The social barometer.

As usual, the cues and clues from the street vendors and actions of Valparaisians have proven more accurate than any calendar.  We are emerging with blinking eyes from five months of winter and though it doesn’t snow in Valparaíso it has been a test of endurance for those of us from an area officially called The Sunshine Coast.  Two loads of timber, three days to dry washing, seeing your breath at three o’clock in the afternoon, inside being colder than outside, sunshine a myth and clouds a constant we have proven the local saying true:  If you survive until September, you’ll survive the rest of the year.

But how do we really know that it is spring?  Knees.  Since the end of April our girls have kept their knees hidden under stocking while at school.  For my students who complain about the silent ‘k’ in English… know knees krun kabout klike kspring klambs.  The close cousin of the knee, the elbow, has also been sighted in various forms enjoying the sunshine.

How do we really, really know it’s spring?  Kites or volantín are taking to the skies and neighbours engage in dogfights.  The idea seems to be to knock the other kite out of the sky. The kites only cost CH$200 each and are available everywhere.  The design is a simple diamond shape without a tail.   Anyone who flies a volantín also possesses a gaint wooden reel with over 300 metres of string on it.  The reel has an internal handle to allow for the string to be retracted at a finger blistering pace.  There is a vast amount of stray string appearing on powerlines, rooftops and tree branches as well as injured kites clinging precariously to the aforementioned structures.

How do we really, really, really know it’s spring?  The Chileans are preparing for their independence day celebration on Spetember 18^th.   Flags, banners and BBQs have been on sale for the past three weeks and everywhere we look we see red, white and blue waving in the wind.  We’ve been invited to a traditional Chilean BBQ on Sunday where we’ve been promised to eat lots of meat.

But how do we really, really, really, really know it’s spring?  Talluah finds it difficult to get warm and this week I saw her walking around the house barefoot.

Happy Birthday Indiana

Indiana, our first-born and ambassador to the fairies, turns 8 today.  She’s had a staggered birthday as we bought her boots before winter, took her to La Serena last weekend, a party this weekend and later this week my parents are arriving with presents from Talluah’s parents.

The weather was perfect yesterday with a top of 22 degrees.  We thought we were going to fry.  Indiana had a few of her classmates come over for a party.  Luckily we had Boris on hand to help us explain some of the more complicated games that the other niñas hadn’t seen before. Games that we take for granted are completely foreign here. 

That’s the beauty of travel – you get to exchange ideas and learn from each other.  For example, the chocolate game that we, in fact learnt while living in London.  For those of you playing at home, this is how it’s done.  Participants sit in a circle on the floor, around a block of chocolate on a plate with a knife and fork and a pair of ski gloves and a beanie or hat.  Going around the circle everyone takes turns to roll a dice, if you roll a six you have to put the beanie and gloves on before cutting off one piece of chocolate at a time. The object is to eat as much chocolate as you can before someone else in the circle rolls a six.  It becomes very funny when a few sixes are rolled consecutively.  Other games we had a go at were, dancing statues, balloon races, pass the parcel, and, an oldie but a goodie Limbo.

Indy’s friends gave her a little surprise by insisting on singing Happy Birthday in English for her and then in Spanish.  Even our landlord got in in the festivities and gave Indy some money to buy herself something nice.  And of course no birthday is complete without a massage from your little sister.

From bad to worse.

The O bus runs along Ave. Alemania and the drivers are either pushing the accelerator or brake pedal through the floor.  Truce had been invited to a party in Cerro Yungay that involved a trip on the O bus.  We jumped off at the bottom of Yungay and looked at the 45 degree street in front of us, threw Truce on my back and set out sights skywards.  Spring has come to Valpo and the days are warming up.  About half way up Truce informed me that I was sweating.   Towards the top of the cerro I was grateful that we’d taken our anti-altitude sickness tablets.

We asked a young boy where number 579 Suchandsuch street was.  He pointed to the other side of a hairpin turn and pointed out a particular house.  Truce jumped back on board the daddy express and we found house number 570 and then 620 and a set of steps in-between.  We zig-zagged up the steps and asked for further directions and we were promptly pointed back down the stairs.

I asked a man who shall be named Mr Lungs if he cold help us.  He yelled to his friend up the street if she knew the family on the invitation.  Mr Lungs told me to go up another set of stairs, he crossed the street and went up another lot of steps.  While I was speaking to another person, who did know the family I was searching for – she was the great aunt of Truce’s friend, Mr Lungs shouted from the other side of the valley, “Hay un gringo buscando por la Smith familia.”  Somebody shouted back to him, Mr Lungs bellowed to me that the family I was looking for was on his side of the street.

The houses are all built on top of each other and there was no way I would have found them without Mr Lungs help.  The older sister of the birthday girl came down to help us navigate through the labyrinth to their house.  We arrived, hot, bothered and an hour late.  Inside the house there were party decorations, one table with a bottle of soft drink, four chairs, a potato salad and us as the only guests.  Surely we couldn’t be the only guests.  After a quick glance at the invite I asked la mama what time the party started.  She told me in another two hours.  The 7 on the invite for 17:30 looked like a 4 for 14:30.  We were two hours early.  Oh well, time to practice some Spanish. 

