Estadio Nacional: Maintain or Reconstruct?

This is a topic I´ve been marinating on for several days now (gotta love the word ¨marinate¨), ever since I walked past the Estadio Nacional last week with D and his brother. I´ve been there several times before, but this day was somewhat different. We went to drop off D´s sister at her atletismo class, and after doing so, decided to walk through the ¨farm¨right beside it. As we walked down the pathway, suddenly the Estadio loomed ahead, and I looked up to see this piece of architecture that was stained with dirt and grime, and so much history. "You know,¨D´s brother said to me, ¨this was the site of so many executions in 1973... it was like Chile´s holocaust.¨ As if I wasn´t chilled enough already by the cold air and fine mist that was falling, those words chilled me even more. I knew about what happened in 1973, of course, but somehow I´d forgotten that a lot of it took place at the Estadio. I don´t really believe in ghosts or anything like that, but I did get a bad feeling walking by the Estadio. It´s hard to even explain, really. I guess just knowing the weight of what took place there so many years ago made me reluctant to look at it for very long. It´s better inside, but outside it´s just ugly. I´m sorry, but it is. It´s old, it´s grimy and dirty, it´s stained. But the thing is, so much history is enveloped by that building that currently, no one is allowed to tear it down and start over.

So my question is: should we? I say "we", but I really mean Chile. I´m a gringa, and as such, I figure I don´t really have much right to say that it should or shouldn´t be torn down. Anyway, it must be noted that of the history of the Estadio Nacional, there is both good and bad. I think this quote by Augusto Gongora sums it up pretty well:

"It is impossible not to ponder the history of the National Stadium: it was a refuge for Europeans fleeing Nazism in the Second World War; it was a joyous site of celebration when Chile won third place in the 1962 World Cup; it was made into a camp for the imprisoned, tortured and executed in 1973; it received the simple kiss of reparation from Pope John Paul II on soil that knew too much sorrow; it danced the "cueca" alone on March 12, 1990 in the days of “the fair and good homeland,” when Aylwin assumed power; it vibrated with music and human rights during the Amnesty International concert at the beginning of this decade. The National Stadium has more history than meets the eye."

The other day when I was thinking about it, I tried to think about it from the perspective of the families of those murdered in the Estadio. Wouldn´t leaving it as is be a constant reminder for them of what happened? Why not just tear it down and rebuild a new stadium, assuming money is not an issue? But then I thought... if they rebuild on the same piece of land, is it really going to help alleviate the concerns of those family members? And actually.. even if they tore this stadium down and built a new one in a different location, the memories are still there. The memories will persist, always, no matter what buildings are razed or constructed. So in the end, what is the point? Is there one?