Yea, back from Argentina. It was a very good trip and great to get out of Santiago for a few days. I love the feeling of being on the road, gonna get plenty of it after school gets out in May. Iīm picking up my ticket to fly down to Torres del Paine and Tierra del Fuego on Friday, looks like Iīll be there from the 7th to the 16th of March. How cool is that? Of course it means Iīll miss Shakira, but itīs okay because it hit me the other day that I really donīt give two shits about seeing her play. It was just the novelty, I guess.
Got an appointment on Friday to see another house, Iīm starting to wonder if Iīm moving again because I want to or if I just like the feeling of packing all my stuff to go live somewhere else. Kinda odd, the things that we start to like. Anyway, this house is right in the center of town, way closer to the subway and all my friends at the house I bailed on at the beginning of this month. Vince told me that 3 Kiwis just moved in, bringing the English speaking population of that house to an all time high. Damn Iīm glad I left.
Iīm taking a History of Modern Latin America class this semester, far and away my best class. Itīs taught by a middle aged guy named Patricio. He talks a lot and really fast, and probably part of why I like the class so much is because I like how I can understand everything he says. Yesterday he gave us the most sobering lecture Iīve ever heard in my life, eyes welling up and everything as he spent over an hour telling us about the time he spent in prison getting tortured as a 16 year old student after the military dictatorship took over in 1973. Itīs absolutely unbelievable that he didnīt crack up. I think about how tough I was at 16 and thereīs no way I could have gone through what he did without going crazy or getting myself killed. I wonīt go into detail about what he told us but I wish so much that these fucking fascists that still live here and support Pinochet could have heard what we heard yesterday so they could maybe understand what that motherfucker did in the name of progress and security. What Iīll never in my life be able to understand is what Patricio told us at the end of the lecture, that he doesnīt feel any need for revenge for what was done to him and his friends. He seemed pretty much at ease as he told us his story, only getting emotional a couple times but doing well to hold it back. All I can think is that the best way to deal with it is to do anything that can be done to get passed it and get on with life, as tough as that would be. Maybe the lasting thorn in the side is that Pinochet is still here in Santiago, alive but fading fast from what Iīve been told, up in the extremely wealthy community at the back of Las Condes. The War Crimes court decided not to try him on account of his fading health. This makes sense, of course, but that he was never dealt any sort of justice for what he did to Patricio and so many other people is something I donīt think I could live with if the same had been done to me. Pinochetīs not exactly Satan, but when he finally fades out of existence I wouldnīt be surprised if the layer of smog over Santiago dissolved, letting the city have itīs first unobscured look at the sky in a long, long time. I really hope Iīm hear when it happens.