Take 2

Hola Chiquillos!

So the big news is that yesterday I switched host families! My other host family was very nice and I am going to miss my brother so much, but the parents worked really late and Axel and Leslie were always at school so I found myself alone a lot of the time. Because of everyone's crazy schedules we never ate any meals together except maybe on Sundays and because of this I rarely practiced my spanish or felt very connected to my sister or parents. So a few days ago I went with the director of housing and we went to see two families and then two days ago is when I finally decided and told everyone. While it was very awkward explaining to them that I was moving out everyone understood that I needed a family that was more present. I'm sure that I will continue to see Axel a lot and I know that I made the right decision.

Sooooo my new family is awesome! I have mom and a dad and three sisters, Javiera (21), Consuelo (16) and Marcela (15). My mom doesn't have a job and is always at home and she's pretty crazy but also really funny. She always has friends over and she's very, very talkative! My dad either is a fisherman or sells fish to stores or something and he is really great and then my three sisters are all really friendly. Also they have a puppy named Mia that looks kind of like a chuwawa but with more hair and she is very adorable. The house is hugeeee and really, really nice. My room is easily double the size of my old room and I even have my own heater which is a pretty big deal here! Last night we all had a long dinner and had fish (not sure what it was called but kind of like Tilapia) and mashed potatoes and salad and it was sooooo good. I spent a good 10 min. trying to explain what my actual dad does because I didn't know the word for stock market so I kept saying in spanish "he buys and sells really small shares of companies" so they said "ohhh he sells companies" and I was like "no it's on a computer", and then they replied "ohhh so he sells computer parts" and it kept going on but then I finally remembered the world "acciones" which means stocks and then they understood. Honestly I feel like my spanish is already getting better just cause before we never had meals together so there would be days where I spoke way more english than spanish and then there were sometimes when I felt like I didnt speak spanish at all, but here I have to speak it all the time and while it's hard and frustrating at times I know that I'm going to learn so much!

Here are some pictures of my new room!

Sooo overall I'm really excited about the move and getting to know this new family. Not sure what I have planned for this weekend, but my new house is very close to the beach and it's supposed to be really nice out so odds are i'll spend a lot of time there!

Chauuuuu! Cariños! Byeeeeee!

Good things to know when you're in Chile:

Hellooooo,

So i'm sorry I haven't posted in awhile, but I'm going to be honest I haven't done many interesting things this past week. On Monday I had photo class at 9am and I was 45 min. late because I took 2 wrong buses which was very frustrating. I got on one that said in big bold letters MIRAS FLORES, but after being on the bus for about 20 min. I asked the bus driver if we had passed Miras flores and he just replied "no, no, no" and he dropped me off at the mall. Not going to lie for about a minute I contemplated just taking the morning off because the mall here is fantastic and huge (4 stories) and very fun, but I figured I'd start the week off right and go to class. So I asked a lot of people around me, in spanglish of course, how to get to Miras Flores and everyone just replied "al frente" and I had no idea what they were saying... like in front of what?? (apparently

it just meant other side of the street) So then I finally got on another bus, but after 10 min. everyone got off and I was the only one left so the driver asked me where I was going and I said "plaza de miras flores" and he replied "no no no no" and honked at another bus which pulled over on the side of this really busy road and I changed busses while in the middle of the street and finally, finally made it to class. Very stressful, but on the bright side at least it made class go by faster because it was 45 min. shorter than it would've been.. right? right?

Another interesting class experience was on Wednesday when I tried to go to class, but after waiting outside the room with all the other gringos for awhile someone came up to us and said class was cancelled becau

se the students are on strike or something. Then on thursday history was cancelled because it's the 100th anniversary for the history building so they're preparing for a big ceremony. So basically I've been to 7 classes in the past 3 weeks... but a lot of Chileans haven't actually been to class because we are still in the add/drop period so you don't actually have to come up with a final class schedule until Aug. 27th. Hopefully though I'll have a few more classes this week because honestly all this free time is driving me a little nuts. I spend a lot of afternoons at Starbucks with my friends or just sitting outside because it's been nice. Also I sleep until 2pm and can't stop. I told this to Axel today and he said that he woke up at 6pm today so I guess I shouldn't feel too guilty...

Okay so besides taking the wrong bus and preparing for student strikes and lots of free time here are some other good things to know when you're in chile...

1. It's chilly in chile because it's winter here. It doesn't really compare to Lake Forest or Gambier, but it still gets rainy and in the 50s which makes it really hard to motivate myself to walk around and explore.

