Chile con Eva

How I Have Come to Know 180 Chilean Freshmen Boys

2007-10-11T14:51:00.000-07:00

Hello friends! I'm writing today, not about traveling adventures (believe it or not), but about something that I do here in the city, a part of my weekly routine. A few weeks ago I started to volunteer at a public all-boys school, helping to teach English. I suppose I should back up a little bit to explain how I got involved.

Back in the beginning of the semester, during our various orientation sessions at the Chilean universities, there was a certain woman who spoke at all of them. She was from the organization English Opens Doors, an organization that recruits foreign students and places them with schools in the city who have applied to be a part of the program. The students work with the English teachers in the schools to help them in class, help with after-school programs etc. I signed up to participate because I thought it would be fun, interesting and it was something I could actually do, a way I could help and volunteer and also integrate more into Chilean society. It took a long time for a school to contact me, and then even longer to meet up with my contact there and go visit the school. But I finally did, only to learn that I would be working with a different teacher, a very nice woman named Marianela.

When I first met Marinela she was kind of clueless as to why I was there or what to do with me. I think there had only been one other volunteer at that school before, but she hadn't worked with them. Therefore we began our conversation with her asking me in broken and heavily accented English: "What you want to do?" I must confess that I felt just as clueless as her. I had never really thought about what I would do in a class or how to teach English for that matter. You may assume that since you can speak a language fluently (and since it's your native language), then you can easily teach it. Well, it's not as easy as you think and I found that out real soon. I may know how to pronounce a certain word or how to construct a sentence, but it's a whole other matter explaining to someone how to do it. You have to look at your language as if you're learning it for the first time as well, in order to explain it properly. Over the past few weeks I've gradually learned how to look at English from another perspective, from the perspective of a native Spanish speaker, and to subsequently compare the two languages, looking at what exactly makes them different or similar. In other words, I now see English in a whole new light and it's been fascinating. But again, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Another somewhat distressing thought I had when I first met with Marianela was: does this woman actually know how to speak English? She had a very thick accent, often leaves out certain connecting words in sentences and frequently looked at me with a quizzical look, signifying she clearly didn't understand what I said. The minute that I told her that I also spoke Spanish, she let out a huge sigh of relief and immediately launched into her beloved castellano (another word for Spanish; it's weird, they almost never say espanol, always castellano). At this point we communicate in our own version of Spanglish, each of us teaching each other new words and phrases along the way. It's been great, it's nice not to always be the only one who doesn't know what's going on haha. Now, you may think, how can a woman who says "come in to your seats" be teaching an English class? Well, I guess it's just a good example of the level of public education in Santiago (at least in terms of learning foreign languages). That, and the fact that she's teaching freshmen boys, so the level of English isn't too advanced. But I'm not giving her enough credit, she really is great with the kids and has their best interests at heart. She's always afraid that her quizzes and tests will be too hard for them, she wants them to do well in class. And it's not like she can't speak English at all, obviously she couldn't be a teacher otherwise; in fact just today she asked me if the expression "The early bird catches the worm" was correct. I must admit I was rather impressed.

So, now let me tell you about my first experiences with the kids. Well, first of all, I go to teach on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 2-5pm. Yes, 5pm, the Chilean school system is crazy and super confusing (I once had a half hour conversation with my host mom about it, during which she explained to me the different kinds of schools and all the different names and what times kids went to school depending on their age). At this particular school, the older kids (juniors and seniors in high school) go to school in the morning and the younger kids (freshmen and sophomores) go to school in the afternoon/early evening. I think. Anyways, I help teach four different classes, all of them freshmen. I believe that I'm teaching the entire freshmen class. And guess how many are in each class: 45 KIDS. 45!!! Therefore, I am ultimately teaching 180 Chilean freshmen boys. When I first found that out, I thought oh god, what am I'm getting myself into?! It's bad enough that they're all boys, but all of them freshmen boys (aka 14 and 15 years old)?! That is definitely the worst age for a boy, the age when they're bound to be the most obnoxious and perverted. And here I am, a tall blond gringa, with all these boys. I knew right from the start that this was going to be quite a challenge.

I have to admit I was completely terrified when I walked into the first classroom (for all the reasons above). I was also totally taken aback by the typical "classroom protocol" at the start of the class. Marianela walked in the room and all 45 boys immediately stood up. She said "Good afternoon, students," they all chorused "Good afternoon, Miss," she continued "You may sit down" and they all responded "Thank you, Miss" and sat down. It was quite formal, like I took a step back in time, but I liked it, it was very cute. Especially since they were all wearing their matching navy blue and gray uniforms. (quick side note - I'm pretty sure every public school in Santiago has the exact same uniform, every school kid I've seen on the streets looks exactly the same in navy blue and gray pants/jackets/ties for the boys and skirts or jumpers for the girls; it's how you know whether someone's still attending school or not) Anyways, if any of you have seen the movie "Machuca" (an excellent Chilean movie about Santiago right before and during the military coup of 1973), it was a scene straight out of that movie. The movie centers on two boys from 'different sides of the tracks' so to speak, who become friends in school, and they only ever show an English class and they're all wearing the same uniforms and it's just exactly the same. So yeah, I basically relive Machuca ever time I enter a class. The exciting part is that now the students also address me when I enter the class, I also get to say "Good afternoon, students" and they all respond "Good afternoon, Miss." I love it, it's so cute haha. Besides calling me Miss, which they do most frequently, they also say Senorita. Although today I was called 'profe', the endearing shortened term for profesor/a. I felt quite important.

So after this formal greeting, Marianela introduced me to each class, saying who I was, what I would be doing and that I would be there with them for the rest of the school year essentially (since they end in mid-December). I then gave my own little speech, all in English, saying my name, where I was from, what I was doing in Chile etc. The reactions were slightly different in each class: I received quite a lot of whistles when I entered one classroom and another group gave me a standing ovation after I finished talking. All of them seemed quite intrigued, to say the least. Besides the whistling, I have also endured my fair share of being the object of many a sexual innuendo, all of them incidentally Marianela's fault. For instance, when asking the class what kinds of activities they would want to do while I was there helping them, she phrased it as "what kinds of things do you want to do with her?" after which the room immediately erupted into laughter and cheering. Another time, she was explaining how I was going to take small groups of students outside the classroom to talk with them and have them ask me questions so that they could "have more contact" with me. That received another cheer. Well like I said, they're freshmen boys, that's to be expected.

The first class of each group I just observed and walked around, helping answer any questions about the worksheet they were doing. But the second week, I started taking kids out like I mentioned before, in groups of 4, so that they could ask me questions about whatever they wanted, practicing their English and hearing a native English speaker talk. I have to say that I have absolutely LOVED doing this! By talking with the kids, I have learned so much about adolescent Chilean culture and it has been fascinating, not to mention tons of fun! We would talk about all kinds of things, mainly focusing on pop culture like movies, TV shows, bands, sports etc. I have to tell you, almost all of their pop culture comes the United States, I am not exaggerating. It's pretty sad actually. As a result, they assume that pretty much any famous English-speaking band is from the U.S., the British don't get their due credit. However, this also made conversation extremely exciting and entertaining for me, especially when I found kids that liked the same shows, movies and music as me. One of my favorite moments was when I talked to a kid who is obsessed with Queen and we sang part of Bohemian Rhapsody together. It was amazing. I also had several conversations about Lost, including debates about who was better, Jack or Sawyer, and they were all jealous that we are one season ahead in the U.S. I also met a few Survivor and Amazing Race fans, which was super exciting! They were proud of the fact that Amazing Race went to Chile in the previous season. I also had a few Harry Potter conversations. When talking about literature, they were always impressed that I said Isabel Allende is my favorite author, and when discussing Pablo Neruda one boy actually started reciting some of his poetry to me (he was obviously a huge Neruda fan).

Here is a summary of what I discovered in terms of the top favs of these boys:

Favorite movies:
1. Scary Movie (this was hands-down the top favorite, literally every single boy I talked to said this was their favorite movie...that's pretty sad)
2. other horror/gory movies, such as Saw, Hostel etc.
3. Piratas del Caribe (Pirates of the Caribbean)
4. comic book movies (Spider-Man, X-Men)

Favorite TV shows:
1. The Simpsons
2. Peloton (the Chilean version of Survivor)
3. lots of other Chilean shows that I didn't catch

Favorite bands:
1. My Chemical Romance (hands-down one of the most popular)
2. Iron Maiden (also really huge)
3. Red Hot Chili Peppers
4. Linkin' Park
5. Incubus
6. Evanescence
7. Green Day
8. Reggaeton (Chilean mix of reggae and rap)
9. other Chilean bands (La Ley, Los Tres)

So yeah, typical freshmen boys. And judging from their musical tastes, they're all really emo haha. But aside from pop culture, lots of boys surprisingly asked me some very intellectual, insightful, anthropological-like questions. For example, some common questions were what crime is like in the U.S., what is the education system like there, is there a lot of poverty, are people very racist, how the cultures are similar/different etc. Probably the most common question of this vein was if I liked President Bush, and they would always cheer when I said no. I was also asked my opinions on the Iraq War and on global warming. I think one of my favorite questions was: "is it true that everything is big there?" I literally laughed out loud, at the same time thinking to myself, sadly there is quite a bit of truth to that statement.

I also learned quite a bit of the culture of 'los jovenes' (young people) in Chile. Having a pololo or polola (boyfriend or girlfriend) is extremely important in Chilean society, and you will always see endless pairs of them making out in the streets, on the metro, on the bus etc. When I asked them at what age people usually start to 'pololear' or go out, they said as young as kindergarten! I simply could not believe that. Kindergarten?! But, they explained, of course it's a lot more innocent then, just some holding hands or kissing on the cheek. I don't know about you but I still think that that is super young to be thinking about stuff like that, even if it is just holding hands. Crazy. I also learned about the popular trend of 'pokemon', which does not refer to the Japanese cartoon but to a style of dress, haircut, music you listen to etc. In other words, a way of life, an identity. The kids are always eager to point out those who follow this style, and it's actually quite obvious as one of the main signifiers is a very distinctive haircut, involving straight hair cut at a sharp angel, plastered onto your face. Kind of hard to describe.

So today, after several weeks of taking small groups out and talking to them (and I think I've talked to just about all 180 kids), I actually led the classes. All 45 at once. We started a new lesson about seasonal festivals (it's a British book, btw) and we read from the book together. Well, I would read a sentence and then call on someone to repeat it, and then I would go over any mistakes in pronunciation. Pronunciation is one of the major issues that these boys have and I don't blame them; the teacher has trouble with pronunciation herself. Therefore it was really great for them to hear me read so they could learn how to actually say the words. And it was super fun and interesting for me too, I learned just how tricky English can be to read and pronounce. For instance, I had to teach them how to say Celtic today...that was a doozy lol. And they also have lots of problems with words that end in -ed. Because if you think about it, you never actually pronounce the ending as it reads, like the name Ed, and some endings sound like a 't' instead of a 'd'. An example: say to yourself the word 'marked.' You say the ending as if it were a 't', not a 'd'. But you don't even realize it of course because it's natural. That is what these poor boys have to deal with lol.

So far, teaching at Liceo de Aplicacion (which is the name of the school, btw) has been one of the most fun, rewarding and interesting experiences I've had so far in Chile. I absolutely LOVE going there and teaching/talking/bonding with those kids. Not only do I feel great about helping them but I'm also learning a lot myself, whether it's about Chilean culture or the many 'chilenismos' of Chilean spanish. There's just this wonderful feeling I get from teaching, it's exhilarating really. I'm so glad that I've decided to do this, it's definitely the best decision I've made here.

And that is how I have come to know 180 Chilean freshmen boys :)

More Atacama Desert Pictures!

2007-09-23T22:30:00.000-07:00

Here are some more pictures of my trip to the North! They include: sandboarding, Lago Miscanti (un lago altiplanico) and crossing the great sand dune in the Valle de la Luna.

Journey to the North: the Atacama Desert!

2007-09-23T20:07:00.000-07:00

Alo galera! (a little bit of Portuguese I learned from a Brazilian traveler) I'm finally back from my great trek to the inhospitable yet visually stunning land of northern Chile, the home of the driest place on Earth: the Atacama Desert. I had been planning this trip for awhile since we got a whole week off from classes for the holidays, Fiestas Patrias, essentially a combination of Independence Day and a celebration of the nation's armed forces. Everyone gets off work and school the Monday, Sept. 17 through the Wednesday, Sept. 19, but luckily the universities extend their vacation throughout the rest of the week. Therefore we had 10 days to travel and I took advantage of every one of those days to explore northern Chile. They say that it's best to go north during the winter since it's (obviously) hotter in the desert and the weather was nice, though it got quite cold at night. I went with four other friends, one who met us half way through at our second destination, San Pedro de Atacama. But let me start from the beginning.

We began by taking a 25-hour bus ride from Santiago to Iquique, a coastal city known as the capital of the north. Yes, 25 hours. It actually wasn't too bad, it's amazing how much sleeping can pass the time. They say that Iquiue looks more like it belongs in Saudi Arabia than Chile. The city is situated between the Pacific Ocean and a series of incredibly steep cliffs and sand dunes, rising up over the city, threatening to collapse and cover it in a sea of rough brown sand. Unfortunately the weather was not very nice when we were there, the sky was rather foggy, so we couldn't see the cliffs and their sharp color contrast with the blue ocean very well (or at least, they didn't come out in pictures very clearly). But we did sense some of that Middle Eastern ambiance while inside el Centro Espanol, a fancy restaurant that looks like it's instead an exquisitely decorated Muslim mosque. This restaurant is one of the several historic buildings in the city's main plaza. The plaza is full of 18th-century style buildings, left over from the time when the city was a booming nitrate town, money flowing in from the various surrounding nitrate mines. In fact, the entire plaza has been decorated a national monument, from its ancient clock tower to the old, but still grand and elegant, theater. More historic buildings can be seen while walking down the Calle Baquedano, a pedestrian street that gives off a type of boardwalk feel, or that's at least what I felt while walking down it. Other quirks that I noticed about the city include an old trolley that calmly sits in the Calle Baquedano, forever rooted in its tracks which still run throughout the plaza, as well as the numerous signs of evacuation plans in case of a tsunami. I have to say that seeing those signs was quite unnerving, one of my worst natural disaster nightmares is a tsunami. But why live in fear, cierto?

We spent our first day wandering around Iquique, observing what I just previously described. At night we were lucky to stumble upon one of the first celebrations for Fiestas Patrias in that area: a big dance show in the plaza featuring traditional Chilean dances from regions all over the coutnry. The second day we took a tour to the see the famous sites around the city, a common occurrence for most visitors there. On the tour we saw two ghost mining towns: Santa Laura and Humberstone. Well, the first one wasn't really a town, it was an "oficina" or office where most of the actual production of nitrate occurred. The second place, Humberstone, was an actual town and big one at that. It had a theater, big grocery store, a hotel, a church, even a swimming pool. Walking around that deserted town was quite surreal and rather creepy; everything was left standing as if it had just been inhabited and it was eerie to see the empty streets, the vacant seats in the theater, the old wooden diving board at the pool with no spectators and no one swimming below. After that we made our way to el Cerro pintado (painted hill) which featured hundreds of geoglyphs, or huge carvings/drawings on the side of big hills. No one knows where they came from: they are thought to be the work of pre-Columbian civilizations, though extraterrestrial conspiracy theories are always thrown into the mix. Afterwards, we traveled to the oasis town of Pica where we got to experience our first thermal bath. It was more like a big natural swimming pool, there were tons of people there. The tour ended with a visit to La Tirana, the tiny town known as the location of the statue of the Virgen del Carmen, the subject of a cult following which hundreds of pilgrims travel to see every year. Overall, it was a very diverse and interesting day.

The next day was another traveling day as we made our way from Iquique to San Pedro de Atacama, stopping through Calama, which is said to be the ugliest city in Chile. Lucky us. The day after that was Sept. 18, Fiestas Patrias itself, so we spent the day exploring the tiny, but very quaint, oasis town to see how they celebrated the holiday. There were Chilean flags hung from just about every respectable establishment and almost every restaurant had someone grilling out front (having an 'asado'). The real party was in the 'feria' on the outskirts of the town, basically a group of tents featuring lots of grilled meat, various games and forms of entertainment, and blasting festive music. We celebrated as best we could, making sure to eat traditional Chilean food (I had pastel de choclo). But apart from the decorations and festive ambiance, we found that San Pedro is full of more tourists than Chileans. It really is a tourist trap, the stopping point for all those adventurers wanting to explore the dazzling geographical wonders of the desert, and most of those tourists are European. Therefore, the town is full of tourism companies and chic restaurants with a slightly rustic feel. The multitude of tourists, combined with the fact that it's an extremely small town and that you basically have to take tours to see anything outside of the town, led to constant reunions with people we had met days before. Whether it was running into that Chilean family from Las Condes in the Valle de la Muerte, or seeing that German girl from our Salar tour in our residencial the night before we left, it was always exciting to reunite with someone unexpectedly again. But I digress (I've always wanted to say that).

