Moments of Peace

The past few days have been very up and down for me as I recount what has happened. I have felt frustrated with friends here and missing friends at home, I have missed RJ a ton, I have missed my family a lot and really have been doing a lot of thinking about what I want my adventure here to look like. I have these moments sometimes where I feel extreme peace that this is where I am supposed to be, but those moments never last long enough. This can be due to amazing and exciting things happening where I wish I could share it with the people I love, or it may be crappy times.

None of this really surprises me or makes me feel like something is wrong because I feel like this is a natural feeling to have when experiencing something completely different. I really wish I could share this with everyone I love, and we could do amazing things together, but I also know that I need to grow individually and that can be just as important as being with people.

Lately I have been praying/worshipping God a bit more than I was at the beginning. I feel like things have died down a bit and I am getting into a routine where I can see the gaps and holes in what I want in my life. I have no idea where this is going to lead me right now, but I am working through this mini series on my phone that is 25 Words a Day of the Bible. I am really bad at doing it everyday, but that is something I am working on. :) And I have also been watching a few more sermons from First Pres and am thinking about going to church with my advisor and her family next week. I am excited to see where this may lead and if there is something that I might be called to do while down in Chile. There might be something, but there also might not be and that is okay. Oh and also, I have noticed I have missed singing immensely and starting next week I will be singing again. I joined this workshop through my school where it is once a week and with Chileans hopefully. I want to thank anybody who is out there praying for me or who has while I have been down here. It really means so much and I appreciate the support.



Tea with herbs, jam and crackers in the morning

In other news! Yesterday I went to a BBQ with my friend Tess and Eric. It was a BBQ of one of Chilean friends that we met through the early start program. It was actually really fun and I was glad I went because I have wanted to do things with chileans. We had some delicious chorizo and other random types of meat. We also day drank which is always funny and played some card games and dominos. Afterwards, Tess and I went back to her house and had a very great conversation with her family while eating our once (their type of dinner, less food and usually bread/avocado/salad/tea...) We probably sat and talked to her mama, papa and brother for about an hour and discussed a lot of things but mainly about some common differences between the US and Chile. Also, I asked them about the protests that were going on yesterday. They had to do with students and they were protesting education and everything that it encompasses. Tess and I then hungout and watched an episode of Girls. I headed home after that and enjoyed the weather, it was very nice out still even at 12:30ish and it was nice to walk around a bit. However when I got home, my stomach started hurting really bad and I got pretty nauseous. I ended up getting sick a few hours later and felt much better after that. I have no idea what happened, I think I must have eaten something wrong because it came on so suddenly and my body was not happy at all with me. Today though my family has been adorable :) I told them about how I was feeling and my mama made me some tea with herbs and then then made me a soupish thing for lunch that was bland but it was good on my stomach. Today I just took it kinda easy and I think that was the best thing for me! I feel much better and hope that it continues in that direction.

Tomorrow I am planning to go to Laguna Verde with some of the girls for another BBQ and just some good hanging out time. I have heard it quite beautiful so will be awesome to see.

Some food pictures! I want to put more food pictures up so I am working on taking more.



My soup and crackers for lunch

Once: bread, avocado, cheese, honeydew melon, an egg, tea

Traveling, Hanging out

Lately I  have been kinda frustrated with not doing a lot of new stuff. I think that must be part of the experience especially when I did so much at the beginning. However, I feel like none of my friends down here want to go out during the day and see something new or at least just catch up. What happened to just going to get a coffee and talking about random things and our lives? I hope this gets better and doesn't continue but it is difficult to figure out how I can fix this.

I miss all my friends who would do anything with me: Go to Lewiston for the day, Sing on the top of furniture, make food, complain about driving to Walmart, get McDonalds, sit in the library and not actually study for 4 hours and so so much...

Woke up on the wrong side of the bed...

Today,
I woke up to my mama chilena waking me up because my alarms never went off. It was really strange too because they were set and still had their check marks next to them, but didn't go off. I jumped out of bed and got ready as quick as I could. I only had 30mins til class started and it takes that long to take the bus there... So I ended up getting to school late, but only by about 5mins which wasn't too bad. However, while on the micro my yogurt spilled in my bag. That was interesting to try to clean up with paper and nothing else on a micro that has a conductor driving like crazy. Then I got to class and it was boring, we then found out there was class yesterday even though everybody had received an email saying there was no class from our school administrator. I have noticed that things like this happen a lot in Chile. Nothing is ever crystal clear and you don't have that direct communication with professors like you do at WSU. That is something that I never thought I took for granted, but now I know that I did. It is always very interesting to learn what things you take for granted. A few other ones are: paper towels in bathrooms, toilet paper in the stalls in bathrooms (or even at all...) and now this experience with my school. I am sure I have many more coming my way.

