The Adventures of Kerri & Matt

We had one day in Santiago and started it with a free* tour. On the way there we saw some art.

The story of this statue involved a jilted lover. Of the man, not the horse. We weren’t told what happened to the horse, though it looks like it may have been a more interesting story.

We passed lots of buildings in Chile this on has access to an underground museum area which we did not visit.

Out front was a giant flag.

There are some very nice parks in Santiago. This was right in the middle of our walk and was going to be a fortress, but instead became a really nice garden area. 

Just before we crossed the river you could see off in the distance a nice spot where you can view the city. Mainly after it has had some rain to clear the skies.

In the river waterfront gardens were several statues. This was a fountain donated by Germany to celebrate the Chilean independence.

The food in Chile is really expensive. Remember that the . is a , so that is $2,950.

It was pretty warm and so lots of palm trees, although with really unusual bark patterns.

This statue is from Southern Columbia between 1-500CE. It is “imbued with a solemn peace, impressive for their ability to irradiate the mystery of the sacred.” The sign says so.

This funny monkey was sculpted by a Chavin sculpture between 1000 and 400 BCE.

This is a sculpture of a young noble women from the Veracruz culture (300-900 CE).

This funky pedestal is Mayan from between 300 and 900 CE.

There was also a sculpture of a man wearing a monkey skin from about 300-900 CE. You can see that it is a skin at the edges around the mouth and eyes.

You can also see the monkey’s hands with his poking out underneath.

This is a quipu, the Inca’s only form of written language. This one has 586 cords organized into 8 sections of 10 sets, and is probably some kind of census data.

The pattern of knots and twisting had meaning to the author and recipient. Very few people in the empire were literate, probably only top officials.

We still don’t know how to translate it.

The museum also had some smaller ones.

These strange carved stone geometric shapes date back to 11000 to 6500 BCE, just after people arrived in America. No one knows what they were used for.

These mummies were people from the Chinchorro people. They started mummifying people in 6000 BCE, 2000 years before the Egyptians.