Musings on the desecration of tombs
Punta Arenas feels like a big city on the approach from the airport along the highway. It feels gritty and raw at times and then surprises with real gems of eclectic architecture. Stuck on the Southern tip of an enormous continent - this is my type of city.
We pass by some shacks perched on the brow of a hill overlooking three large wooden sailing ships, one of which is looking most unsailable - this looks like the fishermen's quarter. Rusting cranes sit in the background of the enormously wide sea inlet that creates one the largest, cold natural harbours in the world.
The stops we make at the airport and hospital show a new and distinctly European style infrastructure.
The light today is grey and cold, it reminds me of a winter's day back home in its miserableness. But, there is something special about the light here, something mystical that I cannot quite grasp. The light is a pale white pastel blue - this is the light that difuses through the atmosphere at such high latitudes. We are at 53 degrees South of the Equator - there isn't much continent left. The next stop would be the white continent.
We pass by a brand new housing estate of beautiful dark brown green wooden houses with perfect streets and white picket fences - the economy is booming here for some. Set into the wooden houses on the first floor huge floor to ceiling windows overlook the strategic straight of Magallanes, flooding light into the interior of the houses. And although the straight may no longer link the two largest oceans on Earth for world shipping as it did so prominently in the past, make no mistake that this area is still of huge locational importance.
I visit the first brick house ever built in Punta Arenas. A photograph shows its construction in full swing in 1895. Modelled on a Parisian flair of bourgeoisie elegance, the monotone photograph hung on the wall of this Russian family home shows the building sitting on the, then, brand new designed square slap bang in the heart of this city. Antiques adorn the house which has been part turned into a hotel. The museum guide opens a few doors to show me rooms few visitors see. A portrait shows who resided here: The Hamburgers. When I crack a joke about it, "They all think that." The polite grey haired man chuckles.
The city cemetery is competition for some of the finest graveyards in the world. It is a photographer's treasure trove of stories. At the entrance are towering mausoleums dotted between glorious pruned trees. The resting places are shrines to the never forgotten. What strikes me is the plethora of surnames. Even some gravestones are written in German and French from the turn of the 20th century. Full of photos of loved ones gone and their most treasured possessions, the cemetery is the history and legacy of the people who worked and lived in this city. One is of a girl who died two years ago. She had just turned thirty and her smiling face sits in her spot alongside her possessions; a pair of sunglasses and a red heart cuddly toy saying "Feliz dia de la madre" - Happy Mother's Day. She must have given it to her mum on Mother's Day and on her passing, her mum must have given it back to her so that they would always be alongside each other. A poem sits alongside her warm smile behind a pane of glass. There was a profound love in this family and I am overwhelmed with a profound sadness for someone's family I have never met. Life can be so ephemeral. Our memories and legacy are, however, forever lasting.
I am drawn to Salta once more to the museum of high altitude archaeology. Why were the objects buried with the mummies separated? Would we accept this happening now to our loved ones? Would we accept this in the future? What difference is there? What is the limit for desecrating a tomb? When, if ever, is it acceptable?
Driving out of the city, I reach ruined boats and shipwrecked rusting vessels that dot the strait. Resting and forgotten on the shore, they are hallmarks to the past.
My stay in Punta Arenas has been fleeting but I have enjoyed being in this buzzing city.
The bus pulls out of the cityscape of multicoloured rooftops and walls and once again we enter the endless expanse of the semi desert Patagonian steppe.
I'm heading further South, to the end of the world on a twelve hour bus journey
We pass by some shacks perched on the brow of a hill overlooking three large wooden sailing ships, one of which is looking most unsailable - this looks like the fishermen's quarter. Rusting cranes sit in the background of the enormously wide sea inlet that creates one the largest, cold natural harbours in the world.
The stops we make at the airport and hospital show a new and distinctly European style infrastructure.
The light today is grey and cold, it reminds me of a winter's day back home in its miserableness. But, there is something special about the light here, something mystical that I cannot quite grasp. The light is a pale white pastel blue - this is the light that difuses through the atmosphere at such high latitudes. We are at 53 degrees South of the Equator - there isn't much continent left. The next stop would be the white continent.
We pass by a brand new housing estate of beautiful dark brown green wooden houses with perfect streets and white picket fences - the economy is booming here for some. Set into the wooden houses on the first floor huge floor to ceiling windows overlook the strategic straight of Magallanes, flooding light into the interior of the houses. And although the straight may no longer link the two largest oceans on Earth for world shipping as it did so prominently in the past, make no mistake that this area is still of huge locational importance.
I visit the first brick house ever built in Punta Arenas. A photograph shows its construction in full swing in 1895. Modelled on a Parisian flair of bourgeoisie elegance, the monotone photograph hung on the wall of this Russian family home shows the building sitting on the, then, brand new designed square slap bang in the heart of this city. Antiques adorn the house which has been part turned into a hotel. The museum guide opens a few doors to show me rooms few visitors see. A portrait shows who resided here: The Hamburgers. When I crack a joke about it, "They all think that." The polite grey haired man chuckles.
The city cemetery is competition for some of the finest graveyards in the world. It is a photographer's treasure trove of stories. At the entrance are towering mausoleums dotted between glorious pruned trees. The resting places are shrines to the never forgotten. What strikes me is the plethora of surnames. Even some gravestones are written in German and French from the turn of the 20th century. Full of photos of loved ones gone and their most treasured possessions, the cemetery is the history and legacy of the people who worked and lived in this city. One is of a girl who died two years ago. She had just turned thirty and her smiling face sits in her spot alongside her possessions; a pair of sunglasses and a red heart cuddly toy saying "Feliz dia de la madre" - Happy Mother's Day. She must have given it to her mum on Mother's Day and on her passing, her mum must have given it back to her so that they would always be alongside each other. A poem sits alongside her warm smile behind a pane of glass. There was a profound love in this family and I am overwhelmed with a profound sadness for someone's family I have never met. Life can be so ephemeral. Our memories and legacy are, however, forever lasting.
I am drawn to Salta once more to the museum of high altitude archaeology. Why were the objects buried with the mummies separated? Would we accept this happening now to our loved ones? Would we accept this in the future? What difference is there? What is the limit for desecrating a tomb? When, if ever, is it acceptable?
Driving out of the city, I reach ruined boats and shipwrecked rusting vessels that dot the strait. Resting and forgotten on the shore, they are hallmarks to the past.
My stay in Punta Arenas has been fleeting but I have enjoyed being in this buzzing city.
The bus pulls out of the cityscape of multicoloured rooftops and walls and once again we enter the endless expanse of the semi desert Patagonian steppe.
I'm heading further South, to the end of the world on a twelve hour bus journey
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