Pucón take 2

Last Pucón trip, Clarita won a few days free stay in the cabins that we stayed at with the group. Her, Jo, and I went back down a few weeks ago, conveniently skipping Montañismo class. We weren´t very hopeful about getting to climb the volcano because the forecast was rainy and cloudy but the one day of the month with a possibility of clear skies was during our stay, so we decided to go for it. We read, watched movies, walked around town, and studied (for an art history test that actually never happened, surprise surprise). One of the days we bussed out to Parque Nacional Huerquehue and did a hike. We hiked in the rain to a raging waterfall and then up through the snow to some pretty lakes. After arriving at the cabin soaked and freezing, we decided not to go back into town to sign up to climb the volcano the next day...it´d probably be rainy again anyways.

Of course, we slept in and woke up to a gorgeous day with the volcano clearly visible through our bathroom window. Thank you nature. Even though we didn´t get to climb the volcano, we had a really good time aaaand, by being lazy and not going into town the day before we ended up saving money :) Definitely a fun and worthwhile trip. Especially because Jo and Clare are awesome people...don´t think I mentioned that before, but they are and it would´ve been impossible to not have a good time with both of them around.

By the afternoon it was windy and cloudy again. We hopped on an overnight bus and headed back to Viña. Jo has photos so I´ll post them after she posts them to facebook and I get a chance to steal em! TTFN...

art is la raja

translation: the shit. Last Saturday I was in Santiago and went to el Museo de la Solidaridad Salvador Allende run by la Fundación Salvador Allende. It was eleven a.m. on a Saturday morning, so I was the only person in the building and the guard outside had to turn on a video exhibit and open some rooms just for me. The video exhibit wasn't very neat, it was a 'piece' by some woman who had linked together clips of explosions from lots of different wars. Everything else was really neat though. Some cool pieces were a giant fiberglass piece in the shape of half of Allende's glasses that you had to duck under and walk around and some really cool paintings. They had a really powerful exhibit up called "ausencias" by an Argentinean photographer named Gustavo Germano, about the dictatorship there between 1976 and 1983. He had taken old photographs of families, friends, couples, etc. and then in 2006 set up photos in the same spot/pose minus the people who had been assassinated/disappeared. Seeing the new photos with everyone grown older without their friends and family was really powerful.

As I was leaving the two guys working gave me some posters, probably because they were so excited to have someone actually come to the museum early on a Saturday and then I heading to the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, just a short metro ride away. I love the Santiago metro, by the way. The trick is to never ride it during rush hour or else you'll end up hating it. Not during rush hour, it's the easiest, cleanest, nicest metro ever, even if Bachelet got way criticized for the entire TranSantiago project. I like it, so there. Anyways...before going to the second museum I took a long walk to and then through the Plaza de Armas. They have a new exhibit up below La Moneda about Salvador Allende but I didn't go in.




The contemporary art museum was cool. Not very big, which is nice because I don't have the greatest attention span. I recognized a few statues (Juan Egenau and Sergio Castillo) from that one time I studied for my History of Chilean Art class :P But the coolest part was the exhibit of art from Japanese artists, especially Nobuyuki Takahashi (above) and Satoshi Hirose.

I take that back, SNOWBOARDING es la raja...

I've now been snowboarding twice here and am totally hooked :) The first time I went to Portillo with Gustavo, my host sisters' cousin and his friends. We spent the weekend in Los Andes, a town about an hour away from here, north of Santiago. We brought the grandparents along and stayed with my host mom's sister and her husband and kids. We watched Enzo play rugby, had an asado (barbeque), and chilled at the house. On Sunday I woke up early and headed out with Gustavo and his friends for the drive up to Portillo. One friend had a truck, the other was a military guy with military friends with season passes, and I borrowed basically all my stuff from them, Jo, and the uncle. Luckily all I had to pay for was renting equipment, pretty sweet. I was the only one snowboarding which was kind of lame because I didn't have anyone to help me pick it back up but I still handled pretty well and had loads of fun. Portillo is beautiful. To get to it you take las curvas, the road that crosses the mountains between Argentina and Chile and is really sketchy and terrifying because people drive as if their cars were like, safety bubble forcefields instead of the flimsy metal boxes they actually are. On the way up we saw a truck that had smashed into the side of the mountain. It was carting a bunch of paper and on the way down there was a mini traffic jam because people had stopped to steal reams of paper and wooden flats from the truck which had been abandoned by that time. There were families hanging around, some guys standing on their piles of paper drinking mate, etc. Of course the guys in our truck had to get in there too so we arrived back home loaded down with brand new printer paper. While they were out stealing from a guy who'd been stealing for way longer and had a huge stash all to himself, I was trying to find out where the cab of the crashed truck was. After a while I realized that the big blue square flat against the wall of the mountain used to be the cab and wasn't just a random piece of the vehicle. Craziness...poor driver.

