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In America, airports screen for terrorists, but when we arrived in Chile, our luggage had to be x-rayed in case we were smuggling in cheese. So, on top of my list for moving there is the lack of fear and threat. I don't believe that Chile is anyone's enemy right now, though I heard that Bolivia is still upset about losing their coastline during the guano wars in the 1800s.I've been home for three days, reveling in the green of summer, the order and luxury of the United States. Ah, warm water in sinks and plenty of toilet paper. But spending a month in South America was heavenly, and it is increasingly looking as though we're destined to be there.
I could forget about the war for awhile, be touched by the kindness of the people we met, wooed by the romance of the neo-colonial architecture, and overwhelmed with options offered to me as a teacher.
I'd hoped to blog, but computers were busy in hostels, always with someone else waiting for their turn. Dealing with a Spanish keyboard and needing to write fast made me decide to wait until I came home. Speaking of writing, as in fiction projects, I didn't do that either. I brought an Alphasmart with me, a small lightweight word processor, but I found that it didn't cut and paste. I can barely write a sentence before I'm rewriting. The three or four times I sat down to work, things didn't flow.
Hostels in winter evenings are cold. Few people in Chile have heat beyond kerosene. There's no natural gas in the country, and South America has been experiencing the coldest winter in 90 years. Also, good light was hard to find in the evenings, and my eyes need it.
Excuses, excuses.
The day before I left, I worked with my writing partner Mary Benson on the plot for STARVED. I told her I'd be happy if I brought back 30 pages. Well . . . my subconscious usually solves manuscript challenges if I leave things alone for awhile; perhaps letting go of the pressure to write the second novel that I need to write was a good thing.
I did read A LOT, something I often don't find time for. Five novels, which were like candy: The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass by Phillip Pullman which pulled at my heart and kept me thinking, the first Sally Lockhart mystery also by Pullman, Ann Rice's Jesus the Christ, and Pharaoh by Karen Essex, wonderful to read on frigid days in July. Snowmen on the July pages of calendars might be something I never get used to.
The picture above was one of my favorite places in Santiago, a historic square near our hostel, La Casa Roja. La Casa Roja run by an ex-pat Aussie named Simon, has the reputation of being the best one in Chile, and comes with a Dalmation named Dado who has his own couch.
I freaked when I got there, though, mostly due to travel fatigue. So many people were smoking, the area around the hostel didn't look safe (although I saw hundreds of university students and women walking alone), and I realized that I wasn't going to be warm for a month. Needless to say, I got over it, and by the time I left Bario Brasil felt like home.
