La Burocracia Chilena

I remember the framer asking me whether or not I wanted to glue my enormous graduation certificate to the frame. Never even considering the possibility of ever using it, I of course said yes. Once happily installed as decoration on my bedroom wall, it was never thought about again. That is until I came to Chile.

Last year I taught English to a lawyer, the head lawyer in the company in fact, and he had said something very interesting that I haven't forgotten. In preparation for a business venture with an American company, he was in the middle of drawing up contracts but was having a difficult time because of the contrasting legal systems in each country. He told me that Chilean society is one that doesn't trust anyone and expects to be cheated.

At first I didn't see it but soon it became apparent as to how true his words were. 'Word of honour' just does not exist here or at least, there is little evidence of it. Every document must be made official by a notary: a lawyer or person licensed by the state to perform acts in legal affairs. If it isn't legalised, it is considered an unofficial document or fraud. In my blatant cultural ignorance, I had never even heard of a notary until I became involved with Chile.

When I signed my first work contract, I had to get it also signed by a notary. When I handed in my letter of resignation, I had to get it signed by a notary and most surprising of all, for the requirement of my next job at a university, I had to get my graduation certificate signed by a notary.

Now this wasn't an easy procedure, especially with my original copy hanging peacefully on my bedroom wall far across the Pacific Ocean. If I ripped it out of the frame, it would surely be destroyed. So I called my university only to find that they didn’t make copies. All I could ask for (ie. pay for) was a testimonial that I had indeed completed my undergraduate degree. I had it sent to my parent’s address. My mother had two photocopies of the document signed by an Australian Justice of the Peace (again something I had seldom heard of before my involvement with Chile) and she then sent them to me.

Two weeks later, we discovered she had sent the two photocopies and not the original. A legalised photocopy by anyone other than a Chilean notary is not recognised by the state so I had to wait another 2 weeks for the original to arrive. My patience grew thin as my work hounded me for a Chilean notarised copy of the document. They could neither put me into the system, so I couldn't even mark the absentees for my student or give them grades, nor pay me for my services.

When the time came, I took the original to first be stamped by the Australian embassy. As there is an abundance of universities in Chile (most of which are uncertified because basically anyone can open an university if they want to - just like opening a business really), I had to get the Australian embassy to prove that not only did I complete a 'real' degree but also that I did it from a 'real' university. Luckily the embassy had an electronic record of all the university registrars in Australia and if my testimonial was signed by one of them, they could easily legalise the document.

But this wasn't the case. In a country where you can simply write on your CV that you have a degree and employers will believe it, a referee had been used instead. The receptionist at the embassy came back and informed me that they could legalise the university seal and stamp but not the signature. I paid $10,000 pesos (more than an hour's pay) and got back my document which now had a giant 'Embajada de Australia' stamp of basically a paragraph of legal jargon. On the third line, the tiny writing "DO HEREBY CERTIFY that the signature" had been crossed out. It was so small you couldn't even tell.

With this, I travelled across town to the Ministry of Foreign Relations and had it legalised. Amazingly, there was no line and I didn't have to pay. The Oficial de Legalizaciones didn't even flip the paper over; he just saw the embassy’s approval and merely stamped and signed away.

The final step was to then take it to a notary, where I paid a little sum to get another 3 more stamps and two certified copies, one of which I gave to my work who then put me into the system. Yet by this time, I had missed the cut-off date for the first payment (which was already 2 months delayed) so I would have to wait another month to get paid - a 3 month wait in total. The incredible thing though was that once the original had arrived, I was unexpectedly able to get my extra 5 stamps in just one morning.

So if you're ever in Santiago, you will soon come to realise that there is a notary on almost every corner. Now how's that for red tape!

El Caos en Chile

Imagine one of the last places on earth that has remained wild and untouched by humans all this time, covered by folds of glaciers, which have unfortunately begun to melt away but only to reveal beautiful pale blue water that almost replicates the sky on land. Now imagine, five ugly dams with 2, 750 megawatts of power hindering the speechless beauty of this unoccupied part of southern Chilean Patagonia.

The HidroAysén project was approved by the Chilean government on 20 May, despite having faced consistent protest. This bill will affect six national parks, 11 national reserves, 26 priority conservation sites, 16 wetlands and 32 private protected areas in Patagonia. The dams would ultimately flood at least 5,700 hectares of globally rare forest ecosystems all for the sake of GDP growth.