Yesterday,
I went on adventure! Tess, Amelia, Tess's chilean dad and I all went to a beach in Zapallar. This is a town that is about 32miles north of Vina del Mar. Along the way we took the upper route so that we were able to see the views of the ocean from up high and all of the buildings that are characteristic of that route. We saw a copper mining site, a petroleum site, the ocean, trees, flat lands, horses and much more. The whole trip to Zapallar took about an hour. Maybe a little longer. Once we got there we drove down to a beach that Tess's dad really liked and he showed it to us. It was gorgeous and had the most beautiful houses near it. I bet those families love waking up to the views they have. We sat and enjoyed the view for a bit and then walked along a walkway for 20 or so minutes to see what was around the corner. Tess's dad told us all about this beach and how he loves coming here to watch the sunset because supposedly it is gorgeous. We then walked back and went over to a little restaurant to the left of the beach. At the restaurant, the girls and I had some delicious mango juice and the dad had an espresso. We then shared some little empanadas that were of seafood. It was kinda like a sampler tray and it had shrimp and cheese, crab and whatever 'locos' are. I think this is one of those words that only chileanos use and so translating it was difficult. I think clams or something similar to that.
We had great conversations with Tess's dad about life, the future and really just whatever came up. He was very sweet and talked slow with all of us. He was also very patient. It was starting to get a little late so we decided to head back and we went the lower route on the way back to see the ocean. We drove through ConCon which reminded me of that time I went surfing and had a delicious basil, tomato and cheese empanada when I was hungover. Lastly, right before getting to Renaca we stopped at this hill that we walked up and we saw the remnants of the sunset in front of us over the ocean and we had sand dunes behind us. It was gorgeous and so much to take in. Yesterday was a great day and reminded me that travelling while I have the chance is what matters and I need to find people who want to do that with me. This is the time to travel and see wonderful things.

Here are some photos of the trip!


Technology...

Well today has been slightly frustrating. My Chilean phone stopped working and now I don't know what to do. It reached a point where it told me that the SIM was rejected so that was not very exciting. Also, there seems to be something wrong with my computer and I am not sure if factory resetting it is the right thing to do, or if I should try to find a place down here that can look at it.

Kind of made for a bummer of a night, mainly because I know there is nothing I can do and that I don't have the knowledge to fix my computer. Ohhh technology.

What else happened lately...

I heard some music today at my school, this is a concert that was a tribute to the history of Valpariso and La Catolica (my school). They were pretty good and I got to listen to them during part of my class instead of having to learn things. Also, my teacher in that class told me I have one happy eye, and one sad eye. Not really sure why he said that or how he thought of that, but it wasn't meant as an insult. He is just kinda a weird fellow.

Here are two pictures of yummy food! I wish I had a photo of the dessert I ate tonight, but I don't. It was like an eclair or something stuffed with Manjar. Super delicious!!

Chocolate cake with jam and manjar

My lunch today, no idea what it was
but it was delicious

Dog Poop

Well today was the day when I step in dog shit.. It was bound to happen since there are so many dogs that are stray and it is not really common for owners to pick up their dog poop. So luckily for me, I got the luxury of stepping in it. The even better part was that I didn't notice and tracked it into my house, up the stairs, on my carpet and then in the kitchen before anybody noticed... I felt kinda bad especially because my Chilean mom started to clean it up. I made sure to clean my boots off and found shit on both shoes to top it off. Then I casually went upstairs to realize that I needed to clean the dog poop of my carpet before my mom saw it! So I got out some purell and Kleenex and cleaned it all up. I didn't want her to know to because it was kinda embarrassing so I threw the Kleenex out of my window... Hahahah. She ended up coming in my room and looked at the ground and then walked out. Thank goodness I had cleaned it up!

Possible classes

Such a bummer, but it was pretty comical.

Also today I finally figured out my classes!

• Mon 10:05-11:35am, Tues 11:45-1:15pm : Practicas y Discurso del Cuentos Latinamericanos
• Tues, Thurs 7-8:30pm: Fonetica y Fonologia
• Tues, Thurs 2-3:30pm: Espanol Escrita Avanzada
• Thurs 11:45-1:15pm: Arte y Socieded

12 credits, not too bad at all and I feel good about my schedule now. I was really worried and stressed about my classes but I decided it was better to take less credits, and take classes that will help me improve my Spanish even when I can't get any credit for them at WSU. I checked though and after this semester I will only have 32 more credits to go! Kinda crazy to think that I only have one year left of college...

