We Made It Back Safe & Sound
We’re back! And before mentioning the trip I’d like to send out a belated thank you to Nathan Groth, Juan Edwards, Myriam Garcia, Corina Aleman, Bill Stott and Alan Devenish for their donations while we were gone.
The total is now up to $1,890, THANK YOU!
What a trip. Will Sherman and I just returned this morning after an all night (18 hour) bus ride from Antofagasta. And the trip was a real success.
I need a few days to really digest what happened, but briefly:
The bus ride on Monday and Tuesday from Santiago to Antofagasta served as a hypnotic, spell-binding experience- the perfect preparation for the next few days of filming. The night passed as we sped out of Chile’s central valley encased in a thick fog. And as dawn broke it was all very clear. We found ourselves in the midst of the driest desert in the world. The next 10 hours I observed the subtle oscillations of purples, pinks and golds; the sound of the bus engine and wind. Sand dunes, dry mountains and vast desert plains rolled by like slow, silent giants.
We spent the night in Antofagasta and the next morning rented a car. After picking up Rolando Carrasco and Santiago Cavieres at the airport we headed directly to Chacabuco and began filming.
In Chacabuco we met Pedro Barreda, the guardian angel of Chacabuco- a younger man who took Roberto Saldívar’s post looking after the abandoned remains of this ex-nitrate mining town and Pinochet-era concentration camp.
The experience with Rolando and Santiago in Chacabuco is one I prefer not to describe in detail. I hope the footage captured that day speaks for itself- it was an event that changed my life. The entire afternoon was a re-living- through the eyes of these men- the time they spent in Chacabuco as political prisoners in 1973 and 1974.
I followed them as they felt their way around Chacabuco for the first time in over 30 years. They repeatedly expressed how sad they were that the place was in such a state of ruin; it made it hard for them to reconstruct exactly where some things had been.
The most memorable moment of all: watching night fall from the roof of the old theater, witnesses to the unveiling of the desert stars, listening to these men speak of some of the most profound experiences in their lives.
We visited Roberto Saldívar the next day at his families home in Antofagasta; Rolando, Santiago and Pedro came along. Rolando recognized Roberto right away but Roberto’s Alziehmer’s inhibited his own recognition. Despite an obvious loss of his memory for details, dates and recent events, Roberto’s recollection of Chacabuco was seemingly flawless. He seemed 15 years older than the last time I met him two and a half years ago; and he didn’t seem to recognize me. At times he forgot where he was and his family won’t let him out on the street alone since he can’t find his way home again- a living metaphor of Chile’s own loss of memory.
That evening Rolando and Santiago flew home. Will, Pedro and I spent the night at Chacabuco- one of the most terrifying nights of my life. Pedro seemed used to it and slept soundly. But rats, freezing temperatures and the eerie sounds of trucks passing on the nearby highway kept me up all night. The place is charged with something; and it doesn’t feel good.
The next day we filmed, photographed and explored; slept the night in Antofagasta and hopped on the bus for Santiago the next afternoon.
This time the ride was reversed. We moved south as day turned into night, the desert fell behind us as the hours unfolded- and we found ourselves once again encased in fog, rolling into Santiago just after the break of dawn.
I’ll begin editing soon.