The end?

I haven't written in a while...and since I've last written I've traveled to Peru and to Patagonia.  In Peru I went to Arequipa, the 2nd biggest city in Peru, and closeby is the Colca canyon, which was absolutely beautiful. Next we bused to to Puno, Peru and visited Lake Titicaca, and the Islands.  The floating islands were made completely of reeds, which was really cool, and Taquile, where we ate lunch, had the most beautiful view.

Two days after returning from Peru, we flew down south to Patagonia, which was quite possibly one of the most beautiful places i've ever been to. While our trip started off slow, (we slept on the floor of the airport for two hours, then slept on a couch of a hotel for an hour and half), Torres del Paine national park was absolutely beautiful, and the view from our hotel was like nothing i'd ever seen. Another day we went over to Argentina to see the Perito Moreno Glacier.  I will put up pictures soon.

I spent 6 more days in Santiago, and tomorrow I leave pretty much for good.  I will come back to pick up suitcases, but will no longer be staying with my host family, and when I return, most of my friends will not be here.  This semester has gone by faster than I ever thought it would. I've been gone for 6 months, and the experiences and memories will never be forgotten. I can't believe it's over...It seems like I got here yesterday.

I'm traveling for about 3 weeks, then will be home after new years, and then it's back to real life...

Almost there!

So it's been a while. I spent this past week working. a lot. Almost as if I was a real student. I finished my incredibly long paper--20 pages single spaced, with a 3 page bibliography and an annex (what?) with transcripts of all of my interviews, and came to a grand total of 39 pages. After this and three more exams this week, Thursday at 4pm could not have come fast enough. But it's here! Only one more exam and one paper left, and I’m on vacation!

Last weekend we went to Santiago’s gay parade, or as they called it 'open mind fest'. We walked around for a while and I was impressed. In general, I've found that  the people here are not very open to gays, and that might be a bit of an understatement. But this 'open mind fest’ shows the society is changing, that the people are moving towards having an open mind, which is so important. The youth of today are the children of those who spent most of their youth during the dictatorship (1973-1989). The life of the youth today is completely different than life around 25-35 years ago. It's pretty cool to see the changes happening, and it makes we wonder what's in store for Chile in the future.  This was my excursion for the weekend, and I spent the rest of my time in my room working. Not so much fun.

Yesterday we went to the general cemetery of Santiago. The place is absolutely huge. Apparently over 5 million people are buried there. What was so interesting about the place was that the class divisions are so clear. Each section is separated by a small road. We started in the wealthiest area, which had small buildings, really intricate and beautiful. Sometimes the coffins were housed in the buildings as opposed to in the ground, which is more common in the states. The above monument is a memorial for Salvador Allende, the president from 1970-1973 before the coup d'etat with Pinochet. Our guide (the same one from villa grimaldi) explained the irony of Allende being buried in the wealthy area of the cemetery because one of his goals was to work on the social inequality.

As we continued to walk through the cemetery, the buildings got smaller as the burials were for upper middle class. Then instead of buildings, they were single burials. The pictures above are from middle class, (I think, I can't really remember). Victor Jara, from the bottom picture, was one of the most famous Chilean folk singers, who was killed during the dictatorship. His tomb had a lot of flowers, and there was a guitar close by that a lot of people had written on.  His wife had him buried in this part of the cemetery because it was where she thought he would want to be buried, which is pretty humble.   As we were in the cemetery we watch a funeral procession, and the people were in street clothes, which I thought was interesting. Our last stop in the cemetery was the wall of remembrance for those who disappeared or were killed during the dictatorship.  There were a lot of names on the wall, which was pretty powerful.

Not sure what's in store for today or tomorrow, I should probably do some work but once again have lost the motivation. This past week or so was an exception to the rule. By this Wednesday or Thursday I will be done. Then it's travel time! After our goodbye dinner Thursday night (our own version of Thanksgiving), a friend and I are off to Peru! We hope to spend a few days at Lake Titicaca and do a one or two night homestay with people who live on the islands in the lake. I can't wait!!!

We're almost done here, I just can't believe it. Where has the time gone?

