Donde esta el toro?!

So it’s been almost a month… what can I say. I have a life.  But, on a sidenote I’d say my homesickness is like an 8 on a scale of 1-10 so I guess that’s not really a good thing.

I’ve decided since so much has happened I’m just gonna list highlights of my life since my last post. 

• I went to San Pedro de Atacama in Northern Chile.  I got food poisoning the morning I got there and was in the hotel room 2 of the 3 days we were there. Enough said.  It was really beautiful the one day I did go out and I’ll put some pics up. 
• Even though I felt like crap after my food poisoning experience, I had yoyi to make me feel a little bit better about myself.  He got kicked in the nuts at high school and had to miss school of 3 days.  It was entertaining to say the least, although I shouldn’t laugh at his expense….. hehehehe
• I started volunteering at a high school teaching english.  My students are 14-16 years old and are loads of fun. Schools are super different here then they are in the states.  On my first day in class they were asking me if I had a boyfriend, what I thought of Chilean boys, how to say “Te quiero” in english, and if I drink alcohol or do drugs.
• I also learned from my student´s that if someone (aka a 14 yr old boy) asks you if you like to eat mariscos (shellfish), say NO.  Apparently little boys being smart-asses is a universal trait.  But, it´s entertaining.
• Mendoza Round 2!  I went back to Mendoza, this time with just Allie and Suzanne and I had a very successful trip. Yay! We did a lot of hanging out because we all had a ton of school work to do.  We got to go out in Argentina which was fun and we also went to the spa for the day which was 45 usd for a full day and a buffet.  It was amazing.  We also went to an all you can eat meat buffet for 13 usd where we ate possilby the best alfajores ever. I’ve decided that if Simon ever studies abroad (which he should totally do!) then he needs to go to Argentina because it´s pretty much a beef-fest 24/7.
• Also Mendoza sidenote, we saw Alexis Sanchez at the airport.  He is called the “miracle boy” or “choosen one” or something like that by Chileans.  He plays for the national soccer team and is huge.  He was standing right behind Suz in the line for security and we had no idea who he was. People were swarming security and taking pictures and we thought it was because Suz had to go through the metal detector 4 times. 
• My camera is broken : (
• ¡Fiestas Patrias! - Chilean Independence Day (week). So I’ve pretty much decided that Chilean’s know how to throw a real party/celebrate their country.  As much as I love going down to the beach with all my friends during the 4th, el dieciocho totally kicks our little party’s ass.  The Chilean independence day activities generally run for about a week.  The 18th was on a Friday this year, so my week was essentially filled with activities.  On Wednesday, my high school was putting on a presentation of traditional dances in Chile.  I brought Suz, Allie, and Andrea because I wanted them to meet my students.  We saw the 3rd years do a traditional Southern dance called the Chilote.  It was actually more fun to see how excited my students were to have my friends from the US at school.  It was so funny because they would practice saying things in english with each other and then come up to Allie and say something like, “You eyes are beautiful” or “How old are you?”   On Thursday I went to a fonda in La Reina.  Fonda´s are like giant county fairs essentially except with amazing food, drinks, crafts, and cultural shows.  During Fiestas Patrias there are fondas in pretty much every major park in the city.  On Thursday at the we saw a Chilean rodeo which is suprisingly a lot different from US rodeos.  There are two caballeros who guide a bull around a half circle ring which has a small area on each side that they essentially have to push the bull into with the chest of their horse.  We also ate anticucho (skewers with beef, onion, sausage) and drank chica which is like a sweet wine.  On Friday and Saturday I pretty much spent the whole day at Andrea´s house with her family because my family had gone to the beach for the holiday.  It was pretty much a 7 hour asado each day.  I´m still recovering from my food coma. 
• On Saturday, during fiestas patrias week, we all really wanted to go out and do something fun.  We decided to go to this club called Club Miel which was having a big Fiestas Patrias party and was supposed to be playing pop and divas on night long. I know exciting.  Turns out Club Miel is also one of the most well known gay clubs in Santiago.  Clearly we missed that one, but it was still loads of fun listening to Madonna and hangin out with all the divas.
• I´m going to Argentina next semester! It was actually a really sudden decision but I´m excited and it will be fun to study in a new country and try some new stuff.
• I´ve been to the US embassy 4 times this week.  They are pretty much retarded and I would avoid having to deal with them at all costs.  Not to mention it´s probably easier to get into the White House then that place.
• Shout out to Min and Chloe who I´m pretty sure read this more than my mom.  I miss you guys!
• I’m sure I´ll think of more stuff but for now I’m kind of brain dead and want to check Perez Hilton.

Besos!

Monica

Causing Scenes…

So as per usual I am behind on this blogging stuff.  In all honesty I don’t think it’s gonna get any better so sorry. 