I think it's spelt with an 's'

A few miles north of La Serena is a village called Chungungo.  We didn’t actually go into the town but it is worth talking about.  The people of Chungungo had had a problem with water scarcity for some time but experienced almost daily fogs.  In the early 1990s large fog catching nets were erected.  Originally the idea was to help create a forest that could harvest its own water but the townspeople asked for water to also be diverted to their village.  While we were driving back from Punto Churros we saw one of the fogs, known locally as camanchaca, starting to roll in.

La Serena has 26 churches, all in various shapes, sizes and denominations.  La Serena is Chile’s second oldest city and there is a strong Italian and Spanish influence in the architecture.   It is vastly different to the chaotic randomness of Valparaíso and doesn’t seem to have the same problem of stray dogs roaming the streets.  Which is fortunate for Lena because she seems to be some sort of dog magnet.  On a few occasions dogs would deviate off their normal course to walk behind her.  One particular dog followed us across La Serena and was dubbed Pebre. 

There aren’t as many buses running through the streets as we see in Valpo and people who live out of the city centre have to rely more on private transport.  We strolled around the Japanese Garden, which could do with a little bit more TLC.  It’s very hard to maintain the gardens when the locals have trouble reading the “Keep of the Grass” signs and kids are allowed to chase swans around.

We went through the free museum.  It’s only a small museum but has great displays.  There is a Maoi from Easter Island, a mummy, several shrunken heads, weapons, fossils and some old crime scenes showing the bones of people killed in battle.

What does Mr Humboldt plan to do with those penguins?

La Serena is 7.5 hours north of Valpara…  Yes, you there, in the front row.  You have a question?  Well speak up man.  What is it?

I’m sorry, did you say, or 3 hours by car

I stand corrected.  You can choose to sit on a bus for 7.5 hours to get to La Serena or you can hire a car and halve the trip.  The bus is more economical but there is only so many times one can answer, “Are we there yet?”

It’s Indiana’s birthday next week and we’ve come to La Serena to see the Humboldt penguins as part of Indiana’s present.  Indy’s a bit of a nature girl and likes most things that slither, swim or fly.  For the sake of alliteration I could have said, slither, swim or sashay but that would just be silly.  Boris’ sister Nefer lives here and she was kind enough to pick us up from the bus station and drop us off at Hostal Balmaceda where we’re staying.  Check them out on tripadvisor.com – great value if you’re travelling as a family or group.

During the bus trip Indiana chatted with a young British backpacker for several hours.  She was so mature in her conversation; after all she is only a week away from being 8.

There are several groups that organise tours out to Punta de Choros.  Formally a fishing village the local fishermen have traded their nets for tour guide hats and take brave passengers out to Isla Choros and Isla Dama in fishing boats that seat about 26 people.  The attraction is that the boats float around a Humboldt Penguin colony.  You can’t go on the island but there are plenty of penguins, sea lions and sea birds to see before heading over to Isla Dama where you can explore the island for an hour. 

This isn’t a river cruise, it’s in the open water and I’m not a sailor.  I get seasick putting bath toys in the tub for the kids.  The human brain can only concentrate on one thing at a time so I’ve now learnt how to say the alphabet backwards.  Talluah managed to be a seat for Truce who has a bony bum, a case of the wiggles and doesn’t mind the odd snooze while navigating the ocean.  Talluah had to deal with her own nausea that seemed to subside after the bag of M&Ms disappeared.  Hers is more the effects of hunger than the Humboldt Current.  I think the phrase is, eating for two.

Room for one more.

“I’m hungry,” says she.

“You’re always hungry,” says he.

“I’m tired too,” says she.

“You’re always tired too,” says he.

“I feel a little bit nauseous,” says she.

“You’re always…”

We’d like to announce that there’s going to be a new addition to the Harper family.   This in turn leads to the odd-hour crusades for necessary foods to stifle cravings.

“I want a bacon and avocado sandwich,” says she.

He sighs a sigh of relief – they have those ingredients.

“It’d be really nice on that groovy bread from the other panadería,” says she.

For the viewers at home watching on Black and White sets, we have named all the bread we buy, groovy bread, dimbo, triangle thingys, the double ones, that one we bought the day we went to the park, etc.

Groovy bread comes from a panadería in el Plan.  “The bread from that panadería in the pan?” asks he.

She nods.

“How long will it take you to cook the bacon?”  asks he.

“Seven minutes,” says she.

“Time me,” says he.

Six minutes and thirteen seconds later he returns with a token of his undying love, groovy bread from the panadería in el Plan and enough lactic acid to drop a cow.

Tagged

For the most part, Valparaíso is covered with art but there is an increasing amount of graffiti showing up.  The local government has been installing rubbish bins all over the city and they usually end of with someone’s tag on them within a few days.  Last weekend they installed three new bins around the ascensor.

One week later they had been vandalised.  This isn’t an expression of art and when you see how much amazing art there is in this city it’s a shame to see graffiti like this.  Thankfully the proper art works seem to be respected and are rarely tagged.