Today is the best day of the year. Maybe, maybe the first day of ski season is almost as good as today was. ALMOST.

Every marathon has its own theme based on the weather and the mood that day. Yeah, there was one marathon that had a very sad theme, or better said, was very sad, but since then, somehow the marathon is just that much more poignant. I feel like all the marathons since that awful day have shown how Boston can come together in the most wonderful way.

Ok, enough sentimental stuff. Let’s get to the big day. So Meb Keflezighi was back to defend his title against people who obviously have rocket fuel in their veins and rockets for legs. Watching them all run today was, as always, magnificent, as they all have these beautiful running strides and they all look like they just ran over from the other block, rather than 26.2 miles away.

Meb ran into some trouble and finished eighth, which is still wonderful. Am I going to judge him? He won the Boston marathon. I watch the Boston marathon. Meb has a leg up on me. LITERALLY.

Anyway, so the winner was Lelisa Desisa, the winner from 2013 who gave his medal back to the city of Boston after the bombing. Well, now he has another medal. Meb meanwhile crossed the finish line holding the hand of one of the other elite marathoners, showing that he is, no matter what, a gentleman.

The ladies final turned into a fire fight with three rounding the turn onto Boylston street and the eventual winner breaking into a sprint. Excuse me, but goddamnit lady. Really? A sprint? After 26.2 miles? Rocket fuel I tell you. Rocket fuel.

Anyway, so here is a look at our elite runners, male and female and the eventual winners, male and female. Run strong, run proud my friends. Run until you have nothing left:

You must photograph:

Not only did Santiago have colonial splendor, but plenty of insanely interesting looking modern architecture:

Take these broken wings and learn to fly:

In Downtown Crossing, there is a place that serves chacareros. For those of you know are unfamiliar with Chilean culinary fare, a chacarero is a Chilean sandwich that contains bread, beef, mayo and string beans. It is out of control delicious. The gringo version features some kind of avocado on it, but I found in Santiago that in fact the real thing does not feature that particular accouterment.

Anyway, I like to eat local stuff and raise my hipster quotient by visiting places where one can local type stuff and see the natives doing native type things.

The Chacarero joint we visited in Santiago provided just such a thrill.

First let’s take a look at the sandwich:

Wild piece of food, eh? Looks like an octopus sandwich to me. I went with a knife and fork for that particular eating adventure. Needless to say, I was full until the next morning after that meat bonanza.

The place itself was great. Each wall was covered in all kind of vintage typewriters, cameras, etc. Hipster quotient — high:

Again, when talking about South America, I go back to my fifth grade geography and history lessons. In Chile, I was surrounded by what I like to call “colonial splendor,” something that harkens back to a post-colonial past, a past where their former colonizer is remembered, but it is also side by side with the new history of country. In Chile, that was hugely represented.

Ah, that colonial splendor:

When I went to the wedding in Chile that I went to in Chile, the natives asked me what I thought of their city and what was my favorite thing. I love the mountains in all forms, looking at them, skiing on them, etc.

Santiago was full of mountains, or las montanas as it is in Spanish, though probably not in Chilean Spanish because it appears to be different than every other Spanish on earth.

When I told the natives that I loved the mountains, they shrugged their shoulders and said “Las Montanas” WHATEVER. Then they told me they were going to New York and I said “eh, just a rock between two rivers.” No big deal.

Las Montanas are the best, obviously:

I remember seeing an interview with Martin Scorsese where he said that he always did the same shot over and over in his films. It was like his go to shot.

I guess when I started being a photographer, I knew had to have some kind of ace in the hole when I got into trouble and I couldn’t get the image that I wanted.

The other thing is that when you start being a photographer, you copy. I mean all artists (I’m not calling myself one) copy when they start making art. As do photographers. When I learned about Alfred Stieglitz, his early work copied another photographer. I would go out on a limb and say that a lot of the work of Robert Mapplethorpe copies or is “significantly influenced” by Edward Weston.

Anyway, let’s be done with the art criticism portion of the broadcast. So there is an image that I just copied and copied from a photographer named Andres Gursky. Here it is:

When I saw this image for the first time, it was life changing. No, I’m serious. It was exactly the type of photography I wanted to do. I wanted to take ordinary thing and make them look artistic. The building looks like a Mondrian but it is just a regular building.

For a long time I tried to photograph skylines, but they always looked the same. Too many wide angles but when I saw the Gursky photo, I unlocked the secret of taking a good photo of a skyline. Stick to clean parallel lines.

The Santiago sky line had plenty of those and they were somewhat reminiscent of the Gursky shot even in their contents. Let’s check them out:

Good artists copy. Great artists steal…

Alfajor. There I said it. (Giggle if you will). Alfajor is a delicious little South American cookie made with dulce de leche that is covered in chocolate. It is like a dulce de leche moon pie. Quite delicious.

The Chilean supermarkets though features some other rather interesting (and yummy looking) things:

(I’m a gringo. I take photos of everything when I go on vacation. Literally everything.)

Mozart, muffins, weddings, existentialism. That’s what we do here at Wrong Side of the Camera. What can I say? We are a mixed bag.

Let’s get started. So I was in Chile for a wedding of two lovely people I know. They got married at the most insanely beautiful place of all time. Don’t believe me? Check out the photos:

Do you believe me now? Yeah. No exaggeration, but I actually felt that my life changed after I saw that view.

While I was on the top of that hill, so many thoughts were going through my mind. Somehow I did a lot of deep thinking on this trip. I started to think what had brought me up to that hill, the path I had followed, how I had gotten there. I thought about the fact that almost exactly six years ago, I was sitting in a cold conference room in New York being called “junk status” by the nefarious person I worked for at the time. I remember how I had walked out crying and swore I would never have another job again. And not to mention that I was worthless and incompetent. It was a long time ago, but I do sincerely hope that that person reads this blog because of the photo above and the ones below.

Why I got so suddenly philosophical, I don’t know but somehow it affirmed this belief in me that everything, no matter what happens will be OK. It will all be OK in the end and one day you will climb to the top of San Cristobal hill and go to the loveliest wedding.

Ah yes, the wedding. The wedding was at the top of San Cristobal hill, a BEAUTIFUL hill in Santiago that features a statue of a virgin and is surrounded by the city and beautiful vegetation.

And then the Beatles started playing and bride and groom entered. Before it all started, I snapped some photos of the attendees. They all looked interesting and I wanted to capture these new faces that looked so interesting and unique. And of course I had to capture the lovely couple:

And after there was insane wedding reception that featured the bride singing, tacos, quiz the gringos time, a video called “House of Vegans” (a parody of House of Cards), cat ears, stiff hipped gringo dancing and general mayhem.

Generally AWESOME: