Highlights of the final weeks

My time here is dwindling, and I'm still not sure how I feel about it. I know that I'm excited to come home, see everyone, and enjoy the holidays, but its quite strange that my time here is finally coming to an end. July seems like an eternity away, and its really cool to see how far I've come this semester.

Last weekend, I had the pleasure of attending a ballet (Sleeping Beauty) in the Teatro Municipal. The theater is absolutely gorgeous, and I'm glad I went just to experience it. But the ballet was really good to. I didn't have the best seat, unfortunately I was squeezed in the corner in the balcony so I had to lean over on the lady beside me to see, but it was all worth it. Afterward the girls and I (Nichell, Monica, and Laura) had some great peruvian food. Here's the theater...

This past Thursday, we had our goodbye dinner/early Thanksgiving at IES. At that point, it definitely felt strange saying goodbye since I still had a week with these people, but it was pretty fun and the food was great. And my chocolate no bake cookies were a hit! I even had a good time at a pub afterward where most of the students went to spend some time. Though I may not be best friends with the students in my program, and most of us are very different, I appreciate the fact that we can occasionally get together and have a good time free of drama. My family at the dinner:


The next day, Friday the 21st, I headed out with 11 other students to a vineyard one of us has worked at this semester. It is outside of Santiago, and the scenery was beautiful. The 80-year-old owner lives with his wife in a historic colonial house that belonged to Jose Miguel Carrera, one of the founding fathers of Chile. We were treated like royalty, and shared beer, soda, wine, empanadas, and later a full lunch spread plus dessert with our generous hosts. All this for 12 students! But don't worry, they have hired help that answer to a bell. I'm not kidding. It was a great, relaxing, absolutely beautiful way to spend a day. I am pretty sure I'll never have a vineyard tour to match it!


I'm anxious to see where Wofford will be playing football next weekend and against whom. Hope to see you all very very soon!

Me encanta la primavera

The past 2 weekends have been beautiful, and I've been able to enjoy Chile's natural beauty outside Santiago for both of them!

Last weekend it was rafting in the beautiful Cajon de Maipo. The water in the river come from snow melt off the Andes, so it is rather cold. But with all of the clothing they give you (wetsuit, windbreaker, shorts, neoprene socks) its not too bad. And it was beautiful and sunny the whole time! Here's a picture of my friends and I getting ready to raft:


This weekend, after seeing the new Bond movie Quantum of Solace (before the US, be jealous), one of my university classes had a field trip all day Saturday. The Colchagua Valley, about 200 km south of Santiago, is famous for its wine. Our first stop was the town of Santa Cruz, where we toured a really neat and diverse museum, with artifacts from South American indigenous cultures (such as shrunken heads), Spanish conquest and early Chilean independance era items, old typewrites, gramophones, and film projectors, a Samarai armor, carraiges, antique cars, and a lot more. Here's some of us in front of one of the antique vineyard trucks at the museum:

After the museum, I had a nice greasy lunch and we looked through a artisan fair they had for the weekend in the main plaza. It was for rich tourists, though and I sadly couldn't afford a thing. But our next stop was the Vina Santa Cruz!

This place was huge and GORGEOUS. Everything is blooming and green. We took a cable car to the top of a hill for a lookout and to learn about 3 Chilean indigenous cultures from their exhibitions: Mapuche from the south, Aymara in the north, and Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in the Pacific. We ended the tour with an explanation of how their wine is made and a gustacion (tasting). I am not a wine fan, but I have to say it wasn't terrible! Here's me enjoying the perfect weather at the vineyard:

Only 2 more weekends left to enjoy in Chile! I now have less than 20 days and the countdown has begun. Make your requests now for gifts and I hope to see you soon! :)

Oh and if you don't have facebook, view the rest of my pictures from Santa Cruz at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2017074&l=58202&id=54001690 !

History has been made

Its been exciting to be in Chile last night and today, watching the results showing the landslide victory of President-elect Barack Obama. While I regret not being in the US and being able to stand in line to vote there, I recognize the unique perspective I have witnessed being in Santiago as a new US president was elected. Most chileans overwhelmingly supported Barack Obama, hoping his administration will improve relations with Chile, though they are nervous about what democratic protectionist policies with respect to the economy might mean for them.

For a country like Chile, the election of a man of color is a BIG deal. I bought a copy of a Santiago newspaper La Tercera today, where 2 whole pages are filled with detailing things like the history of slavery, the civil rights movement, and the discrimination that remains against minorities in our country. The election of a black man is hard for Chileans to fathom, and many of them still view the US as a place of hate and division, though from my perspective they are much more rascist than I have ever seen in the US. My friend's host mom even made the comment that while watching Obama's party in Chicago she was surprised to see so many white people in the crowd!

