A journey back in time, an invitation to discover the city in a different way. That is the invitation of a group of historians and journalists who joined in a tour that seeks to rescue and promote the urban heritage of the city of Santiago.
“It was born from the interest of going to the rescue of the memory of spaces that were the home of the former rulers of our nation, some invisible due to the accelerated pace of life that prevents us from looking up and seeing the secrets on the facades of the buildings in our environment,” said Catalina Schopf (45), a heritage guide who participates in the tour.
Designed and created by the journalist and historian Diego Escobedo (29), the route runs through the historic center of Santiago and has as its starting point the emblematic Plaza de Armas, to culminate in La Moneda.
“There are not all the presidents, but the most colorful in the tour: the two governments of Alessandri, the two of Montt, the first one we had (Manuel Blanco Encalada), among others and as a color data, tell them that we will be accompanied by the relative of a recently deceased former president, so we will have exclusive information and first source, ” Escobedo stressed.
Sculptures, monoliths, buildings and other materialities will be considered in the tour since “not all landmarks” fall only and purely on buildings, said Schopf, who also added that the tour rescues “history and ancient Santiago”, away from the immediate: “It’s like riding a time machine, it is an adventure to discover the city in a different way.”
For his part, the historiographic researcher Josué Polanco (39) valued that it is an effort that united the group of guides under the same notion for more than five years.
“Promote culture, information to the general population, contribute our grain of sand, the more information and better knowledge there is about our history, the greater and better valuation we will have of our cities,” he said.
In the same way, he highlighted the importance of having sign language interpretation, a pending that could be realized after some failed attempts.
“The presidents of the nineteenth century, especially, shaped our current face as a nation,” Polanco added. Likewise, Escobedo stressed that in the area “not only the city was founded but the entire country and 500 years do not pass in vain.”
The traces of these years around figures such as Manuel Montt, Jorge Alessandri, Salvador Allende and Manuel Bulnes, among others, embody this route that travels through “different eras and contexts that come together to tell the story as you never heard before, saw, or felt,” said Schopf, who encouraged to discover an unknown fact of the national shield that will be explained when touring the house of José Miguel Carrera.
The invitation is for this Sunday, March 12 at 5 pm and people interested in participating can communicate through WhatsApp +56956681243.
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