Approximate reading time: 2 minutes
In the middle of the 20th century, the students of the Barros Arana National Boarding School went to Plaza Brasil to meet the girls in bloom. Clearly a social event that revolutionized the sector. Every Saturday the place became abuzz. Exclusive hunting ground for boisterous, poetry-loving youth. Bastion or walled city. This comes back to memory, when we learn that President Gabriel Boric frequents Plaza Brasil to recreate his eyes with that area of nostalgia. Perhaps he is seduced by the sector that may well be Santiago’s navel.
Countless Chilean novels take place in the place and in other times, poets were seen sitting on benches writing their work. Were Gabriela Mistral, Pablo Neruda or Pablo de Rokha in the square? Yes, Alfonso Calderón, National Literature Prize winner, frequented it. There are Canary palms, jacaranda and lime trees, to decorate a typical area of bohemian Santiago. “The path is made by walking,” as the Spanish poet Antonio Machado said.
This is not a casual tour, carried out by the president. The nights are usually quiet and call for meditation. Wrapped in the perfume of flowers, silent inhabitants of their gardens. The murmur of stillness permeates the place.
The employees of the oligarchy, mostly parliamentarians, worshipers of the golden calf, were not pleased to find out that Boric was walking through that area. Because he smells like nostalgia? Perhaps to the deep Santiago? Are you concerned that the president exposes himself unnecessarily? “He should stay at home, sitting in a rocking chair, trying to solve people’s real problems,” added a deputy, who does not know Plaza Brasil. Emblematic neighborhood of the country’s capital, full of stories. Another parliamentarian from his class, whose task is to vilify in bulk, said, as if he wanted to imitate a thinker of the stature of JP Sartre. “Boric demonstrates absolute disconnection.” Perhaps he was referring to it when the president said: “More Narbonne and less Craig.” This enigmatic phrase could well be a verse or the beginning of a story.
I have not returned to Plaza Brasil since my time as a student at the Barros Arana National Boarding School, although I wanted to visit it on countless occasions. Drowsiness, old age and distance conspire in the search for the past. I am unaware of its current presence, although I still feel the squeaking of the tram wheels, while I remember again those who I met there. The neighborhood is different and like any place in a city in constant transformation, the past fades away and nothing remains the same. Night falls wrapped in silence, and those who circulate through the sector randomly look for where to eat or where to sit and rest. Furtive shadows, nocturnal ghosts, stain the walls of the homes. The night has charms and surprises, foreign to the day. I don’t know if there are still pigeons, and if there are, they are fed by other old people. Yes, a stranded old age, screwed for decades, exposed to a fate close to misery. Everything withers away with time and nostalgia, it takes us back to the distant past.
Thinking and walking during the night; recreate with the hiding places. Observe the hallways of the old mansions, which refuse to be demolished; In this case, it is a stimulus to find wisdom, the necessary path along which existence travels. Meditate and stop for a few seconds to contemplate the sky. Maybe there is a moon. And if there isn’t, enjoy the silence. Stained with poetry and nostalgia, Plaza Brasil is the obligatory walk for those seeking the elusive meaning of life. Oblivious to the imbecility of the doomsayers.
Walter Garib