I didn't fully grasp the historical significance of Obama's election until it happened last night, and I know I still don't fully understand it because I was fortunate enough to live after the civil rights movement and the height of rascism and discrimination in the South. My hope is that we can now move forward, improve our image in the world, and come together to fix our troubled economy, solve our broken system of health care, and carefully withdraw our troops from Iraq.

Even if you don't agree with President (elect) Obama, I hope you can appreciate the significance of his election and be energized by the excitement that was seen with the record turnout of voters on Election Day. I am extremely proud of my generation and its involvement in America's democracy. We have broken stereotypes about our apathy and are providing an example for the rest of the world.

Futbol y Villa Grimaldi

Hopefully this post will be a little more positive, although I'm going to talk about a torture center near the end so don't hold out to much hope...

Last night (Tuesday), I went with some other IES students and some Chileans to the "clasico" U de Chile/U de Catolica futbol game. It was a blast! The best part by far was watching the crowd! From before we even arrived, you could feel the excitement. Everyone was headed to the Estadio Nacional, dressed in their team's jersey and wearing their flags like capes. And of course there were plenty of "flaites" (sketchy people) present, running out in the middle of the road, and smashing micros (city buses) to smithereens. On our way, we also observed the police pulling over a guy and demanding his gun, as well as police motorbikes surrounding some man that had tried to flee after committing some crime. Fascinating stuff.

The atmosphere of the game itself is really hard to describe, but let me just say that Chileans are passionate about their futbol. It's incredible to me that they all know the songs and cheers and scream them in unison while setting off flares and throwing streamers. Some of the things they shout aren't that nice, like calling the goalie a "puta de cabaret" (cabaret whore).
La Chile (Universidad de Chile) won the game, 2 to 1, so we all left content with our futbol experience.

This morning (Wednesday), I went with my human rights class to Villa Grimaldi, one of the torture and exectution sites during the Pinochet dictatorship. Ironically, since its in this blog post too, the National Stadium was used for torture as well, though I certainly wasn't thinking about that at the game. Anyway, Villa Grimaldi (where now president Michelle Bachelet was tortured, along with 4500 others) is now a "Peace park" that seeks to preserve the memory of victims and remind people of the atrocities of history so that it will never be repeated.

Very few original pieces of Villa Grimaldi still exist, but there are many recreations of torture chambers and isolation cells. There is also a beautiful memory garden with the names of all the women tortured here, who often suffered unspeakable sexual torture. The military didn't discriminate, even torturing minors and women up to 5 months pregnant.

All of this done in the name of "protecting" Chile from its "enemy within" i.e. people with differing political views. It seems incredible that one would be capable of such inhumane treatment, but yet torture has been used in almost every part of the globe, including the United States, though we don't like to talk about it.

We finally arrived at the tower, one of the original parts of Villa Grimaldi. If you reached this point, you probably weren't going to come out alive. As we climbed the tower, I was overwhelmed by the atrocities that occurred in that place. We could still lift the doors to the tiny compartmants people were kept in, given just enough to stay on the edge of survival. I believe things like this are difficult to see, but extremely important so that it can be avoided and fought against. It is an important reminder that we are all fallen and capable of atrocious things if left to our own devices. Its for this that we are in desperate need of redemption, and I am so thankful to have found that in Christ.

You can find pictures of both of my experiences this week on facebook at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016861&l=d3619&id=54001690

Catching up...

Well, its almost the END OF OCTOBER (!) and we have some catching up to do.

Last weekend, my Chilean family and I did move apartments. It's been crazy since then and things are still not settled, but its getting better. Right now, I'm sleeping in the room with my host mom and grandma, which has proven to be somewhat of a challenge. Hopefully I will have my own room soon, the lack of privacy is starting to wear on me. Other than that, I like our new apartment ok. For some reason its colder here, the street is more shady and I guess that has something to do with it. It is consistently colder during the day and at night than it is outside. But, a major plus is that it is a mere 4 block walk from IES, which is proving to be very convenient.

It has taken me a few days to develop this positive attitude. Saturday was an extremely rough day, and its up there on the list of the worst days of my life. I can't explain it any other way than to say EVERYTHING that could went wrong.

