Night Life of Viña del Mar

The parties of Viña del Mar are quite numerous and quite long into the night. Pretty much every weekend, I end up going with Pelao, the 24 year old who I live with, to some house party. The drink of choice of Chile is Piscola which is a mix of Pisco Rum and Coca-Cola. It's pretty much what everyone drinks. If it's beer, then it's Escudo. The parties are centered less on drinking games and more on conversing and just talking with other people enjoying the company. After a couple hours, you might go to a club to go dancing or something. One could be walking home very easily at 7:30am just because that's when the party ends. And a night is not complete without going to MacDonald's or eating a completo (the hotdog with avocado, tomatoes, and mayo). MacDonalds is basically the only place you can find food at 6:30 in the morning, and that's where all the Chileans go. If I don't go out with Pelao, I'll go out with the many people I'm friends with in AIESEC. They're always doing something which makes things exciting. The only problem is there's never a chance to sleep.

Freshman Week

The Week of Mechones is basically like the week to celebrate the first years that are just now beginning their university experience. All classes after 2pm were canceled and at night their would be parties for the freshman. One tradition, is that all the freshman have to be doused with paint and have their clothes ripped and go barefoot to the street to collect money. And they have to collect a certain amount before coming back. It's not really as bad it sounds and they seem to make it a fun experience. So if you saw a person who looked like a colorful mess, you knew they were freshman. On Thursday of the week was the big day. Beginning at 11am, ten thousand university students from the universities of Viña del Mar and Valparaíso all gathered for one huge party on a beach 30 minutes north of Viña del Mar near Concón. Tons of people were there drinking away and playing music and enjoying time with friends. People were walking around selling shots of rum and selling sandwiches and everything. I went with my friends from Chorus and had a good time. We got to know each other pretty well. I don't think I saw another gringo there the whole day, but then again I'm sure there were a few. (All the gringos from my Study Abroad Program had taken the week off to go to Torres del Paine in the south of Chile) At about 2pm a train was coming with the tracks that basically went through the beach and all the 10,000 people. So all the inebriated people ran after the train and brought it to a halt and actually boarded the train and were jumping on the canisters of coal. That wasn't very good. It didn't pass until about 6 hours later when the Carabineros (Chilean Police) came and forcefully removed the people so that the train could pass. When darkness fell, the party continued and a large number of people headed back to Viña del Mar. But due to the mass of people that were trying to get back, there was a huge traffic jam so it was basically faster to walk than try to wait for a bus because the buses weren't hardly moving. So there was a mass of people walking in the street back to the town. There were large transport trucks in the traffic jam, so tons of people jumped on the trucks to get a lift back to town without having to walk. On one truck, there were probably 40 people. And the truck drivers couldn't really do anything to stop the people from boarding the back of their truck. I finally made it back to Viña in the night.

Mi Familia Chilena: My Chilean Family

After the Orientation, we finally got to meet the families that we would live with. I live with a family of 3: the mother, the father, and the 24 year old son. The family is incredibly nice. The mother, Angelina, is a house-wife, making all the meals, taking care of the house, keeping up with the gossip of all the family friends and relatives, doing the wash and all that. The father, Rolando, is a executive of a local company that is in charge of the parking meters of Viña del Mar. I'm really not exactly sure what he does, but yeah. He goes to work in the morning, comes back around 2pm for lunch, and then returns to work at about 4:30, and then comes back home around 11pm. His work is about 40 minutes away in a nearby town called Villa Alemaña (German Villa). The son, Pelao, is a 5th year Industrial Engineer Student at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso. There are two other daughters that are both married and live outside of the house. Fernanda, the oldest, lives in Santiago with her husband and two children of 3 and 5. Loreto, the middle daughter, lives in Viña del Mar with her husband, near to her parents, and works in a nursery caring for the children. The house is about a 8 minute bus ride from the center of Viña del Mar and about a 15 minute bus ride to where my classes are in Valparaíso. I eat all my meals in the house which isn't a problem because Angelina makes really good food. Rico! Breakfast is either cereal and milk or bread and jam. Lunch is the big meal of the day which generally always has cut tomatoes with salt and cucumbers with vinegar, cut avocado (really good) and lechuga. Some things that might be eaten during lunch include mashed potatoes, beef, completos (hotdogs with mayonaise and avocado and tomato)

