Duuude!!!!

As mentioned before, our itinerary included 5 countries: Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Peru and Colombia, that we were to pass through in around forty hours. For both Catalina an I, this was the biggest voyage either of us had ever partaken in. 40 fucken hours!!! That’s like two days stuck on planes and in airports. It’s all good though, we were travelling, and my doctor had given me a perscription of temazapam that I had tried not to completely take advantage of befor we left.

We arraived in Auckland on the north island of New Zealand at about 11am their time. We had five hours there, which normally would let us head out for a bit and check out a few things around town, but because of Cata’s ethnicity and  policies on which countries she can’t enter without an expensive visa (pretty much all of’ ’em. Thank’s Pablo!), we were stuck at Auckland International.

I can’t really say much about New Zealand from my experience at the airport, but i can tell you this: They have a very nice departure lounge and all the staff at the Burger King were extremely friendly and helpful. The view of the coast from the plane was exquisite and, based on this viewing only, had I more time I reckon it would be a very cool place to visit.

It reminded me a bit of Tassie, and seemed very similar to Australia in many ways, except that even though the population is largely made up of whitey’s like myself, they seem to have a great respect and pride in their indigenous culture, unlike in Australia where for the most part it is swept under the rug to impoverished corners of the outback.

One cool thing I saw here was two old Maori dudes with face tatts and these crazy, totem pole lookin’ walking sticks greet each other by doing that thing where they press their forhead and nose together. Cool. After doing this they sat down at burger king and ate a fuckload of whoppers.  Thats just how they roll.

Did I mention that these dudes are fucken massive too? And wear these sarong/dress things? Just try and make fun of a 120 kilogram dude with face tatts, a dress and a sugar rush from an upsized ultimate Whopper combo…you’ll be chewing your food with a blender for months.

We boarded our plane for Santiago, Chile, at about 5pm after a long delay involving computers, as usual, which meant that all the passengers (over 2oo of ’em) had to be checked off manually. Luckily, once boarded, the plane took off quickly and we began the longest leg of our journey, about 11 hours in the air.  It was also in our favour that the palne was leaving in the evening, so we could crash out naturally with out that twiglight zone, jet-lag, no sleep on the plane shit.

The hostesses were more than helpful in helping us get to sleep as well. They served dinner as soon as the plane levelled off and did’nt skimp on the free booze. I got served a triple when I asked for a scotch on the rocks to wash down my temazapam. For me, this flight was heaven. I sat in my comfy recliner with my own private telly next to my missus and drifted off to sleep, zonked out on scotch and downers, watching the simpsons.

I slept the majority of the flight and shortly after i awoke they began serving breakfast and we began the descent into Santiago. Flying over the Andes, I got my first glimse of South America, and then I had to take a dump. We had a nine hour stop over here, and there was no way we were spending that trying to sleep on departure loung seats and eating overpriced, greasy, airport crap. We got in the line at immigration and one hour and 60 bucks later we were out in the warm Chilean sun.

My first experience in a South American city was probably pretty similar too that of most foreigners: being totally disorientated and trying to avoid getting ripped off by local cab drivers. As you may have read previously, I enjoy getting ripped off by people, so I was quite happy in this situation. My spanish speaking fiance on the other hand, does not, and so we decided not to give all our money to the guy with dagger tatts and facial scars and instead hopped on the bus and made our way into town.

Santiago is a cool city. Its hot and dry and surrounded by the massive peaks of the Andes, which are only just visible through the smog, and you get these massive boogers from all the dry heat and smog. Travelling into the city centre via the outskirts, I learned something very important about South America: A bad area of town is a bad area. You dont want to fuck around here. As a Colombian notarial was to say to me later in preparation for our wedding, compared to Australia, South America is el otro mundo; another world.

Hopping off the bus in the centre of  Santiago, I got major gringo self conciousness. Im pretty much the text book example of a cracka: blonde hair, blue eyes, a littel fat and pale white skin that gets flushed with pink when it’s warm. I look like porky pig with a meth habit, so there was no disguising I wasn’t from aroun here. Not that I really give a fuck, but it’s just that latin people are so damned attractive. I’d even stick the blokes if they put on a wig and bought me a drink. Everywhere I looked there was some foxy mamasita or cut bloke, and there I was: in smelly trackpants, pink and sweaty.

Oh well. It didn’t stop me from enjoying the few hours we had here. Santiago is as chaotic as anywhere else I have travelled, bustling with energy that you just dont see in western countries. There were people on the streets everywhere, just hanging out and sellin all types of shit from sweets to car radios, and posses of fucking massive stray dogs everywhere. The biggest one I saw looked like a pure-bre German Sheppard. Cool.

I also saw a fist fight. They don’t play in Santiago.

Being that we had only had about 6 hours sleep in the past 36 hours and the adenaline of being in a new city wore off quickly and we began to crash fast. Like New Zealand, I would have loved to have spent more time in Chile. What i did see was only the tip of the iceberg, and on top of being home to some the most pristine natural assets in the entire world, a friend of mine in Oz had told me tales of whole strip malls (whick are everywhere in Santiago) dedicated solely to Metal, tattoo’s and video games. Fuck yeah Chile!!!

We got back to the airport at around six and used a free food voucher we got with our boarding pass to geet something to eat at one of the shitty airport restaurants. It’s very uncool to say, but out of the plethora of good places to eat in Santiago, and South America for that matter, my first meal on the continent was some sloppy, luke warm ribs at a TGI Friday’s rip off.

Getting back on the plane to Peru (which was delayed, again!) was pretty much a non-event. All we did was sleep, and when we arraived in Lima we had to bolt to make our flight to Bogota, getting in just as boarding was finishing up. The flight between Lima and Bogota was fucked for me. Catalina slept peacefully knowing that in a couple of short hours she would be reunited with her family who she hadn’t seen for 18 months. I, on the other hand, was shitting myself.

Cata and I have been together for almost 3 years and I have spoken to her mother and sisters a fair bit via phone, albeit in very bad spanish, and they are very nice, but me and her father have never spoken a word. He is an accountant and, so I’m told, a very serious man. I am a bogan and don’t take anything seriously unless it’s 100% neccessary, so I wasn’t exactly sitting pretty two hours from cata’s home.

I tried to listen to music and watch a crappy movie about dogs with Jeff Bridges in it (he’ll never be anyone but The Dude to me), but I just couldn’t relax. An hour and a half later we could see the vast expanse of orange light that was Bogota at night. You could also see the shit running down my legs. The plane began to descend into El Dorado airport and pretty soon the only thing seperating us from them was immigration and my bad spanish.