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| Parque Araucano, Las Condes Santiago Chile |
Santiago is breathtakingly beautiful in the winter. When the sun breaks through the clouds, after it's snowed in the mountains, Santiago is so gorgeous it surprises me.
This park, Parque Araucano, is just a couple of blocks from my office. Trip plays here often, and I've practiced yoga on its green grass. It's a quiet urban park in an area they call Nueva Las Condes, full of open space to run free or lounge the day away. Parque Araucano boasts a lovely rose garden, basketball and tennis courts, a skate park and plenty of play equipment for little ones to explore.
Now I know why they positioned the pope just so. It's a view that elicits gratitude and faith in God's hand.
I've heard Chileans explain why they are so reserved, and they say the mountains have kept them humble, that the mountains remind them that they are just a small part of the big wide world.
The mountains have also served as a natural protection. They say that the indigenous Mapuche evaded being conquered by the Europeans for so long because they would retreat into the mountains where no one could follow. Beyond its location al sur del mundo (the south of the world), Chile is even more remote because the nation is sandwiched between the Andes and the Pacific, with miles of glaciers to its south and miles of desert to its north.
I've never lived near mountains. The Rio Grande Valley, New Orleans and Houston are all Gulf Coast locales that are as flat as a pancake. Santiago is something completely different -- a huge city of nearly 7 million people, nestled in a valley of the massive Andes mountain range. Living here, so far from home, can be scary at times, lonely at others, but I think the mountains are a reminder that we are small, but certainly significant.