Anywho… I need to go back to my adventure to Mendoza, Argentina! Let me preface this by saying I absolutely loved Mendoza and had a fantastic time with the girls, BUT we had so many disasters that it made the whole experience a little overwhelming.  O well, it was a learning experience.  The way the whole trip came about was our friend William had decided to go to Mendoza to visit his friend who was going to be vacationing there.  We (me, allie, andrea, and suzanne) all decided to jump on the wagon and go with him so we could see some of Argentina.  Mendoza is pretty close to Santiago so we decided it would be an easy trip.  Little did we know…

It ended up being that 8 of us went on the trip, 3 of the boys from our program, plus another one from a different program, and the 4 of us.  We had all bought bus tickets to go to Mendoza as it’s only a 7 hour bus drive and is supposed to be absolutely beautiful.  Suprisingly we all made it to the bus stop on time and we were all ready to get on the bus, when the ticket agent asked us for our Carnetas de Identidad (our Chilean IDs).  Problem #1.  No one had told us that we needed our carnetas to leave the country.  We all had to register our visas with the international police when we got to Chile, and then had to go to essentially the Chilean DMV and get fingerprinted.  They had given us a temporary slip, similar to in the United States, but only Allie had her’s with her.  At first the bus driver didn’t want to let us on the bus.  But then he said he would let us on the bus but, it wasn’t the responsibility of the bus company if there was a problem at the border.  I don’t think any of us really understood what he meant until we got to the border of Chile and Argentina…. We all got on the bus and the drive was absolutely amazing because we drove all through the mountains which were covered with snow.  (Although to be honest I missed most of the drive because I took medicine for motion sickness which makes me sleep.)  About 5 hours into the drive we were all woken up because we were at the border.  The border control was literally in a dome in the middle of the mountains.  It was a little scary and reminded me of “The Shining.” This is when we encountered problem #2. The Chilean officials would not let us across the border because we didn’t have our carnetas.  I’m still not really sure why we needed our Chilean IDs to leave Chile, but it was a disaster.  After many phone calls and yelling at us because they didn’t believe that we had registered our visas, they finally stamped our papers and let us across the border.  I think I’m going to have nightmares about being trapped in the dome in the middle of nowhere. 

We finally made it to Mendoza and our hostel which was called Hostel Independencia.  It was my first time ever staying in a hostel and I’m so proud of myself for surviving! It was a pretty nice set-up though so it’s not like a I was suffering.  We paid $10 a night each and all four of the girls were in a room together, with these two randos.  One of the guys was from Chicago and was really nice, the other was from Buenos Aires and was a little sketch, but I guess that’s part of staying in a hostel.  I’m not gonna lie, at first I was a little overwhelmed by the people at the hostel.  When we got there, there was a kumbaya circle going on and we were definitely being judged by the hippie crowd.  It wasn’t really my scene, but by the end of the trip we ended up making friends with a lot of the people there, especially the staff.   On our first day there we did a wine tour.  We were originally going to rent bikes, and bike to all the wineries, but the wind was too strong so we ended up taking a bus tour.  We went to two wineries and an olive oil factory and it was really cool to see the differences in the production at each place.  There wasn’t that much to do in Mendoza because the town is really centered around the wineries.  Mendoza has something like 120 of the 190 wineries in Argentina, so it’s obviously a big deal there.  We also went to the central market in Mendoza which was a lot of fun.  We were shocked by how cheap everything was there as well. Santiago is by no means a cheap city, so it was fun to get the chance to eat some amazing food and not be broke by the end of the night.  On Sunday we decided to take an all day horseback riding trip in the mountains of Mendoza.  We had a long drive to the ranch we were going to start from so we had to get up super early which of course is a struggle for me.  When the company came to pick us up at the hostel, the driver told us that there was snow so we needed to bring extra jackets.  For some reason I had just assumed that when he said snowed, he meant sprinkled a little bit of snow on the ground.  After an hour into our drive I realized he meant it had SNOWED.  Everything was covered in snow and it was possibly on of the most amazing things I’ve seen.  Our guide, Rodrigo, was super nice and was very patient with all of us.  I don’t think we were exactly what he was expecting. lol. I took a ton of pictures, as did everyone else so go check them out.  www.monicapeters.shutterfly.com You can see how ridiculous I was dressed for horseback riding.  I didn’t want to get off my horse cause I didn’t want to get my nikes wet… I was being a bit of a diva.  Additionally my horse was also a total diva and didn’t do anything I tried to make it do.  It’s like we were meant to be. But, like I said thank god Rodrigo (and Allie, Andrea, and Suz) are patient.  After horseback riding we had this amazing lunch at the lodge with Rodrigo and two Swiss guys that had also gone horseback riding with us.  Everyone was really easy going and the guys from Switzerland ended up inviting us out for dinner and bpyaing for everything. que suerte! 

On Monday we were supposed to leave to go back to Chile.  Problem #3.  The pass through the mountains between Chile and Argentina was closed because of snow.  Apparently every year in the winter time, when there is a lot of snow storms, it is very common for the pass to close.  Unfortunately for us we were not informed of this when we decided to make our trip.  We found out the pass probably wouldn’t open until Friday.  So we were essetially stranded in Mendoza.  It was very dramatic and I’ll spare the details, but let’s just say that after two extra days, a cancelled flight, very little sleep, and $100, we finally made it back to Santiago.  Possibly the highlight of all the drama was a very short Facebook message Simon sent me:

Mom: OMG SHE”S STUCK IN ARGENTINA. WHY WOULD SHE CROSS THE ANDES MOUNTAINS IN THE MIDDLE OF WINTER?! WHAT WAS SHE THINKING?!

