Let's visit a few museums...

In Santiago, the Chilean Museum of Pre-Columbian Art (Spanish: Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino) is dedicated to the study and display of pre-Columbian artworks and artifacts from Central and South America. The museum is housed in the Palacio de la Real Aduana, which was constructed between 1805 and 1807. The museum first opened in December 1981.

The museum has over 3,000 pieces representing almost 100 different groups of people. The collection ranges from about 10,000 years.  

In Santiago, the Chilean National Museum of Fine Arts (Spanish: Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes or MNBA) is one of the major centers for Chilean art and for broader South American art. Established in 1880 (making it the oldest in South America), the organization is managed by the Artistic Union (Unión Artística).

The current building, the Palace of the Fine Arts (el Palacio de Bellas Artes), dates to 1910 and commemorates the first centennial of the Independence of Chile. It was designed by the Chilean architect Emile Jéquier in a full-blown Beaux-arts style and is situated in the Parque Forestal of Santiago. 

In Santiago, the Museum of Memory and Human Rights (in Spanish: Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos) commemorates the victims of human rights violations during the military dictatorship led by Augusto Pinochet between 1973 and 1990. 

The museum houses torture devices used during the Pinochet dictatorship, letters to family members by prisoners in detention centers, newspaper clippings, and testimony from survivors. The museum also includes a philosophical examination of human rights. Chilean popular icon and folksinger Víctor Jara's last poem, Estadio Chile, written shortly before his death in the stadium during the 1973 coup, sprawls across the entrance to the museum.

It was fitting that I visited this museum with Yalile (a Chilean relative of a friend that I had met during my trip) who could explain first hand what some of her relatives had experienced during those very dark years...

The Valapraiso National Maritime Museum belongs to the Chilean Navy, was originally created in 1915 and operated on board the Huáscar, a battleship that participated in the War of the Pacific defending Peru and that was captured by the Chilean squadron in 1879. At present, it is located in the building of the former Naval School, on Paseo 21 de Mayo in Valparaíso.