Return back to Valparaíso

On Monday, we pulled into the port of Puerto Montt at around 7:30am and all of us headed our separate ways. The first thing that I absolutely had to do was do my laundry. I hadn't done laundry in more than 16 days which was absolutely too long. I was fine before Torres del Paine, but then I was 9 days in Torres without doing laundry, and then when I got back to civilization I hopped right on a boat without time to do laundry and went another 4 days without laundry. So my jacket smelled strongly of smoke from the campfires at night and overally, 16 days with intense physical activity most days is a little too long. Surprisingly, it was quite a challenge to find a laundromat. The first one that someone directed me to didn't exist anymore, the second was closed, and then after 2 hours of asking people and be directed to random places where there wasn't a laundromat, I finally found a place to do my laundry (thank god). I can't tell you how happy I was to have clean clothes. In the night, I got on a bus to make the overnight (11 hour) trip from Puerto Montt to Viña del Mar.

Later in the week, from Wednesday to Sunday, my Study Abroad Program, IFSA-Butler, had their orientation in Olmué, Chile which is very near to where I was from my week long AIESEC Conference in January. When I arrived on Wednesday to the orientation, the majority of the group had just flown into Chile from the US that day. It was a fun 4 days, relaxing in this small town of Olmué. We had our program sessions preparing us for studying in the university in Valparaíso and how to avoid getting stolen from. In the Study Abroad Group, there are about 30 people. 13 of those 30 are from UNC Chapel Hill, but I had only met 4 of them before we had gotten there. There were only 4 guys and 26 girls and all 4 of the guys were from UNC-Chapel Hill. I'm not really sure what that means or what the cause of that is. The food was absolutely delicious at the hotel, and they always had more than enough.

Ferry Trip

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On Thursday, I said farewell to the guys from Santiago and took a boat to return to Puerto Natales. Once there, I was really hungry after 8 days of eating on slim rations so I went to restaurant and ordered a huge churrasco (kind of like a hamburger, but a different form of meat, I couldn't tell you what). I went all out, which was a mistake. That night, I boarded a ferry that would take me to Puerto Montt after a 3 day trip by boat. I was going to take a bus all the way back to Viña del Mar (a 3 day trip by bus), but a discounted ticket opened up to take the ferry, so I decided to just go for it. This ferry has like 6 levels (3 of which are for passengers and 3 of which are for cargo, trucks, cars, etc) and is officially the longest ferry in the world (3 days).

On Friday, I awoke feeling quite sick. I'm pretty sure that the going all out at dinner the night before was not the best decision. I'm pretty sure that's what made me sick because my body had gotten used to eating a little bit and then it was an abrupt change. Either that, or it was food poisoning. Something. So the first day on the boat was a little rough. I read a lot and met some other Americans my age that I spent time with. There was actually a couple that had both graduated from Duke. Others from up north in Massachusetts. We passed through the endless sight of the archipelago of southern Chile (tons and tons and more tons of small uninhabited islands). I met a woman on the boat that had worked for many years with the United States Peace Corps, particularly in Africa. She was brought in after the genocide in Rwanda to help rebuild the country with social projects after the turmoil of the genoicde. Quite a challenge. She talked about how there was a group of European students that were on a tour to see the gorrillas of Rwanda (I have no idea why there was a tour into Rwanda only 8 months after the genocide, but that's a different matter) and a group of Rwandan guerillas took over their bus and stole all of their possessions at gunpoint. Quite the tour. She was a really interesting person.

