Torres del Paine is an amazing Natural Park... I did a full day hiking... beautiful! the pictures speak for themselves...
One image is worth more than a thousand words... so, instead of writing about the Park, today I'll write about Luis Diaz.
Luis Diaz runs a little bus to bring people to the park. I talked with him in the evening, when I arrived to take the bus back, while we waited for the rest of people... He is 61 years old, but looks younger... "no smoking, little drinking" he said.. He was a policeman for more than 20 years, and was in charge of the Torres del Paine, riding a horse around... "I know this park like the palm of my hand" he said... "I wanted to explain you more things on the way to the Park, but there were those two brasilians who would not stop talking.. they talked like parrots!" he added laughing.
He was proud that his name appears in the Lonely Planet and in the Southamerican Handbook (my guidebook), and that some people said he resembled to Robert de Niro a bit... that was a good laugh!
He told me a story. One day, once all the people left his little bus, he found a huge expensive camera... he looked around.. and the following bus was departing, where the owner was likely to be, so he blew the horn of his bus, showing the camera by the window. The other bus didn't stop, so he started to hit the door of his own bus... then the other bus stopped, and a tourist would go down with a terrified face... he came to Luis and told him... "thank you very much! how much should I give you?"... "I don't need anything" he replied.. "you can just recomend me around and that's enough for me". The tourist asserted and gave him 50 dollars... Luis then told me "happy him, happy me"...
Then he told me another story... he once found a check with a huge amount of money, and no receiver name... so he looked up the check owner in the telephone book, and phoned him so that he could get his check back... the man rewarded him with a 3% of the value of the check. With that money, he bought the little bus he was driving...
He added... "when you do good, things go good for you!"... "exactly!" I said, thinking.. that's what karma is! I don't know if he knew the karma word... but he didn't need to... he knew it better than most of people, for he had experienced it by himself, with his own life, and he lived happily according to it.
It was great to meet him.. it's thanks to people like him that life is so good sometimes!
