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!