SANTIAGO, CHILE

Santiago, Chile:
-- Lots and lots of beautiful architecture – with most of the facades defaced
-- Many public squares with tall statues of national heroes in their centers - mostly vandalized
-- Churches in every neighborhood - with almost all the pews empty even on this Sunday morning, despite a mechanized holy water font that squirts water into the hands of worshippers (Kids love it!)
-- A lush food market and restaurants inside what looks like the Eiffel Tower
-- Sadly, and in great contrast to the pure air of the Antarctic, smog covers the city,

We fell in love with it – and want to come back, but we will wait until the revolution happens or doesn’t happen and until the grass gets replanted. And then we’d stay again at the Ritz Carlton where the staff are brilliant and where Bill relaxed while waiting for our long fight back home.

And now we are back and deeply engaged in floor tile and refrigerators and where to put electrical sockets (they call them receptacles now) and recessed lighting in our new apartment. Hope is feeling better but not best.