Our first day after Fiestas Patrias we took a full-day tour around the Salar de Atacama, or big salt lake/flats. The Salar was astounding: a vast expanse of literally salt, stretching out as far as you could see, with a long row of volcanoes looming in the background. I could actually reach down and pick up a handful of salt from the ground, it was so surreal. In the middle of the Salar we came to a lake, Lago Chaxa. The fact that it was a lake in the middle of a salt flat in the desert was not what made it memorable: the lake was home to flocks of pink flamingos. How an animal such as a flamingo could live in such conditions escapes me, but it made for quite a sight. But we were in for an even greater sight as we made our way up through the mountains, up to the altiplano, or high plain. It was there that we arrived at Lago Miscanti, one of the many lagos altiplanicos, a bright blue lake situated in between snowy volcanoes. The view was incredible, the water such a brilliant shade of blue I don't even know how to describe it. The surrounding mountains were covered with yellow flowers, adding to the color contrast. Also, up there among the mountains we saw more Chilean wildlife such as vicuñas, llamas and guanacos, all members of the camelid family.

The second day started off extremely early, at 4 am to be exact. We had to leave that early in order to see the geysers at El Tatio, a common excursion from San Pedro despite the distance and early start. It took about 2 1/2 hours over extremely bumpy roads to get there, but once we saw the field of holes, all exploding with tall towers of steam that rose high into the air at the same time with the sunrise peeking through in the background, we knew that it was worth it. There were literally tons of geysers and the ground was covered with a strange mix of boiling hot water and ice. You had to be very careful where you stepped because, as our tour guide reminded us several times, people had gotten severely burned in the past. But that didn't stop me from walking right up to the erupting pits in order to get the cool shots of the sun shining through thick clouds of steam. It was a peculiar feeling to be completely surrounded by steam, not being able to see five feet in front of you, but most tourists could hardly avoid it as the geysers were exploding everywhere you stepped. I took a lot of pictures at that place. Before leaving we were served breakfast, and it was quite amusing to watch our guide take out the cartons of milk he had been heating inside some pools of boiling water in the ground, placing them on the table to drink.

Continuing on the same tour, we then stopped at more thermal baths, the Termas de Puritama. These thermal baths were much nicer than those we had visited in Pica, they were much more secluded and there were several to choose from. We truly swam in paradise there, relaxing under waterfalls and warming up after a very cold morning. We got back to San Pedro before 1 pm; it was amazing to think of everything that we had done so far and yet it was only 1 pm! At that point we didn't have a specific plan for the rest of the day, but we didn't want to just hang around town again. I mean, there's only so much artisan shopping one person can do. We had heard from another group of fellow COPA students who arrived there a few days before us that they had gone sandboarding and it was a lot of fun, so we decided to give it to a shot. We didn't think it was very likely that we would get a tour since it was really last minute. Therefore, we were really surprised when the first place we walked into told us they could take us within the next 45 minutes! So we grabbed some empanadas for lunch and set off for our next adventure. Now I have to admit, I never dreamed that I would ever get to do something like this. I mean, I remember seeing a picture of my 9th grade geometry teacher sandboarding in Africa and thinking wow, that's intense. And yet before I knew it there I was, standing at the top of a very steep sand dune in the Valle de la Muerte (Valley of Death) in the middle of the Atacama Desert with a sandboard strapped to my feet. We did go with a guide but we didn't receive that much instruction; well I guess there's only so much instruction you can give for that sort of thing. I figured hey, when am I ever going to get the chance to do this again? So I went for it...and fell. Numerous times. But I always got right back up and I gradually got better the more times I did it. And I have to say, it was really fun! Afterwards we all felt so accomplished and amazed that we had actually just did that, and we returned to the residencial happy but exhausted after a truly long day.

Our last full day we woke up fairly early and rented bikes. We spent the first half of the day riding around about 6 miles around the town, visiting the various indigenous ruins that were scattered about the surrounding desert. These ruins included Quitor, site of the last standing fortress of the Atacameno people who fought against the invading Incas, and Catarpe, a site of Incan administration buildings. The landscape alone made the ride worth it and my adventurous spirit continued to reign supreme as we forded several rivers along the way, reminding me of my childhood days spent wading through the infamous brook of Brookside, NJ. We returned to town just in time to eat lunch before our last tour of the trip, a tour to the Valle de la Muerte and the Valle de la Luna (the Moon Valley). This tour took us back to where we had sandboarded the previous day, although we explored the area in more detail. The valley actually gets its name from a Belgian monk's mispronunciation of the name for the planet Mars in Spanish, Marte, which is how he described its peculiar landscape. I would agree with him, it really did look like Mars. But the Valle de la Luna wins in terms of extraordinary landscape; its not hard to see where it gets its name from. The valley is filled with strange rock formations and the ground is covered with white salt residue, so that when the moon shines on it, it reflects a brilliant white light. In order to witness the fabulous coloration that occurs during sunset, we had to climb a huge sand dune and cross over its top to reach another large rock, which we climbed as well. It was an incredible sight watching a single line of people cross this enormous sand dune, with steep drop-offs to rocky bottoms on either side, walking against the setting sun. They looked like a caravan of camels crossing the desert. After taking many pictures of that scene, I crossed as well and waited with the rest for the sunset. As the sun dropped behind the mountains, it cast a blanket of pink, orange and gold into the valley and against the opposite mountains; it was an amazing sight. But the best was when the sun was completely gone and you could see the moon shining over the valley, lighting up the ground. I really did feel like I was on the moon, even though it was clearly shining above me. Overall, it was a spectacular sight and a perfect ending to our trip.

Well, our trip didn't actually end at that point. We still had a 23-hour bus ride, which didn't start out as smoothly as we hoped. We actually missed the bus in San Pedro because we were waiting in the wrong spot: there was no bus station in the town so we were standing where the bus had initially dropped us off, but it apparently the bus left from another location. We realized that 10 minutes too late and when we got to the Tur Bus office, they informed us that there weren't any more buses with space to Santiago that day. Therefore, after a few minutes of panic, we hurried to the corner to catch a "taxi" to take us to the next town where the bus would stop, Calama. The "taxi" turned out to be a guy with a truck, who called his friend to bring another truck since there were 7 of us in total: the 5 of us and a Chilean couple who made the same mistake. We crammed into the two trucks and head out in pursuit of our bus, praying that we would be able to catch it in Calama. Luckily, after a few more scares involving not knowing which of the two bus stations in Calama it would stop at and receiving conflicting answers from other Tur Bus offices, we were able to catch the bus and we thankfully climbed aboard, ignoring the laughing bus attendant who firmly believed we had just overslept. I never thought I would be so happy to get on a 20+ hour bus ride. After that everything went smoothly and we arrived in Santiago early this morning.

Whew, that was a long description. Well, I did see a lot and it was a 10-day trip. And now I can say that I've been to both the most remote place in the world and the driest place in the world! All within the same month. How cool is that?!

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

P.S.~ I included pictures of flamingos in the Salar de Atacama, the geysers at El Tatio and the Valle de la Luna, but I'm going to post some more in another entry because there are so many incredible things to show!

EASTER ISLAND!!!!

2007-09-10T18:05:00.000-07:00

Hola chicos! I'm back from the dead...or from traveling that is! The past week has been crazy with travel and now this week is crazy with homework, but that's another story. My journey began with last Saturday when my program took a trip to the neighboring coastal cities of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar. Well actually, we to Isla Negra first to visit the most famous of Pablo Neruda's houses, and from what I've seen in Santiago, definitely the most beautiful. His house is absolutely filled with all things related to the sea/ships/sailing: shells, pieces of boats, ships in a bottle, old maps and globes, anchors etc. And he had a spectacular view of the ocean, right on the water with his own private beach.

We then moved onwards to Valparaiso, a beautiful city right on the coast and spread out among some 50-odd hills. For those of you who have been to San Francisco (I have yet to go), it's supposedly just like that, with really steep hills. The best way to get up and down the hills is by funicular, or ascensor. What I loved most about the city were the endless rows of brightly colored houses (I saw a purple one!) and the surprisingly large number of murals along the streets. Everywhere we walked we saw murals. After taking a walking tour of some of the hills, we went down to the marina and got to a take a boat ride! It was a perfect day for it, and it was quite amusing to watch around 25 people cram into one tiny boat. Afterwards, we drove through Vina, past the snazzy casinos and pretty beaches. It's quite obvious between the two cities which is the rich resort town and which is the busy port. All in all, it was a really fun day, nice to get out of Santiago and hang out with basically everyone in the program together.