So now that my random, kind of morbid tangent is over...Portillo is beautiful. The lagoon in the middle is gorgeous and when the sun sets it lights up the mountains. Sunsets in the Andes rival ones back home (sorry Polihale...). It has one run that takes you over the tunnels on the highway and a bunch of harder runs with these pole-lift things called button lifts I think off to the sides. Apparently it's a really good, famous spot. One weird thing is that the ski resorts here are above the tree line so there are no trees anywhere. They're also high up so you can get altitude sickness....definitely not fun.

Last week we went in a huge group to spend the night in Santiago and then head to Valle Nevado for the day. I was originally planning on coming back to Viña that night to take a test early the next day and get my classes over with but I decided to stay for an extra day with Jo and Claire, that's how much fun I had. The views from the mountain is breathtaking, especially from the top of the highest lift because you're surrounded by amazing views on all sides. It was really fun and helpful to go with other snowboarders because I went on harder runs then I did at Portillo and they taught me how to turn better and in general just helped out. There was a really cool ravine thing you could drop into and ride kind of like a halfpipe or even a wave. Snowboarding is like surfing but constantly -- no waiting for sets, you can just do what you want the entire way down the run. Soooo fun :D

The next day my entire body hurt...bad, but in a good way because I haven't done anything really physical in a while. We headed out again bright and early. Turns out it was two for one day so after shoving our way through a gigantic mob of people we finally got lift tickets and were off. The second day was more difficult, I was definitely woozy/probably had a bit of altitude sickness almost the entire day and by the end I was kind of zombieing my way down the runs, trying not to fall too hard. We made it back to Viña safe, sound, and sore.

I'm hopping on a bus to Pucón in two hours so I'll have to put fotos of Valle Nevado up later! I'm getting excited to come home and see everyone. Hope you're all enjoying your summers wherever you all are...I love having such a scattered, adventuring group of friends/family :) cuidense todos, chau!

Conciertos

Concierto Número Uno:

One Dancehall Festival 2008, el 7 de junio, con Tego Calderón, Sean Paul, Mala Rodriguez, DJ Raff, but not in that order. Olivia, Victoria, Betsy (fellow obie, yeah!), me, and Dani (Daniela, Olivia's host sister) bussed out in the morning and met up with her dad, sister, and stepmom in santiago, went to the concert and then stayed at their nice apartment in Providenca (una comuna de Santiago). The concert was great. Mala Rodriguez is from Spain and weird, but I liked her. Tego Calderón (reggaeton artist from Puerto Rico) was probably my favorite...guilty pleasure all the way. And Sean Paul was Sean Paul...I'm not a fanatic but it was pretty cool to hear the classics live. He came complete with four girls in like, spankies and tops that danced (kind of) which was awkward and this one awesome guy whose job it was to appear randomly and stomp his foot while twirling a shirt helicopter style over his head and hyping up the crowd. I want his job.

The next day we went to Cerro San Cristobal which is a famous hill/sporting area/park in Santiago. Rich santiaguinos go there to exercise and hang out. They also have these cool gondola type things called teleféricos (I think) that take you from cerro to cerro. Then we had an asado (barbeque) and bussed back to Viña.



Concierto Número Dos:

Three days later...I was back in Santiago to see Joss Stone with Pablo, Claire, and Jo. We chipped in for gas and all went in Pablo´s car which was nice. The concert was absolutely amazing. She was great, the band was great, her back up singers were great. Espectacular, fantástico, etc. and she´s only 20 years old!!! Everyone go buy her album...right now. Afterwards we hung out with some of Pablo´s friends in his house in Las Condes (the business/upperclass comuna of Santiago). His parents were traveling somewhere so we had the house to ourself (minus the nana, who´s probably almost always there) and got our own beds which was sweeeeet.



Then it was back to Viña to take a history test on: The History of Chilean Art (the entire history of chilean art), which never happened because after the profe arrived (late because he couldn´t find a parking space) he realized the copies of the text that the chileans got and the copies that the gringos got were both missing pages, but missing different pages...so the test was postponed to last week during a class period in which he didn´t even come AND it turned out to be easy. That basically sums up the education bit of my life right now which (thank goodness) is ending after July 7th because I told all my profes that I´m leaving to travel.

La Serena, PICHILEMU, and Laguna Verde/Las Docas

The day after my birthday the entire CIEE group hopped on a bus for a field trip to La Serena, which is quite a ways north of Viña del Mar IV Región. Once there, we went to the Observatorio Cerro Mamalluca, which is a small observatory 45 minutes away up in the mountains. We learned about la cosmovisión Andina (the Andean´s understanding of the stars as compared to our current one), got to see Saturn through a telescope, which was pretty awesome, and also listened to a live band playing música andina. The next day we hung out and went to the market in town. This is the beach by our cabins:



Then, two weekends ago, we went to Pichilemu, famous surf town (surf report here ... you can also check surf for Ritoque which is about 30 mins from Viña and is also really good) with really good waves. My friend Tamma´s best-friend from back home has a little brother named Geordie (17) who came down for a surf trip and ended up moving out there. He has a nice set up: room/apartment in the hostel connected to the Pin Pon, the restaurant where he eats (and once met the Malloy brothers, somehow). The town is adorable, small and dusty and deserted minus a small community of surfers from all over the world (Ohio, Australia, Cornwall, England, Brazil). It gets really busy and crowded during the summer but right now it´s really mellow.

