LA COPA MUNDIAL!!!!!!!!!!

Quedan 11 días hasta el mundial. We are almost there. World Cup time is approaching everyone, and man, is it great to be in a country where everyone loves fútbol!!!!!! So exciting. The pringles cans say: pringoooooools and everywhere there are commericals and ads about the mundial. Also, literally ever since I arrived in Chile, in FEBRUARY, I have been hearing non-stop the official world cup song. I am not exaggerating, I met my family for the first time and on the car ride home my brother played the song for me. Here it is. Sorry, I dont know how to put up videos...Doesn't it just make your heart soar!? I loooove soccer--but apparently the games are going to be at weird early times and stuff because of the stupid time difference. DAMN IT. I feel like I haven't really posted much about just living in Chile. So it is starting now. I plan to take my camera one day to try to document the madness that is the metro system. Ridic. Waaaah starting tomorrow I will have exactly 1 month and 20 days before I leave chile :(.

San Pedro de Atacama!

Yes. That's right. THE DESERT. It is located in the north of Chile, in the second region (chile is divided up into regions, in all there are 15). It starts at 1 in the north, then proceeds to 12 in the south, but later they added a few more up north, haha. Anyways, we had to get to the airport at 4 am in the morning. Needlesstosay, I didn't sleep before that. When we arrived we had time to sleep because we had to drive to Chuquicamata, the biggest copper mine in the world (and I think the biggest mine in general). It was pretty impressive:

Those levels are waaaay bigger than they look. They had to be big enough to fit the most gigantic trucks i have ever seen:

There was a whole deserted ghost town near the mine. It used to be inhabited by all the workers in the mine, but then they ran out of room to put all of the earth they were moving. Half the town is already covered by huge piles of earth. So weird how tiny humans can make such big holes. Holes in the earth, holes in the ozone layer, jeez.

That night I got to realize all over again how tiny humans really are in the grand scheme of things. I went on an astronomical tour. Coolest. Thing. Ever. As anyone who knows me already know, I LOVE OUTERSPACE. Aliens, universes, stars, planets, the MOOOON, its all great. So. Let me tell you about it. We drive to this house/observatory out in the middle of the desert. This really smart french dude that knows everything gave the tour. The stars were the clearest I have ever seen. And soooooo many. The branch of the milky way was veeery visible. We soon learned however, that what we can see with the naked eye is a miniscule amount of what is out there. He showed us all the constellations, and I got to see some I have never seen before, because it is impossible to see them in N. America: Scorpio, the southern cross, etc. So awesome! I want to learn the sky! We then moved on to about 10 huge telescopes that had been chillin only about 30 feet away but no one had noticed them because thats how dark it was. I got to see the rings of saturn, nebulas, and other crazy things. I just love the concept that you are looking into the past when you are looking at the stars. All the stars are suns, there are millions of other galaxies, I am sorry, but how can there not be aliens?! They took the hubble and aimed it at what looked to be a dark spot of sky and found this:

COME ON! and that's in a dark spot of the sky.

The desert is a magical place. The landscape is just so vast. It's amazing. We went to a place called el valle de la luna (valley of the moon) it looks like the moon's surface and is awesome:

We went up on a ridge for the sunrise, but the point is not to watch the sunset, its to turn your back on the sun and watch how the mountains change colors. So beautiful. STOP WRECKING THE WORLD HUMANS, its not yours!!!!! The way we try to "conquer" space (as in dividing up territories, trying to live on other planets) is going to be a very sad day indeed.

Went to a salar (salt flat) saw flamingos! Very cool. All in all, the desert is great. I don't think I could live there though. Waaaay to dry, I thought my nose was going to start bleeding at any second, and the tiny fact that there is no water, you know. Hope you enjoyed the pictures, sorry i made this post super long by putting so many but i mean loook at them!

El salar

MATISYAHU/techo para chile

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

Valparaíso/Viña del mar Coastal towns!!!

