The Kindness of Strangers

Today was better than yesterday. Sort of. I wasn't vomiting, which was better. The rest was debatable.

Since I was able to be upright again, we decided to go to a beach town which is near-ish to Santiago (about 1 1/2 hours). The lady from the hotel told us to go to Santa Maria Avenue and go west; sounded easy enough. We found the road, no problem, but it only went east. She failed to mention that part. So within 5 minutes of leaving the hotel, we were lost. We finally swallowed our pride to ask for help about 20 minutes after that (granted, Mom was ready to swallow hers about 30 seconds in) when we realized we were heading way north on the wrong highway.

Now, it needs to be said that I barely understand directions when they're given to me in English. It goes far worse in Spanish. So right about the time that my eyes were starting to glaze over as the guy at the convenience store was telling me how to go, a kind soul who happened to overhear us interrupted to tell me he was going the same way and we could just follow him. He instantly became my new best friend! I stayed on his bumper as if I were superglued to it. When we got to the place where we were to part ways, he actually flagged us over on the highway and got out of his truck to come give us some more pointers, tell us about the city where we were going, what to avoid, how to avoid getting a ticket and so on... I could have kissed that man!

So we made it to Valparaíso. We drove around the coastal side and up to a beautiful lookout. Aaah, a day in paradise. And then we got back in our car and... dead. As a doornail. Had Dad not been there, I would have just settled in with my book and waited for the car rental company to come pick me up. But Dad pulled off his old "push it to get it rolling til you can pop it into second gear and get it moving" trick. Woo-hoo! Then, about $20USD later in cell phone calls to the rental company, we figured out it was a minor problem and, once again, thought all was well. But Valparaíso is a city set on a huge hill and every street is STEEP in a way that I can't really explain here and that no picture would do justice to. So we decided to go check it out... except that the mix of an iffy car in a strange (and very crowded and rather dirty) city while going practically straight up hills was freaking out a person in the backseat who shall, yet again, remain nameless. Once again I say, God bless Xanax!

We decided that Valparaíso wasn't our city so we ended up in a nearby beach city, Viña del Mar. It was beautiful and the folks loved it. Dad was good, Mom was calm, all was well. We had a very late lunch and headed home.

About halfway back on the highway, I got waved over by a cop. Not pulled over with a car and a flashing siren, mind you, actually waved over by a cop standing on the side of a major highway. O-kaaaaay. So I pull over and he starts looking all official and asking me for my license, registration, etc... he then realizes I'm a foreigner and starts asking me where I'm from, what type of visa I'm on, how long I'm in the country... and where my passport is. I tell him it's in the hotel and he starts asking me how is he supposed to know if I'm legal or illegal. Again, I tell him I don't have my passport on me. Again, he asks how he's supposed to know if I'm legal or illegal. We're at a standstill. I give him my most honest-looking face and in the end he let me go (I guess it was easier for him than following me back to Santiago). Not that I even know what I was pulled over for in the first place!

So we get back into Santiago without further incident; I was driving and Dad commented on the metal dividers they had running down the middle of the streets in between the lanes and how he couldn't imagine what it would do to a person's car to hit one of those. Not 5 minutes later, we found out. Turns out it will give you a flat tire before you even know what hit you. We pulled over and, really, all you could do was laugh. We started looking around for the stuff to change the tires and before we could even find it, there were 3 people there to help us. It's like here it's just completely second nature, that of course you stop to help someone with a flat tire. One of the guys had been inside a restaurant having dinner with his family and had seen us pull over through the window and came out to help. He ended up changing the tire for us. Wow. I take back everything I ever said about Chileans being standoffish in public! Two different people today proved me very wrong. I'm sure glad I was.

Getting lost, a broken-down car, backseat pillpoppers, being pulled over and scolded by a cop and getting a flat tire. All in a day's work in Chile!