Summary
"and now, I feel my great roots unearth, free and…”
In the police station that night, Guevara sleepily listens to a globetrotting prisoner talk about his adventures and thinks to himself about the doctor at Bariloche telling him he’d probably stay in Mexico for a while. Guevara thinks about the far-off lands he will see and begins to feel uneasy, especially when it is hard for him to pull Chichina up in his mind.
The next day, he and Alberto and La Poderosa move along. They stop at a lookout over Chile and Guevara considers this a sort of crossroads in his life.
“objects of curiosity”
Along the route, the two travelers meet other doctors who are often fascinated by their discussions on leprosy, which is not usually a problem on their side of the Andes. Someone mentions a colony of lepers on Easter Island, and Guevara and Alberto are intrigued. They ask him for a letter of introduction to the President of the Friends of Easter Island, and the doctor agrees happily.
They arrive in Osorno and travel through the lovely plotted and farmed Chilean countryside. The Chileans are very friendly, and everything in the harbor and market seems very foreign to them. There is something very indigenous, very “untouched by the exoticism invading our pampas” (57), perhaps because Anglo-Saxon immigrants in Chile do not mix.
“the experts”
Guevara reiterates how wonderful Chilean hospitality is. He helps secure a newspaper article written about the two “Argentinian Leprosy Experts” and their Latin American trip. Guevara marvels at how he and Alberto were audacious in their bragging, which somewhat embarrasses him now.
Before leaving, they work on their bike a bit more; then, they finally say goodbye and head North.
“the difficulties intensify”
The bike continues to have difficulty, but people in the region admire the travelers because they are the “experts,” and they often have places to stay. After the bike breaks its gearbox, they need to have a truck take them to Lautaro, the next town.
Once there, they work on the bike in a good garage. The bike is more or less fixed so Guevara and Alberto decide to go out drinking with new friends. The evening is going well when a friendly mechanic from the garage asks Guevara to dance with his wife because he is not in the mood but she wants to. Guevara sees that the wife is attractive, and since he is drunk, he agrees. The wife is reluctant, though, and Guevara has to begin insisting and pulling her. She pushes back and falls over, so the crowd becomes furious and chases him out. Alberto mourns the loss of more wine.
“la ponderosa II’s final tour”
Back on the road, Alberto is too nervous to drive, which turns out to be a presentiment. Coming down a hill, the brake breaks and the river comes at them terribly quickly. The bike tosses them when it crashes, but they are unharmed.
Now, every time the bike goes uphill, it behaves poorly. Finally, it gives up its ghost. A truck takes them to Los Angeles, Chile and they realize they are no longer “motorized bums” but rather “bums without wheels” (63).
“firefighters, workers, and other matters”
All of the fire brigades in Chile are volunteer brigades, but it is a good service because being a captain is an honor. Fires happen frequently there, which Guevara and Alberto observe while staying at a fire station for a time.
They are staying there because they’d heard of the beauty of the three daughters, but it is also quite hospitable. One night, everyone rushes off to a fire, and they beg to be brought along the next time. In the meantime, they are waiting for a truck leaving in two days and will help pay the fee by moving furniture.
The two young men are a popular pair and enjoy their time in Los Angeles. One night there is indeed a fire, and Alberto makes a hero of himself by rescuing a cat from the blaze.
The truck departs with the corpse of La Poderosa on its back and makes its way to Santiago. They leave the bike at a garage and begin to work to pay off part of the trip with the moving of the furniture.
Guevara writes that Santiago reminds him of Cordoba and has a Mediterranean feel to it. They do not get to know it well, though, as they are only there for a few days. The Peruvian consul will not issue them visas without a letter from their Argentinian consul. The latter initially refuses, but he eventually consents—for a large fee.
The big day arrives, and La Poderosa remains behind in the garage while its two riders move on toward Valparaiso.
“la giaconda’s smile”
Now it is a new phase of the adventure, for the two men had been used to the favorable attention they’d received as wandering aristocrats on the fascinating La Poderosa, but now they are simply hitchhikers.
Walking through the streets of Valparaiso, they attract indifferent attention. Both are exhausted, and they go to a truck stop to detail all their suffering. The attendant lets them sleep on some wooden planks there.