Back so soon, how unlike me! I just couldn't wait to show you my pictures of Valpo/Viña! (they aren't that cool, dont get too excited...So, friday rolls around, we are supposed to leave at 9 30 am, i wake up at my house around 9 05: MIERDA. Takes at least 40 minutes to get there by the metro. Long story short, I make it, and I'm not even the last person there. That's south america for you. hahaha or more like that's young people who were partying all night before for you..heheh. We drive about 2.5 hours to la isla negra: la casa de Pablo Neruda!! I hope you are all familiar with at least a few of Pablo Neruda's poems, and if not, GET ON IT. They are absolutely beautiful and way better in spanish, I must say. Spanish, a romance language, rolls off the tongue sounds great. Me and my host dad were having a convo the other day about how when I returned from the DR I always thought people were being so rude, but really they were just asking me to "pass the juice" but "pasame el jugo" just sounds so much less harsh to the ear. Claudio (mi padre) has the most calming voice ever, he talks really slow and quiet, so you would think that it would be easy to understand him right? Noooo. We just crack up with each other instead.

Anyways PABLO NERUDA: one of the most influencial poets in any language of the 20th century, had 3 wives, has no heirs his only child died at the age of 8, was a big Allende supporter and in fact was nominated for president the same year, but he vouched for Allende. Traveled to every contienent except Africa. Only wrote poetry with green ink because that is the color of hope, apparently. He had 3 houses in Chile: one is in Santiago (no i have not visited, but I plan to soon), the other in Valparaíso (we didn't go..) and then Isla Negra, where he lived most of the time. It is perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean: huge cerulean waves crashing into black rocks:

How much more poetic can you get? I will tell you. His house is modeled to look like a ship. Neruda loved to collect stuff. Just a few of his collections: Those wooden figures on the bows of ships, no joke he has at least 15 just chillin in his house, no pictures were allowed inside..., the glass supporters that go under piano legs, tiny instruments, big awesome instruments, cool stones, beautiful glass bottles, had an ENTIRE room of absolutely astounding shells, and A NARWHAL HORN what is going on!? Anyways, it was probably the coolest house I have ever seen, and so completely the house of a poet, it was kind of hilarious. Collection of cool bottles with hands, and illegally taken picture of the living room, do you see the carved figures?

Next, we went to Valparaíso, which is a city built on hills, all these brightly colored houses all crammed next to each other. I guess the bright colors started when the fisherman used the same paint of their boats to paint their house, that way when they were fishing out in the bay they could point at their house! So cute. Great bohemian vibe, awesome graffiti everywhere, basically murals, so artsy. This girl with a gorgeous voice sang and played the accordion for us, Pascuala Ilibaca, look her up now, she's pretty big in the music scene here. I want to be her:

That night, huge delicious dinner, our director, Patricio is hilarious and gave us a big speech about not abusing alcohol at the start of the trip and at dinner, well, already it is standard to recieve a pisco sour before any food--super strong drink, since your stomach is empty it livens you up--then there is always at least two botellas of wine with dinner, and THEN patricio gives out free drink tickets! Nice one, patricio. Then after yummy food, it's time to dance it off with salsa lessons from a crazy cuban who hopped up on the bar to show us the steps!

Next day, great bike tour along the city, walked a ways got to see more beautiful art, and then a ride along the ocean. ME ENCANTA EL MAR. I wish I was a mermaid.

Theeeen we went to a Viña (vineyard) and a sanctuary/shrine on Sunday. Wine tasting yuum. Then some spiritual pondering. LAS FOTOS:

Valpo and the cute houses (there are cuter)

Need I explain this?

Or this? (so cool!!)

A pretty mural (they were everywhere inside the shrine), it was the shrine of the patron saint of chile María Teresa (i think..) It was nestled in this valley with all the mountains surrounding it. Very peaceful.

The beautiful vineyard with delicious wine: we tried, blanco, tinto y postre (dessert, it tasted like apricots mmm)

matrimonio chileno!

Hey, I have not updated this in so long!!! I feel so much has happened, the time is really flying by. I am finally actually getting into school. Just realized how much reading I was supposed to be doing...oops. First test in two weeks! Soooo in the time since my birthday...I went to a huge, beautiful chilean wedding. So gorgeous. It was the wedding of my mom's brother's son aka her nephew. Basically it was off the hook because his dad (my mom's bro) is the minister of health of CHILE that's right. I am famous. I put up an album on facebook of the wedding and then had to take it down bc people might have published the pictures!!! ahhh! Crazy dude, but dont worry i will show you some pics on here, just none of Jaime Mañalich, my important tío. There were around 400 guests, the ceremony was held in the court yard of a mansion out in the country. Let's just say wedding toasts about love sound a lot less corny in a romance language. After the ceremony there were waiters weaving through the crowd with cocktails and little finger foods and there were SUSHI tables!!!!! YUM. Chileans pronounce sushi like suchi and shopping=chopping. Made understanding their english a lot easier after I knew that.