But the main attraction here is my trip to Easter Island! I left the next day, Sunday afternoon. It was just me and my friend Morgan, which I think was better because you can accomplish a lot more with two people, in terms of accommodations, getting around, activities etc. It was approx. a 5 1/2 hour flight (like the distance to California from N.J.), not too bad. It was so weird/funny to see the arrow for our final destination literally pointing to a spot in the middle of the ocean, with absolutely nothing around it. For those who don't know, Easter Island, or la Isla de Pascua as I will now refer to it, is considered the most remote place on Earth. I would agree with that statement. Standing on the top of a volcano, hill or at the coast, you could see nothing but a massive expanse of ocean, it was amazing. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

We arrived Sunday night and immediately faced our first challenge: finding a place to stay. We didn't book a place in advance because 1) it was near impossible to find numbers for the places in our price range and 2) we had read in numerous places that it's a common occurrence for tourists to arrive at the airport without arrangements as lots of places set up stands there. And sure enough, when we walked down from the plane and into the airport there were lots of counters of places with their little signs, all shouting out offers. We found a nice small place for $20 a night including breakfast, not bad considering literally everything on the island is 10 times more expensive. I mean, they do have quite the monopoly on things, and you're essentially paying for the plane ticket of whatever was sent over (in terms of food, pharmacy items etc.).

The next day, our first full day, we were taken around by the cousin of the owner of the residencial where we were staying. She took us all along the southern coast of the island where most of the moai sites are. I guess I should briefly explain what moai are, since I'm bound to mention them at least 4985485 more times. The moai are the strange statues with very large heads, long ears and prominent foreheads, often wearing little red hats (or top-knots), that have been found strewn around the island (I'm sure that 99% of you have seen pictures of them in some world history/culture textbook or any type of exotic travel publication). Though it's been studied for years, no one is still completely sure why the original Rapa Nui inhabitants built them. The general consensus is that they were built to please the gods so that they would be saved from the island/be able to escape since they pretty much got stuck there and then used up all of the island's resources. Another major debate is where the Rapa Nui originally came from: some say Polynesia, some say Peru, some say both. But the most widely accepted theory is that they came from Polynesia; the physical appearance of the Rapa Nui descendants definitely support that theory, they seem to have distinct Polynesian features. Anyway, there's your little crash course on the island.

Now back to what I was saying. We traveled along the coast and visited several sites where rows of moai were pulled down and are toppled over, strewn all over the ground. It was kind of a sad site actually, seeing them face-down or shattered. But there was also something very powerful about seeing a moai lying on the ground, like you were looking at the downfall of a civilization captured in one single image. We then moved on to what I thought was the highlight of the day: the volcano Rano Raraku. One of the side of the volcano was where they cut out all of their moai, in other words the quarry. Therefore, there are literally hundreds of moai strewn all over the side of the volcano, sticking up out of the ground. Some of them were just heads so it looked like they were sinking into the ground. My favorites were the tilted ones. But even if they were just heads they were still SO big, it was incredible. After walking around the volcano, Morgan and I climbed up all the way to the top. I've got some fantastic pictures of me standing all the way up there, it looks like I'm on top of the world! That's what it felt like anyways :). Looking down into the crater was an amazing sight in itself. It's an extinct volcano so the crater has turned into literally a lake, with lots of plants and such growing in the middle. But also within the crater, up on the side, are more scattered moai. And I could hardly believe it when I looked down and saw a pack of wild horses just hanging out with the moai and galloping around the lake. I am not even exaggerating, it was a magical sight.

After the volcano we went to the 15 moai at Ahu Tongariki, literally 15 moai standing in a row. Now granted they weren't found like that, they were hoisted back up on their platforms in the 1970s I believe. But that's what they were supposed to look like. We then went to the site of Ahu Te Pito o Te Cura, where the largest moai ever transported from the quarry is located. And let me tell ya, it was huge. But the most interesting part of that site I thought was the magnetic stone, the 'navel of the world.' There is a perfectly round stone by the coast that is said to have special powers. If you put a compass on top of it it will spin indefinitely, and it is said that if you press your hands and forehead against it, you will gain it's 'mana' or energy. So of course I did just said, but I can't necessarily tell you if I gained 'mana.' Perhaps I did because the next day was one physically tiring day and I managed to survive. It reminded me of a huge rock at Machu Picchu that is also said to have special powers, and if you press your hands and forehead against it you will gain energy. Interesting....we ended the day at Anakena Beach, a gorgeous beach on the east side of the island, where there are literally moai in the sand, lots of palm trees and crystal clear water.

The next day we rented bikes which was, as I hinted before, very tiring but great for really getting to know the island on your own terms. Our goal was to explore the section of coast south of the town (there's only one town on the island where all 3,000 people live: Hanga Roa). Riding along the coast we stumbled upon this amazing cave, which turned out to be the famous 'cave of cannibalism', an apparently "must-see" site of the island, known for its rock paintings and crazy waves. We then moved on to our main destination: the volcano Rano Kao. We biked all the way up, which was a lot longer and harder than we expected, but it made it all the more worthwhile when we got to the top. And oh my god, the view was INCREDIBLE! Picture an enormous crater-turned blue and green lake, with a section eroded to show the bright blue ocean behind it, and with an ancient village filled with petroglyphs on rocks right on the rim of the crater. Bet you can't, so I've included a picture for you haha :). After hanging out for awhile, eating lunch and enjoying the view, we walked along the rim of the crater to the village I mentioned before, the village of Orongo. And now here comes island history 101: part 2. This village was a ceremonial village of the birdman cult, where they held the birdman competition each year. In short, the birdman competition consisted of a representative from each tribe having to scale the cliffs, swim to some far-off rocky islands where the migration of sooty tern birds would nest each year, wait for weeks or months at a time for the first eggs to be laid, then strap the egg to their forehead, swim back and climb the cliffs again. The first one back with an egg was claimed the birdman for that year, an extreme honor and position of high status, but apparently they had to shave their head, eyebrows and eyelashes and live in seclusion. Doesn't sound like much fun to me. Anyways, we visited the remains of that village, part of which has been restored. The coolest part was seeing the rocky islands where they swam in the distance, with the rocks with petroglyphs of the birdman in the foreground.

After coming back down from the volcano, we biked over to the site of Ahu Vinapu, known for its female moai, as well as several walls that look suspiciously similar to the Incan walls that can be found in Cuzco. Having been to Cuzco, I have to say that they do look very similar, and this is some of the evidence used to support the theory of the original Rapa Nui coming from Peru. However, I wouldn't go that extreme and besides, how hard is it to believe that more than one civilization can build a nicely cut stone wall? We then ended the day over at Ahu Tahai, a popular moai site near the town, watching the sunset behind the row of moai. Now that sight was unreal, I have some spectacular pictures and some are so perfect that they look fake, it's hard to believe that I witnessed something so naturally beautiful and visually stunning.

The third day brought on a whole new set of adventures because we rented a car! That was the best because we really had the means to go whatever we wanted. We started out by driving up the northern coast, visiting several more moai sites including the 7 moai that look out at the ocean, the quarry for the top-knots or hats, and an awesome series of underground volcanic caves that literally had banana trees growing out of them. We then went back to the southern coast and hit up the sites we hadn't seen before, with a repeat visit to the magnetic stone to gain some more mana. We also drove to the more secluded Ovahe Beach, said to be the most beautiful beach in all of the South Pacific, with its water so clear that you can see your toe hair. It really was gorgeous. We then spent the rest of the afternoon at Anakena Beach, swimming in the ocean (which really wasn't that cold) and relaxing in paradise. We ended the day watching the sunset yet again at Ahu Tahai, this time eating some of Chile's best empanadas (the best I've had so far anyways). Thursday morning we reluctantly packed up and left, leaving behind in my opinion, one of the most magical, mysterious, beautiful places in the world.

A few more comments before I finish. Walking through the town was an adventure in itself. Everyone would smile and greet you, so different from the cold stares I frequently receive in Santiago. And since the island is so small, you were bound to see the same people over again, especially other travelers. I love meeting other travelers, especially young ones, I think it's so interesting and exciting to hear other people's stories. We made friends with several from all over: England, Australia, Poland etc. Anyways, everyone was really nice. Another peculiar thing was seeing men just riding a horse down the street. I guess it's not that weird since the island is literally full of wild horses, but it's still not something one sees everyday. In terms of food, I didn't have a lot of typical island food since everything was so expensive. However I did have amazingly fresh juice every morning, as well as some wild guava which our guide picked for us the first day.

So I guess to sum things up, I had a blast, one of the best trip of my life for sure. I recommend that everyone visit the island at some point in their lives, though sooner rather than later before they start building major resorts and such. It can be expensive but just look for the cheap tickets, that's what we did. Believe me it's worth it :).

And now I've just got to get through this week of papers, tests and more papers before a week of vacation and more traveling, this time north to the Atacama Desert!

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

P.S.~ I included pictures of the moai quarry, the crater at Rano Kao, and sunset at Ahu Tahai.

Weekend Away!