Villa Grimaldi

Today was a tough day. We spent the afternoon at Villa Grimaldi, which just 26 years ago was one of the over 700 secret torture centers during Pinochet's dictatorship (1973-1989), where people were murdered and 'dissapeared'. While it was not easy to visit this place, I think it's important in Chile's recent history. The place was beautiful, which I feel is a little ironic. Our guide was a guy who had actually spent time as a prisoner in Villa Grimaldi in 1975, which made the experience especially emotional. After a brief overview of the history of Chile immediately before the dictatorship, we started to walk around, and we took the path that the prisoners did.

We first went to the  front door. The plaque above says 'Here began the prisoners journey. Old entrance. This door will stay closed forever. Today the entrance to Villa Grimaldi is at the other side. The old door is locked shut.

One of the next stops was the first torture chamber. All of the buildings were destroyed at the end of the dictatorships, but some have been recreated. Hearing about the torture techniques almost made me sick. The peoples' legs and arms were tied, and they were blindfolded, with one time a day to go to the bathroom, and 3 minutes to eat lunch. I won't go into detail, but the inital torture treatment was between 1 and 3 hours of electric shocks, along with beatings and so many more terrible things. The second room involved more electric shocks, but with metal bunk beds, so that one could listen to someone else suffer.

Torture room. Metal beds with electiricty

Although you can't see very well, this is a wall of names of people who had dissapeared. We next walked over to a tower where some people were kept in solitary confinement and taken out once a day to be tortured. There is a beautful rose garden dedicated to all of the woman murdered and raped in the torture centers in Chile. 

Throughout the tour, our guide shared some personal experiences, or experiences of friends who had spent time in Villa Grimaldi, and the stories were heartbreaking. It's so hard for me to fathom that this was happening less than 30 years ago. Our guide was 23 when he was taken to the torture camps, and spent 13 months in total in 3 different camps. 23 is not that much older than I am, and I can't imagine being in that sitution. Seeing this place- this evidence- made me so angry that there are still people who deny, or try to diminish the important of existance of the camps. While I can understand the opinion that Pinochet did good things for the Chilean economy, how can you disregard the violation of human rights? I would say the Chile is still very politically divided. About 40/45% of Chileans agree with the dictatorship.

One story our guide told me affected me especially. He told us that there was a man who wanted to get married at Villa Grimaldi. While the first thought was that the man was ignorant, uninformed or insensitive, the reason was that his father had dissapeared at Villa Grimaldi, and he wanted his father to be with him on one of the most important days of his life.

This visit eerily reminded me of the holocaust. While I know they are completely different,  hearing about the horrible treatment of these 'communists', the feelings were similar.  I felt like I was walking around a concentration camp. The idea of this place though is a memorial, and just like the holocaust, it's our reminder of the past to ensure-never again.

It amazes me that our guide gives tours 1-2 times a month. He has to relive these horrible memories every time. They have to be so strong.  It's so important though, we need to remember even the horrible parts of our history.

Sorry if this was a bit of a downer, and a bit more serious that usual, but I guess this visit impacted me a lot more than I had expected...

Salsa, Poll dancing, and Halloween

We spent the weekend in Santiago which was nice since we hadn't really done for a while. Being ambitious, we decided to go out on Thursday night. Since I started teaching English Thursday mornings and having to get up at 6:30, I usually am so tired at night that I go to bed early. I decided to rally this time, and we went to a barrio we had never visited, Barrio Brazil. It's crazy that we've been here for more than 4 months, and theres still so much more to see. We went to this Mexican restaurant with delicious food and margaritas. We wanted to go out dancing after, but the club we were looking for was closed on Thursdays. We went to another neighboorhood, and walked around, but of course at 12:30/12:45 everything is still empty. We sat at a club that had a live band, and I was falling asleep in my chair. I decided it was time for bed. I made a valiant effort though--got home around 3am.

Friday afternoon we had a talk about Religion in Chile. I'm taking a religion class this semester, and I think all of it is so interesting. There's so much about religion that I don't know about, and especially in the context of Chile, which is a rather catholic country, it's especially interesting to learn about. I went to a salsa club for a friends birthday. I hadn't gone salsa dancing in a few months, but it was extremely fun. At first I was horrible, and not that I magically became fantastic, but I started to get the hang of it. It's nice because at salsa clubs people will ask you to dance, you will dance for a song or two,  say thank you and then you part ways. Its fun to dance with different people, and not have to worry about the creepers you might find at other types of clubs. We got there early, around 11:30ish, and after dancing for a couple of hours, everyone cleared off the dancefloor and there was----a poll dancing competition. of course. The lucky contestants were two woman, one guy who probably should have kept his shirt on, and then one tiny woman in her 30s or 40s who climbed up the poll. Bottom line: very entertaining. At around 3 they started playing reggaeton music, and we decided it was time to go.

