Looking back on September

Hello to all! I've decided to write a post looking back on September and in general my stay here so far! September was great and it just flew by especially since I was gone for a whole week up north! Overall September brought more memories, more Spanish words to learn (everyday I learn more and more words), more Chileans to meet, and traditions to experience! Especially with the traditions, September is a big month for Chile in general! The 18th of September is Chile's independence day from Spain! We experienced all the traditions that go along with it such as Anticuchos or shishkabobs of different types of meat and the national dance of Chile which is the Cueca. The Cueca is a mating dance about chickens and roosters. The girl has a panuelo or scarf that she dances with while the man beats his boots on the ground making pounding sounds and clicks his spurs on his boots. You can kind of see that they're both trying to get the other one to notice what they look like and how they dance! It's super fun! Around the 18th of September there are things called Las Fondas which are basically carnivals with food, dancing, games, and things to buy. We didn't go to the one in San Pedro because there were a lot of drunk men walking around so it was a little dangerous. Also during September Chileans drink Chicha which is fermented juice of all types of flavors! I wasn't a huge fan of the taste. Finally, September brings out the kite flying! My dad would of loved seeing how many kids were out on the beaches or in the parks flying their kites! Having just got back from Afghanistan where it's also very popular to fly kites, he would have enjoyed that aspect of the Chilean culture.

Looking back on my two and a half months here in Chile, I've decided that I'm fluent in Spanish. My friend Ben made the comment that if you can hold a conversation and get your point across then you're fluent.... well I can do both of those so I would consider myself fluent which is really exciting to say. Of course I'm learning more and more everyday with my family, friends, and obviously my Spanish classes, but it's really exciting to say that I'm bilingual! I can only imagine what it's going to turn into in these next two months!

The weather is now moving into spring as we just passed the equinox so we're going to be able to start going to the beach more! It's weird now thinking that winter is approaching Colorado and I'm approaching summer! It's going to be a huge shock when I get off the plane in Denver! haha I'm enjoying the weather because I'm able to wear my chacos to feel the sun on my toes!

Well September was a good month and I'm excited what these next two months hold for me because everyday is an adventure in Chile! I'm starting to plan my big ending trip to Patagonia in December, but there is also the possibility of going to Buenos Aires with my best friend Celine! Vamos a ver! We will see where my life takes me down here! Love you all! Chao!

One desert and Four Coloradan Girls

Hola a todos! I'm finally writing after just getting back from one of the best adventures of my life. I just sadly finished my "spring break" down here, but really classes were just canceled because it was Las Fiestas Patrias or their independence day down here. There are parties literally all week! Anyway since school was canceled we took advantage of it and traveled to the north of Chile where there is a huge desert called the Atacama Desert maybe you've heard about it! Who is we? One of my best friends Bailey flew in Friday 9/11 to spend 10 days with me and my other best friend Celine, and my housemate Jeannie or Mama Jean came along to experience it all with us! I will just say now that were were great traveling partners and oh man we had a blast!!

We left Saturday the 12th at 11 pm on a double decker bus with our destination of Chañaral and the National Park Pan de Azucar. The bus ride was 11 hours, but the majority during the night so we just slept! Once we got to Chañaral, a tiny town on the coast with a population of about 3,000. It's probably more, but it was pretty deserted when we were there because it's not tourist season at the moment. We had an amazing lunch that really filled us up and energized us after sitting on a bus for 11 hours! Afterwards we got our room at the hostel across the street. For 8 dollars a night we probably should have gotten better accommodations, but it was a bed to sleep in for the night. The guy we rented from was literally 80 years old and probably shouldn't be maintaining a hostel, but was really nice to let us chill there while we waited for our bus the next night. The first day in Chañaral we went to the beach and explored all around the rocks and hills of Chañaral. For such a small town it was really beautiful! After exploring the town we ventured to el supermercado to buy food for dinner. Bread, avo, cheese, fruit, and yogurt consisted of dinner, but it was delicious! To top everything off we drank some wine out of our yogurt cups because we didn't have any glasses.... cheers to being low maintenance girls!


The next day we paid a guy to bring us out to the National Park Pan de Azucar! We saw a lot there including the various flora and fauna of the park: giant cacti and a lama type animal called a Guanaco. The guy took us to a spot called El Mirador or the look out where we could see all of Pan de Azucar! It was a sight to see and literally took my breath away! Afterwards he drove us down and we paid another guy to bring us out on a boat to Isla Pan de Azucar which is one place in Chile that harbors Humboldt PENGUINS!!!! I was so excited to see the penguins. I have now made my trip complete because I've seen the penguins in their natural habitat not some zoo! It was a great boat ride and afterwards we had the most amazing fried fish lunch on the beach from basically a hole in the wall! Super Rico!



Chañaral and Pan de Azucar were amazing, but was only the beginning to our grand adventure and we were literally only half way to San Pedro de Atacama, our next destination! Like I said before el dueño or owner of our hostel was super nice and let us four girl hang out until our bus left for San Pedro. As girls we had a blast with making our own cards to play with since we didn't have any, but we did have pens and paper! When is was finally time to leave we had some panic attacks because Bailey lost her bus ticket and later on Celine did too.... after a lot of hysteria and talking with the bus people we were on our way to San Pedro!

