Good Beer, Bad Luck & Five Thousand Pesos in Valparaíso, Chile

Forget everything I ever said about Chilean beers, man. Cerveza del Puerto, it's alright. Brewed in the port city of Valparaíso mismo, Cerveza del Puerto tops my list for Chilean beers. Specifically, the dark ale or "bock". It's starts off innocently, rolling over the tongue like a sudsy dark Kunstmann then KAZAM slams you with an aftertaste of whopping charcoal and espresso. Definitely gets an A for originality. The pale ale gets the same grade, but this time only for originality. I've never tasted something so nakedly hopsy, I felt like sending it back to the kitchen.

Hard enough to find though. All the shee-shee bars on Valparaíso's Happy Hill (Cerro Alegre) were either serving cocktails or their very own shitty beer (called Cerro Alegre). I had an instinct to bajar, drop down off the hill, down to the pulsing nightlife of the pueblo. We eventually did so and fortuitously stumbled into the only bar that actually does serve Cerveza del Puerto on tap. The half-dead neon sign on the bar said, "Bar." Inside it's designed to make you feel like you're in a trolley car.

Everyone says Valparaíso is like San Francisco, CA. Up close, yeah. I get it. The Victorian houses, the hills. But pull back a little bit and the whole city, littered with happily-colored houses, looks kinda like a landfill with a slight haze coming off of it. And the downtown architects even sneaked in a little nod to Santiago:


Still though, it's a nice town. And there's one more similarity to San Francisco: you're actually able to talk to people in bars. Well, people in SF are something else, you can't shit-talk the lead-in band without something barging in with their 11 pieces of indie trivia proving that your opinion isn't justified. (But c'mon! You heard them too they sucked!). Anyway, I'm saying that Valparaíso gets it right, striking a happy balance between SF's audacity and Santiago's fright.

We ended the night at around 5am with Piscolas at the Canary, which was hopping. People were really nice, and festive and they talked to us. But the next day hardly set sail at all. We're talking rough. My first jolt came when I realized I'd spent all my cash at the bars and needed to find an ATM on a Sunday morning so I could pay for last night's lodging. None of the banks accepted my Paypal debit card (common and annoying, but I use that card cuz they only charge a dollar per withdrawal anywhere in the world). So I went to the ATM in a gas station mini-mart, pulled out some cash and lunged for the fridge to grab a tall bottle of water and small glass bottle of Afe natural apple juice.

The apple juice almost made it to the check out counter.

Almost, but suddenly it was splashed and shattered all over the floor. Dazed, mumbling and frightened, I put the water bottle on the counter and asked if I could grab another juice from the fridge.

"NO! We're Gonna Charge You for That!"

Whoooa, fuck. I hadn't expected that. So, even though I was thirsty as hell, I speed-walked outta there empty handed. But even that much physical activity quickly made me feel kinda strange.

I made it part way up one of the hills and then heard sirens. In my confusion I thought they were after me so I started running and doubled toward the right up these steep cement stairs, running up them, panting, sweating. Do these stairs ever fucking end!. Finally, I made it. Drank water, showered and started the day. What a day. Ended up at some low-rate, overpriced seafood joint, asleep.



But when I went to pay the bill they told me my money was counterfeit.

What?

You heard me, it's funny money.

No way, lady. I pulled this outta the cash machine this morning! No way!

A close look, however, and it was like the worst counterfeit attempt one could imagine. A 5,000 peso bill (about ten bucks) is normally a toned-down red color. But this was like bright, bright red flirting with magenta and the serial numbers all fuzzy and badly printed.

But I got this from an ATM, I whimpered.

Tough luck, kid. Happens all the time.

But she did give me the bill back, which I found interesting.

Luckily it was only that bill, and the other bills were good so I made it outta there fine. The next question, though: what do I do with this bill?

Thought about calling the bank, but there were several problems with that idea. First, I hadn't gotten a receipt for the withdrawal, so it'd be hard to prove. Secondly, it would mean going back to that gas station, which was not really an option considering the morning's debacle. Thirdly, I'm totally disillusioned in Chile's institutions, both public and private. And if you can't even trust an ATM to come up with real money, if the bank doesn't care to crack down on this rampant and apparently persistent felony, then what kinda confidence am I going to have in them. Nothing works, man. It's the Law of the Animal. So I decided to get the Monkey off my back and pass the Buck.

Or tried to. But then we got kicked off the bus. Fuck. Let's think this through. We were near a plaza and I saw a little kid crying, thought better of it. There was a corner store selling fruit and cigarettes and, perfect, bottled water for 480 pesos. He charged me 500 pesos, and I started to mumble an argument then gave up. He took the bill, gave me change and I left, feeling pretty relieved.

Law of the Animal. I can only hope he finds some sucker to palm it off on. I mean yeah it's counterfeit money, but at the same time it works, right? It worked on the ATM, it worked on me, it worked on him, it should work on someone else. This guy overcharged me 20 pesos, which is about 4 cents so I don't care. But this fact gives me some confidence he'll find a way to pass the Buck. At least I hope so. He was kinduva faded old man, so he might lose out.

Poor Valparaíso. My guide book tells me that it used to be the capital of Chile, it had the first stock market, newspaper, it was the biggest port. In 1866 (?) the Spanish Armada bombarded Valparaiso for three hours, leveling much of it. Then on August 16, 1906 (more SF-Valpo trivia) a violent earthquake shook and razed Valpo, killing 2,000. They say the town never really recovered after that.

Ended the day crumpled in a cool, soothing marble doorway of a bank across the street from another bank. There were marching bands banging drums all day, circling around town and through that corridor, practicing for something big. Completely obliterated, I took pictures of the people walking by and kids playing in the street.