Yesterday was Sunday, so we went out to see the city. We still held to our first impression—that it’s very like Córdoba—though certainly bigger and more modern. Like good tourists we went to the zoo and Museum of Fine Arts. I didn’t care for most of the paintings, except for a few by Lira and Smith, but I did like the work of the sculptors. Although they imitate the French school, these include some fine pieces—particularly the work of Rebeca Mata, which has character.
That afternoon we discovered that one of the Córdoba water-polo teams happened to be in Santiago—the Suquía team, coached by Espejo Pérez, a friend of mine since the 1943 strike. We went to see him at the pool where the match was to be held, and there we also ran into another old acquaintance—“Negro” Llovet, who used to play soccer with me on the Juniors team and spend summers at Bajada de Piedra. He’s the goalkeeper.
After leaving our friends for the time being, we set out on a long, fruitless search for spare parts. Finally, we decided to leave the bike behind.
We converted two of the saddlebags into knapsacks and left everything else on the bike. As we wrapped it in the tent to protect it from the dust and damp, I felt as though we were placing a shroud on the dead body of a loyal friend. Surreptitiously I gave the bike a gentle pat and walked away, sad and upset.
A little while later we watched the water-polo match, shouting and rooting wildly for the Suquía lads. That night we had a farewell celebration, toasting in turn the joyful occasion of our chance encounter and—though they were sorry to see us go—the success of our difficult, though enviable, journey. All our feelings of regret soon vanished, and once more our usual cheer held sway.
On the 4th, after saying goodbye to the water-polo team and giving them some letters home, we headed for the road that runs from Santiago to Valparaíso.
For more than four hours we watched a long series of trucks appear, pass us by and disappear, until at long last one of the drivers responded to our signals, braked and picked us up.
To get to Valparaíso you have to negotiate two small mountain ranges. Crossing the first by day, we were able to appreciate the beauty of the deep green valleys with scattered small farms full of orchards, many in flower and others bearing a handsome crop.
Snaking through the hills, the road on the far side of the mountain comes out into more arid and less heavily populated terrain. The second ascent was by night, and in this part of the mountains the cold gripped us like a vice. We ferreted ourselves between the cases that the truck was carrying. All we could see from there was the glare of headlights of one vehicle after another. The traffic on this road was extremely heavy.
We arrived at about ten o’clock at night. We said goodbye to the truck driver, shouldered our knapsacks and started walking.
The city center lies far below where the highway ends, which was in a neighborhood that must have been built over the top of old wooden shacks. We made our way to a parking lot for coaches and trucks, and there, where the attendant had his hut, was a shack selling fried fish and the inevitable Chilean wine. We went in, drawn by the aroma, and came upon a rather drunk Argentine. Our presence stirred his alcoholic longings for home, and he offered us a few drinks and some fish.
The next day we befriended the owner of the fish shack. What a great guy! He has two elderly women working as cooks. One’s practically deaf and the other, who looks like a medieval witch, is on the very threshold of senile dementia. They help him and he helps them, because I don’t think anyone else would dare give them jobs. At the same time, he has a good laugh and keeps them happy, playing on the deaf woman’s misunderstandings and especially taunting Rosita, the older of the two, with double entendres about her supposed love affairs, which she answers with offended modesty.
He has offered us lunch and dinner for the whole time we’re here trying to organize a trip to Easter Island. This could put our tour of South America behind schedule, but it’s an opportunity not to be missed.
Yesterday we were hoping to get to see a Mr. Molina Lucco, the only person who can give us authorization to make the trip to Rapa Nui. We came back to the fish shack for lunch and dinner. The owner is a true representative of the Chilean people in particular and of ordinary people in general. There isn’t a beggar, a stray dog or cat whose hunger he doesn’t stay with a scrap of fish. He wants to go to Argentina—to earn money, he says—but doesn’t realize he’ll never get rich with that heart of gold of his, because individual wealth is nothing but the exploitation of man by man.
Valparaíso is one of the prettiest and most strategically situated cities in all of Chile. It has a handsome backdrop of a wooded mountain range and landscapes of the greatest beauty. There are glaciers less than thirty miles away where people can practice winter sports all year round. To the west the city is lapped by the waters of a beautiful wide bay, which forms attractive beaches a few miles further north in Viña del Mar. What’s more, it is built in a strangely original way—some of the neighborhoods are linked to the center by long, steep stairways and others by cable cars.
That night we looked round several of these neighborhoods, especially the port, with its narrow, dirty streets full of bars and brothels, drunken sailors and clinging women. We thought we were in the Casbah in Algiers.
Yesterday at one of the shipping agencies we met the captain of a cargo ship bound for Antofagasta. We persuaded him to let us stow away, and if the port authorities don’t nab us, we’re going to work our passage.
Once again I’ve had one of those adventures that are only possible when you make your dreams come true. This could never have happened had I stayed home selling cough syrup. At seven last night, after bidding farewell to the owner of the fish shack and having an obligatory drink or two, we headed for the port. Our clothes, knapsacks and especially our garish sleeping bags caught the attention of passers-by, as well as that of the policeman on guard at the entrance to the docks. He asked us where we were going, and we answered firmly that we were crew members of the San Antonio.
He sent us to get our baggage inspected by customs, but we must look honest, because they let us through without a check. Once on the wharf, we hid our gear in a coal truck that was tipped up beside the rails.