80,000 protesters flocked to Plaza Italia in inner-city Santiago to protest, most of whom were peaceful but some of which began attacking the police, who then responded with water cannons and tear gas. All this came a week after a previous protest in Santiago against the dam project (pun fully intended) and some 50,000 protesters in Valparaíso as well as tens of thousands of protesters in 26 other cities. Latino celebrities have now jumped on the bandwagon in demonstrating their support against the project.

In reality more should be done to increase the amount of power obtained from renewable sources like solar from the driest desert in the world or the incredible amounts of geothermal energy. Oh, and did I mention that the President's wife's brother is the head of the energy company that is most definitely going to profit enormously from this venture?

This is all happening at the same time as Chile’s decision to sell copyright of all Chilean seeds to big, multi-national transgenic seed companies like Monsanto (USA), basically forcing Chileans to only produce transgenic fruit and vegetables as well as making small farmers and private owners pay a hefty fee for having even a small plantation of seeds.

(Image from timesonline.com)

El Metro de Santiago

The metro is such an integral part of Santiago life. It is the fundamental link between the hustle of the economic city centre and the poorer outskirts of the Santiago periphery. Consequently it is stuffed with those who have no other means of transportation and it is also snubbed by those who have the luxury of being able to afford to drive to work (the metro is seen to be for the poor people and who would want to mix with them, right?).

Yes, the subway/underground/metro is a metaphor for the Santiago mentality. Old women are the worst when it comes to aggression, as it is they who rudely push and shove to their best ability to make it to the empty seat. If they aren’t assertive, no one will stand to offer them a seat; not the middle aged men or the young men, neither will senoritas with their absurdly towering high heels or the kids in their stiff uniforms.

I remember the local community complaining that the students from my high school weren’t giving up their seats on the train. We were all subsequently lectured in school assemblies about behaving more appropriately and honourably in public, especially when representing the school by wearing our uniforms.

Now, every day I am faced with a constant battle for a seat. People will purposely miss the metro and stand right exactly where the doors open onto the platform just so they can get a seat on the next metro. People don't wait for you to get off the metro before they enter or walk to the right or stand to one side on the escalator for that matter. I have never felt like such an etiquette critic in all my life but dealing with thousands of rushing commuters has made me reflect upon what I consider to be respectful. So much for 'love thy neighbour'.

That having been said, the metro is an absolute lifesaver. It is clean, local and extremely frequent. Who said that a developing country couldn’t have great transportation? It puts my native transportation system to shame. Everyone has a BIP card, which they top up with money when needed and swipe it at the booth to enter the platform, paying the same price no matter how far they travel. So yes, there’s NO TICKETS and your card never goes OUT OF DATE!

The metro comes approximately every 5 minutes. During peak hour, they increase the metro flow with express metros, which are colour-coded red and green, and which stop at every second stop depending on the colour of the station. One disadvantage, however, is that it closes at 11pm even on weekends, even though the clubs only open at midnight. There are buses but they aren’t as direct...

A few years ago Transantiago monopolised the transportation system in Santiago. Before, the bus companies used to compete for passengers, racing around the city trying to collect as many passengers as possible before another company did. Even now, with only one company, the drivers have still retained they crazy driving skills, terrifyingly speeding around and hardly stopping to let passengers on and off.

The monopolisation also meant that the bus routes changed, encouraging people to travel by both bus and metro. Most people now just take the metro because it’s easier just to change lines rather than wait for the bus or sit in traffic. You pay one price for the metro and you get to travel by bus for free for the next consecutive two hours. If you take the bus first you have to pay an extra $20 pesos for the metro.

In general I think the metro is great, although the hardest part to really comprehend is the price. They fluctuate depending on the time of day, peak hour obviously being the most expensive at $560 pesos (A$1.20), which might sound cheap to a gringo but actually it doesn't correspond with the average monthly salary at all!

Last year, I worked at an English institute for $200,000 (A$420) pesos before tax a month. If I caught the metro an average of twice a day, including the weekend it would cost me about a quarter of my salary. Then take out the average amount for rent of about $120,000 pesos or so. That would leave me with less than $20,000 (A$42) for food for the month. Now how on earth do people do it when they have a mortgage and three children to feed? And what if they earn less? I just don't know how they survive, I really don't.