Simon: I don’t know mom.

Simon: Probably not that she was going to get stuck.

My poor mommy had a heart attack.  She didn’t actually realize that I had to go across the Andes to get to Mendoza, and then was freaked out that I might have a moment like in “Alive” and my plane was going to crash in the Andes.  But, luckily it all turned out well.  It was interesting to see what a lot of foreigners thought of American travelers though.  The swiss guys kept telling us how nice and educated we were in relation to other American travelers they had met.  Additionally Allie discovered a picture of us on Facebook that one of the British guys we met in our hostel had taken of us.  The caption on the picture read, “Some American travelers we met at our hostel. Apparently they’re not that easy.”  I don’t know where all these ideas about Americans came from, but seriously, it’s embarassing what some people think of people from the US.

LASTLY, just because this is getting ridiculously long.  I went to Valparaiso and Vina del Mar this weekend.  We got to see Pablo Neruda’s house, and I saw Rachel! (friend from Tulane).  It was really cool to walk around Valparaiso and spend some time around the ocean.  I also took a lot of pictures there so go look. www.monicapeters.shutterfly.com  I’m going to San Pedro de Atacama this weekend with CIEE, but hopefully after that I’ll get to spend more time in Santiago.  I also seriously need to spice up this blog.  It looks a little boring. Sorry people.

Besos

Mon

Trying to catch up on Life

HOLA!!! so after a series of unfortunate events and a lot of busy work, I am finally back in Santiago and have some free time (sort of). but more to come on how I reached this point in a minute.  First off I have to catch up on what I’ve been up to in the last two weeks! I’m gonna have to split this business up into two posts just because my trip to Mendoza, Argentina  was an adventure in itself.  So bear with me…

First of all, I have officially started all of my Chilean classes! I know exciting.  I’m taking four classes (you receive more credit for classes here then in the US) on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  I’m pretty excited about all the classes that I’m taking and so far I have enjoyed them all.  I commute to La Catolica in the morning around 8:45 and have class until 8:30, which is a long time when you think about it, but it’s worth it because then I’ll have some free time to do school work and volunteer.  It’s interesting to see how classes work in Chile because it’s way different then the US.  The teachers pretty much stand in front of the class and lecture the whole time which is difficult because the classes are longer.  Additionally, the majority of Chilean students do not arrive on time to classes.  For me this is difficult to understand because I’m always so afraid to walk into a class late and interrupt the professor. But, the Chileans will sometimes come in 5, 10, 15 minutes after the class has started and make a ton of noise.  Also no one has textbooks in university.  There is a super high tax on books in Chile so no one buys texts books.  Instead the university has what is called the fotocopiadoras, where students essentially fill out a form and get copies of all of the material they need. I’m pretty sure the entire Chilean university system is committing copyright infringement, but at least it’s cheaper then buying a book.

Two weekends ago it was my friend Allie’s birthday so we of course had to have a birthday week since she was the first one of our group to have a birthday in Chile.  On Friday night we decided to go out with friends from CIEE (our study abroad program) to celebrate Allie and William’s birthday (another friend in the program). There was a BBQ being thrown for all of the foriegn exchange students at La Catolica so we decided to check it out before going out.  I got all pumped about it because we had had such a fantastic time at our asado with all of our Chilean friends so my expectations were high for this one.  But… let’s just say that I was having flashbacks to middle school dances.  While doing the two step sway to Chilean reggaeton in the Cafeteria of La Catolica, we found out that there was also a party at Universidad de Chile.  So we decided to head over to one of the buildings of U Chile to see what was up with this event.  I’d have to say that the U Chile Cuban night was like upgrading to a high school/college party in relation to our BBQ at La Catolica.  All of the students were fantastic dancers. It was like being on ‘so you think you can dance?’ and all the americans were the people who think they are superstars, but in reality are terrible.  Luckily chilean boys love to teach the girls how to dance.  After we decided to head to Bellavista, which is this area with a lot of discotecas and bars, to wrap up the night. 