2. They love mayonnaise, which personally I'm not a huge fan of. They put it on everything! My host mom put a huge glop on her salad the other day. Also they have these things called "completos" and they're so popular/really popular late at night and they are hot dogs with tomatoes, a pound of mayo, and avocado on top. I haven't had one yet and am pretty intimidated, but I'm sure my time will come eventually.

Got this picture from google image, but you see what i mean. Yummmmm?

3. Also they love avocado and so do I. They put it on everything, like avocado sandwiches, hotdogs, everything.

4. About 99.99% of coffee is instant. My family will whip out some hot water and instant coffee at "once" what they call dinner and just pour in the coffee mix and then 8 spoonfuls of sugar.

5. The bus here, or "micro", are honestly like riding on a roller coaster! That one day that I got on 2 wrong busses, one of them was roaming through the hills and i was the only one on the bus and I seriously felt like I was at six flags or something.

6. There are millions and millions of stray dogs. Some of them are sooooooo cute and it's so hard not to touch them, but they likely have fleas so probably not the best idea.

7. They love facebook and facebook chat, american television, american music specifically 90s music (I heard hansons' mmbop the other night and spice girls!), graphbook paper (it's so hard to find normal notebooks), smoking (its gross and everywhere and anywhere smoking is acceptable), twilight, staying up until it's absurdly late, and many other random things...

Hopefully I'll have more interesting things to write soon. I'm honestly having a great time and my friends here are the best. (i made friends! wahoo!) It's been really weird recently thinking about everyone moving back to Gambier, OH. Makes me a little sad, but I know that I have many awesome chilean adventures to come. This weekend I might go skiing, which I'm excited/nervous for because it's been awhile! Also, I'm going to a dave matthews concert and maybe a regina spektor concert in october! So random that they're coming to Santiago, Chile of all places but I'm so excited! Hopefully things will pick up and I wont have all this free time because it gets a little lonely :( but it's okay. My family is very independent and always doing their own thing so I'm often left downstairs in my room (they all live upstairs), but I still have a great relationship with my brother! He's the best!

Hope everyone has a good start to school and fall! I'll post more later!

Chauuuu, besossss, cuidate, adiosssss, bye!

School, free time, and so much sleep

Hola mom, dad, mom's friends, and others!

This past week has been long and exhausting, but fun nonetheless. I've started my normal routine of classes, and the majority of them seem to be alright but I definitely still feel like my Spanish might actually be getting worse. For example, last tuesday I went to Psicologia de la ninez y adolescence (psychology of childhood and adolescence) a class that I was excited to take, but knew it had the potential to be a little hard. So I arrived at 3:30 and stood outside in the midst of thirty or so other chileans until the teacher finally arrived and opened the door. We all walked in and I sat down in what I thought could be a "neutral seat" (I don't want to be the american that rushes to the front row, but I know that sitting in the back row would get me no where) and the classroom slowly filled up and I quickly found that I was the only foreign student in a class of 40. No one really looked at me, which I guess was good because I mean with my blonde hair, freckles, and light blue patagonia fleece it could not have been more obvious that I was an American. Class started and I think I might have understood about 3% of what was going on... I'd hear something that sounds familiar like "centro de neveriousa" and get excited and write it down in my notebook but then I realized I didn't have anything else to write. At some points I thought that kind of knew what was going on, but then everyone would start writing furiously so I just kind of drew pictures and wrote things with huge question marks next to it. After class (it was supposed to be 3 hours but it was only 2 and a half for the first day wahoooo) I decided to go up to the teacher and ask him if he had ever had foreign students in his class... I have absolutely no idea what his answer was. I think he might of said yes, but it's hard and I wont be able to help because there are a lot of students, but he also could of said no, but I will be able to help... I just nodded my head because I wanted to leave that classroom ASAP. I never want/will never to go back to that class ever again and am planning on meeting with my academic advisor tomorrow.

All of my other classes have been alright and throughout the day I do have a lot of free time which is usually filled with facebook, skype, starbucks, or naps. I've been sleeping so late here! This weekend my average wake up time was around 1:30pm and it's perfectly acceptable to sleep that late, which at first I didn't know so I'd set my alarm to wake up at 10:30 so I could shower and get ready for the day, but then I'd walk outside my room and find that everyone was still sleeping, (including my parents sometimes) so I'd just go back to bed.