Hipofocal

 Also, on Sunday I had a fun day with Tess, Amelia and Sam. We all walked around Cerro Alegre and Concepcion. Tess and I happened to get on the same micro which was pretty insane and then waited a good 25mins for Sam and Amelia. We were not surprised and made sure to get ice cream while we waited. We then got these cookies from this lady that sells them out of her front door and attempted to find an art studio. We did and he takes photos and puts them on cloth. It is really cool and not too expensive. He can even use any photo that you have, which means I can choose what I want and make it happen. Then we walked around more and went in a few little shops here and there.

The girls and me

Erray Jota (RJ)

View from the hill the Virgin Mary statue is on

RJ came and visited me :) He arrived on Saturday of last weekend and left yesterday. It was great having him here to hangout and see what my life is like here. My family had a BBQ to welcome him to Chile and to meet everybody in the family. It was a little interesting to have that BBQ so quickly after he arrived because I would assume it was a little overwhelming especially because my family doesn't speak very much English and the relatives that were over, spoke only Spanish. He was able to understand a lot of the conversations but I translated a fair amount back and forth between him and my family and vice versa. After eating some delicious food (choripan, steak, potatoes, Chilean salad) we went out and meet a few of my friends for drinks. It was funny actually because the bar we meet them at was the same bar that I went out to with my family when I first arrived.

On Sunday we hungout and then met up with my friends out on the the beach and attempted to get some ice cream, however we were number 39 and they were only on number 10. So about 40mins later we finally were able to get our ice cream and attempt to eat it as fast as we could because it was melting so fast. Then we went and got some food with Sam and Julie Ann at a place called Domino. It was pretty good, and all of us ordered something similar to hamburgers. Afterwards we went back to my place and hungout with my family.

Monday: I had to go to class in the morning. I like this class, it is basically a class about short stories and my teacher seems like a good guy but he is kinda difficult to understand since he murmurs so much. After my class RJ and I went to my house for lunch and hungout with my family for a while. We then went and met my advisor Karla and talked with her for a bit. I wasn't feeling the best so we didn't do anything else very exciting. RJ made us some food and that was about it. He attempted to cook some chorizo like my family did, but it had a different flavor. It was still really delicious.

The worker showed us a skull!

Tuesday: I had class again and went to it, it was boring but all in all not too bad. Then RJ and I went to a restaurant that the girls and I found and had some good Chilean food. It isn't anything special but it is super cheap and you can get juice, a soup or salad, your food and then a dessert. All of this for 1900 pesos which is about $4 dollars. Afterwards we went around and walked around the port and I gave a tour of everything that I have learned in tours. We walked through downtown, cerro alegre and concepcion, and went up a few ascensors. Also, we went to walk through one of the cemeteries but it was closed but the guard/worker there opened it for us and gave us a tour. It was pretty awesome and so nice of him! All of this took 5 hours so we were pretty exhausted!! But, I had to go to a new class to see if it was going to be good. It is called fonetica and I really liked it. We sang in the class and practiced our pronunciation of words. The professor is this cute old guy who is very sweet and super helpful. Then RJ met me at my school and we jumped on a micro and went over to my place for once.

The perfect company

Wednesday: We didn't do much today since I didn't have any classes. We went to Vina and got some sushi which was delicious. We also visited the little cafe that I like to go to and had some delicious cortados, media lunas and strawberry juice. Then we went and sat in the plaza and ate our sushi while listening to some people play music for money. We also ran into my family which was funny while we were buying some juice. I have never run into them before, except for the two times that RJ and I ran into them! We then attempted to go out to a really good once place for once, however we left too late from my place and it was closed. That was a huge bummer but we found a different restaurant and split some Maui Maui and a Chilean salad along with wine. It was a cute place, the fish could have been better especially for the price, but the wine was good.

Thursday: We hungout in the morning and had lunch with my family and then figured out our plan for Santiago. We had kinda procrastinated all week which is nothing new and so then we had to figure it out. RJ had this app where you can see apartments for rent, hostels and hotels also. He found this one apartment which was pretty awesome and had a little kitchen and living room. We were able to book it and then leave for Santiago. It all worked out luckily because it could have just as easily not worked out. We took the bus to Santiago and got super lost! Thank goodness for this really nice old man who sat in front of us. I asked him how to get to the metro in Santiago and he tried to tell me but he talked too quickly. Then we got off when he did and he told us that he would help us. So he walked with us to the metro and then described which stop to get off on! It was so nice and he didn't need to help us but I am so glad he did because we would have had no idea which stop was ours. We got a little lost after getting of the metro but then we found the place. It was a cute little apartment and had a pool on the top of the building. We then went out to dinner at PF Changs because I have been craving good Chinese. That was such an adventure too because we took the metro and then walked but the map we had on RJ's phone only gave an approximate location. We ended up being just a little short of where we should be and got confused and walked back to a McDonald's to use their Wifi. I asked one of them where to go and we found out it was like 10 steps farther than where we walked too. It was pretty hilarious.

