Typically Chilean

daniela pours a pint in "st patricks day bar" in santiago chile.

something you have to love about the chilean people its their love of other cultures. there is an irish "themed" bar just down the road from my hostel with some good looking leprechauns.....





"la piojera", Santiago, Chile

depite what you can learn about a country from guidebooks and internet and so on, theres nothing quite like having a local person show you around.
daniela , invited myself and some of the guys to a bar/restaurant that serves typical chilean food. the place was called "la piojera", which apparently comes from the word "piojo" which (though literally means head lice! is also a chilean slang word for drunk. so, i guess "la piojera" is something equivalent to a name like "the drunk tank, or the watering hole" or something to that effect.
from the outside its appearance doesnt give much away. i would never have noticed it otherwise.
the place had a great atmosphere, there were two guitarrists playing chilean cueca music and other south american songs. sometimes some drunk locals would make a request and sing along to the song.

most interesting wast the drink that everyone was drinking.

"terremoto" (earthquake)

this drink consists of a type of fruity white wine
and some pineapple flavoured icecream sitting on top. im told this is a kind of icecream that is made with water and not milk.
its quite a nice drink! especially when the icecream starts to combine with the wine forming a kind of alcoholic milkshake.
take my word for it though, this drink is strong.


tom (ireland), unknown typical chilean customer of this pub, Kevin (ireland)
as we were taking some fotos outside the bar, this small fellow walked out just in time to have a picture taken.

here is some cueca music (ctrl & left click to open in new window)

then daniela decided to show us another chilean phenomenon ...

"cafe con piernas" (coffee with legs).
This is a typically chilean phenomenon, basically its a cafe with loud music and waitresses wearing next to nothing, serving cofee.open during business hours only. they are found in shopping centres , main streets..all over the place.i did mention these cafes before in the blog, but this particular cafe had a bit more character.
i wonder how such a business would go down back home? i guess the owner would either become a millionaire or be sent to the gallows.

i have to say i quite enjoyed being the only one who spoke spanish & english in this place, meaning that everyone had to come to me when they wanted to say something. i decided to surprise kevin by asking a waitress if she would like to dance with him since its his last night in south america. it was funny to see kevins suprise as this leather-booted woman takes a liking to him out of the blue.

la vecinita tiene antojo




then we headed back to the hostel bar for the usual party thing. its always somebodys last night. theres a table tennis table in the back yard of the hostel, since there are only two bats, doubles must be played with frying pans. creating a new game "pan pong"

pan pong


Talita (brazil), Myself, Daniela (chile)



tom (ireland), colin (australia), paddy (ireland), Kevin (ireland)

paddy in the picture above, decided to shave off one half of his beard as a party piece for his last night in santiago. the funny thing though is he packed the razor in the bottom of his rucksack and didnt have time to get it before heading to the airport at 7am this morning. so he had to go with half a beard.


silly money
as i mentioned before , chilean money is in the thousands.
you will hear one thousand being referred to as 1 "luca".
and one million being referred to as 1 "palo"
1000 pesos is basically 1.32 euro give or take.
meaning that 1 peso is worth about 1/8 of a cent. but interestingly they still make the 1 peso coins.

though chilean money does seem ridiculous at first, you soon get used to it and realise its quite a strong currency.

now heres what i call a weak currency.......

a friend showed me a one hundred billion dollar bill! he had aquired during a trip to zimbabwe in africa. apparently its worthless.