Small things about Santiago

29/07/2009

Pablo Neruda has me wanting to write odes to everything around me. An ode is due to the gummy bears, hot showers, new blanket, hungry cat, loneliness, game face passengers, Nescafe, the subjunctive, plastic bags, Santiago sidewalks, late nights, mullets, toilet paper and foreign friends. Something about his respect and careful attention directly affect my relationship with surroundings. Ambient characters and pests are part of my life here and rather than step over them I love to give them thought.

Maybe odes will come later. I’m going to step towards poetic respect through these notes...

Gummy bears make resistance futile. Simple sugars in every color and fake fruit flavors lasted a short lifetime in this drawer before calling me. Their control over me extended far past an arm’s reach, taking command trans Santiago where they came into consciousness. I knew for hours that I had little choice, that when the time came to study windowside the demand would be too loud for me. Surely I ate them gummy bears, one by one.

At first, I thought that perhaps all Santiago showers were mislabeled with “caliente” nobs. But only a few weeks in, I happily learned that hot water does in fact exist here.

Hot showers. One does not know a hot shower until having faced a series of cold showers on wintery tile floors. I have now had two hot showers, both of which were easy to identify and hard to salute adieu. And now I am boldly resolved to return to responsible shower sessions and time limits too, but I hope not to forget what a hot shower is not.

Brown and white, white all down and up the front, brown backed blanket on my bed, I am happily bringing you home to me. Before you came, I was sad for me but you have made a bad sleeper glad.

Nescafe, I would love to meet your dad. You must be grand, since your name is every place imaginable. You invade cafes, restaurants, homes, sidewalk advertisements, desiring consumers, conversations, shopping carts, and imaginations. You dominate the coffee world here. How do you do it?

Plastic bags are victims of over use in Santiago. Every bag I buy is bagged and sold, required to come home with me. I am depressed over the volume of bags collected in no time in this city. “No necesito una bolsa, gracias” is met with confusion and insistence. I will know that I have learned to communicate masterfully in Spanish as soon as I can make a convincing argument not to take another armful of plastic sacks with me after making a purchase. This is my new aim.

Little known in places worldwide, Santiago’s a network of slip and slides. Sidewalks are continuously waxed and shined so that a pedestrian here need only skate from place to place. I haven’t picked a foot off the ground in weeks; I just glide. Push off and let the city move your body from one door to the next. Careful though, not falling can get tricky.

Family Affair

July 12, 2009

Today Ali shared her family with us all. We had empanadas, cazuela y mote con huesillos. It was fantastic to be surrounded by loving family, adoring Ali and welcoming us all with open arms. The house that we went to for lunch was so very beautifully homemade. All of the food that we ate was from the farmers market and prepared over a couple days. The furniture was covered in hand sewn dressings and everything had a warm personality to it. I was content to be there with friends and family culture. I ate too much, like anyone would when surrounded by ample and delicious food. Today I learned that Chilean cuisine is indeed delicious, unlike the food that I have found while eating out.

I want very much to make Mote con huesillos. It is a great treat to drink and eat for dessert.

Mote con huesillo is a typical Chilean non alcoholic drink and dessert.

“It is made from husked wheat (mote), mixed with sun-dried peaches (huesillo) that have been rehydrated in water for hours. The water in which the peaches were rehydrated is mixed with some sugar, and the wheat is mixed in a glass with the peaches and the peach-flavored sweetened water.”


Ingredients:
28 huesillos
1 Kg. of sugar
Orange peel
cinnamon sticks
1/2 kilo of cooked mote
3 cups of sugar

Put the 28 huesillos, the kilo of sugar, the cinnamon (just a few sticks) and the orange peel in a pot with water. Leave it to soak overnight. The next day, cook the huesillos until soft, taking the pot off of the stove.

In a separate pan, cook the three cups of sugar - when the sugar begins to burn, slowly pour in liquid from the huesillos (in the first big pot) until all of the sugar becomes a juice and is completely dissolved.

Pour the sugar mix into the large pot with the huesillo juice, adding the cooked mote. Serve when chilled, making sure to mix thoroughly before serving!

Serves 6-7 people

Santiago, Hostal Sammy