Saturday was Allie’s “special day.”  Her birthday was actually on Sunday but on Saturday we decided to have a girls dinner and then go out with the Chileans.  For dinner we went to possibly one of the best restaurants I’ve ever been to in my life, Astrid y Gaston.  It is a very famous Peruvian restaurant that has locations in several major cities in South America.  I got Chupe de Camarones, which is one of my favorite things to eat, and it was definitely the best Chupe I have ever had.  Allie, Andrea, and Suzanne also order delicious food.  We decided to pass our plates around to try everyones food.  The waiter looked a little mortified because I dont think that is necessarily acceptable in such a nice restaurant, but who cares.  If it wasn’t so freaking expensive I would be eatting there every week.  We spent $20 on water alone between the 4 of us!  But it was all worth it because we had a great time together.  Afterwards we ended up meeting our Chilean friend at a discoteca.  We always have such a great time hanging out with them.  I did have one interesting moment at the discoteca however that I do have to share.  When we got there Allie and I were talking to guy who was a mutual friend of one of the chileans.  He was nice and a couple of his friends ended up coming over and talking to us as well.  I ended up in a conversation with this one guy who I was having a really hard time understanding.  I thought maybe I was just struggling with my spanish because I couldn’t understand anything he was saying.  It was an obvious struggle for us to communicate and he was definitely saying some weird stuff but I didn’t want to just walk away.  Finally one of my Chilean friends Mona came over and grabbed me with the excuse that my favorite song was on (it actually was my fav song, but that is beside the point).  Apparently the guy I was talking to was deaf…… Seriously.  I have a hard enough time understanding people speak in Spanish when Daddy Yankee is pounding in my head. Not to mention Chileans who aren’t deaf can’t even understand my Spanish! and apparently this guy was completely deaf so he was reading my lips.  Who knows what he thought I was saying?!

The following Monday I went snowboarding in the Andes!!!  Allie and I had been talking about going skiing and we decided to go on Monday cause neither of us had class.  There are several ski resorts that are really close to Santiago and are supposed to be fantastic so we decided to find out for ourselves.  The ride up wasnt that long, but it was deathly if you are prone to car sickness as I am.  The only way I can describe the drive is like this SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS    Seriously it was bad news, but I didn’t not vom (just in case you were interested).  And to make things worse, they count each curve.  So I had my face pasted to the window as it’s going 40, 41, 42 and so on.  But it was well worth the drive because the resort was empty.  We pretty much had the whole resort to ourselves and it was a beautiful day.   It was really different from skiing in California because it is above tree line, so it’s pretty much just snow everywhere and nothing else.  Additionally, the majority of their “lifts” are pullies.  I was unaware of this little fact prior to our adventure.  Pullies are the worst type of lift for snowboarders because it’s pretty much impossible to go up them without falling, and these were long lifts.  Allie (who was on skis) and I decided to go up a lift that was a T bar.  For Allie it’s super easy because she pretty much just leans back on the bar.  But I had to put the bar between my legs and hold the other side of a bar.  It was awful! To make matters worse, upon reaching the top of the mountian I yelled at Allie out loud in english, “I feel like I’ve just been violated by that damn T bar.”  There was another guy at the top of the lift. He knew english…. and definitely judged me.  After going up the T bar I also made the decision to go through the snow park.  I was so excited because I hadn’t been snowboarding in a while and I love to go off the jumps and what not, but I didn’t have my helmet.  But, after encouragement from Allie I made the brilliant idea to go off the jump.  I cleared the jump and landed, but right at the last minute caught my edge as I was trying to slow down.  Allie said I was a “rag doll” and told me it reminded her of Scarlet takes a tumble http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIwTYL1fwJk&feature=related .  Let’s just say I had issues the next day.  But all in all it was a lot of fun and I’m glad I made the trip up. 

This weekend we went to Mendoza.  I think I had enough drama and excitement in Mendoza to last me awhile.  But I’m gonna have to save that for my next post (which I’ll probably write in a couple of hours).

Vamos a Jotear!!!

Recent unfortunate events that have occured:

• My google and facebook have begun to show up in Spanish even though I didn’t change the language setting
• I walked into the bathroom today without toilet paper.  In Chile there is no toilet paper in the stalls and you have to get it from a giant roll before you go into the bathroom.  My friend Suzanne wrote about not having toilet paper in the stalls in her blog and this was pretty much my moment in the stall:      ”Por favor (Please)… alguien (someone)… Confort (toilet paper)?”  
• Today was my first day of school in a Chilean University. When I left my apartment this morning I told my guard it was my first day of school (he thinks I’m a 4 yr old may I add).  I sat in the class for 20 minutes with all the extranjeros (foreigners). Finally a student came in and told us class didn’t start till thursday and because the foreigners aren’t on the email list no one knew.  It was quite uneventful, especially considering it takes me an hour to get to school.
• I just found out the other day that my host brother’s nickname isn’t actually Georgey, it’s Yoyi.  I’ve been calling him Georgey for 3 weeks and no one corrected me.
• Apparently maraca (which I was told was slut, by my Chilean guy friends), is not a nice word.  Note to self, check with Carmen Gloria before using words that I have learned from the Chilean boys.

This weekend I had a ton of fun hanging out with Chileans!!! I know exciting.  Last weekend we had met a group of Chileans with the host brother of one of the guys in our program.  They were super nice and loved us so we hung out again with them this weekend.  I was really nervous that I would have a hard time meeting people because I had read that Chileans were a little timid, but so far they’ve been great.  My friend Suzanne and I had become friends with one of the girls name Annya who is are age and goes to Universidad Mayor.   She invited us over to her house on Friday to hang out and we love her so of course we said yes.  This is also where I learned my palabras feas.  I told my host mom that when I went home all the Spanish I was going to remember would be the bad words. lol.  I’ve also come to learn that Chileans loooove Kareoke.  It’s quite unfortunate as I am not a singer at all, but it is fun to hear the Chileans singing Backstreet boys and Miley Cyrus in their broken english.                