Then we were ushered into the party area. Beautiful, you'll see. Pool with rose petals, fresh flowers everywhere. A four course meal for all the guests. Famous beatles band in chile? DJ, lots of dancing. It was hellza awkward for an hour or so because basically everyone over 16 brought a date and thus I was veeery awk for a while, flying third wheel style. But then it was ok. My dad is such a crazy dancer!!! He's so cool. Food all the time. Free bar all the time. Beautiful chileans being fun all the time. Great experience to have here.

I also went to Mendoza, Argentina for Easter weekend, or here known as Semana Santa. It is a small city in comparsion to Santiago, and Argentinian accents are ridiculous. Everyone immediately knew we were from Chile because of our accents!! yaaay. Um had a FAT steak with salad, mashed potatoes, bebida and postre for about ten bucks wtf! Found really cool jewelry and by found I mean bought. Couch surfed first day, hostel the next. But a lot of stuff was closed bc of semana santa so it was a bit fome (laaaaame). But the Argentinians we stayed with were super nice and funny, oh but some other gringa that was staying with them (there was also an italian girl) TOOK MY PANTS, so mad. And i also broke my phone of course.

Wrote 6 pages in spanish, sooo hard, but mostly because I was trying to sound smart and not like a 3 year old. hahaah. I was discussing the economic model of chile and the elitist politics, I know I am awesome.

Whenever I go out, usually there are Chileans so I speak in spanish I would say 75% of the time here. When it is just me, Steph and Melissa (my bffs here) we usually speak in english cuz its kind of dumb not to, but we have chilean friends that are super cute! Every Tuesday we go to this place with them that has cueca dancing (the official dance of chile) it is modeled after how chickens dance? I dont know. It's really hard, and both people wave hankerchiefs around and dance in a circle with hard dance steps haha. They are cute chilean hippies and play the acordion, guitar and maybe bass not sure? I also sometimes hang out with the "militares" as we call them bc its a group of boys that are from the military. Kind of freaky though because they studied (only for two weeks) at the Escuela de las Americas aka the US training for south american armies that commit lots of human rights abuses...They are kinda boring too. haha. But I get to practice my spanish!

I also went to Viña del mar and valparaíso. Awesome!! But that will be another post. Ahora las fotos!

The two gringas I hang out with most! But Melissa (on the left isn't exactly a gringa bc she is mexican and speaks fluent spanish..), then there is cutie Steph on the right of the picture. And yes we are taking tequila shots, that's right IM TWENTY ONE! hahahahha no longer inappropriate.
Our couch-surfing hosts in Mendoza. German y Diego. Crazies, as you can see!
But also sweethearts, as you can see!
Delcious dessert at the wedding.
Bride and groom. So cute.
So so cute.
My brother, Benja and padre, Claudio!
The groom's brother (grey vest) sang and was awesome.

And down below is the extravagant pool with petals and wedding cakie!

Happy bday to me!

Hey Everyone,

I have a lot to talk about but the most pressing news is that I am now officially 21!!!!!! I can drink anywhere! haha no, it was great though. I went out saturday night with all my friends and at midnight they sang me happy bday in both english and spanish (because i of course had both chileans and norteamericanos at my get together). Then Sunday my chilean family made a huge lunch complete with a beautiful cake and also gave me these very chilean leggings and a really cute sweater bc apparently they think I didnt pack enough warm clothes and are worried about me when winter comes! I cannot believe I am actually 21. Time passes my friends, its true.

I have officially started school! I am on my second full week of class right now. My classes are:

--Derechos Humanos (Human Rights) with Juan Guzmán, google him right now, he was the guy who prosecuted Pinochet it is ridiculous that he is teaching us, and he is really nice and incredibly smart and of course experienced in the matter at hand. We are also being taught by about 6 other very qualified people as well and I am really excited about this class.