From the breakwater we could see the frenzied activity on board. Five hundred tons of various goods had to be loaded—provisions, cement, wine, and so forth. We tried to get on deck under cover of all this furious traffic, but we kept running into the officer on watch who, according to what we learned from the crew, is the company spy and would never let us sail.
Night was drawing on, and the wharf was gradually emptying. I felt as if everybody was watching us. We went up and down the entire length of the wharf several times. When night fell we curled up in the shadow of the truck where we’d left our knapsacks.
The minutes passed at a maddening snail’s pace. The policeman walked past us three or four times, and so did the stokers, who kept the cranes’ boilers alight. They almost stepped on us as they shouldered the sacks of coal.
Midnight came, and still the officer hadn’t moved. At one o’clock in the morning the new shift of stevedores came on, and Fúser took advantage of the confusion to get on board to locate the toilets, where we were thinking of hiding.
Meanwhile I went over to one of the crane operators, because there was a breeze blowing fit to freeze a penguin. I managed to get him to invite me up. When Pelao got back from his reconnaissance he too took up lodging beside the boiler. We dozed off and on until five in the morning. The sun came up, a new shift of stevedores came on, and there was the officer still at his post, as rock-solid and unmoving as the ship’s mainmast.
The crew arrived at about nine, and a gangplank was set up for them. Then and there we joined the queue. Once aboard we shoved the knapsacks under a tarpaulin that covered one of the lifeboats and got ourselves into the toilet.
Our first impression was not particularly pleasant. The toilet was out of order and was brimming over with shit, but this was no time to be fussy, so we bolted the door shut.
We didn’t dare even breathe. When someone knocked at the door, I called out to say the toilet was in use. They left.
The minutes dragged as slowly as sweethearts making their way home after the cinema, and we got more and more nervous. If we felt like this, knowing the captain wasn’t going to say anything and that the worst that could happen was that they’d chuck us off the boat, imagine what state a refugee would be in, fleeing persecution, knowing that if found he could lose his life.
At about eleven the engines started, but our great displays of silent jubilation did not last long. The engines slowed down and eventually stopped. Meanwhile, several people knocked on the door, but luckily there was another toilet and they used that.
At last at about twelve o’clock we heard the shrill whistle announcing that the engines were about to be started again. Then we heard the screeching of the anchor-chain and finally felt the ship begin to move.
The yellowish smudge we could make out through the tiny porthole slipped slowly by, then speeded up and was replaced by the blue of the sky and bits of ships’ hulls. We hugged each other, wild with joy, even though we were still afraid we might be discovered. I stuck my head out through the porthole to bid farewell to Valparaíso bay. There was a guard of honor in the form of a huge flock of seagulls, flying about our heads like white handkerchiefs waving us goodbye, together with a great crowd of pelicans wishing us a safe journey in harsh but affectionate tones.
After we’d been under way for about two hours—prompted by hunger and the stench of the toilet—we decided to present ourselves on deck. We passed the galley and went in, and a kitchen boy gave us something to eat: some bread and raw onions, and coffee.
The captain called us up to the bridge, where he engaged in a bit of play-acting. As we climbed up the gang-way he gave us an exaggerated wink of complicity and then put on a comical air of severity, demanding loudly, “What do you think you’re doing here? Don’t you know you’re compromising this ship’s officers?” And on and on it went for several minutes, as he read us the riot act with a stream of reprimands. Then he called the boatswain and instructed him, “These gentlemen are under your orders. I can hardly throw them overboard now that they’re here, but see you keep them busy, and let them find themselves somewhere to bunk down.”
We were set to work straight away, me in the kitchen and Fúser cleaning the toilets. Until a few moments ago I had a dish-rag in my hands, washing up plates and cutlery, and then the cook got me peeling onions. Just then the ship began to roll and my stomach began to heave, so I had to take the bucket out and carry on peeling onions on deck. Pelao had already finished his fragrant task, and he took advantage to snap a picture of me “crying my eyes out.”
Last night, after cleaning the kitchen till it shone (the steward and cook want to squeeze every last drop out of us), we went up on deck for air. Amid the fluorescence of the moonlight on the sea, I saw flying fish for the first time in my life. When they jump out of the water they look like the most beautiful silver rockets.
All the sailors were asleep by then, and we headed for the bridge, where we could see a light. There we found the captain, an officer and the wireless operator playing canasta. We made our presence known, and when they found out that we knew how to play they invited us to join them. We played, and Pelao—who’s very good—won three consecutive hands. They were determined to beat us, but couldn’t manage it.
At about two o’clock in the morning the captain felt hungry and sent for the cook to be woken up. When the man saw who he had to serve—two of his own subordinates—he was absolutely livid and insisted that, come what may, we were going to help him. It was impossible, though, for at that moment the three other players were digging their heels in, utterly determined to beat us, and would never have let us up from the card table.
It wasn’t long before the cook came back with five steaming omelettes, several bottles of wine and a filthy temper. We ate the omelettes, drank the wine and began losing—I don’t know whether because of our post-prandial state or because if one of them didn’t win a hand we would still have been playing when the sun came up.
As might have been expected, after the tension of the previous day and the drinks we had last night, I slept like a log and, of course, didn’t hear the cook or the steward when they called me. When I got to the kitchen I had to bite my tongue and take everything they felt like shouting at me. I consoled myself by contemplating the calm beauty of the sea, and for the first time in my life I saw a pair of sperm whales blowing, with their spouts rising many feet in the air. I never knew it was possible to see sperm whales, or any other whales, in these latitudes.