some wine and colorful buildings and IG lies
I wish I could say today looked like today did on Instagram.
On Instagram it looks like Chile is a super calm, slow paced country. It looks like we drank our coffee at a cozy cafe with llamas in the backyard. It looks like friendly faced strangers walking down cobblestone streets with cute dogs with sunglasses. It looks like wine and more wine and then some more wine. It looks like I laughed all day with my grandparents.
And all of that was real. All of those things did happen and we did find this perfect city along the coast surrounded by wineries and fields in a place called Casablanca. It felt like it was straight out of a movie. But not, you know, the movie called Casablanca.
But it still sort of feels like I'm lying or putting up a front. Technically I didn't lie lie, but maybe I did lie by omission. I hate Instagram phony-ness more than just about anything else, and today I felt like the living persona of a person showing only what they want to show to the world to convince themselves they felt the way they looked ALL DAY LONG.
And guess what? Today, it was all fake. Today, I wanted to cry every time my mind remembered what happened at 10:30pm last night.
The truth is that Santiago has been having nightly riots for months. I knew this going into the trip, but I thought it would be easily avoided or something that wouldn't be a threat to me.
That is, until I booked a hotel downtown in Santiago and flew in at 8:30pm and had to order a taxi an hour later when my pre-organized shuttle was a no-show. We started driving and all seemed well until we reached the downtown streets. I noticed foot traffic picked up as the car traffic slowed to a stop. My taxi driver didn't speak any english, but I could tell he was a little anxious about something. I didn't know what. As we got closer, I noticed hundreds of people gathered. All in masks. Some with weaponry and torches. And in front of them, between the people and the cars, was a giant ball of fire.
And then we heard a pop. Or a boom. I'm not really sure.
And my taxi driver asked me to get out of the car and walk to my hotel. He showed me Google maps and my hotel was right on the other side of the fire ball of flame. At first I asked myself I was just another ignorant white person afraid of people who look different than them. If I was overreacting. I wondered for a real second if I could actually just sort of walk around the big group yelling and fighting.
But then- and this is the moment that haunts me, I realized I absolutely could not go out into the crowd. But could I say no to the driver?
YES READER YOU CAN SAY NO!!!!!!!!!!!!
In a fraction of a second, I found the address to a different hotel, showed it to him, opened my wallet and showed him 10,000 more pesos, and he drove me to a hotel close to the airport. He listened to me. I had to demand, not ask, that he take me there. And the entire car ride, as we inched out of downtown following smoke and commotion and police cars and fire trucks, I tried to look bored. Uninterested. I had to look indifferent, like I was in control. I couldn't cry or show any vulnerability.
I don't honestly know how I knew what to do or where I found the strength. All I know is that I was the most alone and vulnerable I'd ever felt in my life. No one was going to help me. I was in a taxi with a stranger who didn't speak English. And all my trust was in myself for knowing what the right thing to do was, and that the taxi driver was hopefully a decent person. I did what my heart told me I needed to do to survive and get the fuck out of there.
So yeah. Today felt like a big old lie.
But also, more than anything, I needed today to feel normal. Just a normal day on vacation. I needed it to feel fun so I could continue my vacation and NOT fly home in fear. I needed to escape in Instagram and in other people's feeds. I had to.
Today, I realized Instagram is sometimes also just survival. Today, I realized I will never again judge a person by how they want their life to look on the internet.
On Instagram it looks like Chile is a super calm, slow paced country. It looks like we drank our coffee at a cozy cafe with llamas in the backyard. It looks like friendly faced strangers walking down cobblestone streets with cute dogs with sunglasses. It looks like wine and more wine and then some more wine. It looks like I laughed all day with my grandparents.
And all of that was real. All of those things did happen and we did find this perfect city along the coast surrounded by wineries and fields in a place called Casablanca. It felt like it was straight out of a movie. But not, you know, the movie called Casablanca.
But it still sort of feels like I'm lying or putting up a front. Technically I didn't lie lie, but maybe I did lie by omission. I hate Instagram phony-ness more than just about anything else, and today I felt like the living persona of a person showing only what they want to show to the world to convince themselves they felt the way they looked ALL DAY LONG.
And guess what? Today, it was all fake. Today, I wanted to cry every time my mind remembered what happened at 10:30pm last night.
The truth is that Santiago has been having nightly riots for months. I knew this going into the trip, but I thought it would be easily avoided or something that wouldn't be a threat to me.
That is, until I booked a hotel downtown in Santiago and flew in at 8:30pm and had to order a taxi an hour later when my pre-organized shuttle was a no-show. We started driving and all seemed well until we reached the downtown streets. I noticed foot traffic picked up as the car traffic slowed to a stop. My taxi driver didn't speak any english, but I could tell he was a little anxious about something. I didn't know what. As we got closer, I noticed hundreds of people gathered. All in masks. Some with weaponry and torches. And in front of them, between the people and the cars, was a giant ball of fire.
And then we heard a pop. Or a boom. I'm not really sure.
And my taxi driver asked me to get out of the car and walk to my hotel. He showed me Google maps and my hotel was right on the other side of the fire ball of flame. At first I asked myself I was just another ignorant white person afraid of people who look different than them. If I was overreacting. I wondered for a real second if I could actually just sort of walk around the big group yelling and fighting.
But then- and this is the moment that haunts me, I realized I absolutely could not go out into the crowd. But could I say no to the driver?
YES READER YOU CAN SAY NO!!!!!!!!!!!!
In a fraction of a second, I found the address to a different hotel, showed it to him, opened my wallet and showed him 10,000 more pesos, and he drove me to a hotel close to the airport. He listened to me. I had to demand, not ask, that he take me there. And the entire car ride, as we inched out of downtown following smoke and commotion and police cars and fire trucks, I tried to look bored. Uninterested. I had to look indifferent, like I was in control. I couldn't cry or show any vulnerability.
I don't honestly know how I knew what to do or where I found the strength. All I know is that I was the most alone and vulnerable I'd ever felt in my life. No one was going to help me. I was in a taxi with a stranger who didn't speak English. And all my trust was in myself for knowing what the right thing to do was, and that the taxi driver was hopefully a decent person. I did what my heart told me I needed to do to survive and get the fuck out of there.
So yeah. Today felt like a big old lie.
But also, more than anything, I needed today to feel normal. Just a normal day on vacation. I needed it to feel fun so I could continue my vacation and NOT fly home in fear. I needed to escape in Instagram and in other people's feeds. I had to.
Today, I realized Instagram is sometimes also just survival. Today, I realized I will never again judge a person by how they want their life to look on the internet.
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