The whole point of my program is that it's based on field work and experiential learning. The first section (which comes to an end next week) has been more classroom based but in two weeks I am moving down south to Temuco to live with an indigenous Mapuche family.
After three weeks down south, we get to spend the final month wherever we want to, living with whoever we want to and studying whatever we want to... a little scary but I finally decided what I am going to research and if you know me at all, it really won't be a surprise.
I am going to volunteer at and research an organization called Teletón which helps children with physical disabilities. The handicap accessibility here is horrible and Teletón's whole mission is to empower people with debilitating diseases. I am going to look into how they help people here overcome all of the obstacles that this city throws at them.
If this goes well, my senior thesis will be a comparative piece which analyzes how non-profits in both Chile and the US help kids with physical disabilities.
I'm more or less living The Holiday! (Super cute movie if you haven't already seen it).
Fast forward to the 1:00 minute marker...
Similarity: Today, my neighbor told me his doctor suggested that he walk a little bit every day to stay healthy so we made a nightly date to walk around the block when I'm done with class.
Slight differences: Kate Winslet's older neighbor is a famous movie producer getting ready for a night in his honor, he has all of his teeth, you can understand what he is saying and they make it further than half of a block every night.
So those may be some pretty large differences but I'm excited that I'm becoming a large enough part of this community that I am getting to know my neighbors. Maybe by the end of our nightly walks, I'll be able to understand what he's saying.
Man time is flying by! Sorry I haven't written in a while. It's been busy around here. Also, I just had to write a proposal for my research project and now I'm sleepy so this is going to be mostly pictures.
Thursday evening after class: We headed to Top Top which is a second story bar with a patio that we have been hitting up quite a lot lately. Ordered a few drinks and un churrasco gigante which is a typical Chilean dish consisting of french fries covered in onions, eggs and meat. My pirate face was because I was sick of taking pictures...
On Friday we had a field trip in the afternoon so in the morning cruised over to Cerro Alegre (one of my favorite neighborhoods in Valparaíso). We had brunch at El Desayunador (The Breakfast-ery?) which may be the only breakfast joint around. The back wall of the restaurant has a giant print by the artist Loro Coirón. He's from the area and makes awesome wood prints which is pretty rare anywhere these days.
Saturday we decided to venture into the world of Chilean wine at Viña Emiliana. It was my first ever wine tasting and I was quite surprised that I could taste the difference between the different wines as my usual reaction is just: "Ick. Wine." I had a lot a lot of fun and feel like I learned quite a bit too about both wine in general and organic farming. For fertilizer, they use alpaca poo and for insecticide they just let hens run around the vineyard and eat the little bugs.
The second vineyard we went to, we just drove up, ate some grapes off the vine and left :) It turned out to be ok though because later that night, we met the man who is their wine maker and became friends.
Today (being Sunday) we went to Reñaca Alta which is a community up a ways in the hills and spent the day with an urban Mapuche community. We helped them built an outdoor grill for community gatherings and add a roof the the existing area. In return, they fed us a feast for both breakfast and lunch, taught us the traditional Chilean dance la cueca and taught us the traditional Mapuche game palín. It is essentially field hockey but much more dangerous because you are allowed to pick people up with your field hockey stick and throw them out of the way. I asked the man teaching us not to hurt me and he agreed. I kind of felt bad because we went to do community service but we mostly just ate and played games. I think they enjoyed showing us different aspects of their culture though.
I also became buddies with baby Matias and played let's scoop dirt onto the soccer ball and into Jill's hands for a while.
Today was the best day of class. Our first Spanish class got sidetracked and ended up spending the whole class discussing good restaurants in the area. I now have a very long ling of places to try. There's even an Indian food restaurant and a vegetarian place that everyone loves.
Spanish class number two went on a little field trip today... to our professors house. We went to the grocery and got eggs, veggies, bacon, orange juice and pancake mix! The real kind too!! (If you order pancakes here in a restaurant, you are guaranteed to receive crepes). We intended to discuss subjunctive verb conjugations over brunch but ended up just relaxing and enjoying ourselves and having a wonderful 3 hour brunch filled with some great Spanish convo. We then had to go because our professor had class at 2:00 but we didn't have our next lecture until 3:00 so we went and hung out by the pool in the middle of our campus. I could get used to this!
So I'm pretty sure the whole goal of coming down here was to experience something different. Although that is true, you sometimes just need a boost, especially on the day you have a 5 page take home test. And where did we unfortunately find that boost... Starbucks.
To our credit, we did go to a couple of other cafes first but they either didn't have wifi or were too small for the four of us and our computers. So my evening after school consisted of passionfruit iced tea, a cinnamon roll and Chilean environmental policy. What a funny combo.
My competitiveness managed to stay hidden until this weekend. Field day and a soccer game meant everyone was about to see my not so friendly side.
We went to El Jardin Botanico on Saturday for a picnic which was really nice. It was the first time we really had the chance to meet everyone else's families that we had been hearing all about for the last month.
my family on the left and Kristen's on the right
The games started out with tug of war and then continued onto three legged races, an egg toss, an egg relay race and finally soccer. My team won the tug of war and was a close second for the egg relay and then we played so many rounds of soccer that it kind of evened out. The whole barefoot situation didn't work out too well as three of us walked away limping but it was so fun!
Today, still slightly limping from a jammed toe, I hobbled around the antique fair (again) with my friends Taylor and Zoe. I arrived a little before them and managed to do a loop around the fair before they got there and bought a Valparaiso license plate and a giant lock. I don't know why but I just liked them. On loop number two with the girls, we stopped by the tent where I bought my license plate and my friend Taylor spotted a folding ruler from the 1940s that caught her interest. She asked the man how much it cost and he said it was normally 5,000 pesos but because she was with me, she could have it for 4,000.
Being buddies with a man that sells antiques. Cool. Being buddies with the Chilean man who sells antiques. I love my life.
It was a small moment but I have always said I measure fluency by the ability to eavesdrop. Nothing is harder than coming into to an unknown topic and understanding Spanish between two native speakers.
Last night we went out for St. Patty's Day (happy anniversary mom and dad!!). We were walking down the street in a big group of Americans and Chileans and I heard the guys behind me talking and I understood it without even having to think about it. It was brief but it happened! We walked by Huevo which is a four story dance club where creepy men hang out...
"Hey, what's that?"
"Ew. That's Huevo. It's a club that's super sketchy and super lame."
Step one: Hearing Spanish and understanding it without having to think. Check.
Step two: Knowing how to say sketchy and lame in Spanish. Check.
Without thinking about it, I turned around and laughed a little and responded and they both gave me this look that said, I think the gringa actually understands us.
I have a huge presentation tomorrow on women's reproductive rights and I have to interview someone. It would help if talking about abortion wasn't super taboo here.
On another note, I just experienced my first tremor. And my reaction... staring at the swinging lamp above my head and not moving. Safe.
At some point in the last couple of days, my friend Katy and I realized we missed american junk food.
So today after class, we took a trip over to our local Jumbo supermarket and got stocked up. Side note that Jumbo is on the fourth floor while the first and second floors are an entire home depot and the third floor is a clothing store. Holy cow. I talked myself out of as much as I could but we ventured home with beer, white bread, cheddar cheese, the biggest Milka chocolate bar ever and peanut butter (which Chileans do not eat!)
So when my host mom got back from work today expecting to find me eating my nightly "once" of tea and toast, she instead found us gorging on beer and grilled cheese.
"Estamos vivos. Estamos vivos. Hahaha" is how my host grandma answered every phone call we received this morning. So there's that to get the most important fact of the day out of the way: we are alive.
Now to recount the last couple of days because they have been quite crazy. And I'm warning you, this might be a long post.
Thursday afternoon. One more 3:30-5:30 class to go. 6:30 bus to Santiago. Concert at 9:30. The line up? Ziggy Marley. Vicentico. Train. Francisca Valenzuela. Shakira!
So excited...