We arrived Friday afternoon. Tamma surfed, I didn´t becasue it was freezing and getting dark. Saturday morning I rented gear and went out with Tamma and Geordie while Jo had a lesson with the surf school. She´s now hooked :) So...with a 5mm wetsuit and booties I paddled out to la puntilla. It was amazing to be in the water at a spot I´ve only heard about and seen in movies. But it was COLD. You get gnarly ice cream headaches duckdiving if your wetsuit doesn´t have a hood and after the first 1/2 hour or so, I could only think about how cold it was and it gets progressively harder to focus. Tamma went out again that day, I didn´t. I like surfing but think I´ll stick to warm water, chill, purely for fun surfing back home.

Since it was his last weekend there, they threw a goodbye fiesta Saturday night and everyone had dinner at the Pin Pon and then went to Disco127 (or just "the disco") which is basically the only disco in town. The next day we went to Punta de Lobos to watch the surf and then caught buses back to Santiago and Viña.

Here´s a satellite view of Pichilemu and Punta de Lobos (the two big bays) and some photos.

paddling out at Punta de Lobos...this is next to the two rocks (las tetas) in the foto below

Finally, this past Saturday Chett, Tyler, his Chilean brother, Rodrigo, and I went on a day trip to Laguna Verde and hiked to a beach called Las Docas. It was fun and pretty, the end...

see that tiny house on the point? it belongs to a famous chilean painter and I want it

cumpleaños :D

It's been a while, but I figured my birthday celebration still deserves a post because it was awesome! My chilean friends and sister got in touch with a few friends from the program and threw me a surprise party. I was completely surprised...had no idea. I thought we'd do something small the week after because the exchange program had planned a trip to La Serena leaving at 8:30am Friday, April 25th...not very convenient. Since birthdays are usually pretty anticlimactic, I was kind of relieved to not have to worry about it.

But...Max told me he was playing a soccer game at Santa Maria (my host sister and her friends' university) if I wanted to come watch Thursday. I went with my sister and Pablo (who left early to run to Max's apartment and meet up with everyone else). Then on the way back, Maca asked if I minded stopping by Max's apartment to pick up a notebook she'd left and surprise! everyone was there with the apartment decorated and music and drinks and delicious cake with candles, the whole shebang...they had planned out everything! everyone knew but me and lied like experts so I wouldn't find out :) We hung out in the apartment and then headed down to Scratch, a club in Viña to dance and meet up with Olivia and her friends because her birthday is also April 25th and they had had a separate, smaller gathering at her house earlier. We danced until really late, got home at 5ish, took a nap, and then hopped on the bus to La Serena at 8:30am the next morning. Fantastic :) Siguen algunas fotos (and a group shot off to the side):

Max y Pablo

Tamma y sus amigos

la Caroline y su hermano

Voluntariado (and student protest)

I have two community service/working with children-oriented activities that I'll be doing here that I'm really excited about but haven't taken the time to let y'all know.

One is through my class called Geografía Social. Each year the class works with low-resource (not sure if that's the best word, I can't really speak English or Spanish at this point) primary schools in Valparaíso. The students are split into small groups and each group is assigned a class that they go to each week. The overall purpose of the course is to instill pride and appreciation in the children for their city because they don't have the chance to really get out and look around and also, it's not something that's actively taught, obviously. The goal is to have a culminating project at the end of the semester, such as an outing to a museum, to the beach, or do a big art project with the kids.

As a kind of pre-volunteer activity, the class went to the Museo Cielo Abierto in Cerro Bellavista, Valparaíso. There are 20 works done by really well-respected artists that are located on the buildings, walls, and sidewalks of the neighborhood and it's really cool. Unfortunately, I didn't go with the class group and tour guide because a Chilean student from the Facultad de Geografía told me that there wasn't class because of the paro (strike, boycott). However, I am planning to go with a few others who missed it sometime this week to see the works in person and take photos.

Not-so-brief side note on the strike: Starting last week students at a lot of the universities around here and I'm pretty sure in other municipalities (so not Santiago) decided to strike (boycotting classes while simultaneously organizing marches, demonstrations, making signs, etc.) because of the TNE. The TNE is a newly proposed national school-pass that students use on the micros (buses) for a lower fare. They always have one but the new one, from what I've gleaned from various tiny conversations, would make prices in the municipalities go up by a larger percentage than in Santiago, is offered by the gremio (guild, association?) of the micros instead of whoever normally runs it, and apparently normally, a part of students' tuition goes to the government who then pays the gremio to subsidize student fares but for some reason this year the government withheld that money. Whatever the combination of reasons, students are pissed.

