So, where to begin...my room hasn't gotten any bigger. I still hit my head at least once a day and my right hip has a permanent bruise from sliding on it to exit through my 2 x 2 door.Two weekends ago, my family here took me to their beach house (really their grandparents beach house). It was in a town named Papudo which is about 2 hours north of Santiago for a three day weekend. The house was a little cottage basically. It was freakin cold there. Every day I walked around in pants and at least a sweatshirt and probably a long-sleeved t-shit underneath. At night we always made a fire and i slept under 5 blankets (they dont really believe in insulation in Chile). Every morning I woke up to some breakfast and then we would walk down to the beach where the fishermen would pull up there boats and we would choose our lunch for the day. Every lunch was amazing and I didnt even know what I was eating half the time.
I watched a couple of the Rugby world cup games with my brother here at a yacht club and he even took me sailing one day on a 'Laiser'. For those that dont know, a Laiser is really small and it can fit two people as long as the second is a midget. So we went sailing out on the freezing water and we lasted no more than 30 minutes and thank God no more. Why? We would have to make these turns out on the water which requires one to move from one side of the boat to the other, duck under the mast that is swinging in your direction and not touch basically anything...all in under 3 seconds. Needless to say, the mast definitely smacked me in head the first time, I definitely did touch the ropes and my brother, Jose, definitely yelled at me numerous times. Nothin like getting yelled at by an 8th grader.
On a different day, my family took me to the town of Zapallar which is one of the most beautiful beach towns I have ever seen. It is basically where all the richest people from Santiago go. There is lots of German architecture as there are lots of German immigrants here, and the water was surrounded by large hills that created rocky coasts and they were covered in huge trees (i only mention that because most of the area north or Santiago is dry with fewer trees).
The father of the house was away all week doing spiritual exercises. His office, which sponsors the Chilean National Soccer team gave him two free tickets to the Chile v. Peru World Cup qualifying match. So with him out of town i got to go in his stead with Jose. Our seats were amazing; ten rows off the field. The experience is hardly like any sporting event in the states, even football,as the crowd was much more into it singing songs and chants without having to be prompted by the loud speakers in the stadium. One of the cheers that broke out was literally 'Stand up and jump, or else you are a f_ckin peruvian (sp?). Needless to say, I stood up and jumped. What Jose explained to me though, was that this match was rather tame compared to the matches between the local club teams. Those are the dangerous ones. For example, the match between Cola Cola and The U. which was played on Sunday, made the news because after the game the fans were going crazy at the local metro stop basically creating a mini riot and jumping ON TOP of the trains. And I tried to go to that game with my friends but we got there late and could not find tickets. Even more, at the end of the games here, the fans of the visiting team, who are already sectioned off in the stadium, are not allowed to leave for at least 20 minutes after the game finishes. This is so that the home team fans can leave and not fight with the visiting team fans. But in reality, the home team fans just wait for the visitors outside the exit of the stadium and fight them.
School has been extremely easy. For the most part I am still just observing the teachers. A few times I have either led or helped lead discussions but they have been few and far between. However, last Friday, one of the full time teachers asked me to cover all of her classes for her while she lesson planned for the following week. Obviously that is not right for her to do since she is being paid to teach her own classes, but turns out she hardly even worked on lesson planning and instead worked on a project she has for her university classes. Other teachers noticed this, and they were pretty pissed. I didn't really mind though, because it was fun teaching.
This past weekend we all hung out with the other ACE group down here at their, and our future, apartment. We caught up on some Grey's Anatomy, which I used to like but now find it stupid, and the season premier of the Office, which was awesome. We all discovered that I apparently give damn good back masages which I discovered is extremely tiring on the thumbs, and we went to a party for some Holy Cross volunteers that are finishing up their time down here. The party lasted til 4 in the morning which is apparently normal according to Chilean standards. I almost found my Chilean princess there, but she turned out to be crazy...
Finally, I began to re-train for a half marathon yesterday after taking 5 weeks off from running due to traveling, my messed up hand, and lack of desire to run. I have been running in the "hills" as the Chileans call them although they are the same size if not bigger than the App. Mountains, and there are amazing views of the city from them.
In the collage the first two are of the soccer game, the third is from Papudo, and the rest are from Zapallar which include a photo of Jose and another with the mother here, two of the other children and the grandparents. And yes, that is a tsunami escape route sign.
