Heeey! I am doing a really bad job at updating. Lots has happened, so I will tell you in a few installments hopefully closely following each other. First, on april 20th, now almost a month ago, I went to the MATISYAHU concert with my friends stef and Dani and it was absolutely awesome. I havent done a post before this, because I wanted to show pictures and stef had them check this out!:
So cool. I recommend him. He spreads his love for Judaism through a fusion of reggae and hip hop. It was semi-awkward though because obviously the majority of the people there dont understand english, so there's kind of that disconnect which results in less enthusiasm. I felt like the most excited person there, indeed, a chilean in front of me turned around and told me, "i dont mean to be rude, but can you be quiet?" and I was just like "uhhhh, no, this is a concert" Like, seriously, what the hellz--its not like i was yelling during hte songs, i was yelling after to show my appreciation hellooooo. Then after the concert we went to get something to eat, we walk in, (dani is chileno), we are at the table and the waitress comes over, stef asks (in spanish) if they accept credit cards, with this simple question, the waitress flips out, slams the menu shut and is like, im not serving them, theyre drunk blabhlaha gringas blahbalbhblah and we were just in shock and i was like ummm first of all we arent drunk, second of all we can understand you, and we walk out. So upsetting. That is the first time I have ever been refused service and she essentially didnt serve us because there were gringas (we were not chilean). It was just so upsetting because as an anthropology/sociology major, I am very aware of social injustices. But in a way, I am glad to have experienced that. People have been killed due to discrimination, while I was just refused service, both are hurtful and should not be happening. It was especially shocking to experience that in Chile, which is seen as a very "progressive thinking" country.
Next, I went on a weekend volunteer trip about 2.5 hours to the south to a town called las cabras to construct mediaguas (temporary homes) for families whose houses were very damaged if not destroyed by the earthquake. We were divided into several groups. Our family was so nice, and lived on the edge of a watermelon patch. They insisted on serving us lunch (delicious) and once (kind of like tea time). I helped out a lot the first day, but the second day I literally did nothing because a whole bunch of men showed up, and refused to let the women do anything/probably didnt have anything for us to do anyways. It was still frustrating. Saw a dead chicken get its beak cut off, we had it for lunch in a stew, the chicken, not the beak. It was nice to get out of santiago and to be doing something to help. The family who we constructed the mediagua for had lost most of their house in the damage. The second story collapsed, two rooms completely caved in, they had a huge pile of rubble that used to be their house. Although it sometimes seems that in certain cases it would be more useful to simply start working on reconstructing the actual house, rather than build a filmsy wooden shack. Plus, people more south are still living in tents and torrential rains are happening. The whole situation is horrible, but I think if there was better organization, it might improve slightly. More about what I have been doing in the next few days...But for now just know that I really like Chile, it is different because I actually feel like I live here, whereas in the DR it simply felt like a perpetual vacation. Hmm..
vineyard/mountains beautifuuul
the crew--most of them
cute abuelito!
gato in a watermelon patch
putting up the pared
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