After all these days we spent in Santiago, I found out the truth that Chile is an amazing country and has many amazing things to be explored. This was my first time to south America. Before the trip, I have many guesses about this continent. After the trip, I got a deeper understanding of their culture. This trip to Santiago is a great beginning of my South America travel.However, I found this trip was totally not enough. I’m already thinking about next trip to South America because I realized there are much much more things that I can experience there. Next time, I want to explore the Easter Island, the Kaap Hoorn, and other amazing landscapes in Chile. Also, I really want to go to Bolivia, Argentina, Brasil, and Venezuela. The first thing I have to do before the next trip is definitely to learn Spanish. I knew nothing about Spanish, so I found very difficult to communicate with Chilean (usually we made gestures to communicate…). Then I think I need to do more workouts to get a better physical condition because I found I will fell super tired when I walked a long time especially when hiking… Really want to change this situation.
After all, this was a good trip and I was richly rewarded.
Author: Chang Liu
Food in Santiago
One of the most exciting things for me in Chile is the foods. These days in Santiago, I tried many foods in this city and I want to share my experiences with them.
I like seafood very much, so seafood was my first choice when I went to any restaurant. In the night days, I tried 3 kinds of fish staple food, crab, and some appetizers with shrimp and other seafood. Salmon is super popular here. I had three meals with salmon and the most popular way they cook salmon(and even all kinds of fish) is fried. Also, I tried perch and hake fish. Different from salmon, they are white meat and have a lighter flavor. I liked the Perch which was taken from a French restaurant, but the Hake was not as good as I thought.
Because of my curiosity, I tried the Chinese food here. The Chinese restaurant was a fancy one in the shopping mall. It’s a little bit expensive but not really good as Chinese food. We ordered five dishes and three of them tasted all the same. The only difference I can tell in that three dishes was the material- one made of chicken, one beef, one shrimp, and octopus. Also, I ordered chicken fried rice, a very common Chinese dish. However… the rice tasted wired and I felt it was not cooked enough.
Overall, I’m a little bit disappointed about the foods in Santiago, because I hope I can get some fresh (alive) seafood here, but all I found was chilled. Still, I had really good time here.
Hake
Rib
Oyster
Salmon
Perch
Chinese food
lunch box I found on the street (looks wired but really good)
Day 7-8
In these last two days in Chile, we had 7 hours hiking on San Carlos de Apoquindo Natural Park and went to the Vega market. The hiking in the free day was amazing and I was exhausted after it. All I wanted to do was lying on the bed and never leave it!!! The waterfalls in the mountains are beautiful. We drank the river water (because we didn’t bring enough water and the day was super hot) which is clean and sweet. After I went back hotel, I found my white shoes were covered by thick dust and they became black. My pants also turned from black to brown…
San Carlos de Apoquindo Natural Park
The very last day, we went to Vega market. I really like the market which is full of local foods and super fresh fruits. I haven’t seen so many fresh strawberries, yellow peaches, and blueberries and I found some fruits I had never seen before. Many local people were purchasing the vegetables and fruits with little carts. The flowers there are beautiful. After getting out of the market, I saw some people selling the lunch around the market and I got one box of the food. That was really inexpensive and good!
Vega market
Day 6
In day 6, we had gone to the museum of memory, which is about the 1973 Chilean coup. Besides this museum, many other places in Santiago about this coup. The coup is an important historical event in Chile and strongly affected the Chilean culture. The appearance of the museum shocked me. It covered by bronze apertured pieces, which make museum looks like a huge bronze cuboid in the white square. The strong contrast between the dark green and white colors seems to remind people of this heavy history. Inside the building, the apertured cover pieces allow people can see the outside through the windows. This makes the museum has a strong appearance and less oppressed when people get inside there. The profiles of people who died in the coup are hang up on the walls, making me truly feel those people had gone. Also, watching those watches, drawings of children, and many their articles of daily use are exhibited on the walls, I can’t help imagining their life before the coup and feel sad about the tragedy. The museum reminded me of many World War two and Sino-Japanese war museums in my country. I think those museums around the world is telling to people that stop the war because the war always hurt the common people.
