Much better

Today, we had to get a few errands done, as it was our last day in Santiago. We had to switch rooms at the hostel (they we’re able to extend our stay in the same room, so they gave us another room.) Then, we raced over to Museo Chileno de Arte Precolumbino, where things are free on Sundays. We first took in a special exhibit: “Morir por Goboernar” (Dying to Rule) – a fun-filled exhibit about “Sexo y Poder” – sex and power in the death rituals of the ruler of the Moche people of northern Peru.

When the leader died, he had to go to the land of death, where there is no fertility, then the land of the ancestors, where there is. To make sure the land of death is gone through correctly, the ruler subjects his “staff” to various “non-procreative” sexual rituals, after which they are killed. They are likely pretty glad for death at this point, as many have had their eyelids, ears, nose and lips removed, to make them look more like skeletons. It wasn’t clear how the ruler managed all this while himself dead (I don’t think I really want to know.) The ruler supposedly comes back to life after all this, but they never actually explained who took his place.

This is documented in exhaustive and explicit detail in a ceramics collection the museum has assembled. It was all pretty disturbing, and just the explanations would have made a good entry into that new class of horror films coming out lately. You can only take so much of that. We stumbled out into the light, and then toured the rest of the museum on shaky legs. Not exactly what we were expecting.

Okay, so after that, we needed to metro all the way across town to buy our bus tickets for tomorrow morning. We did this, and then the guy who sold them to us said something about the terminal we would be leaving from “blah blah blah four blah blah…” It was clear it wasn’t this terminal, and we both heard “four”. We start wandering in the direction he waved us in, asking everyone wearing a badge along the way, they all pointed the same direction, and said something about “four”. We wander down the street for a very long time, and start to wonder if the four referred to miles, when we found it, and it turns out it’s the next metro stop from the one we got off at. So, should be an easy trip out tomorrow.

Then, we metro’d all the way to the other end of town to see a crafts/artisanal village. If you’ve been to Granville Island in Vancouver, you’ve been here, too. Even a guy making guitars (I didn’t see a kayak workshop, I admit.) Some of it was nice, but it all felt pretty tourist-trappy. Oh, well, at least we’ve seen it. We also got our first public bus experience.

We came home, Ev got a hot chocolate in a café on the square, and we sat awhile, watching people. Santiago is very family friendly. After dark, the square is still crowded with families wandering around. It’s the pedestrian access, I think. Many of the streets around the square are blocked to cars. So, they become markets, fun to wander through. We need something like that in Seattle – every other street is no longer a driving street – see what that does to the walkability of downtown.