2007-08-27T20:06:00.000-07:00

Hola amigos! I know it's been awhile since my last post, about two weeks I believe, but it wasn't for lack of material to write about. I've been going to classes, finally settling into a routine, celebrating friends' birthdays etc. But this past weekend was very exciting because I finally got to leave the Santiago metropolitan area, away from the smog, metros, micros and all the hustle and bustle of city life. I, along with 12 other friends, traveled to the cities of La Serena and Coquimbo, two coastal sister cities which are popular vacation spots in the summer for Santiaguinos. It's a 6 hour bus ride from Santiago, bus being the ideal way to get around Chile for those with limited budgets. The ride there didn't feel long at all given that we slept the whole time (it was an overnight bus, leaving at 11:40pm and arriving around 6am). It was a rather surreal experience when we were literally dropped off on the side of the Pan-American highway in the dark, and we had to cross the highway and walk to our hostel. Our hostel actually consisted of two cabanas right near the beach, complete with kitchens. One of my friend's host mom's friends (did you follow?) owns the cabanas where we stayed so we were able to get a good deal, not to mention the fact that they let us check in at 6am instead of at the regular time of 12pm. Therefore, we were able to drop our stuff off and walk down to the beach for sunrise, which was beautiful. We then came back, bought supplies at the local mini market, and cooked ourselves some breakfast (the first of several meals that we cooked, we felt extremely self-sufficient). We spent the day (Friday) in La Serena, looking at several of the 29 churches located within the town, going to two museums, and visiting the Japanese gardens (apparently Chile and Japan have a good relationship; who knew?). La Serena is the second oldest city in Chile so it has some great history and architecture. We then ended the day with cooking a fabulous Italian dinner for ourselves, complete with chicken, pasta, vegetables and garlic bread.

The next day was jam-packed but amazing. After booking a tour the day before, a van came to pick several of us up at our hostel (which was very convenient since we weren't staying directly in either Coquimbo or La Serena). Our guide, Guillermo, proceeded to drive us through the nearby Valle del Elqui, a beautiful valley known for growing papayas and producing pisco (Chile's infamous brandy made from grapes). We stopped at a papaya orchard, but all the trees were sadly dead because the weather has been so cold recently (remember how it snowed for the first time in 40 years in Santiago?). However, we were able to get a taste test of papaya nectar, which I found delightfully sweet. We then moved on to a huge dam which holds back the Rio Elqui, or Elqui River. We were able to get out and walk on the dam where we got some spectacular views of the valley, river and mountains (see picture above). Afterwards, we continued on to the Capel pisco plant, the major pisco plant in the country. The smell was overwhelming as we descended into the cellar and we got to see/try the seemingly infinite flavors that they have developed over time. After the plant we moved onwards to the town of Vicuna, birthplace of Chile's famous Nobel prize-winning poet Gabriela Mistral, where we visited a replica of her house and a museum dedicated solely to her life and work. The highlight of the day, however, came later when our guide took us up the mountain to one of the area's most popular observatories. In addition to pisco, this area is most famous for having some of the clearest skies in the world, a popular spot for star-gazing and astronomy research. Thus, the area is littered with several observatories and we were lucky enough to visit one. I had never been to an actual observatory before, I had only been to planetariums, so the experience was extremely exciting for me. My favorite picture of the trip is the one our guide at the observatory took for me through the telescope, which was our view of the moon through the telescope (see picture above). Unfortunately, since the moon was so bright we couldn't see all the constellations that we would normally be able to see, but we could still see a lot, including Jupiter and several star clusters (groups of stars that were born together and move together). One thing that I found mind-boggling because I had never thought about it before, though it's pretty obvious, is that the constellations are different here than from home. Thus, my attempts to find Orion's belt were futile. It was a very educational and exciting experience all in all. We ended the night eating at Mexican restaurant in Coquimbo (because we had all been craving spicy food for so long) and then moving on to a karoake bar, where I graced everyone with my imitation of Frank Sinatra's "I've Got You Under My Skin." The few Chileans there had probably never heard of the song before so it was pretty amusing, but they seemed to enjoy it.

The last day we headed up to Coquimbo, where our bus was leaving from, to have lunch and stumbled upon some sort of festival in the Plaza de Armas. Apparently it was the 463rd anniversary of La Serena, in addition to Folklore Day in Coquimbo (or something like that). Whatever it was, it included tons of children dressed up in traditional clothing and dancing the cueca (Chile's national dance) on stage in the plaza, with lots of vendors selling traditional food as well. After a lunch of meat on a stick (literally), empanadas and pineapple/orange gelato (the most amazing thing EVER), we reluctantly headed back to the bus station and departed for another 6 hour journey, this time much longer since we were awake and less exciting since we were going back to the smog. Overall, it was an extremely fun weekend, not to mention a nice break for our lungs.

Above I posted pictures of sunrise on the beach, the view of the Rio Elqui atop the dam, the moon through the telescope and a pretty church in Coquimbo.

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

P.S.~ I finished Harry Potter (awhile ago) and it was amazing, though it also brings the metaphorical end of my childhood. 10 years of magic....what will I ever do now?

An Andean Aventure

2007-08-14T13:51:00.000-07:00

Hello all! I'm back with another adventure to recount. I know that I had said before that I wouldn't be writing until I had finished reading Harry Potter, and yet here I am, writing my second post since then while I still have about 300 pages left to read. I must confess that I have been reading it rather slowly, stopping myself whenever I find that I've read too much in one sitting. In fact that's what I've just done and part of the reason I'm writing this entry now, after realizing that I just read about 115 pages since I came home from class. I know it doesn't really make sense since I was in such agony waiting for the book, but I guess it's because I don't want it to end. Anyways, on to my adventure.

This past weekend I traveled into the mountainous countryside with five friends, finally escaping the smoggy confines of the city. It was my first real journey outside of Santiago, not counting the visit to the vineyard (which we literally took the metro to), so it was very exciting. After taking a long metro ride (practically to the end of the southeastern-most line), several buses and a very long colectivo ride, we arrived in the pretty little town of San Alfonso de Maipo, in the Cajon del Maipo (Maipo Valley). But before I go any further, I want to describe our colectivo experience because I thought it was pretty amusing, if not memorable. First of all, a colectivo is one of the many types of public transportation that one can take around Santiago and the surrounding areas. It usually takes the form of a taxi, except that it has a predestined route and can pick up multiple groups of people (like a big carpool), and it's dirt cheap. Well, outside the city the colectivos look more like slightly larger VW buses. After interpreting a string of confusing directions, most of which were lost in translation, from a bus driver who had just dropped us off in what looked like the middle of nowhere (since it was apparently the end of the line for him) we managed to hail down one of these bright blue, and in my opinion rather comical-looking, colectivos. We climbed aboard and right away were faced with yet another obstacle: we had to pay in coins a fee, of which we didn't know the amount. Now we were not used to paying for transportation in coins because for the other forms you just need to swipe your "Bip" card, a kind of permanent subway card which you can conveniently recharge at any metro station. Apparently, before TranSantiago was established (the transportation system that was only recently running since February), you paid for everything in coins, but we didn't know that. But I'm getting sidetracked.

After fumbling through our wallets to retrieve the right amount with a very impatient driver holding out his hand and a van full of people staring at us, we sat down to what turned about to be close to an hour of driving. We drove through the winding valley roads among the towering Andes, it was beautiful. About halfway however, there was a very loud crack on the right side of the vehicle, followed by the unmistakable sound of a limp tire spinning fast along the ground. My friends and I nervously looked at each other, envisioning standing by the side of the road in the middle of the mountains for the rest of the day. However, no one else seemed to have noticed or cared, and we rumbled on.

The driver luckily dropped us off right in front of the gates of our destination, a nature preserve called Cascada de las Animas, named after a nearby waterfall. This place sponsored all sorts of outdoor activities, and we had chosen horseback riding. We had originally reserved for an all-day ride that goes way up to the top of mountain. However, when we got there they told us that we couldn't do that trip since it had snowed recently and the trail was too dangerous that high up. Therefore, we resorted to the 2 hour ride, which was no less exciting and beautiful. We met our guide, Leo, mounted our horses, and with little to no instruction, started off on our journey. I must say that Chilean horses are much shorter and stouter than, I guess, American horses or any other horses I've seen for that matter. But even though they seemed smaller they also looked a lot stronger.

We rode up and up a hill along a rather narrow and gravelly trail, getting higher and higher until we finally reached the meseta, a rather expansive plateau. The view was absolutely amazing, I can't find the words to describe it. The day was gorgeous, there wasn't a cloud in the sky, and the surrounding mountains were covered in snow. Thus, the overall result was breathtaking. Expecting it to be freezing, we were all sweltering under the sun, stripping off layers as we rode along the plateau to the other side, and we arrived at a steep dropoff to the valley below. Our guide pointed out the way to Argentina, explaining how it was a three day ride and that they offer 14 day excursions to ride there and back, a very expensive but amazing experience I'm sure. After taking a little break to let the horses eat, drink and rest, we set back down. I have to say that coming back down on the narrow trail was a lot more frightening than going up, but I just kept telling myself that the horses knew what they were doing, they had only done it a hundred times. However, my horse unfortunately became a little troublesome and kept nearing the edge to reach more food, and after a few scary episodes my guide eventually exchanged horses with me as he continued to tame down my horse. I came out fine in the end (obviously) but it made me think twice about my previous blind trust in the horses.