News of their presence reaches an Argentinian in a restaurant near the trailer park, and he magnanimously invites them over. Guevara and Alberto are grateful and enjoy meeting with him. He invites them to his house the next day.
The next morning, the travelers explore the city with its “madhouse museum beauty of its strange corrugated-iron architecture” (69), bright small houses, and fascinating beggars. They ask when the next boat to Easter Island sets sail and sadly learns it will not be for six months. Guevara ruminates on all the things that are said about the place, with its perfect women, perfect food, and beatific, non-existent work.
At the restaurant, La Giaconda, Guevara and Alberto wait for the Argentinian to show up. He does not, but the owner becomes a good friend and treats them to much food and drink. He always says, “today it’s your turn, tomorrow it’ll be mine.”
Alberto goes off to meet with the doctors from Petrohue while Guevara sees an old woman, a customer from La Giaconda. She is dying and he is acutely aware of his powerlessness; poor people like her become the focus of barely-disguised acrimony and bitterness. The lives of these proletariats are truly tragic and desperate. He writes that it is time “those who govern spent less time publicizing their own virtues and more money, much more money, funding socially useful works” (71).
Guevara can do little for the woman and leaves. Back at the restaurant, it is lively and filled with locals. A woman named Dona Rosita is telling a story of how she saw a man with a knife stab her neighbor. The conversation turns to a man who is a so-called “messenger from God” who can cure ailments.
The doctors provide Guevara and Alberto with an introduction to the mayor of Valparaiso, who receives them amicably but says they cannot get to Easter Island until the following year.
Guevara and Alberto know that they must travel by sea in order to avoid the desert in northern Chile, but since they cannot afford it, Alberto plans for them to sneak onboard a ship.
“stowaways”
The chosen boat is the San Antonio, at the center of the port. The two men wait for the right moment, which finally arrives. They rush into the bathroom of the officer’s quarters and plan to say “occupied” whenever anyone tries to come in.
Unfortunately, the toilet has been blocked for some time and the stench is unbearable. Both men are ill; they can do nothing but present themselves to the captain as stowaways. The captain agrees to take them on, and he tells his steward to give them tasks. Guevara has to clean the toilet, which he is morose about, especially as Alberto gets to peel potatoes.
The captain invites them to play canasta and lets them sleep in the cabin of an officer on leave. The next day, the two work very assiduously to pay off this debt but become a bit annoyed as to how much they have to do.
At night, though, they’d look over the side of the boat at the sea and realize their true vocation is to “move for eternity along the roads and seas of the world” (75).
Antofagasta looms in the distance, and their time as stowaways comes to an end.
“this time, disaster”
Guevara and Alberto decide to visit the famous copper mine of Chuquicamata but have to wait on the road to the mine before getting permission from the authorities. They have said goodbye to the sailors and now make friends with a man and his wife who work in the mine and are Chilean Communists. The man tells of his three months in prison, and it is clear that this couple is “the living representation of the proletariat in any part of the world” (77). It is freezing, but Guevara and Alberto share their blankets.
Guevara reflects on how it is too bad that people like this are repressed because all they want is something better—something to take their hunger away.
At the mine, the men learn a strike is imminent; one of the bosses sighs that they can have a quick tour but then they need to go. Another boss says that, hopefully, the Yankee owners will have to pay more when General Ibanez comes to power.
“chuquicamata”
Guevara writes that this place is like a scene from a modern drama because it has beauty without grace. The mountains waiting for the mechanical shovels to dig into their bowels are right near one of the driest deserts in the world; the lives of the poor will fill that mountain.
Guevara briefly describes the manufacturing process and mentions that Chile produces 20% of the world’s copper, which is now very important because of weapons of destruction. There are often debates over nationalizing the mines or letting them run more efficiently in foreign hands. Whatever the outcome, there is still an “immense number of people devoured by cave-ins, silica, and the hellish climate of the mountain” (81).
“arid land for miles and miles”
Now in the desert, the two men struggle with not having enough water to drink. They sit, rest, and realize they simply will not make it across, so they return back to the town and stay the night at a sentry post.
Over the next few days, trucks help take them where they need to go and they visit many nitrate-purifying plants. Finally, they reach Iquique, but since there are no boats there, they have to scrounge a lift on the first truck to Arica.