On Saturday, we disembarked in the morning to visit a small isolated town that can only be reached by boat called Puerto Edén (Port Eden) just to see it. I felt pretty ridiculously touristy, because they put you in bright flourescent life jackets when you disembark, so basically it's 50 gringos that are walking around this little town and no one else is out. Only 2 people from Puerto Eden were out trying to sell trinkets to the gringos. The rest of the town was completely dead. If I lived there, I would stay in my house as well the 1 time a week that the gringos swarm upon the town. But they built tons of signs and boardwalks and lookouts to turn it into the tourist location that it is. The ferry is basically the only way for the people of Puerto Eden to get to mainland and buy essential things even though it's a day trip by boat to Puerto Montt (the nearest town). So a few members of the town boarded the boat to go with us. As we were leaving and the boat was sailing away, the people of the town began coming out of their houses and functioning as normal. So in short, there are two modes for the town: normal mode and gringo mode. This day I was still working on recovering completely from my stomach sickness.

On Sunday, we sailed out of the archipelago into the wide open area that is not protected by the islands. Therefore, the boat was ridiculously rocky. Swaying back and forth and back and forth. It was actually quite difficult to walk without falling over. This day was more reading and trying not to get sea sickness. haha. In the night, they had a dancing/bingo night (interesting combo) in the area with the bar. And of course, I was selected to be the King of the Ship with an honorary dance with the Queen of the Ship. Basically the selection was only based on one lady who served the food who decided to crown me. The "Queen" was a young married Spaniard traveling with her newlywed through Southern Chile. This made for an interesting dance as the husband seemed to be making sure that I didn't do anything funny. Anyways, it was a good night.

Torres del Paine National Park

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On Wednesday, I set off for Torres del Paine. As I was packing my bag, I was actually kind of scared at how heavy it was. I had food for myself for 8 days, a tent, a sleeping bag, a stove, fuel, a pot, a shirt, a pair of pants, a rain jacket, gaiters, water bottle, a camelback, a sleeping pad, hiking boots, my heavy jacket, my eating utensils, my map and compass, my pack cover; all of that. I, personally, had never gone on an 8 day backpacking trip before carrying all my own supplies. I had done tons of trips of 2 days, 3 days, 5 days, even 6 days, but all those experiences were in groups with shared equipment that was distributed among all the group. Not this time. I was on my own. Sure, there would be other people to hike with so I wasn’t alone in that respect, but I was alone in terms of carrying all my own stuff. About 10 minutes before I was about to get on the bus for the 2 hour ride to Torres, I realized that I had forgotten to get sunglasses. And of course the bus was leaving at 2 pm, right in the middle of the afternoon siesta where everything is closed. I had heard about people that had gotten sun blinded by the reflection of the sun off the snow and they had to be lead off of the mountain by people who could actually see. That kind of worried me so I scrambled to find a place open that could sell me sunglasses. I was running with what I think was a 60-65 pound pack in crocks to find a pair of sunglasses, typical gringo stereotype. If I missed that bus I would have lost a lot of money and had to wait until the next day to go which I didn’t really want to do. I finally found this small drugstore and hurried to find a pair of sunglasses. I found a pair that seemed alright, but as the woman that worked there was helping me, she dropped one the pairs and lens popped right out. Great, so they were cheap as cheap can get, but they still seemed to have the solar protection so I went ahead and bought them and ran to catch the bus. During the bus ride I met these group of 5 guys from Santiago who were planning to do the same route as I, the Grand Circuit, so I decided to tag along with them since they seemed pretty cool. As we approached the national park, flocks of animals called Guanacos lined the sides of the roads. It is an animal that closely resembles a llama. We arrived, and the grand lakes and majestic mountain types stood awaiting us. I set off with the 5 guys from Santiago as the wind pounded upon us. Not 6 minutes into the trek, the wind had ripped my pack cover off and carried it so fast that I couldn’t even catch it. Within a few minutes I couldn’t even see it anymore and I wouldn’t have been able to get it. I was thinking, Great, this is a grand start to my trek. 3 of the guys, Cholo, Negro, and Marco were about 25 and were friends from high school and had decided to come trek Torres during their summer break. The other 2, Ody (his nickname because he resembled Ody from Garfield) and Diego were about 22 and were also friends from high school. We hiked the 2 hours to the first campsite. But unfortunately, my bad luck followed me. As I was setting up my tent at the campsite, the wind was pounding upon us. All of a sudden the picked up my tent as I was setting it up and snapped the poles right in half. Great…..Not only did I not have a pack cover in a place where it rains more than the Amazon, but I also didn’t have a functional tent. After some thinking about what to do, I finally remembered that there was a tool that came with my tent that can help in situations such as these. Basically what it is a small piece of pole that slides over the broken part to make it stiff and make it work. Of course, I had pull the string through all the pieces and tie it and then slide the supporter piece over the break. Luckily, it worked for the most part so I actually had a dry place to sleep at night.

