punta arenas/ ushuaia/ the end of the world

Visiting is cool but living here must suck.
The place feels totally isolated and like you are standing at the end of the world. Punta arenas is a wind swept village. The weather is amazing. We get on land and it is sunny, but 15 minutes later it is pouring rain. And hour after that it is sunny again. By the time we leave it has rained several more times. But the rain is close to sleet and it tings as it hits things. The city was initially founded mainly by croats, and they have left their traces everywhere. Francesca complains they are cliquish and only employ their own people. Wandering through town I randomly befriend a group of catholic school girls. They are 17 but seem much younger, so sheltered and isolated are their lives. They are nice and surround me, asking me questions when they understand I am a foreigner. They seem impressed by the name of my country, but I wonder if they know where it is. Many latin Americans think my country is a province of spain, and I suspect these girls did as well. I cant blame them though, from here Europe must seem very far.
Ushuaia is almost identical in feel to punta arenas, except that with argentina bombastic tendencies, it has attempted to make money out of its unfortunate position, by styling itself as the Official End Of The World. It might have a point. Technically, Puerto Williams in chile is a bit more south, but almost no one lives there. I ask Horacio, an argentine, who claims “Puerto Williams is not the end of the world, it is the underworld. The end of the world is in argentina.” What Ushuaia makes lacks in, um, most things it makes up in extreme natural beauty. You enter the city via the beagle passage with all of its glaciers and snow capped mountains, and then arrive at Ushuaia, which is itself surrounded by snow capped mountains. The place was apparently found first by the british. The argentines were afraid that the british would occupy the land completely if they didn’t colonise it first, so they build a penal colony on the island (tierra del fuego). Being sent to Ushuaia was just one step below the death penalty. Few tried to escape, and those that did were normally found later, frozen to death, and I can see how: it is the beginning of autumn here and already freezing. In the mountains (but not THAT high up) the snow is still visible from last winter, it never melted. I go to the end of the panamerican autoroute, which runs from here to Alaska, according to the sign. We take the Train To The End Of The World, following the path the prisoners used to take. It ends in a dead end at the foot of a mountain. There is nothing around but animals and rock. Weird place.