The way it generally works is that the student association holds a vote (either every day or every few days) to decide whether or not they want to continue the boycott. But in my university, the voting takes place by departments so it's really difficult to figure out whether or not I'll have classes. Last week there was a march and the students took over a few main streets and I got to see tear gas and tanks. As far as I know, no one got hurt, it was more or a routine "get out of the road" type confrontation. But tear gas sucks...

Since then it's mellowed down. There's a national action on Thursday and no one is sure how long it'll last. Apparently it happens all the time: students get pissed, strike, and then they get at least a bit of what they want (mine workers and probably other sectors I don't know about do it too). It actually makes me a bit ashamed of the U.S. because that would never happen now. Even if the population wasn't scared shitless of the government or super apathetic, they wouldn't know how to go about demanding that the government pay attention and give them what they want because they've forgotten how...and that's aside from all the possible technical political reasons why U.S. citizens act the way they do. Anywho, I'll have plenty of time to write blogs now because I hardly ever have university class...

The other volunteering I'm doing is once a week at El Hogar Teresa Cortés Brown (a girls' home), hanging out with a bunch of girls ages 7ish to 15 ish. There are 24 of them during the hours that I'm there in two tiny classrooms doing pretty much whatever they want, supervised (kind of) by one tía (aunty). For now, I'm just hanging out and talking to and playing with them but am planning an art project and am looking into setting up a penpal type deal so that they'll have something educational, interesting, and fun that actually lasts beyond the few months that I'm here. I was told to help them out with schoolwork if they need it, but it didn't seem like they had any homework and the school workbooks I did see didn't belong to anyone in particular, they were just being passed around like all the other pens, paper, and art supplies (scarce). It's really nice to hang out with kids at least once a week and interesting to watch how they interact with each other, the tía, and me (one realized I wasn't Chilean about 30 minutes in and then had me translate My Chemical Romance lyrics the entire time :P)

an exciting weekend

Hannah came from Santiago! So I woke up a few hours after arriving home saturday morning to meet her and her friend Ilana in Valparaiso. We went up to Cerros Concepción and Alegre (the touristy, picturesque ones) and walked around and drank real coffee (finally!). Then we met up with other friends back in Viña to go watch a soccer game (the article is in Spanish, but there's a picture). We went with a bunch of girls from CIE and Max(imiliano), Pablo, Alain, and some of their friends who showed up at the game.

We were rooting for O'Higgins (the away team from Rancagua) which was playing Viña's team, Everton. When we got to the field we bought tickets and had to go through security which was comparable to U.S. airport security but without the fancy machines -- no lighters, liquids, pat downs, everything. Then the fun started...soccer in Chile (and I'm pretty sure in almost all of Latin America) is so much more fun than soccer in North America. It was almost embarrassing how fome (boring) we are in comparison. We sit, drink beer, yell and stand up sometimes, and clap. But soccer fans here bring drums (snare and bass), yell, cheer, sing, clap, JUMP, dance, throw confetti, balloons, light flares (how they are allowed to have flares when they don't even let you bring in lighters, have liquids, or sell alcohol within the stadium is beyond me) etc. for the entire time...all two hours of it. There's a ten minute break at half time when some people stop for a bit to buy food or talk to friends but that's it. I heard the announcer once saying that it was "absolutely prohibited to launch projectiles" (ha!) but the rest of the time it was only O'Higgins cheers and yelling and swearing at the other fans and/or the players.

and sometimes it gets really interesting :) The game was tied for most of the time one to one but then O'Higgins started to win and the Everton fans got really mad. Like, throwing rocks at the O'Higgins fans mad and then beating back the riot police mad...beating them back...full plastic shields and helmets and billy clubs versus sticks, flags, jerseys, and rocks, and the fans managed to beat the poor poor men unlucky enough to be on duty into retreat formation behind their own little gate. Then...while the players are still playing (and I almost missed the best goal because I was watching for small boulders speeding toward my head) the O'Higgins fans started to rattle the bars in between the two sections. Then more people started doing it and the fans b r o k e d o w n t h e m e t a l b a r r i e r in between the two separate fan sections and flooded toward the Everton fans.

No one died, but the police and riot guys had to make them go back and then force almost all the Everton fans to leave the stadium (with more fighting and yelling and dogs). They fought them back all the way into the hill behind the bleachers, it was nuts... They arrested two guys and had to escort them out a different way along with one cop bleeding profusely from the head, poor guy. Then the game ended, O'Higgins won 3-1 and we waited because fans from different teams have to exit the stadium separately, which I now understand.

Apparently it doesn't always happen like that. Max explained that O'Higgins fans always go to watch the games and are super enthusiastic so the stands fill up and everyone is really excited for their team and then the home fans get more angry than usual...they actually canceled a game the next day because of what happened at the game we went to :( But I'm pretty sure that every game is two straight hours of yelling, jumping, singing, excitedness and am now a fan. Gringos are so fome (boring) when it comes to soccer...it's way more fun when everyone is amped up to watch the game!

