... As always I ride the swings and round-a-abouts of life... Floating between moods and places like Mercuery (one could say mercurial... but one shouldn´t call oneself mercurial... so I won´t (but you can if you want;)) ... anyway, all that means, is that after a breif sojourne my optimistic face is back (albeit with a dodgy hair cut;) ... Lots has happened in the last few days... I´ve done lots and been floating around this nice, expansive, searching city which spreads it´s tendrils through the landscape up to the limits of mountains...As you can see above, I finally went to a football game... we (Colo Colo) won 2 - 0... The picture is of a goal celebration... ut let´s step back... this hostel has been a bit of an up and down journey but it´s always eventful... I´ve made many more friends as people come and go from the hostel... a new crowed of people has been assembeled and I managed to drag then off to watch the game with me... The new characters are Chris a Manchester lad who supports Liverpool and whom I managed to convince to shave his beard down to a Hitler-tash, Eza a crazy girl from Switzerland who is addicted to talking to people she even stopped to chat to the person who checked her ticket for the game and the person who frisked her, James a Cheltenham boy who is like a game of testosterone pinball as he pings from one girl to the next (but a good lad), and a pair of Dutch girls Suzanne and Reyella... (and in the interim between the last post and this there was also Ruddeger (can´t pronounce or write his name in English the Dutch tearaway), Erika from Origon, Dutch girls Anouk and I forget the other ones name, and a couple of Bubbly Ozzie girls Liz and Rebecca... oh yes and an American called Alyssia... and... well, you get the gist!)... So we went to football and had a resonable amount of fun... I resumed my age old tradition from Bristol City games and constantly eat or drank during the game, Providing an endless and mostly nonsense commentary on the game, and oh yes, there is my old ´dictator hand´ which comes out during games (where I hand signal tactical imperitive to a largley unnoticing football team with gestures resemble a dictator gesturing at a ralley)... it was nice to be back in the swing of it:) ... we were in the family stand and away from the great atmosphere of the intence fans, but I´d been told by Felipe (a Chilean I met in Hanoi) not to go in that area... but we were to taste the extreme atmosphere and jumping of the fans on the Metro home... all the fans piled on to the Metro at the nearest station and started singing and jumping up and down... we met an Ozzie fellow who has followed Colo Colo for 5 years and stands in the extreme end of the stadium... The locals looked at him strangly in all his Colo Colo parafinalia but once he started up chants among the fans all on his own they soon looked at him all doughy eyed as one of their own, and by association that badge was pierced onto my metaphorical lapel... We all started clapping along with the fans on the train and jumping up and down... it was like being in a rock concert... but with us the train itself stated bobing like a car with that stupid hydrolic suspendion they have in America... the train got stopped at a station for everyone to ´Calm down´ and we eventually got home... but it was a bloody good atmosphere... I´m just glad the jumping up and down didn´t reach fever pitch while the train went round a corner... that would have been a bit dodgy!
Later that night we hit the student part of the town in true South American style, not leaving home till gone 2am and some people returning around 7am... it was a good night and it warmed my cockels to see Chris get so well aquainted with the local girls... hats off for the ingration tactics;)
... After that night and 3 odd hours of sleep I woke up with the enivatable downer... the mix of hangover and a empty void after plans had been fulfilled and little else remained except you and that weird fuzzy scratching behind the eyes... but then, after showering and stumbling down the stairs Antionio, A manager of the hostel but also a bit of a legend... his buisness card for the hostel actually gives him the title "Latin Lover Host", asking if I wanted to go for a cycle around the city... after initially batting him off as I worried about getting done for drunk cycling I decided to go and had a totally cracking day cycling around the city... it seems the thaw of the hostel had begun... (in fact the owners had gone to the beach for the weekend, so the staff felt free to be the lovley people they are and socialise with me again:)... We visited many prominent areas of the city including the cemetary and the house Pinochet used to torture and kill people (I know that sounds depressing but the cemetary was incredible... like a little town with graves which are better then most homes... really massive... and the Pinochet house (number 38, which never appeared on the map during his regime) was striking for what a beautiful part of town it was in and little memorial stones on the floor marking those who died there and which showed them to all be in their early 20s)... In the cemetary we visited the grave of a hero and a symbol of rebellion for the youth of Chile, Victor Jara, a musician became a political activist during the Pinochet regime and was killed by the regimem (they cut off his fingers and told him ´Now play your blessed guitar and we´ll leave you alone)... I felt great after... I had an empanada on the way, saw the true local areas of the city and then returned to a hostel which was warm and beautiful just like when I first arrived, with warm and friendly staff:)
... ... OK, I´m gonna go now... I could write more but this is enough for now... thanks for all being lovely emough to humour me and read this... keep well and keep sunny my people... and always remember... ... ... ... VIVA COLO COLO!!!! :)
... love you all:)
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