El payaso en la micro

Since being in Santiago over ten years ago the metro systems have expanded and now spread over the entire city, lending itself to quite some confusion of overlapping lines and when to get on and off, transfer to a bus to reach your destination, etc. So Dad was kind and took me for a trip to the mall Alto Las Condes from where we are in Santiago Centro, right downtown. Very nice of him to take a few hours just to orient me to the metro and bus system, and to spend some time together after not seeing each other for a few months.

We get on the bus headed back from the mall, and one of the more ingenious forms of Chilean artistry takes over. The chilean payaso (clown) on the bus. He gets on at the beginning of the ride and proceeds to, in quite friendly fashion, haze the heck out of the passengers. You try not to giggle in hopes he's not going to pick on you next, but there's no hope. I stepped onto the bus and the three elderly ladies behind me promptly get introduced as "Miss Mundo 1943, 1944 and 1922". On walks a wizzened old lady aided by her cane, "y Miss Universo del arca de Noe, mejor que se siente para disfrutar de su ultimo viaje en micro!" (and Miss Universe from Noah's ark, she'd better sit down to enjoy her last trip on a bus!) - as he literally drags a kid from a chair and plonks the lady down.

He cracks jokes and pokes at people and keeps you giggling for about 20 blocks, gets his tips and jumps on the next bus until he's made his living for the day. For some odd reason I try to not giggle thinking maybe I can avoid tipping the dude at the end of the ride, (odd reaction) but there's no luck there - I'm crying laughing within two blocks. Another girl says that she has no money and he's like "que alguien te preste! dude, borrow some!"

The next female that comes onboard, "Oiga, el chofer esta casado, desgraciada,vengase para atras pa' disfrutar del show! Ya po' Vamos a chocar y va a ser tu culpa!" (Lady, the driver's married, :insert insult:, we're gonna crash and it's gonna be your fault, quit hitting on him, get to the back of the bus...)

He finishes his show with a, "No se preocupe de malgastar su dinero, no lo voy a gastar en alcohol o en drogas porque las drogas son malas y si te tomas drogas vas a terminar como payaso en una micro...." to general gales of laughter on the bus. (Uh, don't worry about misspending your money, I won't spend it on drugs or alcohol because drugs are bad for you and if you take drugs you're going to end up as a clown on a bus...wait...)

Where would you be if you couldn't poke fun at yourself? He got a tip from us :-) I think we were too scared not to.

la Vega central de Santiago

Did you think that My Fair Lady was set in Covent Garden in London? You're wrong. It's set in La Vega - at least, the Chilean version of the play has it's perfect setting among the tin roofs and alleyways of la Vega Central in Santiago. Imagine the fruits, flowers and sellers from the movie, you've got the setting our our adventure this morning.

From the flower stalls to the squashed cabbage leaves on the ground, kittens sleeping between the stalls. Professor Henry Higgins was stuck in my head roundly declaring that, "here she is a prisoner of the gutter, condemned by every syllable she utters..."

Lois Mateer, Mom and I set out at 7 am, well before the sun came up and well below freezing temperatures, bundled to the hilt and our sense of adventure primed for an excursion. Lois and Mom with their lists and I as the general pack-horse to carry the goods.

Hundreds of tiny stalls with mountains of fresh, delicious produce line the alleyways. The richness and bounty of the Chilean countryside gets shipped to Santiago to be sold at the Vega. Mountains, mountains, of lemons, potatoes, tomatoes, spinach, avocadoes, pumpkins, fish, meat etc. Baskets of nuts, dried fruits, and every spice from oregano, thyme and basil to garlic, walnuts and almonds. Every variety of peppers, eggs, cheeses and hams. I had a fun time accusing one guy of injecting his garlic with steroids, what do you mean by selling garlic that's the size of a large potato? He laughs and lets me take a picture. I had a definite moment of realizing that Lois was standing next to a mountain of spinach that was taller than her. She's my height!

Highlight of the morning, the sun barely rising casting it's first weak rays and lighting up the fruit as we're standing in front of one of many tomato stands. Mom looks at Lois and says, "You realize we're never going to be able to bring our supporters here...." as they look at each other and giggle wickedly together and pay 25 cents per kilo of tomatoes.

Our take-home booty.

Now, caveat, this is way cheaper than even the usual feria, or street market, price. I wanted to laugh but was sweating profusely carrying our wealth of raspberries, kiwis, potatoes, broccoli, brussel sprouts, cilantro, nuts, etc. They wanted to get fish and meat still but I objected vociferously as my arms were falling off and my feet were frostbitten.

To compare it to home, we spent about $80 US for what at home would have easily cost $400.00 at Bi-Lo. At home I wouldn't even dream of getting that much produce. Supper tonight was, well, food like God intended it to taste.