Here's a map of Torres del Paine National Park: http://www.torresdelpaine.com/ingles/secciones/02/a/popup/3.htm



On Thursday (Hostería Los Torres to Campamento Laguna), I set off with the guys from Santiago through the forests of the trail, through open fields, all with beautiful terrain. I saw for the first time in my life (at least I think) a woodpecker as it pecked away at the trees. How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? And then the rain began, pouring down upon us as we made our way to the next refugio. At the refugio, they have places to set up your tents and get water if necessary. There were about 20 people at this specific refugio and a couple people that lived in the refugio for months working there.

On Friday (Campamento Laguna to Campamento Dickson), we slept in until about 10am as it was raining outside and I didn’t really feel like packing up in the rain. That was one difference that was quite nice compared to trekking in the US. In the US, you have to set off relatively early, say before 10 or 10:30 because if not, you’re going to be hiking into the hours of dark, but since it’s southern Chile, there’s sunlight until the hours of 9 or 9:30 meaning that you can begin hiking at 1 or 2 with no problem. So basically I was in no rush to get out of bed every morning. Although being in a tent alone for 12-13 hours (although 8 or 9 hours sleeping) makes you appreciate the company of others. We set off in early afternoon and began to reach sight of the snow capped mountains and glaciers in the distance. As we continued along, there were a number of people passing us in the other direction that had had to turn back because the pass, 2 days ahead for us) had been closed because of a mudslide. This was a problem. The thing was, on the other side of that pass is the grand sight of trekking along the massive glacier, but those that had to turn back wouldn’t get to see any of that unless they travelled the 8 days in the other direction to reach the other side the long way. We were taking a big risk continuing. If we reached the pass (4 days in on the trail), and it was closed, then we would have had to turn back like the others and hike the 4 days back on the same trail that we camin in on, and we wouldn’t get to see the glacier at all. If I had to do that, I wouldn’t have gotten to see the glaciers at all because that would add 4 days to my trip in Torres del Paine, and those were 4 days I didn’t have. But we had confidence that it was going to open up within the 2 days that it would take us to get there but that didn’t get rid of my worries. The next camp took it out of us in terms of the difficulty. It was about 12 miles away with a lot of elevation change and it seemed like we would never reach it. This is where we got introduced to the torrential mud that would of swallowed babies easily (*actually that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but when stepped in, it easily went higher than the tops of your boots). All I can say is thank god for gaiters. They cover the tops of your boots to stop mud and water from entering inside your boots. It was really almost as if we were hiking through streams rather than trails. After a long and tedious day, we finally arrived at the next camp, Campamento Dixon, where a group of 20 or so tents were scattered in the field. Dinner was extra delicious that day. After dinner, we sat around talking into the night, and of course had to partake in drinking some rum to keep warm.