Us in front of the view

Friday: On Friday we walked around Santiago and went to see the Virgin Mary on the hill. We were able to walk up to it. We tried to take an ascensor up but it wasn't working so we took a taxi instead and met a really cool guy named Eduardo I think. He talked to us about how he is travelling for 5 and a half months. We hungout with him for a while and stared at all of Santiago. The view was gorgeous. Afterwards we met another lady when we took a taxi down and she was pretty nice and talked about travelling a lot for her job in Finance. We then walked to the fish market and then took the metro home. We bought some bread and RJ bought a lot of alcohol for all of his friends/family from home. We then went back and sat up at the pool for a while eating some bread, cheese, avocado and had some wine. We just needed to sit and relax for a bit before going out to dinner. We went to a restaurant that was on the 16th floor of a building and went to a seafood restaurant where we the room rotated. It rotated super slowly but we ended up being able to see a 360degree view of Santiago. We had a really delicious dinner and some dessert. It was a great last night.


Us in front of the statue

Saturday: We woke up really early and left at about 6:30 in the morning to catch the metro to the bus station. We ended up getting off at the wrong station and I just decided it would be best to take a taxi instead of walking and possibly getting lost. I talked to the taxi driver first and asked how much it would be to the airport, he told me 12,000 pesos which seemed great because it meant it was a flat rate for the whole trip. We definitely got our money's worth out of it because it took a good 20-30 mins from where we were and it would have been a lot more if I hadn't just asked at the beginning. Then we tried to get his tickets but the automatic machine wasn't working and so we had to wait in a super long line that wasn't moving. We seriously thought he wasn't going to make his flight but we got moved ahead because there was only like 50mins left til it was going to take off. He got his ticket and then we said goodbye, possibly for too long and he ran through immigration and security. It was hard to see him go, but we both knew that it had to happen.. Then I caught the bus back to the bus station and bought my ticket to Vina. I fell asleep immediately in the bus with my ticket in my hand and woke up to it not being there. It was actually pretty funny.

All in all it was an amazing weekend and I couldn't have asked for a better time or better company.

Update!!

My cute Hostel

So I have been slacking on my blog posting... Time to update anybody who is reading it!

La Serena:
The next day here I hung out with the girls and we walked around the town for a while. We went to the feria and bought some food and random things. We also tried this really weird fruit called Copao and it was delicious! It is kinda like a kiwi but larger and very acidic. The man who sold them was very sweet and he told all of us about them and their medicinal value. He recommended to us to put sugar on the top of it and it made it delicious! Then that evening we went to the Observatory Mamayuka which is on the way to Pisco Elqui. We had about a two hour tour and view session with a Chilean. So his English was chopping and it was difficult to understand him, but nevertheless the sky is amazing and always so interesting to learn about. The only bummer about the night we went out was that the moon was full and so it blocked the majority of the stars because of how bright it was.

Japanese Garden

The only thing I had wished we had done was a tour to the Penguin/Dolphin island and maybe a tour down in Pisco Elqui to see more of the landscape the land! Maybe when my Mom comes down and visits me!

Home:
Coming back from La Serena was easy and the ride back seemed quicker than going. They had some movies playing this time and we were all pretty exhausted. We had made some stuffed peppers as food for the drive and they turned out really good. :) It was weird as we pulled into the Vina station because it almost felt like I was home, even though Chile really isn't my home, but it seems to be taking on that right now. I think that is important and part of the adventure down here.

At Orientation Brunch

Then we had orientation for the week! It was boring and pointless since I already had the 3 week early start classes here. But we met the new people from our group and some other exchange students. Also I GOT MY VISA! Which was a process and took a few hours for the whole group to get them, but we all got approved and now everything is finalized for studying down here.

Signing up for classes was difficult! Now that I am thinking that I will be majoring in both Biology and Spanish it means I need to make sure almost every class can count for something. So, I had to sign up for 10 classes and then get approval from my Spanish and Biology advisor that they would give me credit for required classes. I think I have figured it out and am taking: The Discussion and Practice of Latin American Short Stories, Art and Society, Parasitology, Mapuche Games (PE Class) and a Spanish Seminar class. I like my short story class and have the rest of my classes this week. After this week I will have everything finalized and hopefully start to get acclimated to taking classes with Chileans.

Nothing else major has really been going on. I have been to the beach a lot, my host family got a new exchange student but he is from the south of Chile, I am going to classes and just living my life down here. Oh and I went to a carnival on Monday, it was kinda lame hahah.

I miss everybody up in the United States!