After the ride we had a nice big lunch at the restaurant on the property, complete with some white wine. Overall it was a fantastic day, a perfect excursion for those wanting to escape the city for a day. I took sooo many pictures so it was hard to pick which ones to post. But I guess they're mostly all the same. You can see the mountains (obviously), my guide in front of the drop-off at the edge of the plateau, and a pretty good picture that one of my friends snapped of most of the group climbing up on our horses.

And now I'm off to read some more Harry Potter despite everything I just wrote, I did stop reading in a particularly intense place.

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin :)

Esta nevando! It's snowing!

2007-08-09T16:18:00.000-07:00

I am pleased to announce that I have officially just witnessed the first snowfall that the city of Santiago has seen in 40 YEARS!!! I kid you not. Not only has this been the coldest winter that Santiago has seen in 30 years, but last night was also the first time it's seen such precipitation in four decades. I really brought the cold weather with me didn't I?

Now you may be thinking, well how is that a big deal for you? You've seen snow all your life, as well as experienced the cold, including the brutal winters of Chicago. But I have to tell you that this was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. For many people, including some adults who have never left the city, this was the first time they have ever seen snow in their life. And if they were lucky enough to see it up in the mountains before, they most likely never had seen it in their home. The joy and excitement that I witnessed was absolutely contagious; everywhere I looked I saw pure happiness and laughter in their faces. Now granted, I didn't see too many people. The snow didn't start falling until about 11pm last night. Inside my house it was pretty quiet: I was reading Harry Potter in my pajamas on my bed, Camila was already asleep, Jorge was in his room reading, and the parents were in their pajamas as well. But then all of a sudden I heard shouting as my madre called down the hall, "Mira! (Look!) Mira! Esta nevando! Esta nevando, Jorge! Mira!" The next thing I knew, my host brother was running down the hall and out the door with his camera, Camila was up and out of bed donning a jacket, scarf and hat, and my host parents had run out the door in their pajamas. I quickly joined them, only stopping to slip on some Birkenstocks and grab my camera.

When I walked outside, we were not the only people there. Most of the neighbors had also ventured outside, so the street was full of people laughing and taking pictures in their pajamas. It was the first time that I had ever seen a neighbor, so it was quite a shock when I saw so many people emerging from the line of houses that I had never seen someone come out of before. My host brother was running up and down the street taking pictures of anything he saw covered in snow, while my madre took me, Camila and the dog to the corner of the street to look at the main road and how it had changed with this new white covering. At first I felt a little silly standing outside in my pajamas and glasses with all those people there, but my mom was standing right next to me in her pajamas and slippers. Plus, that was part of the fun. I then proceeded to take several pictures of the street, cars and my host family laughing in the snow, some of which I posted above. It's hard to explain the atmosphere in words, but hopefully you can see some of the pure happiness and excitement shining through the pictures.

This was one of my best experiences here so far, especially since it was definitely a moment of family bonding for us, which made it even more special for me. I can only hope that I will get to witness more amazing events like this as the semester wears on.

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

P.S.~When we finally came back inside, I almost put on Christmas music because it seemed like that time of year again. And then I remembered that it's actually summer at home. That is so weird to me right now haha.

Tours, Asados and Harry Potter, oh my!

2007-08-07T17:45:00.000-07:00

Hola amigos! Sorry I haven't written in awhile but lots of stuff has happened, one of which has been rather distracting, but I'll get to that later. But to start, I'll talk about classes.

Where I last left you all, I had had one very stressful day of visiting classes. Well those days of visiting continued throughout the week, though they were not nearly as stressful as the first one. In fact, I'm still visiting classes to this day but I feel more confident in my choices at this point, and I feel that I'm close to making my final decisions. One class is mandatory for everyone in the program, the Advanced Spanish class. We were separated into two classes based on a written and oral assessment that we took during orientation, literally our second day here. Even though they kept stressing that there was absolutely no difference between the levels of the classes, it was quite obvious that one class was filled with "the kids who could speak" while the other had "the kids who were still struggling with carrying out a conversation." I definitely consider myself as part of the latter group, so I have to say that I was very surprised when I was put in the other group. Despite the intimidation, at least it will push me harder, right? The class looks like it's a balance of grammar and cultural readings, with a paper every week and a big research paper and presentation at the end. I honestly didn't think it would be this hardcore, but we'll see how it goes. At the moment, we've just been going over distinctly Chilean phrases and words, which I must say has been VERY helpful and equally fascinating. Now I can finally somewhat understand when someone says "cachai?" to me (it's essentially the equivalent of me entiendes or do you understand me?).

In addition to that class, I've decided to take the other class the COPA program offers, titled "Historia y Sociedad en Chile contemporanea" (History and Society of Contemporary Chile). It's essentially a history class of Chile ranging from the late 1800s to modern day, with discussions on human rights during the dictatorship, Chilean movies, field trips etc. Sounds interesting to me, and I can understand the professor which is a big plus.

Another class that I just visited last night that I'm pretty sure I'm going to take is "Raza e identidad cultural chilena" (Race and Identity in Chilean culture). It's about all the cultural influences and different ethnic groups that mixed together to form the modern-day Chilean identity and sense of nationalism. It talks about Spanish colonialism, French and Germans in Chile, the indigenous people etc. To an anthropology major, this class sounds fascinating and I really loved the professor, he was actually animated. The fourth class that I will probably end up taking is "Premio Nobel Literatura de Latinoamerica" (Nobel Prize literature of Latin America). Out of the five authors the class studies, two are Chilean (Pablo Neruda and Gabriela Mistral), so that's pretty impressive.

And now on to more exciting things, like what I did this past weekend! Saturday was a great day. COPA arranged a tour of the city with professional guides, and we split up into groups of five so that we weren't some huge mob of gringos walking down the street. We mostly walked around the center, through the Barrio Larrastias, past Cerro Santa Lucia, the Museo de Bellas Artes, the Plaza de Armas and La Moneda. I had already seen many of these places myself, but it was much more interesting when you had a guide explaining the history, obviously. For instance, I learned that the street I live off was named after a former president of Chile, Manuel Montt. I thought that was pretty cool. For lunch, we ate in the barrio of Bellavista, a very funky, artsy neighborhood with lots of cafes and restaurants. Then after lunch we visited Pablo Neruda's housein Bellavista, La Chascona, one of three houses he had in Chile. His house was actually made up of three different buildings, all rather small but filled with really unique, funky furniture and artwork. And we saw his Nobel Prize, shining through its glass case. Overall, it was pretty exciting.

After the tour we all went back to our respective houses to rest up for a bit before the big asado that night. That day was the birthday of one of the girls in the program and she had invited basically everybody in the program over to her house that night for an asado. Now I should probably explain to you what asado means since I've only mentioned it 20 times. It's basically a barbecue, with lots and lots and lots of meat. All kinds of meat: sausages, steaks, chicken etc. There was so much meat at her house it was insane, it looked like they were cooking an entire animal. The food was great, followed by cake, presents and dancing. All in all, it was a really great day.

Now to my distraction: Harry Potter 7. As most of you probably know, the last Harry Potter book came out on Saturday, July 21, less than 2 days after I left. Despite that agonizing fact that I was missing the release of the book by such a short amount of time, my wonderful parents promised to send me the book as soon as they got it that day (which they did). Two weeks passed and I was still waiting, despite the 7-10 day delivery estimate. But hey, it's Latin America, I was prepared to suck it up (though there were a few rough days during which I was very tempted to seek out the few, very expensive, English copies that I had heard rumblings about). Plus, I couldn't help but feel sorry for the poor Chileans, the Spanish version of the book isn't expected to come out until February. Lo and behold my patience paid off, since I received my book last night! So therefore I must warn you that I probably won't be writing again for at least another week, or until I finish the book. And with that said, I'm off to read some more!

