We can all probably agree that 2020 is not a year that we will remember fondly, although we surely wont soon forget. Our Christmas plans to head to the beach for Christmas week were given the kibosh by the Chilean government about three weeks before the day, as they decided that a recent uptick in cases necessitated a move back to fase 2 in their paso a paso plan (update on this in my next blog post, as we did eventually get away), which meant that we could no longer travel out of the Santiago metropolitan region to other areas in the country, and we would now be quarantined in the house on the weekends and holidays, only being able to leave the house with a police permiso on those days. SoI reluctantly canceled the Airbnb and say good bye to yet another vacation (que te vaya bien), and girded in for a different kind of Christmasalthough not much different than anywhere else in the western world right now.
I think you could guess that Christmas in Chile are the same, but in some ways very very different. 30 degree heat does not make you want to drink rum and
egg nog or mulled wineChristmas trees are a thing, but lights on the houses are notI also feel sorry for Santa as I cant imagine he is in his suit, although most of the time I see him in air conditioned malls so it cant be too bad (mind you I did not see any this year). One of the big differences though, is that Chileans celebrate their Christmas on the Christmas Eve, or noche buena as they call it, which if you have small kids it sounds very stressful. They have the big Christmas eve dinner, then Santa (or Viejito Pascuero in Chilean parlance), shows up around midnight to drop off the giftswhile the children are still up! So I guess one of the parents distracts the kids while the other rushes to put presents under the tree, and then back in and wow, Santa came! Maybe they see him driving off in his Changan CX70 pickup waving, Im not surebut whatever, it sounds very stressful for parents, and no way I am keeping my kids up until midnight.
we took advantage of the weekdays before Christmas to get out and enjoy the city, including a bicycle wine tour at Cousino Macul (a winery within the Region Metropolitana) and a hike or two (Manquehuito and Cerro El Medio in Lo Barnachea). As an aside, while we enjoyed the wine tour, I was annoyed about hearing about the family that owned the winery by the end of itsounded like the most conservative no fun people in the world (the cuicos who ever cuicod)anyway, but 5 stars would go again.
What I think I did forget about in the disappointment of not leaving for the beach, was that Christmas are just so damn special when you have a 3 and 6 year old running around. We were also lucky enough to have Stephs parents here, who braved COVID traveling and shifting regulations (still shifting, always shifting) to make it here without incident. Christmas Eve was hot, so after a morning hike and an afternoon spent around the pool, we proceeded to have a fondue and then set up the TV outside to watch Elf (my personal Xmas movie favourite, dont @ me), and decorate gingerbread cookies on our patio.
During the hike, they changed the regulations so you needed a negative PCR test to go back to your car.
I had found the google Santa tracker page, and Zoe asked me every 5 minutes to see where Santa had gotten (oh look, hes in the Sandwich Islands, delicious), and the excitement at this point was really starting to build. We finished Elf and got the girls ready for bed, and then they spent time both writing letters to Santa and drawing pictures for him, and making sure that they picked their best decorated gingerbread cookies for him, and the best carrots for his reindeer. We sat together and read Twas the Night Before Christmas (and had to explain why Santa was smoking haha), the four of us snuggled on the couch, with the girls listening intently to each word.
