This was entirely a travel day, so I don’t have much to say and almost no pictures to show. I spent the morning packing in my cabana, picking up my laundry, returning my rental bike, paying Dario.
He hailed me a cab when it was time to go to the airport, and paid the driver for me. I asked if I could take a photo with him. Here it is:
We shook hands and I got in the cab. “Enjoy your time,” he said, one more time, and waved goodbye.
As the plane boarded, I felt sad in a way to be leaving — but also relieved. To be free from the intensity of all the emotions this complicated place had brought up in me. To get back to the real world. Easter Island really doesn’t feel like part of the world to me. It feels like somewhere else entirely, unanchored to any specific time or universe.
On the plane, I sat next to a friendly young Mexican woman named Edith. I was amazed at how well I could understand her Spanish, after weeks of listening to inscrutable Chilean Spanish. She told me where I should go when I finally get around to visiting Mexico (her favorite cities are Merida and Leon). I’d thought I’d catch up on my blogging but instead I read Cheryl Strayed’s Wild and watched Argo.
When we bumped down onto the runway, I felt comforted to be back on the mainland. I’d returned to Earth, traveled through the other dimensions that seem to divide Chile from Easter Island, like the characters from Lost.
I spent the night in the obscenely overpriced Holiday Inn across the street from the airport because my flight to Arequipa, Peru, was leaving at 7 the next morning. I ran on the hotel’s treadmill while watching an episode of Tabatha Takes Control, which I’d never seen before. I wondered what this scary-thin, frosty-haired woman is like in the real life. It must be hard playing the role of someone with all the answers. What would she think of Cabanas Matanga? Or of Easter Island? Would she be able to play that role there? It was difficult to imagine.