On Saturday (Campamento Dickson), we decided to take a day off to enjoy the areas around the camp more. So basically I slept in until 11 or 12 as the rain pounded upon our tents. We hadn’t had a bath for a couple days so Marcos, Nacho (a guy from Viña del Mar that I met during the hike who was traveling alone), and I decided to take a dip in the lake that was right next to the camp. It was pretty cold with the wind and all and then we were about to get in even freezinger (that wasn’t a word, but now it is) water. In the distance, you could see the glacier as it extended into the water. Needless to say, our baths didn’t last more than 20 seconds, but it took half an hour curled up in my jacket to get warm again. I didn’t have a way to measure the temperature, but I couldn’t imagine how it could be more than 40 degrees. We did some exploring around the area to see what there was to see.

On Sunday (Campamento Dickson to Campamento Los Perros), we set off again as we packed up in the rain, unfortunately. Through the forests and the mud we trekked. When we were about halfway, we got the great news that the pass was open and that we would be able to reach the glacier on the other side!!! I was quite happy to hear that and to know that I wouldn’t have to turn back and trek the exact same stretch that I had done for the past 4 days. We finally reached a smaller lake up in the mountains with huge rocks on its borders. It looked more like a crater filled with some water. And on the other side of the lake, we came to our first glacier up close. It was quite large with the tops of it reaching up into the clouds (or maybe I should say fog). The small lake was filled with miniature icebergs that had broken off of the glacier. Nearby we came to Campamento Perros, which was dreadfully cold. We arrived drenched and we were warmly greeted with a wigwam like structure with a fire and a place to dry clothes. There were probably about 25 people huddled in this small structure to keep warm, talking, drinking mate, cooking dinner, playing games. It was a really nice atmosphere. It was probably 93% Chileans and 7% foreigners. There was one other American, NO Israelis (not that I don’t like Israelis, I was just completely shocked that there were none considering the abundance of Israelis during the rest of my trip), 2 guys from France, and 1 European couple. As the night got darker, the guitar music started, the singing commenced, and the alcohol was passed around. Negro studied music and he had brought his instrument with him (I really wish I remember what it was called, but it was similar to a banjo/ guitar/harp) It was fun. Haha.

On Monday (Campamento Los Perros to Campamento Paso), we set off in the morning to visit a glacier that was nearby that everyone had recommended. An hour hike without packs into this open rock area, we came a glacier that was right in front of us. There was no lake stopping us from touching it, only a stream of water flowing down to form a river. It appeared to be precariously situated as if the top part was going to collapse at any moment. The overhang stood something like 80 feet over us. Bakán (really cool). We hiked back to the refugio and set off for the pass. The mud on the trail was absolutely torrential making it quite difficult to avoid completely dirty. And then the rain came as we made the difficult hike up the mountain side. Finally, we got to walk through the snow considering that we were at such a high elevation. There were probably about 6 times where I thought we had reached the pass, but as soon as we got a little higher, you could see another false pass on the horizon. We finally reached the pass and the rain was pouring down on us as the wind was blowing determined to knock us over. My gloves were already wet so I was clenching my fists to avoid the cold. But the view was amazing. We were on the ridge of a mountain peering down on a glacier field with the size of 104 square miles (I looked it up). All across the the glacier, you could see the crannies and pools of turquoise blue water. Quite a sight. As we hiked down the other side, we always had the sight of the glacier right in front of us. Diego, one of the guys from Santiago who I was hiking with, twisted his knee badly so we went at a slower pace so that he could keep up. Hiking down the steep mountains is even worse than hiking up because you have the constant pressure on your knees and it's a lot easier to get injured. We arrived at the campsite, and I had one of the best dinners of my life after such a long day of hiking. I was the only gringo there so it was definitely a good way to meet people from Santiago y some from Argentina. I spent most of the night by the fire, enjoying its warmth while conversing with the others.

On Tuesday (Campamento Paso to Campamento Los Guardas), we had a pretty easy day, slowly making our way down the steep slopes through the forests right next to the glacier. The night was spent playing music and singing. Fun fun.

