So I have some photos to show that i've actually been doing things since i've been here.  Friday night we had our welcome dinner with us four and our mamás. It was an extremely long dinner, not surprising considering everything takes a very long time here.  A well-known dish here is chicken or beef 'a la pobre' which means poor men's chicken or beef. It's a piece of meat with fried eggs on top, with french fries= a lot of fried food in one place. Not necessarily the most appetizing of things, but maybe it's something I have to try. 

This weekend we had a walking tour of Santiago. We went to one of Pablo Neruda's house, which was actually really cool, and a zoo at the top of a mountain.  It was cold outside, a pretty depressing day for the zoo and none of the animals were outside, but there were some pretty cool monkeys and flamingos. 

Saturday night I went with two of my friends to a Karaoke bar.  Not only were we the only gringas there, but we were younger than pretty much everyone by at least 20 years.  We have yet to find the places where the young people hang out in Santiago.  The newest plan is to find a young person on the street and then follow them in hopes they go into a bar or someplace with other young people. Whether this is such a good idea, I don't know...but perhaps it's worth a try.  At this karaoke bar, my two friends and I first sang an embarrassing version of A'int no mountain high enough. Unbeknownst to us, there are many different versions, and this was not the version we were familiar with. We awkwardly tried to sing to a tune we didn't know, and when we finished, the only applause was from the enthusiastic bartender. We later tried to appeal to the half-empty crowd with a Jackson 5favorite 'ABC' which was better (it couldn't really get worse).  It was really hard to compete with all of the off-key depressing Russian love ballads everyone else was singing. We did our best though. It was a valiant effort.

After this we went to a salsoteca, which is kind-of like a dance club that plays salsa music.  Once again, we were the only ones there probably under 30/35, but my host brother and his cousin joined us. I was asked by an old guy to dance, and I embarrassingly made a fool of myself by my lack of knowledge of salsa. The dancing was fun but short-lived as I think it's not as fun trying to dance with a clueless person. My friends and I are planning on taking salsa lessons, so that next time, I can hold my own on the dance floor.