Today we decided to take it easy. Our breakfast arrived like clockwork at 9:15, we ate it and then stayed in bed for a few hours reading and relaxing. We both needed to recharge our batteries after the long trip and the previous day’s running around. We decided that we had to go back to the Jumbo and actually do a little grocery shopping for “the basics”. By the time we got around to buying food the night before, we were pretty tired and we only managed to get some beer, water, and the ham-potato balls; and you know what they say - one can not live on ham-potato balls alone.
By the time we arrived at the Jumbo, we were both pretty hungry. We decided to stop at the little in-store cafe for lunch. The sandwiches in Chile are fairly homogenous; chicken on white bread with all the crusts cut off. We noticed that besides the chicken sandwiches they had hot dogs. We decided to give them a try.
Now the other day, in the mail, David and I both saw a glorious thing. We saw a waiter serving a hot dog..with avocado on top. Yes, avocado. In Chile, it is known as “palta” and it is ubiquitous. It was even on the neatly wrapped, crust-cut-off chicken sandwiches (just like mom used to make). We ordered our hot dogs and went to the condiment stand. BEHOLD next to the ketchup was a giant pump container of palta. How could something so wrong be so right! Tony Bourdain, our favorite acerbic TV chef would be in heaven. We certainly were.
After finishing off our palta, ketchup, and hot sauce topped dogs (on fantastic fresh buns, by the way) we continued our shopping trip. We knew that we could find practically anything one might find in an American grocery store, but the extent of this perception was yet to sink in. We discovered the “International” food aisle, which had a wide variety of Indian curries, Chinese sauces, Old El Paso taco fixings, and Shure-Fine Macaroni-N-Cheese (in case we go insane and suddenly yen for the south). We found Heinz ketchup (good liberal ketchup, as David put it) with Six Flags Great Adventure discount tickets on the back. We found Hellmann’s mayo and French’s mustard. So, as far as basic supplies go, we were set.
We actually had much more fun exploring the non-American parts of the store. I had to physically restrain David from buying the entire Argentinean beef case. If you’ve spoken to David in the last two years, you’ve probably heard about the Two-Steaks-A-Day blog that he subjects everyone to - it was that kind of pampas-fed, Argentine meat. It was $10 for a pound of filet. Several months ago, I mistakenly had the impression that we would be able to save money in Chile, but now I realize that we are going to single-handedly fund the Argentine ranching industry for 3-5 years. We also discovered some good old Chilean meat, particularly ostrich, in filet, burger, and (notably) carpaccio. We’re thinking of bringing out the carpaccio as a “big gun” when we have Steve over for dinner, but we’ll try it first and make sure we don’t die from either toxins or pleasure. For now, we settled for the burgers.
After completing our second shopping trip, we came home and decided to take a walk to the Vina del Mar, the A1-A of La Serena. The sunset there was absolutely gorgeous, the sand was freaking cold, and the restaurants very tempting. We however, still had about 3 pounds of excellent BBQ meat in our fridge, so we went home and fixed a simple dinner of leftovers and apple sauce.
Before dinner, we got Skype working and called both sets of parents to say hello. It was really neat to see everyone “face to face” and we only had minor technical difficulties. I think it will be even easier to keep in touch with friends and family than it was when we were in Gainesville!
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