As you have probably been able to read through the lines, I haven’t been too successful in finding an apartment in South America which is quiet enough to read, write and think, let alone to sleep.
Finally, I consulted a real estate broker who suggested this apartment in Humberstone in Chile:
I signed the contract right away.
The owners were nice enough to furnish the apartment. In the kitchen, there was even a bowl of fruits waiting for me.
Coziest of all is the living room.
The bedroom for guests is rather spartan, but at least you’ll have a stove when you visit.
What I found particularly attentive was that my remark about writing lead to the provision of a typewriter. Finally I can type the N with a tilde: ÑÑÑÑÑÑ.
Next to the town there is a very windy hill from where I can offer you a panoramic view over the whole settlement.
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I believe Humberstone is the only completely car-free town in all of South America. Exemplary! The only downside? I still don’t have internet.
As you know, I am currently hiking on Easter Island.
Today, as I wanted to make siesta in the shadows of the stone statues, I spotted a familiar face.
First, I thought it was some random man who happened to look like Joe Biden. But when I saw the six guys who were with him, all wearing the same khaki pants and blue shirts, I knew it was the US Vice President.
I didn’t want to disturb him, but when he noticed me staring, his grin became wider, he made a thumbs-up gesture and shouted “hey, how are you doing?” So I came closer and, trying to be funny, asked “Is this a campaign stop?”
“No man,” he laughed, “I am done with campaigning.” And then, more seriously: “If half the country wants a lunatic clown, who am I to stop them?”
We chatted a bit more about the election, but then sat down in the grass, unpacked our lunch boxes, and talked about life, from lawyer to lawyer, from old man to old man, and it ain’t nobody’s business what we talked about. But he’s a nice guy. I think people will miss him and President Obama rather sooner than later.
I have never seen a “George W. Bush Boulevard” or “George W. Bush Square” anywhere in the world. For some reason, he is not very popular anymore. I am not even sure if there is any “George W. Bush Street” in the US, except maybe in Texas.
But then I saw these signs just around the corner from my hotel in Tirana, the capital city of Albania: “George W. Bush Street”
I wonder what American islamophobes will make of the fact that some of the most pro-American countries in Europe are those with a large Muslim majority (especially Albania and Kosovo).
Having heard about destiny, fate, premonition and other similarly unreal esoteric concepts the whole evening, I decided to give it a try.
I set out for a walk after leaving the bar, with no particular goal in mind, ready to be guided by the higher powers whose existence I had thus far denied.
After 30 minutes in the dark, fate had indeed led me to exactly the one house in the city to which the key – which had miraculously appeared in my pocket – fit. Even more miraculously, the apartment was empty, mine to take over. I did so, fully converted, for this was much more compelling evidence than anything that the believers had tried to produce. Never again shall I doubt the wisdom of the gods, destiny, the oracle and all the holy virgins and witches.
The Norns Urdr, Verdandi and Skuld controlling the destiny of all men, women, children and “Oh, look, there’s a squirrel!”
Preparing my trip to Easter Island, memories of Kon-Tiki leaped into my mind, one of the first travel/adventure books I read. Thor Heyerdahl and his crew did not sail to Easter Island in 1947, but further north, yet the underlying question if the islands of Polynesia were settled from Asia or from South America concerns all of the South Pacific.
Heyerdahl’s scientific methodology is outdated. Nowadays one would analyze DNA to reconstruct migration routes, instead of floating on a not very navigationable raft for a full 101 days through seas infested with sharks who’d love to eat a Scandinavian for change. But the Kon-Tiki expedition was definitely more thrilling. And the only way to make the general public aware of a debate which had until then only raged in academia.
The younger ones among you may only remember all this from the 2012 movie, which was a rather kitschy attempt to get a generation used to kitsch and action interested in the expedition.
If you think that the part about sharks and whales is over the top, here is a great cinematographic document for you: a film from the 1947 expedition.
Until now I hadn’t even known that the scientists/adventurers were also filming. Their material was made into a documentary which is endlessly more impressive than the recent movie. In 1952 it even won an Oscar.
Here’s the trailer:
To see the whole film, you do however have to visit the Kon-Tiki-Museum in Oslo. Fittingly, a taxi from Oslo train station to Bygdøy peninsula, where the museum is located, costs just as much as a flight to the Tuamotu archipelago.
In 1955, Thor Heyerdahl finally visited Easter Island, where he again advertised the hypothesis that the primary settlement came from South America. But he had some influence on Easter Island before. With the news of the successful Kon-Tiki expedition, it had become known that simple rafts were fit for long journeys if you caught the right current. When the Easter Islanders read about this in National Geographic, some of them built boats and used them to flee to Tahiti, a journey of 4,258 km.
The Happy Hermit 