On Saturday (aka 6am at Annya’s house), the Chileans decided to have an asado(BBQ) Saturday night.  The asado was at another boy’s house name Juan Palbo, who is known as Pope (pronounced Poo pe).  Allie, Andrea, and Suzanne all convened at my house as per usual before going to the asado.  We ended up leaving my apartment around the same time as my host sister Pochi and her boyfriend.  It was a little akward because she’s really shy and I think a little intimidated by me and my friends.  So we were standing outside the elevator and I was trying to make conversation with Pochi and her boyfriend. I asked them where they were going and her boyfriend said a bar.  Soooo just joking around I said to her o what’s the name of the bar because, “Vamos a Jotear en ustedes.”(we are going to lurk/creep on you guys).  My host sister then gave me possibly one of the most terrified looks I’ve ever seen.  I immediately tried to recover by saying o it’s a joke it’s a joke, but she was having none of it.  We then had to ride 14 floors down the elevator with them…. let’s just say my friends were not happy with me and my jokes.  When we finally got to the asado it was great though.  I did ask Annya however about my little Vamos a Jotear incident and she said it was fine so it’s unclear why my host sister reacted that way.   There was so much food at the asado it was ridiculous. When we told them how shocked we were by the amount of food, all the Chileans were insistent that this was nothing.  They had hot dogs, chorizo, chicken, beef, potato, salad, and of course pisco.  We had a great time just hanging out and teaching them American jokes like “That’s what she said…”  It was fantastic. Next week we are planning Allie’s 20th birthday and it should be a lot of fun/craziness.  Luckily we have the Chileans to help us out.  Anyhow I’m kind of tired even though I just took a nap so I’ll have to think of more stories for another time. 

Besos

Well hello there!

Hola familia y amigos!! So I think updating this blog might become difficult for me seeing as it’s been a couple of days since my last post. Lo siento!

Anyways, today is supposed to be my first day of class.  As you’ll probably see by the date and time of my post, I am not at school.  Things are really… unorganized (to be nice), in the Chilean University system.  Pretty much foreign students have a “shopping period” in which they get to try out classes at both La Chile and La Catolica and figure out which ones they like.  The problem is there aren’t times, dates, and classrooms for a lot of the classes so you have to go around and figure out when and where everything is. This is the system at La Chile which is essentially the size of UCLA.  And La Catolica, which is has over 20,000 students still has their students register for classes by turning in forms with teacher’s signatures on it because it’s “tradition.”  I’m gonna have to start counting the number of time people say TIC (This is Chile) as an excuse for things. But, honestly I’m not that upset cause I get to hang out some today, I just want to make sure I get my classes finalized.

I had a super busy week so of course I have lots of stories, but I can’t actually remember them all so I’ll try to the go through the big ones that I remember…. It also helps that my friends have blogs that I can read and then copy and past into mine. lol

First, as promised. Harry Potter words!  Let me just preface this with, my friend Suzanne wrote down pretty much all the words that we would not need to use on a daily basis, but we have somehow managed to work them into our vocabulary, freaking out everyone we know.

varita= wand
Tenebroso= Dark Lord
mitad= alley
mortifago= Death Eater
era grosero= was rude
veritaserum= Vera Serum
demonio= bloody hell
escoba= broomstick
maldicion= curse
meros mortales= mere mortals (My friend Allie decided to whip this one out on my host mom, let’s just say my host mom gave us a blank stare, it was very uneventful)
puntadas= stitches
vagando= lurking
ocultarlo= hide it
agujeta= shoelace
tarata= daft bimbo
atolorando= boggled
hechizar= to hex
me espantan= they freak me out
Por las barbas de Merlin!= Merlin’s beard!
Hasta la vista, Aragog= Farewell, Aragog LOL
el Elegido= the Chosen One

I’m pretty sure that these words are only understandable in the context of Harry Potter, but it’s still fun repeating them. This is probably why foreigners think people from the US are crazy.

For the past two weeks we’ve pretty much been having lectures all day M-F with my program that I am doing study abroad with.  They are generally pretty long and muy fome (boring, Chileans love this word).  On monday we had a professor come and talk to use about the smog in Santiago.  Things that I learned from him:

1. Even if you have a powerpoint you can still manage to make it the most boring presentation ever, especially if you turn off the lights and talk for an hour and a half without ever interacting with your students

2. Apparently I’m at a high risk for early death.  In all of his stats he compared Santiago’s smog (which is a really big deal here) to that of Los Angeles.  Los Angeles had a higher level of smog and pollution in all of his stats and considering I’ve lived in LA most of my life, I’m not confident in my long term health.  Maybe that’s why I hate hiking, can’t handle the clean air.

3.  Field trips can also ruin your lecture if you take your students to possibly the most ridiculous place in Santiago.  On our first lecture field trip, the professor took us to one of the smog monitoring center’s in Santiago.  We pulled up in our bus next to a gated 12×15 box, where we then spent the next two hours going into the box in groups of 5. I’m a poli sci major, I don’t understand science in English so I’m definitely not going to understand it in Spanish.  It was a long day to say the least.