Until we walk into class and our professors inform that they were listening to the radio and the concert doesn't start at 9:30 but 5:30. What?! The tickets say 9:30. We have a two hour bus ride at 6:30 to get there. Their response: We aren't in the United States. It turns out that Shakira was scheduled to go on at 9:30 but the other four were playing between 5:30 and 9:30.
In a class of 21 students, it would have been kind of noticeable if 15 of us ditched... so we sadly sat through class and crossed our fingers that our professors were wrong. They weren't. We missed all four of the opening shows which was a bummer. I was really excited to see Fransisca Valenzuela because I like listening to Spanish music to practice listening but sometimes I'm not in the mood for stereotypical latin music and I heard she has a bit of a different style.
I came home and youtubed her and she's pretty good. If you want to skip the talk show host's little intro, she starts singing about 35 seconds in.
On the bright side, I did get to see Shakira live in Latin America which was really fun. Although I didn't stand a chance of knowing the songs because the ones I do know in English, she sang in Spanish. (She Wolf = La Loba).
tiny little shakira in the corner
After Shakira we decided to grab a 2:00 am breakfast where I was as usual, lost in translation. I got chicken with pasta de chipotle. I think I'm getting spicy chicken and pasta because my host family here calls pasta, pasta. Nope. Pasta= paste. Duh. Dinner comes out looking like buffalo wings. That's cool I like those too. It was actually chicken covered in about a year's worth of ketchup. We all got a good laugh out of it though.
The next morning we wake up to the news that we have to stay in Santiago another night because Valparaiso and Viña del Mar are on tsunami alert due to the Japanese earthquake. We make hotel reservations for another night and decide we may as well check out Santiago. And here's what we found:
Beautiful murals. This one right outside our hostel.
Displays of photos commemorating the one year anniversary of Chile's earthquake.
A protest to reform the education system which appeared to have more
terrifying police officers in full protection than protestors.
And La Moneda (essentially the Chilean White House)
At La Moneda, we get a phone call that we can return to Valpo so we cancel the hotel, jump on a bus and head home. Exhausted, I head to my room to relax a little when my little sister walks in and says that my host mom is on the phone and she wants to talk to me. She tells me that she is staying in Santiago for the night for work but I need to get my things together in ten minutes and leave with my little sister. We had to stay at their grandma's house because it is further up the hills so it's safer. I thought the tsunami wasn't coming!
We watched news footage of Japan for about an hour which scared the bologna out of me knowing that tsunamis could possibly be coming to Chile. Thankfully before bed, my brother, sister and I watched "Horton y el Mundo de los Quien" (Horton Hears a Who) to lighten the mood. And to my surprise, they didn't just translate it but did a wonderful job rewriting it so it still rhymed in true Dr. Seuss fashion.
Anyway, my host mom just got home and needs help with the groceries. Sorry that was so long :)
I know that I am going to be safe. I absolutely do. But I am so freaked out. We took the bus up into the hill to spend the night at my host grandma’s house because it’s safer up here. To be honest, I heard that the region of Chile that I’m in isn’t even going to be hit by the tsunami, just the north and south. But I’m not scared for me.
I don’t want to wake up in the morning to find out that other people have suffered. I don’t want to take the bus back down the hill to realize it’s a good thing we left. One of my host family’s past exchange students is traveling through the south of Chile right now and we haven’t heard from her yet.You should see their faces when they ask each other if they have heard from her. I don’t have internet right now so I’ll post this later but I love you all and appreciate you caring enough about me to read this.
And to freak me out even more, the room I’m staying in has the creepiest doll ever staring at me. I’ll post about the Shakira experience when I’m feeling more level headed.
my little sister was nice enough to move this for me
so i didn't have to stare at it all night
Send thoughts and prayers. The one year anniversary of Chile’s earthquake was only two weeks ago and I think they deserve a break.
Today while studying education, we compared the Chilean educational system to that of the US. We were discussing different options for American students when they graduate high school: work, college, technical school, culinary school... which got me thinking; I really feel like baking right now.
