Quotes About Chile

In Chile it is bad manners to acknowledge that you're overly satisfied, because that can irritate the less fortunate, which is why for us the correct answer to the question "How are you?" is "So-so." That is an opening for sympathizing with the other speaker's situation.

El cabildo no tuvo la decencia de asignar una pensión a Marina Ortiz de Gaete, esposa legítima del conquistador de Chile, ingratitud tan frecuente por estos lados que incluso tiene nombre: «el pago de Chile».

Qué año sería eso? Por allí por la misma época en que murió Pedro, me parece. El joven necesitaba título de rey para realizar el enlace y como su padre no pensaba dejarle el trono todavía, decidieron que Chile sería un reino y Felipe su soberano, lo que no mejoró nuestra suerte, pero nos dio categoría.

AND SINCE we're talking about nostalgia, I beg you to have a little patience with what follows because I can't separate the subject of Chile from my own life. My past is composed of passions, surprises, successes, and losses: it isn't easy to relate in two or three sentences.

even though the majority of Chileans, especially the entire middle class, supported him. Parliament (again the parliament!) made it difficult for him to govern; it forced him to resign his position and exiled him to Europe.

in 1938 the left came to power under President Pedro Aguirre Cerda, a member of the Frente Popular, or Popular Front, in which communist and radical parties participated. After Pedro Aguirre Cerda, the deposed Ibáñez joined forces with the left, and three successive radical presidents followed

Allende was the first Marxist to win the presidency of a country through a democratic vote. The eyes of the world turned toward Chile.

Those were the days of the Cold War, when an irrational paranoia divided the world into two ideologies and determined the foreign policies of the Soviet Union and United States for several decades. Chile was one of the pawns sacrificed in that conflict of titans. The administration of Richard Nixon decided to intervene directly in the Chilean process.

Puedo anotar mis recuerdos y pensamientos con tinta y papel gracias al clérigo González de Marmolejo, quien se dio tiempo, entre su trabajo de evangelizar salvajes y consolar cristianos, para enseñarme a leer. Entonces era capellán, pero llegó a ser el primer obispo de Chile y también el hombre más rico de este reino, como contaré más adelante.

Se extendió el documento pertinente, que lo ponía a salvo de cualquier acusación en el futuro, y así fue como se nombró al primer gobernador de Chile por decisión popular y no por cédula real.

Aquí, conmigo, doña Inés Suárez! —exclamó, y cuando me adelanté a los soldados y oficiales para colocar mi caballo junto al suyo, agregó en voz baja—: Nos vamos para Chile, Inés del alma mía…

Chile, unlike other regions of the continent, did not offer the possibility of wealth beyond dreams. Gold and silver mines could be counted on the fingers of one hand, and the minerals had to be torn from the rock with unspeakable effort. Neither did Chile have the climate for prosperous tobacco, coffee, or cotton plantations. Ours has always been a country with one foot in the poorhouse; the most that the colonist could aspire to was a quiet life dedicated to agriculture.

Los incas utilizaban veloces mensajeros, los chasquis, que corrían por pasos ocultos de la sierra en sistema de postas de relevo, cubriendo el imperio desde el extremo norte hasta el río Bío-Bío, en Chile.

In Chile, poverty and solidarity go hand in hand.

Recently, a busload of us tourists crossing the border between Chile and Argentina had to wait an hour and a half while our documents were checked. Getting through the Berlin Wall was easier. Kafka was Chilean.

In Chile, the clerk on duty demands that the poor petitioner produce proof that he was born, that he isn't a criminal, that he paid his taxes, that he registered to vote, and that he's still alive, because even if he throws a tantrum to prove that he hasn't died, he is obliged to present a "certificate of survival.

Our country has produced exceptional men and women: two Nobel laureates—Pablo Neruda and Gabriela Mistral—the singers/composers Víctor Jara and Violeta Parra, the pianist Claudio Arrau, the painter Roberto Matta, and the novelist José Donoso, to mention a few who come to mind.

El imperio incaico quedó chico para contenerlos a ambos. Pizarro, convertido en marqués gobernador y caballero de la Orden de Santiago, se quedó en el Perú, secundado por sus temibles hermanos, mientras Almagro se dirigía, en 1535, con un ejército de quinientos castellanos, diez mil indios yanaconas y el título de adelantado, a Chile, la región aún inexplorada, cuyo nombre, en lengua aymara, quiere decir «donde acaba la tierra».

Su expedición a Chile alcanzó hasta el Bío-Bío, el mismo río donde los incas habían retrocedido setenta años antes, cuando pretendieron en vano adueñarse del territorio de los indios del sur, los mapuche. También los incas, como Almagro y sus hombres, fueron detenidos por ese pueblo guerrero.

That huge old house, which had an entrance on two streets, was one-story tall with a mansard roof, and it harbored a tribe of great-grandparents, maiden aunts, cousins, servants, poor relatives, and guests who became permanent residents; no one tried to throw them out because in Chile "visitors" are protected by the sacred code of hospitality. There was also an occasional ghost of dubious authenticity, always in plentiful supply in my family.

Algunos eran de una ignorancia monumental, llegaban a la universidad sin poder situar a Chile en un mapa y seguramente tampoco eran capaces de situar su propio país en el mundo: creían que Estados Unidos era el mundo.

costumbre chilena de convivir en clan para siempre.

El Jardín del Edén, la tierra prometida, el paraíso. Mudo, mojado de lágrimas, el conquistador conquistado iba descubriendo el lugar donde acaba la tierra, Chile.

To see my country with the heart, one must read Pablo Neruda, the national poet who in his verses immortalized the imposing landscapes, the aromas and dawns, the tenacious rain and dignified poverty, the stoicism and the hospitality, of Chile. That is the land of my nostalgia, the one I invoke in my solitude, the one that appears as a backdrop in so many of my stories, the one that comes to me in my dreams.