Afterwards we met up with more friends in someone's apartment and I accompanied Hannah and Ilana to Valparaíso to check Ilana into a hostel and go dancing. Then on Sunday I made lunch for/with my host sisters and Emilio. I made tempura salmon to put inside sushi (with carrots, cucumber, green onion, avo, etc.) and they came out really really good. A perfect way to end the weekend, I must say. I miss food from back home! That's all, ta ta for now...

classes? ¿Qué clases?

Two weeks ago was semana mechona ("Freshman Week") at lots of the universities here which means that: 1. all classes are canceled after 11am and the ones that are supposed to happen before then usually don't because the professors know that not very many students will come and 2. the universities host outings (bonfires at night, trips to the beach, etc.), parties, and concerts during the entire week. The particulars depend on the university but it's a guaranteed good time...

Since it's an entire week off, almost all the gringos take advantage of the free time and go to Patagonia, Perú, whatever...some went to Uruguay, others to Buenos Aires, all over. My friend Tamma and I chose Mendoza, Argentina because it's beautiful, close, easy to get to, and there's lots to do.

We left Tuesday night at 10:30 and arrived around 5am, which includes going through customs. So the bus ride isn't really that long at all. We took a ginormous, double-decker bus that did 180 degree turns going through the mountains. I went downstairs once and it was really scary because the front of the bus is flat, so the driver would drive right up to the wall of the mountain almost stop, and then turn, turn, turn, turn and start up again (taking up the entire road in the process). I'm pretty sure it's way safer at night because you can probably see the headlights in advance...I don't even want to think about what would happen if you had to pass another car after one of those turns during the daytime. The car would get smooshed flat or knocked off the mountain, pobrecito.

The first day we checked into our hostel and slept a bit and then walked around and planned out what we wanted to do. We went to Parque San Martin which is almost as big as the city and really nice (picture below) and bought avocado, tomato, and crackers at the mercado central for lunch. Argentina is way cheaper than Chile and has better food (I don't think there's a Latin American country with worse food than Chile, actually...sorry chilean friends). Comparing Chilean food to Mexican food (real, not Tex-mex, U.S. style mexican) would be like comparing food in England to food in France or Italy. So we used fruit stands and supers for breakfast and lunch (breakfast for two = 4/5 pesos = $1.75 tops) and then got to go out for dinner every night :)

Other cool things about Argentina is that they have licuados (a blended fruit drink that's thinner than a smoothie, thicker than water, and super delicious every time) and you can get them with almost any fruit and with either water or milk.

70% of the male population has a mullet. I could write an entire blog about mullet varieties in Argentina...

Almost everyone drives really neat old cars.

Argentinean guys are really attractive.

They have REAL coffee. Not the instant Nescafé shit, which is fine, but gets old real quick when it's the only thing you drink.

Not so cool things about Argentina: people refuse to speak to you in Spanish. Even when we responded in Spanish or repeated what they were saying in broken English back to them in Spanish to verify what they were saying, they wouldn't switch over to Spanish. It was kind of frustrating because it makes communicating a lot more difficult and it makes no sense. One theory we have is that maybe they judge the amount they think we understand based on the fact that we looked like gringas and/or had different accents and just assumed that they were helping us out. At any rate, it was frustrating.

Nobody in Argentina has coin money...people literally laughed at me when I asked for change. They give you candy instead of monedas when you buy something and are supposed to get a few cents back. It's absurd. We finally figured out that 1. the machines on the buses don't give change back so that sucks them out of the system and 2. everyone hordes the monedas that they find to put into the coin-eating bus machines. No-one could explain where the coins went after the machines ate them until we met two random guys about our age who told us that they go the Buenos Aires to be processed and then are returned to banks so sometimes (only sometimes) the banks will have monedas. Very weird.

Other not so cool thing is that all guys ages 8 to 80 whistle or make noises or say irritating 'piropos' when you walk by. Piropos = compliments, but they're more irritating than flattering. It's super easy to ignore when it doesn't happen constantly, but it was almost constant in Mendoza. It's sometimes funny when a guy assumes you don't understand him but you do, but it's still irritating. We walked past a group of old men sitting in a group in the plaza and one was like "there go some pretty girls" and his friend was like "you're right, there go two pretty girls that don't want us (seeing as we're old and ugly and loitering in the plaza)" ... anyways, the point is that it happens a lot more in Argentina than in Chile.

All the big clubs are 20/30 minutes outside of the city in a line out in the middle of nowhere. We didn't go out but we drove past them on the way to hiking. I have no idea why it's set up that way...

