Sunday, January 15, 2012
Santiago, Chile
I have three hours to spend in Santiago while my hostess Susaan Straus attends a birthday party with some of her “Chilespouse” friends. The options to spend the time are plentiful. My picks for today - the Barrio Bellavista and the Plaza de Armas.
Later this afternoon Pio Nono, the main street leading into the Bellavista section of Santiago from Banquedano Square, will be jamming – the café tables will be pulled out onto the sidewalk and filled with students and young professionals. At 1 PM on Sunday, the café society has yet to rev up. What is ramping up is the foot traffic over the Maipu River heading straight into the Barrio Bella Vista.
Groups of families, and I mean the whole family - fathers, mothers, little kids, the occasional grandparent, a sprinkling of tourists, and groups of teenagers all stroll leisurely down the quiet street that ends in an explosion of activity at the base of San Cristobal Hill.
A digression:
Chileans, especially on a weekend or late afternoon, have walking down to an art form, an act of promenading, casual, slow, and sweet. They savor the moments being out and about. A promenade of ten minutes, 20 min., half-hour, might evolve into an entire afternoon or early evening of leisure. Strollers chat, are free of care for the moment. Brisk is not in the vocabulary.
The reward at the end of Pio Nono is the entrance to an immense aviary and the funicular that ascends a good sixty degrees up the sheer hillside to the tippy top of San Cristobal Hill to the Parque Metropolitano. On a clear day you can see all the way to the Andes.
The neighborhood used to be a bohemian enclave. Bohemia is losing ground fast to trendy and chi chi places like the Patio Bellavista, prices escalating accordingly. If you look around, you can still find some cool night spots, like the Café en la Aire, where 2 years ago, I heard a great duo playing blues, in Spanish. Another influence on the growth of the neighborhood is the new Universidad San Sebastian (top photo) built on a space occupied by a sprawling flea market the first time I visited here five years ago.
I only have time for a bare bones walk up and down this street and to quickly poke into the streets along it. Time to head back across the river to the Metro at Banquedano Square. More leisure time awaits at the Plaza de Armas.
Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
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