A Fishy Fish Market

Today was another beautiful day in Santiago.  The morning was spent on a lesson of math and the afternoon was spent exploring the city.  Today, we visited a history museum in the city center of Santiago, explored an intriguing fish market, and in the afternoon we finally got the car back along with some good news. 



After my lesson of math was completed, we attempted the quick and efficient metro journey from our hotel to the city center of Santiago.  Today, we were headed for the Mueso Historico Nacional.  The National History Museum was amazing!  The first room showed artifacts from the Inca and the Pre-columbian era.  Many later rooms showed artifacts and paintings from the time of the Spanish and Portugal conquest.  In the paintings, Spaniards were depicted brutally killing the indigenous natives.  I was surprised, and especially interested in the way that the museum’s exhibits were shown from the European side of the take over.  The Spaniards were shown in a good light.  There were portraits of noble generals and victorious battles. One picture showed  Spaniards shooting down at struggling natives from a high platform with the caption “Defending Santiago”.  This disturbed me, but soon the subject changed to Pinochet’s take over (see blog: Exploring the Center of Santiago).  The museum ended with Allende’s broken glasses after the military coup.  It was said that when the coup began, Allende shot himself; but no one really knows. Ohh, what an interesting way to end the exhibit!



After spending so much time in a cooped up museum, we wished to stretch our legs. We let our curiosity guide us, and soon we came upon a peculiar sight.  We had walked smack into a busy fish market!  We entered a maze of fish restaurants, fish stands and fish smells.  The stands were covered with ice, and on top of the ice one could find all types of sea creatures.  I saw eels, spiky, creepy, black halibut, crabs, trout, oysters, shrimp, and many more nameless weird fishes.  Intermingled with the stands, there were small seafood restaurants.  From the eateries ran persistent touts trying to persuade dazed tourists to eat at their restaurants.  They were no match to the touts of India.  In fact, I hardly even noticed them!  
                   


After we were finished having fun in Santiago, we had a job to do.  This started with a long metro ride to the car part of town.  The mechanic planned to meet us at the very Auto Planet that we had found on our first day in Santiago.  With him, he had a fixed up, detailed, and working Maz!  We checked her out and she looked as good as new.  The mechanic, Francisco, also brought some good news.  He knows a friend who might be willing to buy the car.  This is great!  I guess we might not need to worry about finding a buyer.

Today was amazing.  We explored a museum, looked around a fishy fish market, and got Maz back from the mechanic.  We squeezed many activities into a small day and tell you what, I am tired! 



Thank you for reading Rohan Geographic!