Saturday, Halloween!! Definitely not as popular here. Apparently it because a holiday as we know it about 5 or 10 years ago. There were a lot of parties that probably were 'halloween parties' but no one really dressed up, it was very easy to spot the foreigners. We decided we had to dress up--i mean it's halloween, so we bought wings and went as fairies. We went to a club in an ex-factory, which was huge, and had 3 or 4 floors all with different types of music. It got packed really fast. When we decided to leave, there was a line of people waiting to get in, at around 3:30am. I don't think i'll ever get used to the nightlife here...
out 3 nights in a row, impressive right?!

I'm in my last 3 weeks of classes, crazy! Time to do all the work that I didn't have all semester, uh oh...

Mendoza!

So this seems like it's mostly just a blog about weekend trips...my weeks (Monday-Thursday) are mostly uneventful, involving class, homework (I actually do have stuff to do) and relaxing. This morning I had a 40 minute spanish presentation in my religion class, which was pretty scary. I've never talked for that long infront of a group of spanish speakers, but I survived and it went okay. Next up an final paper of 25 (single spaced) pages. The newest development, that it was single spaced paper, was a bit of a bummer. When I finish, not only will it be the longest spanish paper I have ever written, but the longest paper I have written. ever. So we'll see how this goes...It's weird that I have less than one month left of classes. By Nov 25, I will be done with everything and on vacation! I cannot believe that it is already almost November...time is flying, and it's absolutely insane...I don't like it very much.

So this weekend was Mendoza...There's a group of students at Universidad Católica who plan trips for exchange students, so we decided to go with them instead. I had a good time, but I learned that I would much rather plan trips on my own. We got to the bus around 9:30 am on Friday. While Mendoza is really close to Santiago, because we have to cross over the Andes, it takes more time. The bus is probably about 7 hours. Everyone told me the trip over is beautiful. While it was pretty, I have seen a lot of other prettier things since I've been here.

                                                            view from the bus

We arrived around 5:30 and went to the apartment we would be staying at for the next two nights. The place was alright, and if the beds were taken out of the living room, the paint changed, the windows changed (they were like prison windows), and the kitchen changed, I could maybe think about staying for longer than 2 nights...
We went for a walk to the big park, and spent less than 5 minutes there before deciding it was time to eat (here I go with the food again). We found this really good parrilla restaurant, with really good argentinean meat and got meat, salad, wine and dessert for 32 pesos ( a little over 8 dollars!) We decided to go out dancing later, and it was actually a lot of fun. We only stayed out until 3 which meant that people had just started dancing, but it was still a good time.

5 hours later we were up and on a bus for a day of tours- city tour, chocolate factory tour, vinyard tours, you name it. We saw all different parts of the city, got to eat free chocolate and try lots of different wines. I would call the afternoon a success.
That night we decided to go out with the group, which was decidedly not a success. They took us to a club and we got there around 11:30, about 3 hours two early. There was no one there, so after about two hours of sitting, we decided to leave. Across from our apartment building we found an open icrecream store. It was my first time I had ever seen icecream stores open after 2am. We sat outside and ate our icecream, which was delicious. Best part of the night.

Sunday was more relaxed. We walked around, ate, and went to the plazas which had a lot of artesania. At 10:30 pm we boarded a bus back to Santiago. 10 hours later, we made it home. I drifted in and out of sleep for most of the ride, but one time when I woke up, there were a lot of police on the bus and they were checking bags. Apparently we pulled over to the side of the road and stayed there for over an hour and a half, but  I was unaware of this at the time. Around 4am we all had to get off the bus to go through customs, which consisted of waiting in one line to "leave" argentina, and then wait in another line to "enter" Chile.  It was really cold out. In line, I learned that we were stopped for a long time because two girls tried to smuggle drugs across the border. Each had 1 kilo of cocaine, to be exact. I guess the dogs found it, and they got off the bus. I would not want to be in their shoes.  Around 8 we made it back to Santiago, just in time to hit the morning metro rush.