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

Las clases empiezan

2007-07-31T16:28:00.000-07:00

Today was my first day of visiting classes. And even though I only visited two, I am exhausted. Let me tell you, this is no easy feat. The process is long, arduous, stressful and extremely complicated. First of all, you need to look through the 5 million course books you were given by each of the universities and pick out all the classes you would consider taking. Then you need to find out what days and times each of those classes are, see which classes conflict, realize that every class that you want to visit is at the exact same time, and figure out how many classes you could possibly visit in that two hour block. And then you have to find out where each of those classes are because, naturally, each university has at least 4 campuses all around the city. And, also naturally, even though you may want to visit several classes at the same university, they never seem to be on the same campus. So then comes the really fun part: figuring out how you are physically going to get to these classes, navigating through the oh-so-lovely public transportation maze of buses and metro trains. And once you see that two classes from the same university that you thought you could visit one after another (since there was a 15 minute window between them) are actually on two different campuses on opposite sides of the city, you realize that realistically you need 40 minutes instead of 15 to travel. So that really cuts down on how many classes you can visit per day and eliminates a lot of your options.

With all that said, I will now begin to describe my particular adventure. I visited two classes de la Universidad de Chile. The first was titled "Imagen de Chile en Pablo Neruda y Gabriela Mistral" (in other words, how Chile is described by its two most important Nobel prize-winning poets). It was in the Escuela de Gobierno (who knows why), and the tricky part was that this particular Escuela was not on one of the main campuses. Instead it was located somewhere deep within the center of the city. I spent a good part of last night trying to find it on a map and ten figuring out a decent route from my house. Even when I set out this morning, I was still guessing on the exact location. But after a few metro stops, an arrival at la Plaza de Armas (which is beautiful in the morning by the way, especially when there aren't a lot of people there), and a bit of walking accompanied by some skillful map reading, I found the building. Then came the task of finding the classroom. For some reason, this class did not have a listed room number in the course book, an added bonus to my quest. Therefore, a trip to the Secretario de Estudios was in order, where I asked where the class was and then finally, arrived. Luckily I had left so early that I had about a half hour before it began, enough time to compose myself and prepare a grammatically correct speech for the professor about how I needed to leave early in order to visit another class. To my surprise, a friend of mine from the program arrived not too long after, I hadn't known that she was going to visit that class. To my even greater surprise I then met another girl from George Washington University, who happens to be good friends with one of my good friends from high school, Diana Bardes. What are the odds huh? It is a small world indeed.

The class was very small and was actually mostly filled with gringos (I should point out now that here in Chile, gringo is not an offensive term at all, it's merely a fact of origin and race. Therefore, don't be alarmed if I keep using the term, I'm merely assimilating to the culture. Chileans in general have a very different scale of "political correctness," mostly a lack thereof. But that is another topic for another time). There were actually only two Chilean students in a class of about 10. The profesora passed out the syllabus and after discussing it for a few minutes,we arranged our desks in a circle and went right into reading poems out loud. It seemed like a very hippie-ish "you can express whatever you are feeling" class; well, it is a poetry class. Apparently there will be several talleres or workshops where we will write our own poems on topics that we pick out of a hat. I don't know if I agree with that. I mean, picking out of a hat what you're supposed to be expressing your most soulful emotions about seems kind of like an oxymoron. Anyways, at that point I had to leave for the next class, but my friend told me afterwards that they preceded to draw with oil pastels. I kid you not. I'm not so sure I'm going to return to that class, but we'll see.

My second class, an anthropology class titled Culturas Andinas, was on another La Chile campus in Nunoa, a barrio more on the outskirts of the city but closer to the mountains; even though it can be annoying to get to, it's worth it for the scenery. This required me to get on the metro again and take it back to the station nearest to my house, then get on a bus which dropped me off about a block away from the campus. Now here is where my problems really started. Last night a friend that lives in Nunoa sent me a hand-drawn map of where the bus would drop me off and where I needed to walk to get to the campus. I got off the bus, walked down the street and eventually arrived at a campus. Note that I saw A campus, not the campus. After walking around this campus for awhile, asking people where the Facultad de Ciencias Sociales was, and not really recognizing anything from the tour we had taken of the campus a week ago, I finally talked to a person who told me that I was at the wrong university. Perfect. Luckily, the La Chile campus was closeby and I could see the top of one of the buildings where I was. After finding the exit to the campus I was on (because of course there was only one entrance/exit through a mile-long gate that covered the whole campus), I made my way to the right campus, located the building and finally, the classroom.

Now I knew I was late, obviously. The class had started while I was still in the other class, but I was told that it was normal for foreign students to walk in and out of classes for the first few weeks and that the professors knew that. Nevertheless, it was still extremely awkward as I opened the door into a room full of silent, clearly Chilean faces and a professor who started at me until I found the one empty chair in the back of the room. I then preceded to figure out what in the world he was talking about, no easy feat in another language with a professor who was talking a mile a minute, and to calm myself down. But it was just my luck that after about 10 minutes of lecturing, he split the class up into groups of four to read articles and discuss them. Just what I needed: group work in a class that had been going on for a week that I just entered. Not to mention the whole Spanish thing. Surprisingly, out of my group of four, two of the other students happened to be gringos, so that was comforting (but of course, we still spoke Spanish to each other). A nice girl from Australia, who had been taking the class since the beginning, filled me in afterwards about what was going on and what they had done and I was smart enough to get her email address before we parted ways.

After the class I made my way back to the COPA office where I regrouped, made some photocopies of documents that I need in order to register my visa within my neighborhood (gotta love the bureaucracy) and met up with some friends. I ended my adventure with stopping by my padre's store on the way home and receiving a free chocolate bar, a much needed treat.

Whew, that was a long description, I'm sorry if I bore you. I must point out that this entry was written in blocks, interrupted by my little sister whisking me away to play jump rope with her in the hallway. Life is never still with Camila.

I also added some pictures of the campus that I am going to tomorrow, Campus Oriente de la Universidad de Catolica. It was a pretty crappy day when I visited yesterday, but you can still tell how beautiful the campus is. Note the contrast between the palm trees and the mountains, I found that very amusing.

Well, I'm going to bed because I have another long day ahead during which I'm sure that I will have many more adventures, but hopefully I won't get too lost.

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

Aventuras pequenas

2007-07-28T18:26:00.000-07:00

So yesterday marked my one-week anniversary of my arrival in Chile! It's kind of weird to think I've only been here a week because it feels like much longer and already I feel a bit more confident with my Spanish skills and a whole lot more confident with public transportation (well, at least with the metro). By the time I leave I'm sure I'll know it inside out.

In the past few days I have had more and more orientations/tours about the universities. I don't think I can listen anymore to someone explaining how to register for a class. The campuses are nice, especially U de Diego Portales, you can definitely tell that it's a private school. And it's unlike most Latin American universities in that it has only one campus, a plus for someone who has to learn how to navigate three different universities, each with over 20 different facultades. In between the meetings and tours we've had some time to ourselves, during which I've explored more of the city. I finally made my way into el centro and saw some of the big sites, such as the Plaza de Armas, la Catedral (which is humongous and beautiful), la Plaza de la Constitucion and el Palacio de la Moneda (where all the presidents of Chile used to live but what is now more symbolic, their equivalent of the White House). La Moneda is also infamous for being the building which was bombed and overtaken with Salvador Allende inside during the military coup of 1973. I put up some of the pictures of those places above. We also made our way to el Mercado Central, the big fish market where they sell every type of seafood you can imagine, as well as enumerable fruits and vegetables, half of which I had never heard of/seen before. I tackled my dislike of seafood during lunch when we ate at an all-seafood restaurant, although I wasn’t near as brave as some of my friends who got the ambiguous mixed seafood platter.

And while we’re on the topic of food, today I took a trip with a few friends to a nearby vineyard, la Vina Cousino Macul. For those who don’t know, Chile is known for its wine. It has a ridiculously high number of vineyards, all over the country, and there are quite a few around the greater Santiago area. We found one that was relatively near a metro stop and decided to make the trip. The tour was pretty much all foreigners , mostly Brazilians actually, so even though the tour was in Spanish, the guide spoke slowly because it was hardly anyone's native language. The tour was very interesting, we got to see big old casks where they used to store the wine for fermentation and the modern tanks that they use now, as well as the "bodega" or underground vault where they keep the bottles to age, I believe. Then we got to taste test some traditional Chilean wines, ones that you can only find in Chile. I felt very cultured.

Manana, I believe I am going to the park with mi familia, the last day of winter vacation for the kids. Starting Monday I'm sure that my family and I will have a more structured routine since I'll begin visiting classes and schools will start again. One more day of freedom.