So enough random facts...what'd we do?! The next day we took a bus to Maipu, a dusty flat town about 45 minutes outside of Mendoza, and rented bicycles for the afternoon. We got a map and rode to a family-owned liqueur and chocolate factory (the most delicious chocolate ever!) and to a few wineries. We did a tasting at one with the sample chocolate from the other store and then on the way back stopped at this guy's yard. He had converted his open-air garage into a kitchen, set up some tables, put on some classic 80s music, and had a full-blown super-cheap super-good restaurant going. It was a wonderful way to end the bike ride. Then I spent almost an hour begging for monedas to get back to Mendoza...but before that it was great :)

The day after that we went hiking in Aconcagua and then rapelled back down. There were three drops we got to rapel down: a baby one, a medium one, and one that was over 100 feet tall. It's pretty neat because you're basically walking/hopping down a vertical rock face and you can control your speed and go back and forth to explore and you're suspended in the air the entire time. Good fun. Finally we went to a hot springs for the afternoon to rest up and soak up some sun.

The final day we drank real coffeeeee and did some souvenir shopping in the plaza. They have really nice leather things in Argentina (belts, shoes, bags, bracelets, earrings even). Then we came back to Viña/Valpo... I really want to go back to do more hiking and to snowboard this winter, especially because it might be cheaper in Argentina than in Chile. There are lots of cool spots to go in Aconcagua, we just didn't have enough time or the right equipment. Also, it's probably two more bus rides of about the same length to Buenos Aires, which is totally doable from here (time and money permitting) so with some luck, I might end up going back...if not this semester then some day! Here are some photos:

Field trips

Now that I've stolen photos from facebook friends of the CIEE trips, I figured I'd update everyone before I head off on another adventure and get too far behind.

A long time ago, we went to Rabuco, a small town? area? in the country. We got to tour a grape farm (not quite sure what you call places that grow grapes but aren't vineyards)...the fields and the sorting and packing and everything. They were packing them in Dole packaging so I'm not sure if it's a private owner that sells to Dole or if Dole owns the entire thing, which is more likely. I asked how much they get paid for picking and I don't remember exactly how much it was but I remember being bummed out because it wasn't much. It was by the box, 70 pesos I think and the boss guy told me that a really experienced worker could pick 150 boxes a day (they aren't that big) so...something like 150 x 70 = 10,500 pesos which is around $22 a day USD, give or take. Each person has a number and a specific task, whether it be picking, weighing, sorting, packing, etc. and each task has a different pay rate. It was really interesting to see exactly where our fruit comes from and how it's grown and talk a bit with the people who grow it.

Afterward we played some football/soccer, ate some empanaditas, and watched/learned the cueca, a traditional chilean dance that they pretty much only do at festivals and celebrations and stuff. They basically trot around in a circle and then go toward each other and back and then trot around again in a different pattern in a slightly different step. More complicated than just trotting, but that's kind of what it looks like.

Then, a few weeks ago, we went to Pucón, an overnight bus ride south of here. It's a beautiful, touristy town with a lake and an active volcano. There's loads of adventure tourism: river rafting, mountain biking, climbing the volcano (and snowboarding/skiing down during the winter time), hiking, horseback rides, etc. The program put us up in cabañas (cabins) that were super nice, like flat screen tv, jacuzzi tub, food and impeccably made beds appearing miraculously kind of nice, which was odd but fun. The first day there we went to Currarehue, a smaller town nearby. We went to a Mapuche museum (the Mapuche are Chile's largest indigenous group) and ate a lunch of their traditional food...absolutely delicious (quinoa, squash, piñones from a tree that grows in the area, tuber/potato things). Then we went out into a field/forest area nearby and hung out with some Mapuche women and their kids. They showed us how traditional weaving is done, how to play a traditional game that was like field hockey, how to do one of their dances, etc. Then we just hung out and talked and at the end made maté and sopaipillas over a fire (also really really good, but they make their maté with the cup full of leaves and stems so it's super strong and bitter). It was a nice change from visiting museums and going on tours -- more interesting and fun but still informative.

The next day we all chose different activities in the town. I went with the g roup who did river rafting and it was so fun! They made us wear ridiculous outfits (picture to the right somewhere) and taught us basic instructions, row forward, backward, kneel on

the inside of the boat and hold on for dear life, stuff like that. The water was pretty cold but not too bad with a wetsuit and the scenery was really beautiful. At one point we got to walk around a rapid that was too big to go down with everyone in the boat, jump off a little cliff, and swim like mad to the boats before getting swept away...good fun :) The last day we went to see waterfalls and swam in some hot springs before taking an overnight bus back.

cosas generales

I just realized that I haven't really written about what my daily life will be like when I actually settle into a schedule, which is starting to happen now that I've registered for classes and gotten used to getting around Viña and Valpo.

So...breakfast is whatever you want whenever you get up because everyone does different things in the mornings. Sometimes Marce works, Wale goes to do her residency, Maca has classes or sleeps in, and Pame always has school. There's only instant coffee here, I've seen one coffee brewer deal since I arrived -- in the CIEE office in Viña. They also don't really understand why anyone would want cold coffee, so iced coffee isn't an option unless you make it yourself.