On Wednesday (Campamento Los Guardas to Campamento Pehoé), we began entering the world of tourist central. Most people come to do the "W", so that's were most of the tourists are. The old gizzards from America traveling with their guides, the young french couple that just got married, the Chinese woman visiting Patagonia alone, the two British girls teaching English in Santiago, all of these who you wouldn't find on the back side of park (where I was the first 6 days). I saw maybe 4 gringos (North Americans for those who don't know) on the back side of the park during the first 6 days, and about 70 within my 2 days in the front part of the park. We walked along the glaciar until finally reaching the point where it turns to a lake. As we were watching the edge of the glacier, a huge chunk crashed into the water forming one of the new baby icebergs that littered the lake. Some of the points were so steep that it required a 40 foot ladder to go down it. As we finally reached the Campamento Pehoé at dusk, we found the camp of gringos, gringos, and more gringos. We were quite exhausted by this time in the trek, so that night, it was time to enjoy. At this developed campamento, there was a hotel, a restaurant, and basically everything a tourist would need. The guys from Santiago and I started in the bar and enjoyed a delicious hamburger. Having such small portions for 7 days really makes you appreciate delicious food. We met a girl of probably 28 years from China that was traveling through Chile. She was excited to practice her Spanish which was really interesting because her Spanish kept the tones that are part of Mandarin. Her accent was very choppy Spanish, but it could still be understood. I thought it interesting that she didn't really know English, but she knew Spanish. It doesn't seem like most Chinese would learn Spanish before English which was interesting. Afterwards, we bought boxed wine and I enjoyed my last night with the guys from Santiago. There were probably about 11 of us that started the trip and finished at the same time, so you spent the nights in the refugios with the same people (oh and when I say refugios, it's basically, there are places to put a tent, and a small shelter to cook under). So we toasted to a good trip and enjoyed the night.

Punta Arenas and Puerto Natales, Chile

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On Monday I had heard that there was a large population of Magellanic Penguins on a beach near Punta Arenas so I decided to check it out. I took an hour and a half bus ride out of Punta Arenas to a beach with a settlement of penguins. They were just chilling on the beach and waddling, doing what penguins do. The wind was blowing with great force making it generally quite hard to walk. As far as the eye could see, was knee high grass until the beach. About 60 or so penguins were huddled in the sand relatively immobile as they seemed to be sleeping. They had their backs to the forceful wind so as to allow it to blow over them without pushing them over. A couple others had huddled into a log where they were protected from the wind. Every so often a number of them would flock into the ocean for their daily fill of fish. Within the knee high grass, a number of penguins had made underground burrows where they seemed to be keeping away from the cold. I must say it was quite a strange sight to see a group of penguins and not 20 yards away, a group of cows.



On Tuesday, I said farewell to my Spanish friend and took a bus to nearby Puerto Natales, the starting off point for treks to Torres del Paine National Park. I found a backpacker's hostel where there were tons of backpackers just as me. The hostel was probably filled all with backpackers, I want to say probably 70% of which were from Israel, some from Santiago, and some Europeans. As I was walking down the street while doing some errands it was completely sunny, and not 10 minutes later a typical thunderstorm was pouring down upon the town with its dark grey clouds. The wind is so forceful that the weather changes in southern Chile within minutes. That night, the Israelis wanted to go for a night on the town to some pubs so I decided to go along. It was at the bar, that I saw where they stereotype about “don’t be a jew” came from. The whole time during while we were at the bar, the group of Israelis were continuously trying to bargain with the waiter. If the menu said a Rum and Coke costs 2 dollars, they would say “we’ll order 5 for 7 dollars”, always trying to get more for less. I feel that there are some situations where bargaining is appropriate, but not in a formal establishment like a restaurant with set prices. I asked them why they tried to bargain so much and the response they gave me was that as Israelis, they majority travel for 8 months while the rest travel for 2 months. For that reason, they have to save all the money they can or by the end of the trip they’ll be completely broke, hence their incessant bargaining. So that’s their reasoning, although I probably wouldn’t do the same.