Stuck Inside of Renca, with the LATAM Blues Again

Yesterday morning, I was looking forward to my flight home from Santiago (SCL) to SFO via Mexico City, and I decided to do an online check-in—only to learn that LATAM had cancelled that flight. The website offered a link for rebooking but, when I tried to do so, only the Mexico City-San Francisco segment of the itinerary appeared. The leg out of Chile had, apparently, disappeared into the cloud(s).

LATAM's website was not user-friendly yesterday.

This was disturbing, to say the least, because I had made such an effort to return from Argentina to Chile and then to Santiago, having changed my original ticket in the city of Osorno. Still, with some difficulty, I managed to contact LATAM’s Santiago call center and, after trudging through the automated answering system (including a pretty long hold), I managed to speak with a live human—though I worried, at every moment, that we might somehow get disconnected and I’d have to start all over again.

At first, LATAM’s agent suggested a Thursday night flight to New York and thence to SFO but, given the mess that JFK has been with arrivals from Europe (and now spring breakers from Florida, I suspect), that was a non-starter. When I asked about alternatives, he found availability on Friday night’s non-stop to Los Angeles (my original itinerary) and SFO. I jumped at the chance although, rather than take another flight, I may consider renting a car and driving back to the Bay Area.

Renca's Snoopy would prefer to shelter in place...

Still, it was a letdown and, for the next few days, I’ll be biding time in Renca, a non-touristed neighborhood about which I’ve written before on this blog. Like most but not all people here, I’m staying indoors, though I do take occasional walks, avoiding the relatively few folks on the street. Some are wearing surgical masks, but others are seemingly oblivious to “keep your distance” recommendations, and middle-aged men still gather outside the local botillería (liquor store). There’s now a 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew throughout the city, though its efficacy in suppressing any virus outbreak seems dubious.

The architectural details may not be the most appealing, but this expanded Renca home suggests the owners are doing well.

Still, Renca is a changing población that, I suggested to my friend Marializ Maldonado, appears to be in transition from working class to (perhaps lower) middle class. The basic housing style consists of side-by-side units known as casas pareadas, which share a central wall and are mirror images of each other. Some people, though, have added improvements such as a second story to their homes, occasionally with balconies, and quite a few now own shiny new SUVs and minivans. Many streets are narrow one-lane alleyways, so people often park on the sidewalks (traffic moves slowly here anyway, so it’s still pedestrian-friendly). At the time the project opened, in 1965, few probably expected to ever own a car.

Many Renca residents park their cars on the sidewalk.

There are other infrastructural improvements. Opposite Marializ’s house, a once neglected park has now become the well-kept Plaza Chile Israel (Israel’s embassy subsidized renovations here), and a formerly graffiti-covered building has become a sede vecinal (neighborhood meeting hall) with a handsome mural. There is daily maintenance, and the plaza remains a garden spot for occasional couples and a very few people who appear unaware of or unconcerned about the public health crisis.

Two years ago, this folkloric event took place on the redeveloped Plaza Chile Israel (Marializ's house is barely visible at the far left).

That said, though I’m getting bored with staring at the computer keyboard and, at times, streaming videos on the iPad, there could be worse places to spend a self-imposed semi-quarantine. I’m still looking forward to boarding that plane for LAX on Friday night, for which I’m saving my last remaining novel, and then getting home to Oakland. There, at least, I’ll be able to work in the garden, walk the dog, and even go for a bike ride (all acceptable under California’s “shelter-in-place” guidelines).

Meanwhile, apologies to Mr. Zimmerman.

The Haitian Connection?

In 1978, when I first visited Chile, the default choice for coffee junkies was semi-soluble Nescafé, and that’s still common here. It didn’t bother me personally, because I don’t drink coffee—how can something that smells so wonderful taste so awful?—but my fellow travelers often searched desperately for espresso or even a freshly brewed cup from grounds.

Café Haití was Santiago's original café con piernas, but more drinkable than Nescafé.

At that time, just about the only place to do so was Santiago’s Café Haití, a chain of standup coffee bars that was notorious for its café con piernas ("coffee with legs"), served by attractive young women in micro-skirts and other form-fitting clothing. The clientele was overwhelming male (and machista) but, on occasion, female clients couldn’t resist what appeared to be the best available caffeine fix. My own wife, given her Italo-Argentine background, reluctantly became one of them.

Taken last year, this screenshot summarizes the size of Chile's immigrant communities.

Why the chain’s founder chose that specific name is unclear—the source of his coffee seems likeliest to have been Brazil or Colombia—but in recent years Chile has become the country of choice for emigrants from the impoverished Caribbean country, and Haitians are a visible presence in the capital and elsewhere. For what it’s worth, Chile was the second country in the Americas to abolish slavery, after Haiti itself.

Caleta Camarones is an historically Afro-Chilean community.

Even though I have a background in colonial Latin American history, I’d never seen much evidence of the Afro-Chilean heritage. The only precise location I can identify is the coastal village of Caleta Camarones, midway between the Atacama desert cities of Arica and Iquique, whose four-time mayor Sonia Salgado once stated that “Our ancestors arrived here together with the conquerors.”

My Haitian immigrant waiter at Ostras Azócar

The Haitian presence is something different, though, and it’s increasing. The first Haitian I ever encountered personally was a waiter at the classic seafood restaurant Ostras Azócar, who told me more than a decade ago that he learned his fluent Spanish through listening to radio broadcasts from the neighboring Dominican Republic. He now has a family here, and has recently opened his own small business.

I see many Haitians in the Renca neighborhood where I’m staying at present and, at best I can tell, most of them are speaking Haitian Creole (I certainly don’t recognize it as standard French, of which my knowledge is admittedly limited). At a downtown Santiago gas station, I recently had a conversational exchange with a Haitian janitor whose Spanish was likewise limited but was clearly making an effort to communicate.

Haitian options are becoming part of Santiago's fast-food scene.

Most Haitians appear to occupy menial jobs, but there are some indications of entrepreneurship as well. Not far from my Renca accommodations, there’s a sandwich shop that offers Haitian dishes alongside the standard completos (hot dogs) and churrascos (grilled beef). That suggests, at least, a hopeful foothold in the dominant Chilean culture, though there’s certainly been some anti-immigrant sentiment here. I’ve not yet sampled the food there, and it’s unlikely ever to match the impact Peruvian cuisine has had.

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