On Tuesday I had possibly one of the most depressing days since I’ve been here, but very eye- opening.  We had our usual daily lecture, but it was on Human Rights.  Most of the lecture was centered around the hundreds of thousands human rights violations that were committed during Pinochet’s dictatorship.  I never actually realized the magnitude of disappearances, deaths, and tortures that occured during this time in Chile.  In school we had always talked about Argentina, so I was more familiar with things that occured there during their military regime then with Chile.  The lecture was very interesting, but he spoke like a lot of Chileans, very quite and not pronouncing all of his words so it was hard to hear him sometimes.  He told a lot of horrific stories about various ways people were tortured which was hard to listen to.  At one point in his lecture he was telling  us about possibly one of the most horrific methods of torture used during the dictatorship, and I thought he said he had passed through this torture facility.  Because I couldn’t understand certain things, I was too afraid to ask so I just let it go.  I asked a couple of friends if I had misheard him and they said they didn’t know.  After eatting lunch, we were told we were taking a field trip to Parque por la Paz, which sounded like a nice place.  Let me just preface this with saying we never actually get details on what we are doing, just headlines.   So we went as a group to Parque por la Paz with our professor from the morning.  It was really beautiful with a ton of modern artwork and located right at the foot of the mountains.  When we walked in however I saw a sign that said this was the place where over 5 thousand people had been tortured, killed, or disappeared during Pinochet’s regime…. that I was not expecting.  Apparently this parque used to be called Villa Grimaldi and was an old Italian villa in an isolated part of Chile where people were brought.  To top things off a few minutes into the “tour” of the park, our professor tells us that he was a victim in Pinochet’s dictatorship and was taken to this Villa and tortured.  We then spent the next two hours walking through the park listening to his stories of what happened to him while he was held at this facility.  It was absolutely horrific and very difficult to hear.  He was disappeared when he was a 20 yr old university student. My age.  He was taken 3 times over a period of 4 months, tortured each time, and released, back into the community.  After 4 months he was forced into exile by the government.  He came from an upper middle class family, and was just a normal student who was president of the law student club at La Chile.  I also learned that Michelle Bachelet, the current president of Chile, was tortured at this facility with her family, which I was completely unaware of.  I feel like I should have learned some of this stuff at University in the States, because the events that occured in Chile are what changed international human rights laws and how people are prosecuted in a court of law…. After the tour through the park we went to the General cemetary.  Almost equally depressing.  We saw Salvador Allende’s grave, as well as thousands of unnamed graves.  It was actually interesting, to say the least, because this cemetary is literally in the middle of the city.  It’s filled with above ground graves and moseliums.  Apparently 5 million people are buried there!!!

Seeing as this post has again become obnoxiously long, I’m just going to wrap it up real fast and write about my weekend in another happier blog. 

On Wednesday I got to talk to Grandmama, Nene, and Uncle Richard which was great! It was nice to talk to family after having such a difficult day on Tuesday.  Thursday was the last day of our Chile Contemporaneo class (sweet!) and I was glad to be done with it.  After our presentations we went out for drinks with our tutors, which was a lot of fun and a nice way to end things.  Since then I’ve just been pulling out my hair over these classes and trying to get everything organized.  I’ll try and write a post tonight about my weekend with my Chilean friends (as well as Allie, Andrea, and Suzanne).  Until then

Besos!

From my cama caliente…

First of all I’d like to apologize for my completely incoherent posts.  I pretty much have know time in life sooo I’m trying to do this blog thing late at night which results in akward posts that are hard to follow.  I’ll work on that….

To start things off I have to explain the name of my blog! Cachai is a slang word in Chile that everyone uses.  It means “understand?” and my host mom always used it when I first moved in until she realized I understood everything she was saying.  I also like the way it sounds, thus the name of my blog.  Additionally I have started a shutterfly account so that everyone can see my pictures as well!  Here is the link, and just check it whenever to see new pictures I have taken and uploaded. http://monicapeters.shutterfly.com/  I’ll also try and post it on the side of my blog.

So I’ve been super busy and really haven’t talked to that many people. Sorry! I will explain the lack of time in a minute, but this is gonna be my quick run through of life for the past two weeks so bear with me…

