The time of remembrance does not cover the space of one day, but winds through the twelve months.
Fifty years after Pinochet's coup, Chile is dedicating the whole of 2023 to the memory of that tragic September 11, when the country understood the true meaning of lost freedom.
A space from which to start again to think about the future, imagining planting new seeds so that democracy continues to grow.
The events, including symposiums, exhibitions and concerts, have already kicked off and will soon come alive.
Among the most symbolic projects is the regeneration of the metropolitan green space in Cerro San Cristobal, in the capital which, repopulated with original trees and plants, will become the Park of Democracy: a warning, a wish, but also a form of thanksgiving for everyone those countries which, like Italy, stood by the Chileans during those interminable 17 years.
But the anniversary is also a time to understand and plan, in a country that continues to come to terms with its traumas, discovering itself unresolved and divided, squeezed in the geographical isolation between the Andes cordillera and the Pacific Ocean.
Although Allende's grandchildren had a rematch with the young Gabriel Boric who climbed to La Moneda at 35, the perimeter of action does not allow for left-hand turns.
Proof of this is the failed attempt to overturn the Constitution which dates back to the years of the dictatorship, and the new constituent exercise which has just begun, which promises above all to be a test of balance and compromise.
In the words of the Chilean journalist Francisco Covarrubias, Boric discovered himself as a musician ready to play at a rock concert who found himself performing pieces by Mozart.
And, if the third position in the executive is held by that acclaimed Camilla Vallejo, emblem of the student protests against the conservative government of Sebastiano Pinera, the push for change is held back by concern for stability, while Boric's honeymoon with the voters, ten months after taking office, it seems to have already come to an end.
According to the latest Cadem polls, the leader's approval rating has halved, going from 50% of his arrival to 25%.
The figure is weighed down by inflation that has shot up to record levels of 12.8%, while the World Bank forecasts a 1.7% drop in GDP this year.
But the picture is also aggravated by the increase in crime, with a 43% increase in homicides in 2022, which reached 842, and drug trafficking on the rise, to the point of evaluating militarization in the north of the country.
In this context, the president was not forgiven for the pardon of a former member of the armed struggle of the Patriotic Front against the dictatorship, and twelve demonstrators sentenced for the 'estalido social', the violent protests of November 2019 which, in the wake of Yellow vests had inflamed the squares of the country.
The fiftieth anniversary of the coup, which sees a new pool of experts - the third - engaged in the investigation into the death of Pablo Neruda, to establish whether the real cause was poisoning or actually prostate cancer as was said at the time, thus it becomes an opportunity to also reflect on the social causes that make this country a constantly boiling pot.
A space for Boric's government to interpret the complex scenario in which the desire for order mixes with the desire for change.
To give answers according to new schemes, thus continuing Allende's legacy.