I'll have class starting next week Monday through Thursday. They all start at 14:00 or 16:00 except for one at 8:15 on Tuesdays (everything here is done according to the 24 hour clock system except for when you're talking with someone...more or less). I'm taking a course on Globalization and Chilean Identity through CIEE (the independent study-abroad program), Comunicación y Cultura Chilena (through PIEE, the exchange program at the university), Historia Urbana y Regional de Valparaíso, Cultura y Literatura Brassileña, Historia del Arte Chileno, and Geografía Social (which, from what I know so far, is a lecture once a week and then excursions to teach children in the community).

Claire, a friend from the program, and I also signed up to work with Un Techo para Chile. It's a government-sponsored program whose goal is to eliminate encampments by the year 2010. They build mediaguas, which are buildings shared by the community for classes, town meetings, or whatever, as a basis for community-initiated growth in the future. Volunteers also work with the community to help them realize whatever goals they feel most important,working toward the formation of a strong community and integration into broader Chilean society. Anyhoot...

I'll be commuting to Valparaíso for some of my classes, but it's easy; I just take a micro (bus). The history building is right by our apartment and it's amazing. It looks like a castle...I'll take pictures soon.

Lunch is between 1 and 3pm and is a big deal. Salad or vegetable of some sort, bread (basically 70% of food that's eaten here), a main course, and dessert. 'Once' is between 7 and 10 and is usually tea or coffee, bread (of course) with jam and butter or simple sandwich fixings.

If I have the afternoon off I can go jogging by the water, to the beach, or exploring. Nothing is very far away -- walking and buses are all you need. However, I'm expecting to have a lot of reading and prep during the week because classes are way more self-directed here than in the states. My PUCV classes only meet once a week and everyone has told me that it's up to the student to read everything on the reading list on their own time and prepare for whatever they think will be on exams.

Then it's the weekend! So far, that means hanging out with my host family, then going out with my host sister and friends or a few students from CIEE. Sometimes we just hang out at friends houses until 2 and are back around 3ish, but usually we go dancing...for hours and hours and hours. Then sleeping...not very much. It's actually pretty ridiculous...I'm always amazed at how many people are out, even during the week. But the hours and hours of dancing are great :) I've met some really nice people around our age and am a bit nervous (but also excited!) to start classes and hopefully meet some more friendly people. It's really challenging to understand everything that's going on when I'm in a big group of people all talking at once, but it's always a good time and I'm sure it'll get easier in the coming months...

I'm off to make tortillas with the familia. Tortillas here = a quiche-like dish, so I'm making them tortillas gringo-style :P ¡ciao ciao!

Carreteando y la playa :D:D:D

carretear = slang for going out with friends (to dance or do whatever I think)

A few nights ago my oldest sister's pololo (boyfriend) played with his band in the basement of el huevo, one of the main clubs in Valparaíso. They play classic rock and were really good. They're called malmenor (click on the name to go to their myspace, Emilio is the guy playing guitar). Afterwards las gringas (white foreigners), Solveig (who is Norwegian and Swedish and also really tall and therefore impossible to lose), Claire, Kate, and I went upstairs to dance in el huevo. It's genius: four different floors (I think) each with different sections and music. They play reggaetón, eighties, electronica, hip-hop, banda (that's what it's called in Mexico at least. I think they're called rancheros here, but I'm not sure) and salsa on the roof. We met a salsa teacher named Rodolfo who spun me around like crazy and dipped me to the floor...the whole enchilada but I was only able to pick up the basic basic step and just followed as best as I could. Muy muy entretenido==>fun.

The only bad thing about going out here is that you can't count on getting any sleep. From what I've seen (which isn't much), if you're meeting up with friends first, it might not be until 2/2:30am until you actually go somewhere to dance and el huevo stays open until 5am most of the time. So I'm guessing that getting home between 5-7am is pretty normal. I'm not sure if that's the Chilean m.o. but as of now, I'm counting on more than enough time on the dancefloor but a super messed up sleep schedule. We'll see...

Other fun stuff = the beach!!!! Finally! Today we went to Ritoque, a beach about an hour away. Fernando (Marce's boyfriend from Santiago) and Emilio came and it was really fun. Marce drives kids to school (not sure if I said that yet) so we used the big yellow van. We picked blackberries on the way and picnicked and walked on the beach. There were waves, jellyfish, things called aguas muertes (dead waters) that were like clear pieces of gelatin but I don't think they're animals, and sand/sea fleas!!!They're so disgusting! You could feel them under your feet in the water because there were so many. It was super cold anyways but still really gross. These were the jellyfish that had washed up. They're huge with curly tentáculos and stripey stuff on top.

I'm choosing classes tomorrow in Valparaíso. It's going to be crazy confusing because the system's a bit different here but it should be fun. I'll probably take a bunch of art classes so I'm not too overloaded. I'll post pictures of the beach on the side panel =====>

chocopandas y pokemones

Mullets are cool in Chile!!!! I was seeing a lot of them and I asked what they were called and Vale told me an interesting story that goes like this: street vendors get on buses to sell sweets and ice cream and drinks and then get off to sell their stuff on other buses. Pretty standard stuff, but they were the ones who originally had mullets. A popular ice cream is called a chocolito and the brand is panda, so they would yell "chocolito, cien" or "chocopanda, cien" and now kids of the middle and even upper class have stolen their hairstyle and it's called a chocopanda. They aren't like, over-the-top mullets but are definitely short on top longer in the back, genuine mullets. Dreadlock one are also pretty popular.