• My program: I’m doing a study abroad program with CIEE.  There are 30 students in my group from all over the country and I’m the only one from Tulane.  I really like a lot of the people in my program, but of course there are a few odd ones.  We have been taking a class at Universidad de Chile (or La Chile as I will refer to it) through our program called Chile Contemporaneo.  I pretty much leave my apartment at 9 for class and don’t get back until 6 or 7 depending on whether me and my friends have once.  We get credit for the class it’s just hard because I really don’t have time to do anything else.  And it is super boring!
• University Classes: I have the option to take classes at either Universidad de Chile or Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile.  Both schools are the top universities in Chile.  After looking at the course I think I’m going to end up taking most of my classes at La Chile, but I’m going to try both Universities and then next semester I’ll choose one or the other.  Classes for La Chile actually started today, but this is Chile and nothing ever actually happens on time.
• Food:  I’ve actually only had real Chilean food a couple of times, and let me just say, it’s overrated.  Maybe I was expecting amazing food, because I absolutely love Peruvian food, but I was kind of disappointed.  This is not to say that there isn’t good food, but it’s not like I’m dying to go to a Chilean restaurant every night.  My host mom makes a lot of typical food I’d normally eat at home, like pasta, chicken, beef, etc.  Obviously a home cooked meal all the time is amazing so I’m not really complaining.  I will say that I eat all the time! My lunch is always huge, and then we have once around 6 and then dinner around 10-1030. But I’m also walking all over the place so I won’t be gorda from all this food.  I’m still looking forward to trying Peruvian food as all the Chilean have told me that this is the best food.
• Harry Potter:  So I went to see Harry Potter the first week I was here. Por Supuesto! Most movies here are shown in english with spanish subtitles which makes things easy for las gringas.  And it’s also SUPER cheap to go to the movies, like 5 USD. So exciting!  Anyways Harry Potter was great, but what made it even better was reading all the subtitles. My friend wrote them down (of course they were all the completely useless ones), but I will borrow her notebook and add them to the post next time because they are hilarious. 
• La U Futbol Game:  So on Wednesday a group of us decided to go to La Universidad de Chile futbol game.  First of all wednesday was like the coldest day ever and apparently smart Chileans do not go to the games when it’s f..king cold.  Stupid Americans! Although it didn’t really matter how cold it was as we didn’t get there till after halftime.  I’m not going to lie, I was kind of disappointed.  Everyone was telling me how I was going to get to see amazing futbol in Chile and they sucks.  Like LA galaxy would kick their asses and that’s saying a lot.  I’ll have to go to a national game or go to another game when there is more people and not as cold!
• Boys:  Because this is a family friendly blog aka my grandparents and parents are reading this, everything is going to be PG-13, so if you want the good stuff you’ll have to message me. But just for chuckles… The boys here crack me up.  First of all mullets are super in style in Chile. Like it’s an epidemic, my friend Chloe sent me this thing about Chile that pretty much as summed up my experience: “If you’re female and foreign, even if your face looks like a foot, odds are good that you can still find a husband to your liking in Chile. Once you’ve spotted a guy you like, just shave off his mullet, burn all his fanny packs and walk that weon right on down the aisle”  When we go to the clubs there are always kids lined along the wall with fannypacks. It’s like the Chileans missed the 90s or something.  I’ll have to lurk on some Chileans and take a picture for everyone to enjoy.
• This weekend: So this weekend I had a lot of fun with my friends from the program and my family.  On Friday we had a “class” at a Chilean restaurant with music and Chilean food.  The food really wasn’t that good, but the pisco was great (Peruvian Pisco of course).  This meat dish which is very Chilean plate.  It was pretty much a piece of meat with alfredo saw on it… enough said.  At least CIEE paid for all of our drinks : )  After a group of us went to Bellavista which is like this really hip neighborhood with bars ad discotecas.  We went to this great discoteca and we got in free because we were American.  It was like an old church and played pretty good music, although a lot of reggaeton.  We met a lot of Chileans, some of which were really creepy, but for the most part some nice people.  On Saturday we went out to a pub in Las Condes with the host brother of one of the boys in our program.  He was nice and brought a whole bunch of his Chilean friends (which are usually mostly boys). But we did meets some really nice Chileans and had a good time.  We also had possibly the most amazing cheese fries you’ve ever tried, possibly better then F&Ms.  On Sunday I went to Vina del Mar with my host family to visit my host dad’s mom.  I was excited because I wanted to see more of the city and have heard a lot about Vina del Mar and Valparaiso.  We went out to lunch at this really good restaurant with my family, the abuelita, and my host dad’s sister.  It actually mad me really home sick because the abuelita reminded me a lot of grandmama and the Tia was exactly like my Auntie Patti. : (  But I still had a nice time and they were very welcoming towards me.  My host dad also drove me around so I could see some of Vina and Valpo.  I really like Vina! It reminds me of the South of France/ Manhattan Beach.  As for Valpo… it was nice, but it’s really dirty. Like Santiago is a bigger city then Valpo, but this was just kind of nasty.  The congress building was reallly cool, but I pretty much decided after seeing Valpo that I would not want to study there next semster. I love Santiago too much! But I do plan on going back soon to visit my friend Rachel who is studying at PUC in Valparaiso. Exciting. 

I’m sure there is like a million other things to say, but for now I’m too tired so I’ll just save it for another time. If you guys have any questions ask me!

Besos!

Super Bien!!!