So upon returning home after school, I decided to do a little summer job hunt and I sent an e-mail with pictures of all my cookies to about 10 bakeries in Denver. And that is what you get today :)
[Before this little story starts, I was no where near the earthquake yesterday so I love you all but no worrying. There aren't even tremors around here :) ]
...
Cultural differences all day long. Pirobos all day long. Now, what's a pirobo? It is a whistle or a comment or a movie line yelled from the rooftops at female passerbys. And I happen to live in the center of a bunch of construction sites so we have latin american culture (which totally accepts pirobos) plus construction workers. I can essentially leave my house in running clothes, with no makeup, rocking my afro to its fullest and still get whistled at at least twice on my five minute walk to the subway station. Please don't panic out there everyone who worries about me. These guys are harmless! Chileans are such such such nice people. Many of them just happen to yell at me.
So today, after spilling tomato juice all down my shirt and having disturbingly large hair, I had to come home from class and I think we may have actually set a pirobo record. Set this all aside for cultural difference number two.
Here (I'm not sure about the rest of Chile but in Valpo), smiling at someone is a sign that you have met and should therefore say hi. It is not something just thrown around between strangers. Out of habit, I smile at people as I run past them, walk past them, sit next to them on a bus, across from them on the metro. And they just stare back. It drives me crazy! We have even seen babies that don't smile back and that's just sad. Because of that, I love smiling at other gringos because it is their habit to also smile back and that makes me happy.
Where these two tie together... I was walking down the street after my new pirobo record about to turn in my neighborhood and I see this gringo walking out. I am so excited to smile. Not because he was at all cute but simply out of the cultural comfort I get from receiving a smile in return. It's surprising how much I miss that. So I smile! And what do I get in return... A completely straight face and "Que linda eres." Darn it, you're Chilean. Is a smile so much to ask for?
On a completely separate note... if you're reading this you probably have some level of interest in my day to day life so a quick tidbit. Between classes today, my friends and I went to a lebanese dessert place that one of them knew about. It was closed but after my friend stood on the fence and yelled "Julio" for a while, his friend/ roommate let us in. He is her host mom's boyfriend and he was actually very happy to have us. Even though the restaurant was closed, Vladimir (who is actually Chilean) gave us tea, coffee and empanadas! So yummy. When Julio returned, he played us a little guitar and informed us that he loved karaoke. And I know no better way to end lunch on a happy note than youtubing karaoke background music and singing Frank Sinatra as a group. What a funny way to spend our two hour lunch break :)
Last night was a little rough because I did not feel at all like going out and getting hit on by rando men. The cultural differences are sill a little tough to get used to. After chatting with my momma (my actual US one) who I love dearly, I decided to go for it. It was so fun! We went to a local bar, met up with some Chileans and then took a bus over to Valparaiso because they have more bars over there. After watching my friends dive right into some Latin dancing at La Rumba and listening to live music at Trova, we realized our night had flown by and it was 4:00 in the morning. We needed to get some sleep! Of course the Chileans we were with stayed out when we went back. I got home at 4:30 this morning and of course I wake up at 8:30. Why?
Even though I'm exhausted, I was glad to have time to enjoy my day. Julie and I went into Valparaiso for the antique fair and the farmers market (we had to take pictures for a class presentation). But I was clearly so excited to go to a Chilean antique fair for homework. After taking some pictures and throwing together a powerpoint, I took the metro to the beach to relax and chat with one of the other girls on my trip. Happy Sunday!
Today was your average weekend activity kind of day. After breakfast, the family and I ran some errands and stopped by the feria (farmer's market) to get our fruits and veggies for the week. My host mom's boyfriend explained to me, there are two types of Chileans. There are feria Chileans and supermarket Chileans. In the supermarket, you get to pick out your produce but it is much more expensive. At the feria, you say I want one kilo of tomatoes and instead of taking all of the pretty tomatoes from the display tables, the person working the area takes a kilo of tomatoes out from underneath the table and hands them to you. Not as pretty and bruise free as the ones in the display.
He also added that they save the good ones for their friends and frequent customers. So, if you want great, fresh produce for cheap, you have to have patience. You have to keep going back to the same farmer out of the whole market every week until they like you enough to give you the good stuff. Good thing I have a Chilean host mom who is in with all the farmers.