Day 5
In day 5, we had been to Valparaiso, a colorful seaside town. It was a sunny day. Thousands of colorful houses on the hill are really clear from the fourth floor of Pablo Neruda house. The Pablo Neruda house is super interesting, where is like a treasure house. I found a candlestick decorated by men with hindquarters of a goat and likely they are Pan, the god in Greek myth controlling flocks. Also, I saw the plate with a pattern that a woman in a nautilus, a teapot with a lady’s head, and many other interesting collections. The overall arrangement of the house is also cool and I really like the small spaces with exquisite furnish and decorate.
The murals around those little houses on the hill are amazing. I haven’t seen so many murals at the same time before. In this city, every corner is colorful and has amazing details. I can really feel the people’s enthusiasm for art and life.
Afternoon, we went to Vina del Mar, where has good beaches. We took lunch at a Mexico restaurant and then walked to the beach. There was really too many winds and sunshine on that afternoon. I felt super cold when the winds blew me and felt hot when sun on me.
Valparaiso
Day 3-4
In these two days, we have traveled to many amazing buildings and parks. The church Benedictine Monastery Las Condes gave me a really deep impression. It uses simple materials to create a clean and sacred space. The interaction between the dark gray walls and the white walls is good and also the different patterns and tailings on them soften the contrast to make the place closer to people. The light pouring down from the gaps between walls, surrounding the central cross of the church. I like to visit churches where make me feel peaceful and this church is one of the greatest ones I’ve visited.
I had two good lunches these two days. One was in Mestizo and one was in El Anclg today with Momo, Shihan, Ziyuan, and Jackie. We had a group lunch in Mestizo and I ordered salmon and the cake in the glass bottle. The salmon was really, but the dessert was tooooooo sweet for me (haven’t tried a dessert sweet like this even in America). El Anclg was a recommended seafood restaurant on Yelp, so we decided to try it. Many kinds of seafood can be found there and the flavor was good (though a little bit salty). I ordered crab claws. The sauce I haven’t tried before, which is super heavy. It’s not bad but it covered the flavor of crab claws, so I think it’s too strong for me. Really miss the Cantonese seafood in Shenzhen!
Benedictine Monastery Las Condes- the wood door
Benedictine Monastery Las Condes
Benedictine Monastery Las Condes
Crab claws in El Anclg
Day 2
Today we took the metro to the downtown and explored Moneda Cultural Center, Plaza de Constitucion and Cuidadania, precolumbia art museum, Plaza de Armas, and streets around that areas.
I think the metro we took today is similar to the Beijing’s older metro lines. It’s not fancy but really clean and comfortable. However, it doesn’t have the railing and the doors close too soon and I think that’s kind of dangerous. The metro stations are beautiful. They have good paintings showing on the wall and the tiles covering the wall always consist interesting and colorful patterns.
In the commemorate streets we visited this morning, I found that they planted trees with black (dark purple) leaves to make the street seems heavier.
The activities in the afternoon are super exhausting but very interesting. I haven’t seen a street so deeply like that before. I realized that almost all the streets of Santiago are different in the paving materials and patterns. Also, benches of different shapes and colors are on different streets.
Santiago people on Sunday looks really relax. They just talking to each other, enjoying the sun, or sleeping in the plaza and the streets around. Every store on the streets is closed. They make me feel that here is really an amazing city.
Chang’s Bio
Hi, I am Chang. I am a freshman in Architecture major. I was born in Shenzhen, China, a prosperous city near to Hongkong. I traveled many cities in China and visited Badain Jaran desert, Tibet plateau, and some snow mountains. My first abroad trip was to Japan and I love the amazing culture and sea foods there. As a person born around Tropic of Cancer, I think the winter of Columbus here is super cold and I am trying hard to get used to it. I have practiced opera for five years and I played piano for about seven years. I am a big fan of sci-fi, fantasy, adventure, and thriller movies and TV shows like Game of Thrones and West World. And my favorite music style is Cantonese popular music in 20 century’s Hongkong.
I am so excited about traveling to Santiago with you guys because it will be my first time to the southern hemisphere. Also, it will take about 40 hours flight from China to Chile, so the trip will be a unique experience for me to such a remote place.
Chang’s selfie
I learned opera for years.
I am having a long-distance relationship.
I have two younger brothers.