“the end of chile”
It is a long, arid, and monotonous way across the desert. Guevara marvels at Valdivia, a Spanish explorer, making this trek, especially as he never had a kingdom of gold in the end. Valdivia symbolizes “man’s indefatigable thirst to take control of a place where he can exercise total authority” (85). This phrase of Caesar’s works here for Chile, because Valdivia desired, more than anything, to rule a warrior nation.
Arica is sweet, small, and seems more like a Caribbean town; it retains aspects of the Peruvians, its former owners. A doctor lets the men sleep in the town hospital.
Alberto wants seafood before they head into Peru but they can find nothing tasty. A series of vehicles take them to the border and they bid goodbye to Chile.
“chile, a vision from afar”
Guevara stops his narrative and muses on how when he wrote these notes, they seemed flashier, and he’d like to review them now. He writes of the current state of healthcare in Chile, which leaves a lot to be desired. He notes that the standard of living is lower here than in Argentina and that many Chileans migrate to Argentina. Those who work in the mines in the North are paid better, but living costs more. The political scene is confusing because there are four presidential candidates; Carlos Ibanez del Campo seems likely to win. He is a retired soldier with dictatorial tendencies and runs the Popular Socialist Party. There is Pedro Enrique Alfonso, ambiguous and friendly with the Americans. Arturo Matte Larrain is the champion of the right. Salvador Allende represents the Popular Front.
Guevara bets that Ibanez will continue Latin America’s stoking of hatred for the U.S. to gain popularity, then nationalize the mines.
Chile offers economic promise to those who will work for it, but, of course, that is only the people who already have a bit of education and technical knowledge.
Guevara concludes by saying that Chile should do its best to shake the U.S. off its back, though this is a Herculean effort.
Analysis
In these chapters, Guevara and Alberto spend the bulk of their time in Chile, raving of the Chilean hospitality and reflecting on how Chile is different than Argentina. They always demonstrate an interest in getting involved in what the various towns they visit care about, such as the fire brigade.
Now that La Poderosa officially gives up the ghost, the men are in a different stage of their journey: they are wandering bums, very clearly dependent on the generosity of others. Interestingly, they never really evince any discomfort with seeking out food and shelter from people or institutions, even occasionally exaggerating aspects of their situation (their “anniversary” bit) to get food and shelter. They are grateful, of course, and do not seem to be met with any ire from those whom they ask. Guevara seems to imply that South American hospitality is a conspicuous part of its identity.
Guevara and Alberto demonstrate a few moments of blatant immaturity, reminding readers that they are not demigods. Guevara aggressively tries to dance with a woman who does not want to dance with him, and ends up getting in a fight because of it. They also decide that, since they cannot pay for passage aboard the ship, they ought to be stowaways. They are the hilarious victims of karma when their hiding place becomes too fetid and unhealthy to remain in; Guevara also has to clean the very toilet he thought he could hide near without being detected. Neither man seems to learn from his mistakes or hubris, either. Critic Fernanda Bueno notes that it is not a typical bildungsroman “because the [hero’s] personality [does] not change significantly in the process.” He sometimes has a “naïve approach to life” as well.
As mentioned in the first analysis, Motorcycle Diaries offers several examples of the formation of Guevara’s revolutionary ethos. He meets with a poor woman and sees that he can do nothing for her suffering. He sees that her poverty means that her sickness is a burden on her family members, who come to see her with acrimony. For Guevara, her story is “the profound tragedy circumscribing the life of the proletariat the world over” (70). He concludes that “it’s time that those who govern spent less time publicizing their own virtues and more money, much more money, funding socially useful works” (70-71).
Guevara also reflects on the situation of the Chilean miners, ruing how they are seemingly expendable in the quest to dredge up the land’s wealth to use in weapons to wage war. The Communist couple they meet on the road is glaringly poor, without “one single blanket to cover themselves with” (77-78). These Communists are the people whom the West excoriates but who are, Guevara notes, simply desirous of “a natural longing for something better, a protest against persistent hunger transformed into a love or this strange doctrine, whose essence he could never grasp but whose translation, ‘bread for the poor,’ was something which he understood and, more importantly, filled him with hope” (78).
