Valparaíso Local Customs

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A principios del siglo XX se construyeron quince ascensores para comunicar la parte baja de Valparaiso con sus cerros . Hoy siguen funcionando y además de hacer su función son piezas de museo y parte de la historia de Valparaiso
El peral , Espíritu Santo , Artillería , Mariposas , Lecheros , Monjas..., son nombres de los ascensores
Early on the XX century 15 lifts were built to communicate the lower part of Valparaiso with their hills. Nowadays they keep on working and besides of making their job they are
museum masterpieces and part of Valparaiso story
El peral , Espíritu Santo , Artillería , Mariposas , Lecheros , Monjas..., are lift names

There are a couple of museums in Valparaiso, but we got to see some authentic art work at the Café Mirador. The owner is an artist and you can admire his paintings and woodcarvings right there in his café. And he will be proud to show you around a little and give you first hand explainations!

Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) was the son of a railway employee and a mother he lost shortly after his birth. As a young boy he got to know the poet Gabriela Mistral, who encouraged him. He was about 13 when he published his first poem. In 1920 he began to write under the pen name Pablo Neruda (his real name was Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto). Neruda studied at the University of Chile in Santiago. Between 1927 and 1935 he employed by the Chilean Foreign Service, which took him to Burma, Ceylon, Java, Singapore, Buenos Aires, Barcelona, Madrid, and later to France in the Spanish Civil War. In 1937 he returned to his native country, but in 1939 he was appointed consul in Paris, and, shortly afterwards, in Mexico. In 1943 Neruda returned to Chile, and in 1945 he was elected senator of the Republic, also joining the Communist Party of Chile. Because of his protests against the government he had to live underground in his own country for two years until he managed to leave the country in 1949. He returned home in 1952. In 1971 this great poet won the Nobel Prize for Literature. He died in 1973. His first published book: Crepusculario (1923). The following year saw the publication of Veinte poemas de amor y una cancion desesperada, one of his best known and most translated works. Residencia en la tierra (1933). Collection of poems: España en el Corazón (1937). Canto General de Chile (1939). Las Uvas y el Viento (1954). Among his works of the last few years can be mentioned Cien sonetos de amor (1959), Memorial de Isla Negra, a poetic work of an autobiographic character in five volumes, published on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday, Arte de pajáros (1966), La Barcarola (1967), the play Fulgor y muerte de Joaquín Murieta (1967), Las manos del día (1968), Fin del mundo (1969), Las piedras del cielo (1970), and La espada encendida. - Pablo Neruda maintained a house on the Pacific coast near Valparaíso called Isla Negra. The Isla Negra house has been turned into a permanent museum dedicated to the poet.

The film Il Postino (1994) is a small gem from director Michael Radford (starring Philippe Noiret, Massimo Troisi, Mara Grazia Cucinotta, Linda Moretti). Here is a rough summary of the story: Pablo Neruda lives in exile on a small Italian island. Because of the huge increase in mail that this causes a poor fisherman is hired as an extra postman. Il Postino is to hand-deliver the mail to Neruda. This poorly educated man learns to love poetry and eventually befriends Neruda. Then he suddenly falls in love and needs Neruda's help and guidance more than ever ...

Casa Museo Gabriela Mistral.
Gabriela Mistral was the pseudonym of Lucila Godoy Alcayaga (1889-1957), the first Latin American woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature (1945). Mistral grew up in a village in northern Chile becoming a schoolteacher at 15, and later a college professor. Besides being a poet and a teacher, she was for a while cultural minister, and diplomat in Spain, Portugal, Italy and France. - The museum house is located at Higueras Street 118, Cerro Alegre.

Excursiones: un city tour de medio día por Valparaíso y Viña del Mar, con
una visita La Sebastiana, de Pablo Neruda, cuesta 22 dólares.
Un paseo de 15 minutos por la bahía de Valparaíso cuesta 5 dólares. Se
hacen salidas de pesca por 20 dólares la hora.
El tren más lento del mundo: La Colombina, Pje. Apolo N° 91-77. Paseo
Yogoeslavo N° 15. Cerro Alegre.