No upcoming weekend trips as of now, but possibly the beach soon? It's finally getting warm out here!

Buenos Aires!

Just warning you all this is a long one...

This past (long) weekend was our first trip outside of Chile--Buenos Aires, Argentina! It amazed me that less than two hours away from Santiago (shorter than my normal trip from Boston to St. Louis) was a city so completely different. This is not to say that I liked one city more than the other, only just that it was like being in two different worlds.

1. the accent-- Argentineans and Chileans speak completely differently. All the Chilean modismos don't work in Chile. I found myself holding back my 'si pohs' more than once. Argentineans also pronounce "y" and "ll" differently, more like the "su" in casual. There were many times when I asked someone where a certain street was and when I said the word "calle" without the different pronounciation, I got a lot of funny looks.

2. About a week before I left, I was walking back from a coffee shop, and two young girls handed me a brightly colored flyer. When I looked at it, it was a flyer with the message "abortion is homicide"

At la plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, I was approached by a woman who was representing a campaign about AIDS awareness and prevention. This contrast in issues has really stuck with me.

Now onto my trip...

It started out late, as our flight was delayed about 2 1/2 hours. We got to our hostel around 1:45, and instead of going to bed, we got dressed and went out to a club. The club was absolutely packed, I'd say almost a little too crowded, so we left around 4:30am to go wait in line for tickets to the Argentina/Peru soccer game. It was a really important game because Argentina had to win in order to possibly classify for the world cup. We waited for about 3 hours, and by that time I was pretty exhausted, but had a ticket! We got back to our hostel around 9am, and after only having slept for about 6 hours of about 30, we decided it to take a nap and wake up around 2 so we could still have half the day. Instead, I woke up at 1pm to a pain on my side, and a top bunk on top of me. That ladder someone had removed from the bunkbed the night before, turned out to be pretty crucial--it was what held the bed up. Aside from a nasty bruise, there was no harm done, but I wasn't going back to sleep.

That afternoon we went in search of food. We went to La Boca, which is a barrio with a lot of brightly colored houses, which we actually never saw. We were searching for restaurants that didn't seem to exist, so after a pizza lunch, we ended up leaving because the area isn't so safe at night. Argentina is known for its book shops, so we stopped by a huge one that is in a converted theatre, and decided on a some delicious icecream for dessert. success.

Saturday morning we headed to Recoleta cemetery. The cemetery is interesting because no one is buried in the ground, everyone is buried in what almost look like little houses. The cemetery looked like a small creepy town, and it was so easy to get lost in the rows and rows of buildings which house coffins. A lot of famous people are buried there (the only way to have a spot in the cemetery is to have a family connection), including Eva Peron, which is the above photo. We also stopped by the museum of Bellas Artes, which had a lot of really cool modern art. After lunch we rushed back to the hostal in order to get ready for the soccer game.

The soccer game was definitely an experience I will remember for a very long time. It was so cool to see an entire country rooting for one team, something we don't have in the states, and something which I think we would benefit from. The stadium was packed, and everyone was chanting. In the second half, the score was 1-0 Argentina, and it began to rain. It drizzled at first, then stopped, and then all of sudden the skies opened up and it started pouring. There was no scoreboard so we didn't know how much time was left, but as it continued to rain, and we watched people start to leave the stadium, we decided we should be probably go too so we could find a taxi and not have too much trouble leaving the stadium. No such luck. It continued to pour, and thunder and lightening. There was not a taxi in sight. Our cell phones didn't work in Argentina. There was nothing to do but wander looking for a taxi. It was probably one of the most pathetic sights ever. It looked as though we had jumped into a swimming pool with our clothes on, we were absolutely soaked. We were in a residential neighborhood, so there weren't very many places to go. We finally found a restaurant and practically had to beg them to let 4 soaking wet girls in the restaurant. We sat down and decided it was about time for bottle of wine. There are pictures that document this part of the evening, but they were just too embarrassing to put up here--i'm sorry. We finally called a cab from the restaurant and found out that the final score was 2-1 Argentina, and the final 3 minutes were extremely exciting. Too bad we missed it.

