Hello all! I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to write- it’s been a bit of a wild ride since I arrived in the country. In short- I arrived in Santiago February 15th. I had an incredible, busy, overwhelming, and exciting first week in the city and at the hostel (where I’ve been volunteering in exchange for room and board for several weeks now). The first night I arrived I noticed my roommate coughing and sneezing a lot- as it turns out she had covid. The start of my second week, she tested positive for covid, and the entire hostel staff (many of whom, myself included, had been feeling off) were sent into isolation. In a panic, I texted a mutual connection I had gotten lunch with (Angie), and in an act of incredible generosity, she offered me her empty home in the mountains for the week. Her neighbors, also incredibly kind and generous, drove me up dirt roads to get there, dropped off groceries, and texted with regular check-ins throughout the week. My symptoms stayed mild, and by my third day there, I was spending my days outside in the sunshine. I would wake in the morning, pick fruit from the many fruit trees on the property, sit, drink tea, eat breakfast, read, write, and mostly watch the mountains, which were extraordinarily beautiful and surrounded us on all sides. I will attach pictures below, it is truly not to be believed.
Looking back, I am still so incredibly grateful. I had to do a quarantine for what we now know was a false positive test in December, and then again in January, and the way both quarantines affected my mental health was not ideal. My week of isolation could have been horrible and exhausting, trapped in a tiny room in a hot airless hostel in a foreign place. Instead, I spent the week in the mountains, surrounded by nature, alone but deeply happy.
Now I am back in Santiago, and having a wonderful time. I’ve spent most of the week exploring the city, either alone, or with new friends I’ve made at the hostel. Today, I have the opportunity to go to the final rehearsal before the new season begins at the Municipal Theater of Santiago. I am so thrilled to be seeing theater here. I've been missing it quite a lot, and getting to experience it in this way is so exciting to me. Last night, I bought my ticket to go to Coyhaique in a week- a small town in Northern Patagonia, but Southern Chile. Jaine (one of my best friends from college) is coming to join me for a week and a half, and I couldn’t be more excited to hike and see more of Chile.
Below, I’m including something a little more my style- a series of sense recollections and happy moments from the last few weeks. Hopefully, that will give you a better sense of what it’s been like here than any summary I could offer!
The sunrise flying in. Red and gold over the mountains it looked like the sun might be melting into the valley. All the glow of early morning light, shining from above.
The market at Los Dominicos. I took the subway for the first time and in the bustling station could not find the entrance to the platform. I walked back and forth several times, trying to look very purposeful, until finally I found it. Then, a mix of Atlanta and New York, the only two metro systems I really know. I left the station, crossed the long sunny expanse to the church. Wanted a bench in the shade, but when I arrived found it occupied by a beautiful sleeping cat. Not wanting to disturb her, I sat on a ledge nearby.
The long nights sipping beer with friends. Conversation in all languages. My Spanish is getting better, but there are still many words I cannot find when I am speaking. I try to go around my brain. Perhaps it is covid, or the time away, but trying to speak in Spanish today felt a little like swimming. I will try again tomorrow. We sit outside in a circle, and giggle about the world. I have agreed to stay an extra week at the hostel, until Jaine comes. When my friends leave, what will I do without them?
Pasta night, wine and cocktails. Basil taken fresh from somebody’s garden the day before. When I asked where it had come from the answer I received was “the universe”. Delicious and illicit, I eat until my plate is clean.
Dancing until 3 am, wild, with abandon. The Brazilians confused as to why we won’t stay longer. I am exhausted, my feet aching, up way past my bed time. I ask to go. They ask for the time. Only three am? It’s early, there are still two hours, we leave when they sweep us out the door. I laugh, but also groan. I end up herding the rest of the hostel members home. Like unruly toddlers. It takes a while, but we make it work.
Night after night, watching the sun set in the mountains. I go from frantic anxiety, forcing myself to sit from start to finish, to perfect serene calm by the last day. By my final sunset in the mountains, I can sit for hours, simply watching the colors shift on the mountains. Every day it is different, but always, there is the fiery orange and red glow sent into the valley as the sun sets between the mountains surrounding the city I can no longer see.
Getting my diploma as a PDF. Unexpectedly, I burst into tears, throw my favorite song on my phone, and dance around the house, shouting happily to the mountains around me (I have no service to tell my parents) “I GRADUATED COLLEGE!!!” I am incandescent with pride and excitement.
When I am hungry, loneliness strikes. I spend the day wandering the city on my own and by 2 pm have not eaten yet. Lost, a little confused, feet aching, I make my way to Mercado Central (Santiago’s massive fish market), and in seconds am literally swept into a tiny side restaurant, seated, and given (for comparatively little money) a massive plate of fresh fish, salad, bread, salsa, and a shot of Pisco Sour. By the time I finish eating, I am not lonely anymore.
I spend one morning in Museo de Bella Arte. Though the older art is beautiful, I have some trouble with the academic Spanish explanations. When I walk to the basement, where they house the contemporary art, I am stopped short. Massive paintings, filled with color and texture, seem so vibrant as to actually jump off the wall. They are so colorful I can almost taste them. The are untitled, meant to be absorbed, and perfect for a solo traveler, still learning the language. I spend a long time with them and return the next day to do the same.
Many nights spent talking until 1, sometimes 2 am. My favorite spot to rest is on the shoulders of my friends here. Despite the week we spent apart, the other volunteers and I have become very close, and spend much of our free time cooking, sitting, and eating together. I feel so lucky to have a community of people I can return to every night.
On the days I have to clean the hostel, I put on Eloise and sing. I think I wake up everybody in the corridor, but it’s already 11 am, and it’s a hostel anyway, so I don’t care much. If I have to clean the toilets after the kind of night they seemed to have, I feel like it’s my right.
I cook here, a lot. Each morning at Angie’s I make myself a new breakfast to try. While I’m there, I start my period, and find myself absolutely craving chocolate. I have one bar of dark chocolate (brought during an initial grocery drop off), and it isn’t enough. I concoct some way to make brown sugar french toast with the ingredients I can find in the house, and end up eating it outside. Ten minutes into my breakfast, I notice that the tree in front of me is actually a plum tree. I pick several, and they become a part of my breakfast too.
At night, the stars in the mountains are stunning, and in the Southern hemisphere, different for me. Each night, I drag my sleeping bag onto the patio, and stay awake for as long as I can, waiting for shooting stars.
Breakfast in the hostels is a quiet, calm affair-honestly sometimes my favorite part of the day. I make eggs and coffee with a lot of sugar and sit with Nina, another student from Brazil studying Spanish down the street. I like waking up early and it’s easy to do- the sounds of the street and the hostel beginning its morning wake me up faster than any alarm.
A picnic, in the shade in Santa Lucia, with a new friend. Before, we go to a pasteleria and try to get empanadas, but they laugh when I ask if any are vegetarian. I get multiple different types of bread, a massive stick of butter (they will not sell me a little bit), and take them to the park where I eat my toddler’s lunch.
The fruit and vegetables here are so much tastier than in the states. Every time I bite into an apple, I feel blessed. I take them from the breakfast buffet and stick them in my bag to snack on throughout the day. I try to spend as little money as possible. Occasionally, I succeed in going a day without spending, but rarely.
I am trying to decide if I’d like to go to Mendoza, Argentina. I think I might.
I have learned to take my time here. The best sort of travel, I have learned, happens when you allow the days to happen to you, more than the other way around. Many of my favorite days here have happened out of the blue. If I learned anything at Angie’s, it was to take things as they come. Acknowledge the difficult, savor the good.
It is a beautiful life.