Hasta la proxima entrada,
Erin

Mi familia y los primeros dias

2007-07-24T19:59:00.001-07:00

Hola! I can't believe that I have been here for almost five full days! I'm not sure if I feel like time has gone by fast or slow. There are times when I feel like I've been here forever and other times when I feel like everything is completely new (well, most of it is). At this point I have moved in with my host family and they are wonderful! My parents are extremely nice, friendly and very caring. Apparently they have had 8 exchange students before me, so they clearly know what they're doing and love doing it. The father owns his own little mini-market store around the corner from the house and the mother works at an office close by, I believe. I have a 6-year-old sister named Camila and she is probably the cutest little girl I have ever seen! I love talking to her and playing with her because I can generally understand what she's saying and I learn a lot of new words from her. She's always bringing her toys into my room wanting to play, although I think her favorite thing to do is play what I like to call our "juego de abrazos" (game of hugs or the hugging game). She holds up her arms and says "abrazo?" Then I hug her and she starts tickling me and it generally ends up with her rolling on the floor laughing hysterically. It's adorable. I also have a 17-year-old brother named Jorge, although I've literally only seen him for about 30 seconds because he was on vacation with friends when I arrived, and he just came back late last night. Then there's the grandmother who lives in the house and who is equally loving and adorable as the rest of the family. We had a nice conversation about Isabel Allende and she showed me the books she has of hers, two of which I recently read. And then there's the dog Lulu, a little fluffy white ball, the cutest dog I have ever seen. Lulu doesn't smell, slobber or bark even, he just gives you little kisses and snuggles in your bed; in my opinion, the perfect dog.

My house is located in Providencia, one of the middle/upper-class barrios (neighborhoods) of the city with lots of shops and cafes. It's also pretty centrally located, it's just to the right of "el centro" or center of the city, which believe it or not I have yet to visit. The house is only a few blocks away from the nearest metro station, and it's only a few metro stops from the program office and the center of the city. Speaking of the metro, I have to say that this is the nicest, cleanest, most modern and sophisticated metro system I have ever used/seen. I have yet to see one piece of trash in any of the stations, on the tracks or on the trains. All of the platforms have TVs that you can watch while you wait, although I have never had to wait so far because a train comes literally every 2 minutes or less. The trains themselves are very nice as well. The system is also very easy to navigate and use. You use what is called a "Bip" card, a card that you can put money on which doesn't expire and with which you can use for all public transportation. In addition to the metro there is an extensive system of buses, however it's very confusing to navigate and definitely not as fast. Apparently an entirely new system of transportation called "TranSantiago" was established in February and very few native Santiguinos even understand it, they all hate it. My family says the metro is the best and I definitely agree. Hopefully I will be able to use it to get to all my classes.

Yesterday we began our series of orientations at the universities, starting with la Universidad de Chile, better known as La Chile. We went to what was essentially an assembly for all the study abroad students of the semester from all the different programs, a room full of gringos. And lo and behold, I saw Christine there (for those of you not from my town, Christine is one of my friends from high school who is also studying in Santiago for the semester)! It was very exciting. During the meeting we received a ton of papers about registration and classes offered, only the beginning of the mound of paperwork that I need to read in order to figure out my schedule. After the meeting we got a tour of one of the campuses of the university. La Chile, including the other universities in Santiago, has many campuses around the city because it's so big, and each campus has various facultades. Unlike in the United States, the university system is very different because students don't choose majors. Instead, they basically choose a career path at the beginning and follow a very structured path of study, their "facultad." Therefore, they basically take classes with the same group of people for 4, 5, 6 years (I think it depends on the facultad how long it takes). Anyways, I'm going to try and take classes within the same facultad so that it will be easier to make friends with Chilean classmates.

Today was a free day, really the first time since I've been here that there wasn't anything planned. In the morning I took care of a few errands: getting my picture taken which I need to take to the International Police tomorrow in order to register my visa (one of the many bureaucratic processes in this country) and buying a cell phone. Getting a cell phone was extremely exciting because before that there was really no way to communicate with other people in the program, and thus very difficult to get together and do things outside of planned events. Afterwards, I met up with three other compañeros (classmates) to do some sightseeing, something I really hadn't done yet. We went to the Cerro San Cristobal region, a very nice area across the river where there is a funicular that takes you up to the top of a very big hill. A little way up the hill you can get off and visit the zoo, which is literally on the side of the hill. Otherwise you can go all the way to the top where there is a large statue of the Virgin Mary (an area called Santuario de la Inmaculada Concepción), a shrine and chapel for the Virgin, and spectacular views of the city. From there you can ride a cable car along the hills for even more amazing views of the mountains and the city. You don't realize just how big and expansive the city is until you see it from high above, it's HUGE! Everywhere you look you see the city and the enormous snow-covered mountains that surround it. Since air pollution is pretty bad in the city you can rarely see the mountains clearly with all the smog, but after it rains (which it did yesterday) it generally clears up for a day. Therefore it was a perfect day to see the view, although the mountains were still a little faded and are hard to see clearly in pictures. Overall it was a great excursion, very worthwhile.

Tomorrow we continue with the university tours/orientations, this time at la Pontificia Universidad de Católica, better known as La Católica. I believe that it is a private university and smaller than La Chile. Hopefully we won't have to take another tour in the rain, but the way things are going, it looks like it rains every other day and clearly this was the off day.

Hasta la próxima entrada (until the next entry),
Erin

Bienvenidos a Chile!!!

2007-07-21T22:28:00.000-07:00

Hola a todos! I'd like to welcome you all to my wonderful blog, which I will hopefully be writing in frequently throughout my semester in Chile. This is the first time I've ever done one of these (besides the good ole' LJ days) so we'll see how it goes.

I begin by saying I'm finally here in Santiago!!!! I feel like I've been waiting forever to get here, but now that I've finally arrived it seems like I've been here more than two days. Just last night I found it hard to believe that it was still my first day, it felt so much longer than that. Well, I guess that's what an overnight flight does to you.

Speaking of the flight, I guess I'll start there. So it was originally supposed to leave at 11:30 pm from JFK and get in at 10:05 am, which was already cutting it rather close since I had to be at the hotel by 12 pm that day. But of course I woke up Thursday morning to find out that the flight was delayed until 1 am. It didn't actually end up leaving until 1:30 so I got to the hotel a little late, but just in time for a nice hearty "almuerzo" (lunch for those lacking Spanish skills, I think I'll throw in some words every now and then, especially typical Chilean words, that way you could say this was somewhat worthwhile and educational to read). With soup, a big meat dish and full dessert at lunch alone, I could tell that meals were going to be a little different. At this point (although I only have two days of experience to go on, and most of my meals at a hotel), it seems that breakfast is small, lunch is big, and dinner is big as well but much later at night. But more on that later.

Flying into Santiago was amazing, all I could see where these endless, beautiful mountains. Finally the mountains opened up and there was the city nestled in a valley. They say that you basically can't go anywhere in Chile without seeing the Andes. I believe it. Well, at least in Santiago you always do because the entire city is surrounded by them, all covered with snow. I've been told that it rarely ever snows in Santiago, even in winter, which seems hard to believe. I haven't taken pictures of the mountains and the city yet, there hasn't really been time, but I'm sure that soon enough I'll have tons.

These past few days we have been staying in a hotel, Hotel Manquehue, and it's been really awesome. I have two roommates, one from Virginia and another from Hawaii, both really nice girls. There are 26 of us in the program, a nice small number I think. And believe it or not, 6 of us are from Northwestern (Go 'Cats!), we are totally dominating. People are from all over, but there are a fair number from the Midwest. The program directors are all really fun, 3 crazy ladies who glare at you if you talk to them in English but who are pretty chill in general. We've been having "cultural orientation" during which we had a few informational sessions on like security, some administrative stuff including filling out lots of paperwork, and a little bit of Chilean history and culture. We had a written test this morning to test our grammar and we also had an oral interview with two professors who will be teaching the program classes. Apparently they are going to split us up into two groups based on our writing and speaking abilities so that we get more individual attention in our mandatory Spanish class. I just hope I didn't do that badly, although I have to admit, my subjunctive was rather rusty and I've never been that good at demands. Oh well.

After the tests we had an "ejercicio" (exercise) that allowed us to become a bit more familiar with the city. Actually, I should say it rather forced us to do so because they basically sent us out there with some vague mission, a small map that is almost impossible to read (let alone navigate), a transit card to get us on a bus one-way, and a bit of money for lunch. My group had the task of figuring out how many metro stations there are in Providencia, one of the barrios (neighborhoods) of Chile, and to describe what was interesting about them. Well, I won't go into all the details now, especially since we only visited two stations and I'm sure that I will learn much more about them in the future. But let me just say that they are much nicer than I expected, super clean, modern, efficient and sophisticated. I mean, there are even TV screens on the tracks! Pretty awesome.

Tomorrow we move in with our host families! We actually already met them, they picked us up for dinner tonight and we got to see our houses. I could write pages and pages about my visit tonight and my first impressions, but I'll leave that to a later date. For now, I can say that I absolutely LOVE them and I can't wait to move in!

Well, I should go to bed and rest up for another long day of info sessions. Apparently tomorrow's theme is academics at the universities, registering and all that. Muchos besos para mi familia y mis amigos!

Ciao,
Eva :)