The view, from where we sit

They say the more things change, the more they remain the same, and this is what I'm finding in Chile -- like the huge divide between this country's rich and poor.

Sure, when I was growing up here in the 1970s there was a lot more poverty and many more people lived in cobbled-together adobe houses, with dirt for floors, cardboard for windows, and tin slabs for roofs (our house in the Santiago neighbourhood of Santa Olga was made of wood and I think we had actual windows, but the floor and roof were as I describe).

In the ensuing three decades, Chile became much more prosperous, thanks to all of its exports, so now, there are actually large supermarkets here, and malls, and credit cards (unheard of in the past). A large portion of the population also own vehicles and live in better homes, with dry wall and tiled floors.

Still... the difference between the "haves" and the "have nots" in Chile remains pretty stark, and this has really been brought to light by this weekend's earthquake.

For example, because I'm from Canada, I was able to rent a beautiful and large apartment in Providencia, one of Santiago's best neighbourhoods, which is itself adjacent to one of the city's wealthiest (Las Condes).

Providencia looks like any large and cosmopolitan area in North America or Europe: lots of shops, cute cafes, nice restaurants. As such, if you look around, you'd be hard-pressed to see any damage from this past weekend's earthquake. Apart from a nearby, very old church that lost its roof, the surrounding 20-storey buildings don't look at all like they'd withstood 8.8 on the Richter Scale. All the stores are still very busy with well-dressed customers, the outdoor cafes all have patrons, and Mercedes Benz's still circle the narrow streets in search of parking spots near the more popular area restaurants.

Drive out of this elite enclave, however, and it's a totally different story. The kids and I took a two-hour drive yesterday, in search of a school, and actually saw that there is much more damage in the rest of Santiago, in the poorer neighbourhoods. We saw lots of piled rubble, downed walls, broken windows, etc. We saw kilometre-long lineups for gasoline, and for food, at some stores. Apart from that, we saw how some of the rest of Chile lives -- run down, one-storey homes; graffitti everywhere you look; little kids selling boxes of laundry soap on the street; young women selling home-made bread at just cents a piece.

On television, too, we've also been seeing a lot of the devastation that happened in Chile's south. Again, I don't think it was the wealthier areas that suffered the hardest. No. It's the poor people who had little to begin with, that lost everything, including family members. Also, much of the country remains without power, water and other basic necessities, like food.

So, Nick, Carmen and I are realizing that the view, from where we sit, in Providencia, is quite skewed, and while we're not planning on moving, I decided that three of us are going to get out there, and help. One of the things I'll be doing today is finding out where we can volunteer, with relief efforts.

The three of us received a huge gift on the weekend. Now it's definitely time to give back.