Fiestas Patrias

From September 17th onward, seemingly the entire country shuts for Chile's independence celebration. Nothing was open today (September 18th - the official day of the celebration) and people either go to asados (bbq's) or Fondas (big carnival type parties that are held all weekend at various parks and venues throughout the city). These are pictures from the Parque O'Higgins Fonda.

There was a ton of dancing, but unfortunately/fortunately none captured by camera...yet.

Click here for more on fondas and Fiestas Patrias.

Side note: I have a begrudgingly officially joined the rest of the civilized world on facebook. It's become a necessity in modern communication and is an essential component to creating/maintaining/repairing/ruining any resemblance of a social life. I've found, especially in Santiago, that the question: "Are you on facebook?" is one of the first questions asked upon meeting someone. So, in what will most likely prove to be a fruitless balancing act of accepting/making new friendships and ignoring/ruining old ones, I have conceded and have one more thing to check online. Thank you world.

More Soccer - Chile vs. Colombia

Click here for details of Chile's 4-0 shellacking of Colombia.

Chile vs. Brazil

For my first ever non-high-school-junior-varsity soccer game experience I got press access to the Chile vs. Brazil World Cup qualifying game. I thought we were only getting passes to the Chile vs. Columbia game, but when we picked em up, they had both games included. Nice birthday present.

My credentials were technically only valid for the press room and the seats, but I was able to finagle my way in to the Zona Mixto zoo that was the post-game press area and onto the field at the beginning of the match.

The dingy National Stadium is the biggest in Chile, with a capacity of 65,000, and was used as a torture camp during the Pinochet dictatorship. It definitely felt like death had been there at one point or another.

We got free hamburgers and drinks in the press room.

Brazil won 3-0. Click here for more on the game.

Here are some pictures:

Chile's team

Chile's fans

Chile's uniformed police force (el amigo verde)

Where's the gringo?


Brazil's Diego