--Poesía chilena (chilean poetry)--the professor is really old and hilarious and basically just LOVES poetry. He reads us poems every day in this really weird sing songy voice and laughs at his own jokes. Half the class is sleeping but I have a feeling he loves talking about poetry so much that as long as one person is awake he doesnt care!

--La formación y el desarrollo de la sociedad latinoamericana (the formation and developement of latinamerican society)--This is my sociology class that I MUST get credit for for my major. I hope it works out. I can perfectly understand the professor and there are about 45 chileans in my class, it's crazy.

--El cine chileno contemporaneo (contemporary chilean cinema)--I really like this class too, the professor would be really hot if he didnt have a unibrow. He talks super fast, and I can hardly understand anything he says. Luckily he uses powerpoints and then we have excerpts of films. It's really interesting but the movie clips we watch are super weird.

I pretty much like all of my classes but chilean school is way different in that you only have 3 tests and maybe like 2 written assignments a semester. You have readings but no one checks them, but I hear you are screwed for the tests if you havent read them. I have NO idea what the tests are like. I have none of my readings yet because you most obtain them at the "fotocopiadoras" which are rooms scattered throughout the huge campus and there is a different one for every subject. I have yet to find any for any of my classes! Instead of buying books (bc they are super expensive) they just fotocopy everything (aka breaking about a million copyrite laws haah).

Oh, I also went on a bike tour of santiago on saturday and it was AMAZING. However, it lasted from 2:30 in the afternoon to 8:30 at night. It was supposed to end at 6 (already pretty long) OMG. bike seats are torture devices. My ass still hurts. As well as my shoulders. We literally rode all around the city. And Santiago is HUGE. But it made me love Santiago so much more. I realized there were all these awesome places right by places I already knew. Santiago is so cool and artsy and pretty!!! Ok now for pictures!

My beautiful not to mention delicious birthday cake!
My chilean friends (more came later for the DANCING part!) the girl is Montse my host sistie!!!!
All my free dranks! Roncola (rum/coke), Frambuesa mojito (raspberry mojito SO good), mango sour (no translation)
TWENTY-ONE TWENTY-ONE!

amigos chilenos!!

Hey everybody, not to brag, but: I AM IN. I have been hanging out with chileans almost everyday. I feel so immersed (in a good way this time, not icky culture shocky). First, when you go out here, it is considered early if you return around 3, even 5 in the morning. People being the night somewhere between 10-12, perhaps go to an outside bar, or someones apartment. Then go out dancing around 2-3ish. From what I gather, most close around 5ish. Then usually you go to an after party somewhere. I guess thats the bigcity nightlife for you!! Also the metro (subway) opens around 7:30, so instead of taking a taxi, lots of peeps just wait for the metro to open. haha

So thursday was the strong aftershock that was a 7. something wtf! I was home alone it was a little scary, but NOTHING compared to the terremoto. What was scary was my mom and sister were at the coast where a tsunami alert was issued. They were okay, but a lot more scared then me. They said it was like armaggedon. Everyone running, screaming, crying. People with their pets in their arms, etc. They had to run to higher ground, imagine a whole city of people trying to go to the same place!

We had a meeting with our embajadores culturales (cultural ambassadors aka chilean students) on Friday. We got divded into groups, mine is Alejandra shes is awesome. There's about 6 ppl in our group, we went to a cute little cafe, and she told us about this benefit concert at San Joaquín (main campus of católica) later that night, and that we should tots meet up. Then I had DELICIOUS sushi yaaay! Ale had told us it started at 6 but would probs go past midnight. We should up around 10 30 (our sushi had taken a long time) there were tons of peeps but we were there for about 2 songs and then it was over!! Very fun bus ride though, all the kids from the concert. It is really fun being a foreigner sometimes. Everyone thinks it is hilarious if you say any swear word, so you can really liven up a crowd quite easily. Went with Ale to her apartment, which has an awesome view, then partied until 5 in the morning at a discotec. Met some new friends!

Next day spent all day at a great leisurely lunch en "el campo" aka 30 minutes outside the city, but technically it still is the city haha, but definiely more trees. With my fam, very fun. That night went to a choripanada at my friends host family's house. She has two host sisters our age. TONS of chileans. It was great. I have lots of people I can call now. yaaaay! My goals are becoming true!