25/05/2011 (posted 26/05/2011)
I slept well until the alarm built into my new watch woke me up perfectly on time. Makes a difference from the piece of junk I bought for three quid in Bolivia - shame the hot springs finished that off though.
When I woke up, I immediately had bad stomach cramps again which were no fun at all.
They eventually went away, and I got up and ready and headed out to the city centre.
In one of those cool coincidences in life, Jonny (from the OM team)'s girlfriend, Rita, lives in Santiago and I added her on Facebook and we decided to meet each other and hang out.
So at 12pm, I went to our designated meeting point and couldn't see her anyway. Obviously, all I was going on was pictures of her on Facebook so I couldn't be sure, but I didn't see anyone remotely looking like her. That was, until one girl walked into an area very near our meeting place, sat down for five minutes and then went off again. That girl looked ever-so-slightly like Rita but I was far from certain and before I could do more research, she went. Her abrupt exit made me think it wasn't her as she would surely spend more time looking for me, but it still unnerved me slightly.
At 12:30pm, I knew something had gone wrong so I went to an internet café to see if she had been in touch. She had, ten minutes earlier, and said that she was waiting at La Moneda train station - I was at La Moneda palace, and last night we said 'see you at La Moneda'. I believed that this was where the mix-up had occurred.
So I walked to the station, had a look around, had to pay to get onto the platform as I thought she would be there but still couldn't find her. And then, finally, I looked up and saw her waving at me.
It may have been 1pm instead of 12pm, but we had met all the same. So she showed me a few cool places in Santiago including a 'cultural centre' building with some Mapuche stuff and Cerro Santa Lucia, a really awesome place. It's a hill right in the middle of the city and has some old buildings sort of built into it, and you can walk up to the top and get a view over Santiago. So we did, and it was beautiful.
While we were having lunch, I told her I work at Starbucks and she said there were some in Santiago. This made me more than a little bit excited, and we went and I felt like I had come home. Everything from the soft furniture to the smell to the aprons was just uplifting, and I had a caramel mocha which didn't disappoint - of course it didn't, as I specified the exact number of syrup pumps and espresso shots to put in.
Over the course of the day we covered a massive distance on foot, which was good as it meant we could talk about stuff and get to know each other more but it also meant I was knackered at the end of the day. However, the day culminated in a visit to a studenty pub where we ordered one of the best main courses I have ever had. It is called Churriana or something like that, and was a bed of chips upon which was fried chicken, chorizo, sausage and bacon. Imagine that, washed down with a beer containing honey and you'll conclude that it was a good meal.
The one negative of this meal was that it inevitably led to my stomach cramps making an unwelcome return in a significant manner. The nature of the pain leads me to believe that it is an issue with my digestive system in some way, but I can't be sure. If it carries on for a couple more days I will seek medical help but until then, I'll drink lots of water and try to shake it off.
JG
So that was the end of the day, and I am seeing Rita again tomorrow in the evening to go to her evening group at her church which shall be fun.
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