museum houses memorabilia of torture devices used during the dictatorship, letters to family members by prisoners in detention centers, newspaper clippings and testimony from survivors. [A few days later we heard from our tour guide, Cristian, in Valparaiso that his aunt was tortured, and that she is one of a few women who's testimony we heard in a video at the museum. The video was very hard to listen to, and then it felt chilling that we met her nephew a few days later. Cristian expressed his amazement that women were tortured during this time; if the idea was to prevent terrorism, why were women being tortured?] Why were any Chilean citizens tortured, killed, disappeared and exiled? This time in history has to be a part of the Chilean psyche, and hard for us to understand, not having lived through it, or even having been aware of it at the time.
Nik and I were reminded of the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. Unimaginable and painful history, but so worth the time to learn and remember and share with our kids.
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| No photography was allowed inside the museum. |
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| Plaza outside the museum |
At the risk of overloading our readers with too much history and quoting info I learned from Wikipedia... I also found it quite interesting that the United States, being in the midst of the Cold War at the time and seeking to fight Allende's Marxism, backed the overthrow of Chile's government in 1973. Nixon authorized $10 million to unseat Allende, and the CIA encouraged Chilean military officers to carry out a coup and also provided cash and weapons. "A CIA and White House cover-up obscured American involvement, despite Congressional investigative efforts." This all puts that "goodwill" moon rock Nixon sent to Chile just 6 months before the coup in a new light. Henry Kissinger (Secretary of State at the time) explained Nixon’s morality: “I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.” History is pretty fascinating, I think, often not in an inspiring way however.
Visiting the museum reminded me of Sting's song, "They Dance Alone," from his 1987 album, "Nothing Like the Sun." I knew vaguely what this song was about, and Google clarified it for me: women dancing the Cueca, Chile's national dance, alone because their husbands/ sons/ fathers were killed or disappeared under Pinochet. They danced with photos of their loved ones. Here is a video with the song, that I have always liked, but now brings tears to my eyes, knowing the terribly sad details: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqPdJ20Bsfo
Here is a short video in which Sting talks about the meaning of the song and performing it in Chile, with mothers of the disappeared: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rh9Fwj2CBE8
Here is Sting's original music video for the song, which I find a little strange, but still beautiful and interesting:
“Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding. You cannot subjugate a nation forcibly unless you wipe out every man, woman, and child. Unless you wish to use such drastic measures, you must find a way of settling your disputes without resort to arms.” -Albert Einstein
“Peace is not solely a matter of military or technical problems– it is primarily a problem of politics and people. And unless man can match his strides in weaponry and technology with equal strides in social and political development, our great strength, like that of the dinosaur, will become incapable of proper control– and like the dinosaur vanish from the earth.” -John F. Kennedy
“If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner.” -Nelson Mandela
“The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace.” -Mahatma Ghandi
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