VALPARAÍSO - Pablo Neruda would be proud. Mere moments after arriving in the city the poet and Nobelist once called home, we set out to track down a mysterious lead and find the heart of this place by starting with its stomach.
Though ostensibly writing about himself in his "Autorretrato," Neruda might as well have been writing about the quirky charms of Valparaíso and its people.
For my part, I am, or believe I am . . .
. . . monumental of appetite, a tiger for sleeping,
quiet in joy, inspector of the nocturnal heavens,
invisible worker, persistently irregular . . .
With two friends, one a lifetime local, I head out to find an unmarked restaurant called Los Deportistas, named for its proximity to a soccer field. We buzz across the city's ramshackle flat center in a pint-sized public bus, picking up the port's dock and market workers along with uniformed grade-schoolers on their way home for lunch, getting an accidental slice of life as we go. Eventually we start the dizzying climb into one of the "cerros," the hills that surround the center of town and create its distinct neighborhoods.
Up here, we find the homes that give the city its distinct look: beautiful, European-influenced architecture that often combines wood and brightly-colored corrugated metal. Perched on the hills, these homes - a little rusty, a little rickety - create a feeling that the city is held together with sticks and glue, yet that's one of the keys to its beauty and charm.
While Santiago may be the business-centric capital (which can also be rather conservative and dull) and the country's soul is reflected up and down its skinny, 2,600-mile strand of deserts, mountains, lakes, and farmland, Valparaíso is Chile's beating Bohemian heart.
The rest of the country can be buttoned-up, tight, tidy, and even occasionally moneyed, but "Valpo" is none of that; if you have a creative urge to feed, this is your town.
Like San Francisco in its hippie heyday, persistently irregular Valparaíso is driven by the alternative and the artistic - a visual, cultural magnet for Chileans and centuries of adventurous expatriates who discovered the Pacific port city just before or after making their way around Cape Horn. While some world cities have corners that create a unique, authentic flavor, here, that magic is still blissfully spread across the entire town.
With a good dose of outside influence, a geography that forces creativity, and an atypical reputation that attracts a certain kind of Chilean, the city created itself on its own unique terms.