First of all, even though I’ve only been here a week I’ve had a lot of stuff that has happened so this might be obnoxiously long, but I know at least my mom will read everything. Soooo…

 Primero:  I live in an apartment with a Chilean family in Las Condes, which is pretty much a super nice neighborhood in Santiago.  I have a pool and gym in my aparment building as well as my own room, TV, bathroom, wifi, etc. My host mom’s name is Carmen Gloria and her husband is Rodrigo.   I also have a host sister who is 18 and a host brother who is 11.  they are both named after their parents, however my host sister goes by Pochi (or La Pochi) and my host brother goes by Georgey (which I absolutely love).  La Pochi has been recovering from swine flu (which I only found out about after eating “once” with her), and is a student at a private University in Chile.  Georgey is a little dorky and very much reminds me of Simon when he was younger. He absolutely is obsessed with video games (as is the whole fam) and he also throughly enjoys listening to Michael Jackson “Beat it.”  I live very close to the metro, which I take everyday to class with my friend Allie who lives on the same street.  It’s only about a 15 minute walk to the metro but I still have issues getting there on time. What can I say I run on ppt (peruvian pacific time).

Some things I like/dislike/have observed/are interesting/inappropriate:

• Interesting: We were given multiple lectures about overbearing Chilean mother’s and how we may not be accustomed to the lifestyle that many Chileans have.  My Chilean host mother has had 20 students in her house and after having lived with her for a week, I can say with confidence that… my mom is way worse (sorry mom). This is kind of in a good way. I love my mommy, but I’m pretty sure that my Chilean cultural lessons were written for anyone who was planning to live in a house with my mom. For example… 

1. Chilean mom’s may enter your room unexpectedly without announcing themselves- Mom: 1, Carmen Gloria: 0    
2. Chilean mom’s may go through your room and clean it or organize it without asking- Mom 1, Carmen Gloria: 1
3. Chilean mom’s may be overdramatic, and excessively worry about you, especially in the beginning of the program- Mom: 1(my whole life), Carmen Gloria: 0
4. Chilean mother’s may spoil there sons even into adulthood, where it is very common for males to live their mother’s for an extended period and do absolutely nothing- Mom:1 (two words, Simon Peters), Carmen Gloria: 1 (little Georgey is a prince)

Final Score- Mom: 4 Carmen Gloria:2    But despite this i still miss my mom a lot and would actual welcome her suprise visits into my room.

• Love!!!: La Cama Caliente. For those who have never had the privelege of sleeping on a cama caliente, it’s like a God put ur bed in the toaster oven and when it came out, it was like a little slice of heaven.  It’s essentially a heating pad that goes across your entire bed. Amazing!!!  Only a few kids in the program have a cama claiente and I offered to share with my friends, but after bailing out on a fiesta they are officially banned from my cama caliente. Que lastima!
• Dislike: It is the middle of winter in Santiago… need I say more. And there is no central heating in Chile…it was negtive 4 degrees Celsius in my room this morning…
• Interesting/Like/Dislike:  Chilean Spanish. Whoever told me Chilean spanish was easy to understand was full of it. I don’t know why I thought Chilean Spanish would be easier to understand then the Argentine’s Spanish.  Apparently Chilean’s have the worst Spanish of Latin America.  This is pretty much because they use so many chilenismos (slang), swallow the ends of their words, and do not pronounce their s.  Here is an example of the presidential candidate speaking Spanish (it’s horrible) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kllnAp-x9oQ&feature=related  But on a positive note I’m having no problem understanding them, except for a few words here and there.  My host mom is very impressed by my comprehension (thanks mom, grandmama, nene, grandpa), but she said that my accent is “como muy gringa como holA cOmO esTAs?”  Que bueno! lol
• Interesting:  Peruvians in Chile.  Apparently they are like the Mexicans of Chile.  There are a lot of Peruvian immirgrants in Chile and lets just say the Chileans aren’t very open to extranjeros in any form.  But, on a positive note Peruvians are known for speaking excellent Spanish in that they don’t use a lot of slang, pronounce all their words, and speak the most correct form of Spanish.  They also are known for having the best food in Latin America: Por Supuesto!  I’ve also found it advantageous that I look like everyone here.
• Dislike: I miss my friends and family a lot!
• Inappropriate: Cachemos.  I will explain this chilenismo in a later post.  Let’s just say that every time I say it my host mom giggles and says “es una palabra muy fea.”  Me and my friend Allie have taken to saying it in the streets to each other which could be a problem… there’s a good chance that my grandpa knows what this means. lol
• Like: Alicia and Sergio. Alicia is the host mom of my friend Allie.  She is such a ham and reminds me of grandmama a lot. I could write a whole blog about her (which I fully plan on doing). Sergio is the host brother of my friend Andrea.  I haven’t met him yet but I saw a picture… Let’s just say I do not talk to Simon the way Andrea talks to Sergio, even though she claims he’s only her host brother.
• Love:  There are TVs on the metro and at the majority of the stations.  Beyonce’s music videos for Diva and Halo are being featured right now. She has so much sass I love it!

Considering I have officially defeated the purpose of writing a blog I’m gonna stop and save the rest for another time.

Coming Soon:

• Picturas!!!
• My trip to Harry Potter at el cine
• La U futbol game
• Suzanne! La Peter of our program
• More info about Santiago
• Food
• Mullets and Fanny Packs (in case you missed the 80s)

Besos!