This weekend my history class was cancelled again so on Thursday I had a long day at starbucks and the mall and then Friday I went out to dinner and had the best quesadillas ever and then went to this club 89 which is all glass and right on the ocean! Last night I went to see El Origen (Inception) which was great and luckily it was all in English but with Spanish subtitles. It's been a pretty lazy weekend, which I really needed, but I hope it doesn't become a habit because my friends and I seem to sleep through the whole day sometimes and tomorrow morning I have to get up at 8am for my photo class so wish me luck with that one. Next weekend we might go skiing, which would be awesome!

Te extranoooooo (i miss you) and talk to you later!

xoxo

four day weekend

Helloooo,

The last few days have been very fun, relaxing, lazy, and a little crazy. Wednesday was our first day of classes and I only had two, anthropology and spanish. My anthropology class was pretty overwhelming because it was a class with about 40 people and I was one of probably 5 gringos. The class started with everyone going around and saying their name, where their from, and why they wanted to take the class and when I first heard this I thought i was going to have a heart attack! I quickly scribbled sentences in my notebook to prepare for my turn and tried to listen to the other students so I could kind of copy what they were saying, but I couldn't understand anything! They actually sounded like they were speaking a different language, I would hear some familiar words and then they started to sound like they were speaking chinese or something so I kind of gave up. The class was supposed to be 3 hours long (its only once a week thank god!) but it was only an hour because it was the first day. After class I had a pretty long break and then had spanish which was pretty easy and it's through my program so it was great to be in a class of all familiar faces!

Because history classes don't start until next week I didn't have class on Thursday and I don't have class on Friday, which means 4 day weekend! Honestly though I'm kind of ready for classes to start because i've had a wholeeee lot of free time recently. Thursday and Friday were pretty lazy and relaxing... sleeping in and then I've been going to starbucks every day (i know it's bad and not exactly chilean, but it's soooo good!) Last night my friends and I made a mexican dinner at my house with my brother, Axel and it was excellent. We made a huge bowl of guacamole and then had chicken and beef tacos. We were pretty proud of ourselves. After dinner we went out to the discotecas, which are obviously very fun but people don't start getting there until around 2am sooooo I've been staying up a lot, lot, lot later than I normally do! I'm getting use to it, (i mean its not that hard) and i'm sure i'll turn nocturnal in no time!

Hasta luegoooo, besosssss, jajajajjaajjaaj bye!

Registration for classes

**Picture of my friend and I in Valparaiso and we were just sitting and then a dog came and nudged himself in between us. Adorable.

Holaaaa! Yesterday (Monday) I finally registered for classes and then tomorrow (Wednesday) I get to start! I'm actually really excited to start school, get a routine, and meet some more chilean people!

Yesterday I woke up and went to the shell station (our super cool meeting spot) and met a friend and went to Starbucks! Starbucks was soo nice and exactly like the one's in the US which was kinda funny. Then another friend came and we stayed for awhile talking about classes and deciding which ones to take, and then decided to find somewhere to eat lunch. We walked around and found this mexican restaurant cause we were craving guacamole but it was sooo $$$! $22 for fajitas! Way too much, so we kept walking and then decided to go to a restaurant called Tip y Tap. We all ordered some variation of a hamburger, but when our food came out my friend's plate was literally just a hugeeee piece of meet with no bun, lettuce, tomato, nothing, but it did have about a pound of fries. We laughed sooo hard cause the hamburger patty was like literally the size of her plate, it was hugeee. Mine also was the size of my plate and so large and i literally couldn't eat even a 3rd of it. I actually couldn't even pick it up is was so big so i ate it like a salad. After lunch we were soo stuffed and then went to registration. I signed up for:

1. psych of childhood and adolescents
2. Cultural anthropology
3. Black and White photo
4. social psychology
5. Social violence (anthropology class)
6. Spanish class thats required to take.
7. History of sickness, disease, and public health

I purposely signed up for more classes than I want to take because it's hard to add classes later, but easy to drop them so we were told sign up for as many as you want. With this schedule I wont have any classes on Friday so i'll have a 3 day weekend every week! Perfect for weekend trips around the country! ! I'm going to go to all of the classes this week and then probably choose one or two to drop, but so far none of my classes are toooo early and they all seem really cool!

After classes I walked to the beach with a friend and watched the sunset which was beautiful and it was about 65 degrees and sunny yesterday! Today (tuesday) I have nothing to do, but I'm going out with some friend to locate school supplies. I'll keep you posted on classes, but as of now everything is going just swimmingly!