The Force of Chilean Small Business

I live in one of the central comunas in Santiago, a very “right down the middle” kind of place socioeconomically. I feel so popular, because it is becoming one of the “it” comunas to live in for a couple reasons. It’s safer than that the comunas south and west, there will be (2) metro lines running through it in 5-7 years time, and housing costs are within reach of those wanting to leave the neighboring comunas. However, as any good economic student knows, high demand, low supply…and generally higher costs. Compared to five years ago, it is hard to find an reasonably priced, non-tiny apartment in Ñuñoa, and the housing market in Santiago in general is very competitive. Since there is so much demand for living in Ñuñoa, contractors and jumping on opportunities to buy old, beautiful houses, demolishing them and building gigantic, overpriced, unoriginal, and generally ugly apartment buildings. Your apartment may be only 30 m2, but you get a doorman, a swimming pool 3x the size of an average bathtub, and a multipurpose room for birthday parties, because your apartment is too small to host anything there. Can you see I’m not a big fan?

I mean, you’ve got a great view, but you can’t get out of bed…it’s the price that “luxury” comes with, so stop complaining.

Is this the hallway or the living room?

Okay, forgive my tangent. I’ve developed this opinion after years of being around a man that would live on the streets before living in one of these buildings. Just for the principle of it. So I think he rubbed off on me.

What my point is, is that my dad made an astute observation while they were here. “There are a lot of mini markets, corner hardware stores, vegetable and fruit stands, little pharmacies, etc around here” He’s right. If I need an onion, I walk across the street and get one at the vegetable market. If I want a quick meal, I walk two blocks and buy some empanadas at the bakery. If we are getting ready to eat dinner and decide we want a Coke, Andrés walks next door to the mini market and picks one up. “Little things” are never more than three blocks away for us.

Santiago is changing. The economy is growing, people are now generally more interested in “big” than “little” (sound like another country we know of?). For example, I work in a completely different world than where I live. If I need a quick something to eat, I have to walk into the massive mall across the street because it’s the closest thing to my office. Granted, it’s convenient, but it doesn’t mean I love supporting the massively Americanized grocery store chain. I just only have 10 minutes to get what I need.

Still, just because there are these Wal-Mart sized grocery stores, mini-replicas of the Mall of America, and corner strip malls with chain pharmacies, mini markets and dry cleaners, doesn’t mean the small businesses are just packing their things and giving up. They have faithful clients, offer competitive pricing versus the chains, and offer higher quality. Win-Win-Win, as Michael Scott would say. And even though these big malls and bigger grocery stores and these-and-that chains are popping up like radishes, doesn’t necessarily mean they are full. For example, every Saturday and Wednesday there is a fruit and vegetable “feria” where vendors line a street selling real, fresh, farm-grown products. It’s always packed. After getting what we needed for the week, we walked across the street to get some spaghetti at the grocery store: empty. If you can follow Spanish, look at the news report I saw yesterday highlighting this issue:

Negocios de Barrio Sobreviven

I hear a lot about Chileans saying they are losing or that they are feeling identity confusion because of their desire and demand to have things more American, but I think the small businesses and Saturday ferias here are a good representation of Chileans fighting to keep America out of their business. Literally.

Keep it up, guys.

Happy Saturday

Yesterday, Andres and I didn’t waste away our entire day sleeping, unlike some other past Saturdays…He got a little mad at me that I was up by 9:30, “sleep Amy! you talk all week about sleeping and now you’re awake too early!” He didn’t want to feel left out being the only snoozer, so we started our day a bit earlier than he probably hoped.

We started talking about our upcoming wedding and the things we still needed to organize, buy, book, etc. The flowers at our reception come with the total price, and even though I don’t like them, who cares? Everyone’s going to be focusing more on the wine than the centerpieces. However, I do get a say in my bouquet, which I am doing all by myself, a decision I may come to regret in two weeks.

My aunt Jenny did such a beautiful, perfect job with the flowers for wedding #1, so I’m a little worried that my bouquet is going to turn out looking like a five year old grabbed a bunch of weeds and handed them to me five minutes before I walk down the aisle.

I mean, how could I make wedding #2’s bouquet even compare??

So, Andrés told me we could go to the flower market and see what flowers are in season so I won’t be stuck with red roses (a Chilean favorite). We got there around 2:30, and about half of the market was open, but even still there were some viable options. First, there was one guy that had dahlia’s, my favorite. He had some red/orange ones that Jenny used in our bouquets, and I got really excited, first that they were there, and second that 20 of them cost 7 bucks. I also found hypericum berries, also used in our flower arrangements for wedding #1, so I think that I’ll keep this bouquet simple and just use those two. So, in a market with majority roses and lilies, we found some good options to use when I go back in two weeks to buy them.

We then decided to go to a vase wholesaler, but alas, this was a Saturday afternoon in Chile and it was closed. We need to find two-four taller glass vases for the ceremony, and we’ll most likely use zinnia’s which Andrés found in the market and liked a lot.

Now as we were heading back home, we passed the Vega Central, Santiago’s main produce market. Andrés started talking about how good a milkshake would be, and I took that for smoothie so we pulled a U-turn and headed to la Vega. We spent no more than 15 dollars for all of this:

I mean, in speaking terms of gasoline, electronics, furniture, cars, etc…Chile is not inexpensive. But if you have the time and know where to buy, food can be pretty darn cheap. Especially when it’s in season.

Hmm now we have all this fruit and no blender. Off to the mall. 30 minutes later, we walk out of the store with a beautiful Oster glass and metal blender. This thing is like a Mercedes compared to the extremely loud, plastic and overall crappy blender my parents have (or I believe had, buying a new one a month after I left).

Our small freezer is now stuffed with frozen strawberries, bananas, raspberries and blueberries just ready to be smashed blended into smoothie perfection. It may take us a year to get through it all, but I’d say it was a pretty great way to spend a Saturday.