Santiago: Semana 3

I got a new teacher this week and she is much better. I think the problem with the other guy was that he liked to hear himself talk to much. Class is still good but I am now at the point that I am putting everything I have learned together and having to perfect my spanish even though it is no where near perfect! My friend Josi and I made a list of things to do this week so we could make sure to get everything in before we leave Santiago. Monday we were going to go to this new restaurant that we heard was good, but there was an activity with school to go to that exact same restaurant on wednesday so we didn´t go. But, we ate lunch at a good french restaurant then went shopping for our halloween costumes. We found some colorful mesh tops to wear to be 80´s since that is about the only thng we can be with our budget and lack of clothes here. Later that day, i tried to get a ticket to go to yoga but they were all full already. The guy told me to come in case someone didnt show up. First he gave me a tour and told me all about the place, I think he thought it was funny that a foreigner wanted to go to yoga or something. Then when i got there later, even though i was the 4th to arrive for the waiting list, he told me I was first on the list. Soo I got to go to yoga again and this time it was better since the guy spoke a lot slower and I could actually understand.

The next day after class we went to Concha y Toros which is a winery right outside of the city. We went on a tour of the winery and got to try a couple of wines. Their most famous wine is called Castillero del Diablo. He told us that the owner of the windery had his own cellar with all of his favorite wines but people would steal it. So he told everyone that there was a devil in the basement and then none of his wines were stolen again since latin americans are generally very supersticious. I have to admit there might be more to that story but it was in spanish so I got what I could. In class earlier I learned of another legend about the Trauco. He is a mysterious character that captures single women and impregnates them...but basically it is a way to put blame on someone when a single girl gets pregnant in chile. After the wine tour, i had dinner with the family and then went to a bar to watch the futbol match. I learned some new drinking games that night which is always fun. But then there was this chilean that wanted to talk about why there is not one universal language and kept aking me why why and I was tired of talking to him so I left.

On wednesday I went out to lunch at the traditional chilean place with some people from school and our activities director Carlos, since it is his last week. I learned after talking to him and some german girls that the rest of the world is taught that there are only 5 continents. They link all of the Americas together, and exclude Antartica. I thought that was really interesting and don´t understand how we have such a different view than everyone else. Or how they just don´t count Antartica at all. After a long discussion about that, i went back to my house, then yoga again. Then that night, Josi came over and we watched Motorcycle Diaries. It was really cool to see it now since I have visited a lot of the places that he went and am going to a lot of the places in the near future. We also studied for our test that I just took and am currently waiting for the teacher to correct. Tonight we are celebrating Carloween which is a halloween/ goodbye party for Carlos at school.

Well, carloween was quite a success. Josi and I dressed up 80´s which is usually just the back-up costume in the states, but here it was quite a hit. All the people from school thought we were trying to be Cindy Lauper. So we just went with it. At the party, we played beer pong, started by me, and then we played flip cup, also started by me. I took it upon myself to liven up the party a bit. During flip cup, we had no more beer, but we had piscola! No worries, why don´t we just play with that? I found out fast that playing with the same amount of piscola as beer makes one really drunk. BTW piscola is pisco (the famous chilean alcoholic beverage) mixed with coke. We went to a club after the party, danced and then I went home early at 4 since I was going to Mendoza the next day. I got home to my homestay and was tiptoeing around not to wake anyone at the late hour on a thursday night. I tried to turn my light on beside my bed and it wasnt working. I was feeling around trying to get it to work and I found this other button and I pushed it. Just my luck, it happened to be the panic button. Soooooo the alarm went off in the whole house! I had no clue what to do and finally the daughter came out and turned it off and she did not look very happy with me. I apologized to Ana Maria the next morning and she just laughed and said she is glad it happened cuz now she knows it still works! I felt so stupid, but what can ya do.

The weekend was my reunion with my friends from BA! I took a long 8 hour bus trip there which I slept the whole way even through the beautiful andes mountains. But I was needing some recovery from carloween. We had to get out at customs though for like 2 hours which was really not fun. I went with a girl from Santiago, Janneke, and we went to the asado with the hostel that night. Luckily it happened to be at this other hostel where my friends were staying but we hadnt been able to contact each other that day. We ate some good steak and watched the Cordoba rugby team dance with each other and then went home. We got to stay with the whole team of 20 17 year old boys. I know i am spoiled by not really liking hostels that much but 20 dirty boys sharing a bathroom with me put the icing on the cake. The next day the rest of our group arrived and we went to a hot springs. We took like a one hour bus ride and i had just dranken this hugeee thing of water and i have not had to pee that bad in a long time. And of course there was no bathroom on the bus. So i ran out as fast as i could and found the grossest bathroom ever which i am pretty sure was part of some lady´s house but it didnt matter. Anyways, the hot springs were absolutely gorgeous..we arrived in what looked like nothing, but we walked down and it was just great. We spent the day in the sun, and when we were hungry, sat down at the restaurant for a 2 hour lunch (not by choice) and while we were eating this one cloud came over the hot springs and just started pouring. We were covered thank goodness. the rain stopped pretty soon after and we were able to hang out there until the bus came back to get us. At night we went to a nice dinner and then a club. The whole rugby team happened to be there too. I opted out early since I am getting old and can only handle one night of partying a week. The next day we walked around a little and then went on a sunset horseback ride. I loved it. But again I had to pee before we went on the horses and nicely asked where the bathrooms were. He replied with a ummm well anywhere you want! So me and two other girls had to find a place on the farm to pee in broad daylight. We walked up into the mountains on our horses, mine was named apache. He immediately went off the path because he was fed up with the slow horse in front of us and i kinda freaked out cuz i couldnt get him back on the path, but after that everything was good. The sunset wasn´t anything special since a cloud covered the sun, but we did see the lights of the city on our way back. Dinner was really fancy this night...Mcdonalds but man i was glad to have good salad. I never knew how much I would miss salads. The lack of good salad here is amazing, but at least I can count on Mcdonalds. There was this fair going on still and we went and shopped around. I bought a couple little things, then we went home. The bus ride home was much more exciting since I stayed awake for the andes mountains this time. They are beautiful and it is amazing how hot it is yet there is still snow. Overall, the weekend to mendoza was a success! i expected to do more things with wine considering all the wine from Argentina is from there, but I went with the flow and still enjoyed it! Major downfall though was the amount of disgusting bathrooms (and lack thereof) I had to use this weekend. Sometimes I am definitely reminded that I am in South America.