This is a two-month post-project recap of the Atacama Stories project in Chile. It’s a long story so I might resort to installments unless my day continues to be as dry as it has been, in which case this post will just be really long.
The amazing country of Chile and the super cool group of people working with Atacama Stories made the entire experience probably the best one of my life. Having traveled my share, I know that the people make the difference in the experience and I was fortunate enough to be with a lot of smart, talented, and fun ones.
In the Atacama, I expected the dry air and blue skies. But the snow-topped volcanoes on the horizon and the small pueblo shops and houses were a surprise. The beauty of the place was alien: dusty, barren, and dry.
I was assigned to the mining section, and was partnered up with Andres, a delightfully chatty Chilean from Universidad de los Andes. We spent five nights in the coastal town of Tocopilla working on our story about Piquineros, or small pick-axe miners in tiny mines, like rat-holes, in mountainsides. We met four men, Artemio, Rafael, and Pedro Pablo (times two). We stayed in a sketchy motel with bread and butter for breakfast, and ate lunch at the “Jennifer Restaurant”, where we could get marisco soup, coke, and just about anything else for $3. We spent a lot of time deep inside the dusty mine, getting to know the miners and their passion for their craft. We visited three of their homes, all very different. Pedro Pablo Vega lives alone on a mountainside in a shack, with no water or power. He uses one of the mining lamps for light and heats water for his bath in the sun. He has a radio he listens to during dinner and he cooks outside on a fire. Rafael, on the other hand, lives in a roomy, clean (if cluttered) house on a crowded street with his 6 children. They loved us and told me they wanted a picture of me to frame and put on the wall!
This picture of Rafael Cortez was taken inside the Mina Teresa, where he spends the day extracting copper and filling wheelbarrows for the others to take outside. The project turned out pretty well, and I had a lot of really good experiences working on it.
On the nights I was in San Pedro, we hung out at Katarpe Hostel, where we were staying. It was really fun getting to know everybody and goofing off.. drinking Pisco Sours and Piscolas (Mi favorita!) and… speaking spanish! I was a little disapointed that I didn’t get to see any of the sights, like the geysers, volcanoes, flamingos, or salt flats because I was in Tocopilla most of the time. But at least I got to see the Pacific Ocean from South America! Now I have seen the Pacific from Asia, NA, and SA.. only Australia to go! :)
Once we finished up our stories we headed to Santiago. I ate a lot of food “Italiano”, basically with palta (avacado), tomatoes, and mayonnaise. And, a lot of empanadas.
Very informative.