Sunday we were to a huge artisan fair that happens in the Barrio San Telmo every Sunday. They had everything from jewelry, to maté containers (a type of tea drink that practically all Argentineans drink) to antiques and incredible freshly squeezed orange juice. We spent the late morning/early afternoon wandering around, and it felt like we were in Europe. (I haven't been to many places in Europe, but it looked more like Europe than Latin America) That night for dinner, we had to go out for some meat, because that is of course one of the things Argentina is famous for. Our hostel recommended a good restaurant that wasn't too touristy.  The meat and vegetables were delicious, and the dessert, a waffle with dulce de leche (almost like a stronger caramel sauce, and another symbol of Argentina)  was to die for. Another successful food day in Argentina.

On Monday, two of my friends went home, and another one had work on an essay, so I did a little bit of exploring on my own. I walked over to the main plaza, the casa rosada (the pink house- their version of the white house), the obelisk, the the main theatre which actually ended up being closed. It was absolutely gorgeous outside, so it was really nice exploring. That afternoon I met up with my high school friend's college friend who was studying in Buenos Aires (thank you Rachel Bauer!) She was at a park with her friends, and I didn't realize how big this park would be. I wandered for a while looking for non-couples or groups without babies. I found a group who I thought might be them, so I walked an awkward circle around them--it was them, and it was okay I was so awkward. We stayed at the park for a couple of hours playing frisbee, guitar, and it tried my first maté! Everyone said it was extremely bitter, but I didn't find it that bad. Once again I realized that the world of exchange students is a very small one. I met a couple of people who were friends with people I went to high school with, or go to college with, which was exciting.

That night we went to a drum show, which was extremely cool. This group plays every Monday, and are extremely extrememly talented. The venue was also really cool. We went with a group from our hostel, so we got to meet some new people. We met some very interesting characters, but a on a whole some really cool people. Although there were some people from the US, we also met people from Australia and Brazil, all who have their own stories of why they were in Buenos Aires, which was really cool.  This was my first experience staying in a real youth hostel, so the experience was exciting.

A pair of leather boots and some more delicious icecream, and we were on our way back to Santiago...5 days does fly by fast. Up next: a weekend of some homework (I mean I am here to study?) and next weekend: Mendoza!

Hope this wasn't too boring...

Viña and Valpo+ more

I went to a club last weekend, and for the first time in my life I got carded. Carded, meaning I look younger than 18. I mean I know I look pretty young, but younger than 18? We went to this club with my   friend's host sisters, and they're in their late 20's, so we were easily the youngest people there, but it was one of the most fun clubs I've been to. They played everything from Madonna to Mambo #5 to Hot n' cold and there were some really funny dancers.
This past Friday and Saturday we went to Valparaíso and Viña del Mar, which are about an hour and a half from Santiago. We stayed in an the apartment of our Spanish teacher's son's girlfriend (long story how we found that) but they rent out the apartment on the weekends.  It was absolutely gorgeous out, so we did a lot of walking around. Viña del Mar doesn't really have a ton of stuff to do, besides the beach, but I'm so glad it's finally get nice out, it's about time! We decided to "make dinner" since we were in this apartment, so we picked up food to make salad at the grocery store, and bought these delicious empanadas, one with shrimp, mushrooms, onions and lots of other stuff, and others with spinach and cheese. But before we ate dinner, we we walked to the beach and got some icecream. (Fascinating that everything I do revolves around food...but not surprising at all)After our wonderful dinner, we we met up with our spanish teacher's son's friends (another long story), which was fun because we got to hang out with Chileans.

                                        

On Saturday, we had a really good lunch (here I go with the food again) with great fish, and the funniest english translations I have ever seen. Potatoes and the Pope are both the same word (papas) so everytime there was potatoes on the menu it was translated as 'popes'. Papas fritas (french fries), was translated as crispy popes, papas salteadas (salted potatoes), translated as skipped popes. My favorite was probably 'empanada loco queso' translated as empanada crazy person cheese.

After lunch we took a tour of Valparaíso. The city is really cool, with really brightly colored houses, and old elevators. We walked all around the city, walked over to Pablo Neruda's house (I've now seen all 3!) and then walked around the port, and made it for Saturday night.  I'd really like to go back to Valpo and Viña sometime soon, maybe go to the beach, eat some more good food?

Off to Buenos Aires tomorrow!