Such a long day! We woke up extra early today to catch a bus in Santiago to go to El Museo de la Memoria y Los Derechos Humanos (Museum of Memory and Human Rights). It was essentially all about the human rights violations that occurred during the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-1990). It is so easy in day to day life to not think about death and torture and human rights violations but it happened and it is a huge part of Chile's history. We saw videos of people talking about being tortured, a bed that people were tied to to receive electric shocks and diagrams of water boarding.
outside of the museum
a wall with a picture for each person who
was "disappeared" or murdered
[Mom, skip this paragraph]
Honestly, I cried when I read a letter that a little girl wrote to her dad who was being detained and tortured. It essentially said, "Dear Dad, I miss you so much. I haven't seen you in so long but don't worry, I promise I won't forget you. Mom told me that maybe if I study hard, you'll come home. I've been trying so hard Dad! I study so much. Mom keeps crying but she tells me that it's nothing. When you get home, we can play all the time. I love you and miss you."
After that very intense morning, our class and professors went out for a lunch of typical Chilean food. We actually went to a restaurant that Anthony Bourdain went to for his show No Reservations and really liked. I finally got to try terremotos! And they were quite delicious. It was white wine with Pineapple sorbet. We sat and chatted and then got serenaded by a mariachi band while our professors sang along. Very entertaining.
After lunch, we got back on the bus toward Valpo and I woke up to hear people talking about buying tickets to the Shakira concert this Thursday. Come on guys, it has to be sold out by now. Turns out it wasn't. And they talked me into buying a ticket to a Shakira concert. I figure life is short. Maybe I'll learn to shake my hips?
I really lucked out with my host family. They are just the nicest people in the world. My host mom's name is Lidia but everyone calls her Pelu and she has two kids, Matias and Isadora. Last night, Pelu told me that Evita (nanny/ housekeeper extraordinaire) had made us a really good lunch for today. I was the first one home from school today and I didn't know where this lovely lunch was hiding so I waited until Matias and Isadora got back. I asked Matias when he was going to eat lunch and he said "Whenever I'm hungry". Great 15 year old boy response. Fearing that I would accidently break into dinner instead of lunch if I ate by myself, I asked Matias if I could eat lunch with him and his friend.
His response: "Obvio!" With this look that just said stop pretending like you aren't part of the family and asking silly questions. Of course you can eat with us. Whenever you want.
And speaking of the homestay situation, I finally took pictures of my room :)
I may have definitely under packed.
Sad sad looking closet.
It's midnight here and in Chile that is way to early to come home from a night out (even if it is a school night). My friends and I headed into Vina to try to find some terremotos tonight only to discover our little outdoor bar didn't serve them. Bummer. That's ok though because they did have strawberry mojitos. One more word that is different in Chile than the rest of the Spanish speaking world (Strawberry is frutilla here instead of fresa if you were wondering). Anyway, I was just about to order another round of drinks when our waitress told us they were closing. At 11:00? We weren't aiming to party but that is pretty early to close. I guess everyone is right that Valparaiso is the party city out of the two.
So we headed into the plaza to grab a taxi home and they have the craziest system here. They are called collective taxis or colectivos and they are taxis with set routes that you share with other people. Every route has a number on the roof so you jump in whatever taxi is headed toward your house (mine are 86 and 7) and cozy up with up to four other people. It's really hard to see the numbers from far away so I asked one of the colectivo drivers who was parked where to stand to hail my taxi and he told me he would take me straight there for a little extra. I asked how much but unfortunately, numbers are one thing I really need to work on.
He said 2800 but all I heard was the word thousand so I jumped in. Two dollars is a pretty good deal to be taken straight home! When we got to my house, I handed him 1000 pesos and he just looked at me like I was stupid. He then repeated 2800 to my disappointment and I handed over the money. I guess $5 still isn't too bad of a deal to avoid walking alone at night.
These aren't my pics but I google imaged it to give you an idea of what they look like and how hard it is to see the number and hail the right taxi when they're going fast!
