Don Chima

On May 3, Don Chima turned 90 years old.

Sunday he and his wife Emilia invited me over for birthday cake – a torta de ciruelas brought by his daughters from the city. Emilia emerged from the pantry with thick slices laced with dulce de leche and whipped cream.

The sky has darkened these last few weeks, and the ortencia that line the pathway to their home – deep blue in the summer months – are beginning to take on a metallic green-red sheen. In the kitchen, we sat on benches around the estufa (stove), and chatted about family, the years passed. As we spoke, a white cat pressed up against the kitchen window, framed by the apple orchard behind. El gatito blanco is the newest addition to the troop of some dozen felines that stalk the pampas around their home. “So many people have left, we try and take care of them,” explained Dona Emilia.

Eliecer Bahamonde, known affectionately as Don Chima, was born in 1920, just up the hill from where he lives now. The school in Calen was smaller then, and all of the students walked to school barefoot except for the wealthy boy who lived on the beachside. At 14 Don Chima finished primary, and at 20, like many Chilotes of his generation, he headed south to Patagonia, with hopes to earn some money and start a family.

When his mother heard that her son was leaving, she wove and sold a chola, a traditional woman’s shawl, to help pay for his passage southwards. Chima knew he had some relatives who worked in yarn works in Argentina, but he didn’t have any papers to cross the border. Instead, he took to the hills, crossing at night by horseback through the cordillera to enter el pais vecino. “Back then, you could travel from village to village and people would offer you a plate of food, a place to stay without question.” It took a month to find work in one of the large estancias, but when he did, he stayed.

Younger than the other field hands, initially Don Chima performed a variety of odd jobs. On one farm he worked as a cook’s assistant, peeling potatoes, sweeping floors and serving plates of food. He liked it okay, at least until the crotchety cocinero got angry one day and chased him with a machete.

After that, on another estancia, he was charged with looking after 3000 sheep (on a farm of 90,000). He was given seven horses – one for every day of the week. For ten years he roamed the golden steppe in threadbare clothing, saving money for a life back home. Once he got lost in a snowstorm so thick it blocked out the stars. He wore every piece of clothing he owned that night, but made it through.

One afternoon I asked Don Chima if he sang, if he whistled. I couldn’t help wondering how he passed so many hours alone, accompanied by only mountains and bleating sheep in a seemingly interminable landscape. “No, no,” he replied, almost shouting, raising his eyebrows until they disappeared under his cap, shaking his head furiously. Perhaps the only impediment Don Chima has these days is hearing loss. When he speaks, he booms. “I like the quiet. The space. La tranquilidad. Eso y no más.” He eased back onto the bench with a giggle and began to warm his hands on the stove.

Don Chima is a small man, slightly hunched. He wears a cap at all times except when he eats and he lays it carefully on the table beside his plate. He is nearly bald. His eyebrows are dimples that sprout from three deep creases that begin between his milky blue eyes. His cheeks are taught, tanned by the sun and his chin is a road map of wrinkles. When he speaks he rocks forward, as though on horseback.

When he returned to Chiloe at 30, Don Chima settled down to start a family. With the money he earned, he purchased over 50 hectares of land and the house of the wealthy boy who walked with shoes on the beachside.

Together with his wife Emilia, they manned a store. The building was tremenda, he recalled - made of Alerce, Chilean redwood, with big windows. The store - it was not named - had two stories, with nine rooms. Outside it was painted celeste - the color of the glaciares en Patagonia. Don Chima would travel by boat to Puerto Montt for supplies – sugar, flour, potatoes, wine, liquors. The trip took eight days.

Their life was busy, but peaceful. Only once was there a notable disturbance – when a drunken customer stabbed Don Chima with a cuchillo under the armpit. On the rampla, pier, just below my home, thousands of sacks of potatoes were shipped out to mainland Chile and abroad. There were no roads then, and so people would come by horseback along the beachside to buy their wares.

Sundays were always busy in the store. “We worked from sunup to sundown,” recalled Emilia. “We never rested, the store was full of people and so when we did eat, it was late.” On one Sunday afternoon in 1960, a few people sat around drinking, watching the sea from the storefront windows. Everything began to shake. Sacks, jars began to fall from the shelves. “We all ran upstairs and watched the water come up and fall back. There was a family selling fish and marisca on the waterfront, and they were swept away.” Many remember the earthquake of 1960, likening it to the recent tragedy this past February.

This Sunday, like other Sundays here in Calen, everything is quiet.

There are roads now. The sound of hoofbeats has faded, occuring muy a vez en cuando. Potatoes continue to be planted, but they're rarely sold. All that remains of the store are the shingles of the bodega behind their new house on the hill. The bright red wood is now a silky brown. A prensa – an apple press – sits in the bodega unused. These days they sell their apples instead of make Chicha. Emilia grows beats and repollo (cabbage) in a lot beside the apple orchard. Don Chima still owns land around these parts, but much of it he sold to finance his daughters’ education, now teachers.

Sundays are quiet. The cat scratches to be let in.

I ask Don Chima which age was the best – which epoca de la vida. 25 he bellowed, no hesitation. “Life was exciting, free.”

Not far off from 25 - I've been having the time of my life in Chiloe. It's an experience in itself living and keeping up a house, but after a little practice I'm spending less time in front of the estufa lighting fires and more time out and getting to know the community. I've spent a lot of time at Don Pablo's learning how to cook traditional Chilote recipes from Nena (and many of the women in the village), I was invited to help with the recogida de manzanas and the making of Chicha by the family as well. Pablito took me fishing with nets recently and to a torneo de futbol in nearby Tenaun. I've learned to mariscar. My friend Jeannette recently invited me to Chonchi to interview her father, a famous accordeonista. Next week I head to Quenac for the radio theatre piece. More coming soon!