In an effort to get out of the way and get a TAN, my friends and I had plans to head to the beach at Vina del Mar (hour and 1/2 from Santiago by bus) Saturday. Unfortunately, it was cold and cloudy from the start and NOT a good day to be wearing shorts. All we really did in Vina was drink hot chocolate and sit on the beach for about 3o minutes. Sad, right? So upon returning to Santiago, we got all the way to Las Condes where Tiffany lives and decided to got to the movies (I have to see a Chilean movie for class). Though we didn't know it at the time, we decided to go to the most difficult mall to get to. After about an hour of walking, waiting, and riding the bus, we finally arrived at the mall that was probably 10 miles away. When we finally arrived at almost 8pm, we discovered that the mall was closing at 8:30 for the municipal elections the next day, and that included the theater. By this time, we were reeeally irritated. So we went outside, found the bus stop, took a bus, stopped and waited another 3o mins in the cold for another bus, and were on our way home. Not 2 minutes into the ride, however, our bus got a little too close to another micro and sideswiped him, taking both mirrors with him. Thus, we had to all get off and find another ride home.

Needless to say, once I finally got to my new home in one piece, I was irritated, hungry, exhausted, and in need of a shower. This is when I find out that our washing machine is currently taking the place of my bed and I must sleep with my mom and grandma. Fun, huh?

So there is my sad sad story, which thankfully I can already laugh at. It taught me a lot about how to hold on my sanity when NOTHING goes my way. And I'm still learning that lesson...

Beautiful spring weekend and... we're moving??!

This weekend was absolutely beautiful and sunny. It made me very happy. :) Friday marked the 6 week mark... 6 weeks from then I will be preparing to fly home!

It was my friend from Wofford Jackie's birthday Friday, so we took her to eat Cuban food for lunch, had pedicures, and went out with her brother and his friends that night. I was very proud to say I was a very "chilean" partier that night. For some crazy reason, parties here don't really get started until at least 1 am. So we went out then, spent some time at one club but weren't really into the electronic music (very popular). We went to another club too, which was also a little strange, but had some better variety. In all, it was a good time and we finally got home at about 4 am.

A few hours later.. :) We got up Saturday and headed to Cajon de Maipo, a national park outside of Santiago. We had a great time in the beautiful outdoors, despite many setbacks that didn't go according to plan. But, as the saying goes, getting there is half the fun!

After a 45 minute metro ride and 45 more minutes on a crazy bus, we were dropped off in San Jose. Unfortunately, the trail to Cascada de los Animas (Waterfall of the Spirits) was another 15 mins or so in car in San Alfonso. An old man hanging around told us there would eventually be a bus. So we sat down and ate our lunch on the side of the road to wait. Eventually, we gave up on the bus and took a taxi.


We ended up at Cascada de los Animas, which was not quite what I expected. The land is owned by a company that offers all kinds of outdoor activities and lodging, and apparently you're not allowed to hike to the falls on the weekends without a guide... i.e. 8 bucks.

Obviously, they trap tourists who have come all this way only to charge them to walk on their own two feet, but it turned out fine and we had a great time. Everything was beautiful and blooming and the weather was perfect. For all the pics, go to http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016351&l=0ba77&id=54001690 (the Cajon pics are the 2nd part of the album).

The beautiful Cajon de Maipo valley:
In other news, though I never thought it would happen, my chilean fam and I are moving next Friday and Saturday. Not far, only 3 metro stops down the road, but I'm going to miss this apartment. And I'm not looking forward to the whole process and dealing with the only half-finished apartment (we saw it last weekend) which is a mess right now. But I'll make the best of it! I've already started packing up some stuff up and I hope I can fit everything back in these 2 suitcases! I've aquired a few extra items!

Hope all is well back home, I'm thinking of yall settling into the cooler days of fall while I enjoy the transition to springtime! Remember that if you have mail to send you better do it quick while I'm still here! :)

"Normal" in Santiago

I know its been awhile since I've posted. Life has been moving right along in Santiago, and its so normal that there's not really a whole lot to say. The biggest and most exciting development of the last couple weeks is that it is finally starting to feel like spring, after a long time coming. I even got to wear a skirt this week!!

Its a little hard to believe its already October, but at the same time hard to believe its not time for me to be home yet! :) I have 7 more weeks exactly here in Santiago.

Last weekend, I went to a concert to honor Chile's president Salvador Allende, whose government was overthrown by the 1973 Pinochet coup. It was a great time with lots of Chilean rock music and I even got to see lots of communism and fascism symbols! Haha The night was ended with a celebration of 20 years of democracy in Chile (1988-2008). Here are some photos of the concert:

Although I am enjoying the way life has become "normal" here in Chile, I am missing greatly those of you back home. Study abroad is not without things I have had to give up, including seeing my dad's family in the mountains for our annual reunion last weekend and Homecoming festivities this weekend.

Tonight I'm going to a "gringo" bar for some Mexican food (haven't had it in 2 1/2 months!) and tomorrow should be a fun-filled day of the Santiago Aquarium and MIM (science and technology) museum! I am hoping for a trip to the beach soon to enjoy the beautiful weather, so stay tuned!! :)