El cielo en llamas, bienvenida a Chile

  I really don't like small planes. What would be small turbulence in a nice, jolly 747 becomes a armrest-gripping, sweating, praying-to-the-Lord-to-confess-any-sins-you-might-have-forgotten ride. Air hostesses on small airplanes should get combat pay, I'm quite convinced. How they manage to stay upright while the plane is banking at a full 45 degrees is beyond me, as my seatbelt is the only thing keeping me in my chair at that moment.

  Then the captain comes overhead and pleasantly informs you that he's turned the seatbelt sign on due to some slight turbulence.

  "Why thank you, Captain Obvious," runs through my head, rife with sarcasm at this point as the poor dude's coke, which moments ago was on his tray - 2 whole aisles ahead of me, drips only my lap from it's arc of flight from his chair over to mine.

  My flight from Atlanta to Toronto...Toronto... on my way to Chile was such a small plane. No worries though, I had just been through much grander misadventures traveling through Africa. Time to visit Chile. Ah, Chile lindo. I haven't been to Chile in ten years! Mom and Dad have now moved down to the Southern Hemisphere for their next term with Mission to the World to do church planting in the Santiago and Osorno (down south), and maybe a few other cities as well.

So the Lord lit the skies on fire in welcome. I am not kidding:

I can honestly say that there was no capturing the color of the skies - pure flame. Arde el Cielo.

Sorry, but there's a good chance the spanglish might turn on anytime soon. If I forget to translate, holler.

The funny part of the whole arrival process was getting here. Nobody was at the airport to pick me up! Now, ordinarily I would have panicked, but I figured, knowing the reliability of my dad, something was afoot and there was a good reason he's not showed up. The taxi drivers I was standing around who kept asking me if they could take me somewhere were joking with me that "le puedes tirar la oreja a tu papa despues" or that I can pull my dad's ear later for leaving me stranded. I gave had almost given dad up for a lost cause when a very flustered father showed up. Being in a near panick about not being able to get to the airport on time, he had left his carnet, (chilean ID), driver's license, money, you name it, he'd forgotten it at home. So, in honor of newly arriving in the country and brandishing my 2 day old international driver's license, I got to drive us through the city of 9 million people. Bear in mind I haven't driven in months, but hey!

Good thing mom didn't know or she'd have had a kadiption. (Is that how you spell that?)

 

The sunset turns the snow on the Andes the shade of the clouds at sunset. Tonight, pink!

Puro sacandoles pica- reineta frita, papas duquesas y un vinito tinto - con Torta Mil Hojas pa' postre. Supper - fried reineta (a fish, don't ask me what it is in English), papas duquesas (something like fried, mashed potatoes-to die for), a local red wine and this Thousand Leaf Torte that I'm gonna write about later to finish it all off with.

 

He did not, however, warm this land before my arrival.

Chocolate and skittley misadventures

What's to do on a ten day sail with plenty of time to kill and a handy cocoa pod in your posession? On a hike up Mout Agou in Togo, I found an awesome cocoa tree with ripe pods growing, so I grabbed one and, visions of Willie Wonka's Chocolate Factory dancing through my head, decided it would be an adventure to make chocolate.

Oh yeah... chocolate does grow on trees. I've found paradise.

The bottom one, you're mine!!

Two keen roommates (i.e. bored) join in the fun and it gets out of hand rapidly. Step one. Google the process. The fine art of chocolate making involves candy thermometers, drying cocoa beans in the sun for days on end, adding ingredients like lecithin (hard to come by in the middle of the ocean), carefully mixing and stirring the chocolate, etc. The images on the web are of indigenous women piling pods and grinding them in gorgeous tropical locations. I've got the ship's galley kitchen.

 Bored, armed sailors. You should be scared.

Hellooooo my lovely! oh yeah, that's cocoa.

So my roommates and I came up with our next approximation to the real thing. No sunshine? No problem. Oven set at 220 Celcius- another quandry. How much is 220 celcius? who cares! Surely it will roast, it's at the top of the dial! Whereaby we skip that entire pesky roast-the-bean-in-the-sunshine-for-5-days step.

Wait - the cocoa pods come covered in a really sweet fruit! That obviously needs eating off first! (We insert our own step 2.) The white fruit tastes rather like litchie. Unfortunately, when you add a juicy fruit to the oven, the juices caramelize and don't become chocolate, the whole thing just burns.

Step 3. Add cocoa butter. Right. I don't have that on the ship. We'll skip that too. You can see where this is headed...not to successful chocolate -making.

We gave up and ate skittles instead, readily available in the ship shop, proving that lots of initial enthusiasm sometimes does yield before ignorance.

 Skittles anyone?