Another thing I've been trying to learn are the different stereotypes here. One is a 'pokemón' which is someone who dresses a certain way (straight, emo-ish hair and hats. They listen to reggaetón)...I'm not quite sure what else, but it's fun to say. They also told me that 'flaites' are people who think they're gangster. There are also emo (pronounced: "eh-mo"!) and hardcore :P That the kids here would have their own stereotypes is something that I never thought about but makes a lot of sense and is really interesting. Hopefully I'll figure it all out :)

Lima, Santiago, y acá

...acá = here and they use it loads in Chile...

So, I arrived in Lima, Peru around midnight and after waiting on my plane which was connecting to Santiago, was told that I was on another plane leaving for Santiago. By the time I got to that one it had left because we had arrived a bit late anyways. The two others leaving for Santiago were already full (of course). LAN (the airline) gave me a hotel room for the night. It was a Ramada connected to the airport and way nicer than the ones in the US. However, I was the only person besides staff that I saw the entire time (2am to 6am, so not that weird, but still...).

I got to Santiago late but safe, hopped on a shared shuttle deal, and after a minor crash arrived at the Hotel Torremayor and met up with the group. The driver was getting irritated with a backpacker from New Zealand who didn't know which hostel he was going to so he turned around to swear at him and ask him to find an address in the book because there are many hostels in Santiago. But we were rolling and drifted to the side...and smashed into one of the cement cylinders lining the side of the street. Pobrecitos...tourist and irritated driver both. He just looked at it and got back into the car. Luckily, I was able to translate enough so that we eventually found a hostel with an address.

While in Santiago we went to La chascona, one of Pablo Neruda's houses, La moneda (the main government building), and I got to see Hannah! La chascona was so cool! Neruda (born Naftali Reyes(?) Basoalto...who knew?) used it as a secret spot to be with his lover, Matilda Urrutia, who later became his third wife, and for his dinner parties/meetings with special people. They told us that chascón is a quechua word that means messy-haired, so the house was named after the curly-haired Matilda. There are all kinds of neat things in it. It has great views and is kind of like a ship, with windy staircases, portholes, a mess-like dining room, etc. We couldn't take pictures in most places and I don't have any of Hannah and me, but I do have some:

view from one balcony of La chascona

from one of the courtyards to the circular balcony. The courtyard above had a humongous grapevine with loads of fake-looking, delicious grapes.

La moneda

a government building (I've already forgotten which one/the importance) and some government dudes to the left of La moneda

Por fin...

I´ve finally arrived in Valparaíso/Viña del Mar! We got here yesterday afternoon, had lunch and some presentation/discussion time during which it was really hard to focus because everyone was so nervous about meeting their host families...and finally, they came to pick us up. My family is really nice; there´s a single mom named Marcela or Marce which was the name of my last host mom :), Valeska (25, finishing her thesis for a degree in psychology), Macarena (22, going to university, but I´m not sure where), and Pamela (16, loves music and is a bit quiet but also really nice). Right now there´s also a cousin and his friend visiting (Enzo and Marceal, but I´m still not sure which is which) from the Andes.

They´ve had host students before and I think they were as relieved as I was after talking for a bit. I think we´ll get along really well. I was glad that I had photos of Russell and Donovan because they were a great ice breaker and helped me explain that everyone in my family eats meat, I love seafood and am actually not that picky when they were wondering what type of vegetarian I am. The mom (Marce) embroiders beautiful, beautiful scenes that are hung around the house and Valeska paints so the photo book of Kauai that I brought was a lucky pick -- she said she´d probably end up using the photos for another piece. They have an adorable dog named Ino who is white and fluffy but not one of those irritating kick-dogs the size of a football that never shut up. He´s the regalón of the family (spoiled) and isn´t allowed in my room because he walks on the windowsill and they´re afraid he´ll break the window and fall all the way down.

I´m in the CIEE office in Viña and I think we have to go soon; we´re doing a practical tour of Viña and Valpo today then taking a language placement test. More on where I live, the journey here and PICTURES in a bit...

I'm studying abroad!

...almost. There are 17 days until I leave for Chile! I'll be studying at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso in (guess where...) Valparaíso for five months. This will be my blog while I'm abroad so that y'all can see what I'm doing and I don't have to feel bad about not sending out regular detailed emails. Writing about my daily life for anyone in the world to read kind of weirds me out but I guess in this case it's useful :P

As for now, I'm reading, practicing my Spanish, praying for the rain to stop, and killing time until I leave. I'll be in San Pedro and Santa Barbara, CA from the 17th to the 24th visiting family and my two fabulous friends. Then I'm off!

Kyle and Sarah, the gals I'll be visiting in California.