San Pedro de Atacama is almost literally on the border of Bolivia and Argentina so it is a hot spot for many backpackers from all over the world! During our four day visit of San Pedro we had met people from Australia, New Zealand, Israel, France, the US, and Chile! I now love the environment of hostels because you are able to meet so many people and converse in any language that you can! Hostel Cabur, where we stayed for the first two nights, was the coolest hostel in probably the whole world! For one our room was awesome and really comfortable with four beds and space to move around. There was a kitchen to cook in that had an endless supply of tea and coffee to drink! There was a common area with a fire place for the night, hammocks to snooze in, and tables to sit and chat with whom ever decides to cross paths with you! I will never forget the Australian sisters we met who I will now call my San Pedro moms! They were almost done with their six week tour of basically all of South America! They had endless stories to tell us and many laughs to share with us! We also met our six Chilean sisters who conversed in Spanish with us, drank wine with us, and took us dancing on the last night in San Pedro! The hostel was an amazing experience and I'll never forget the memories that were created there!

During the day we paid for two excursions. One of which was getting up at 3:30 in the morning to go see the Geysers de Tatio. It was beautiful being surrounded by volcanoes and geysers at 6 in the morning! We learned all about the geysers, which included learning the errors of the Chilean government trying to take advantage of the energy the geysers create. Their error was that they couldn't use the energy and they actually ended up exploding the ground and creating a false geyser that never stops going off.... stupid government always screws with the environment in some way or another! (You can see the false geyser in the background of the photo). After seeing the geysers we went swimming in the thermal pools created by the geysers! It wasn't super hot like we wanted, but there were really warm spots and really cold spots! The cool thing was when we were in the pool it started to snow on us! It was beautiful looking up at the sky seeing the snow fall all around us! Our trip to the geysers was totally worth it and made me really want to hike to the top of the volcanoes! (Hiking a volcano is on the list for Jeannie and I)


The other excursion we went on was to Valle de la Luna which was just absolutely mind blowing! We hiked all around including an amazing canyon with towering walls of rocks! The other hike was to the top of the dunes to watch the sun set which was amazing and proof that God's creations are truly amazing! The colors and the view we saw really did take my breath away and I could have sat up there all day and night because the view was awesome! Words can't describe, but pictures will just have to give you a little hint as to what it really was like!



All in all our trip was just amazing! The girls I went with couldn't have been better! The bus trip back was 23 hours... ya I know! It felt great to be back in Viña at home where there was clean clothes, good meals, and a comfortable bed, however the memories we created together will forever stick with me as long as I shall live! In the meantime my life is kind of disorganized right now as I'm trying to shift back into school mode again and catch up with everything I missed out on this last week! Life is great here and I hope this post finds you all in good health! Besitos y abrazos! Miss you all!

A taste of the bad side of Chile...

I had an adventure the other day.... It all began after my grammar class when my friend asked me to accompany her to the market to buy avocados and tomatoes for her family's dinner. The market here is a few blocks from the main building of PUCV (my university) and runs down a long street. You can find just about anything there from your fruits and vegetables to screws and tools... literally anything there. Any way my friend wanted me to come with her because the last time she was in the market some guy kissed her on the cheek! So she wanted me to be her "bodyguard". haha The market is kind of a dangerous place and you just need to be careful with your belongings and be aware of your surroundings. So with that being said... my friend bought what she needed to buy and we left and went around the corner so that she could put the produce and money back in her bag. With a strong hold on her backpack the whole time she began to put her money back in. During this I see out of the corner of my eye a man approaching us and I'm wondering why is this guy approaching us? Then it dawned on me that this guy was about to steal my friend's backpack. I reacted a little too late in trying to grab the backpack first. Since my friend had a strong grip on the backpack and the man grabbed the other strap so hard, she flew and was then dragged on her butt for 5-10 seconds. The robber yelled "ya sueltala mujer" which means "drop it already lady!" She yelled NO and I was about to yell at her to just drop it and let it go when the guy gave up and walked away angrily!

It was a sight to see! As someone who has grown up in a town where everyone trust everyone and leave their keys in the ignition, this was an eye opening experience that I'll never forget! It was scary for me to stand there and see my friend get dragged across the market clinging for dear life to her backpack. I didn't know what to do or how to react! The only thought I have now was I wish I had just reacted a little sooner to grab her backpack before the guy did. In the end everything is okay and he didn't get the backpack in the end. However, it did leave the two of us on edge. I was shaking and griping my backpack the whole time on the way back on the metro.

Some things I've learned after this incident.... 1. robbers target people depending on their clothing and appearance (my friend was in a long white jacket). If you stand out in nice clothing and obviously look like a foreigner you're more likely to get robbed. 2. Next week is independence week for Chile. The head guy for the Spanish department for foreigners at PUCV, Jorge, said that robberies happen a lot around holidays because people want money so they can party for the week. 3. You can never let your guard down and always need to be aware of your surroundings. We should have walked farther away from the market before doing anything because the guy obviously saw her putting her money back in the backpack. I've gotten quite comfortable here and had just begun to start trusting people and situations a lot more and then this happened to us. I'm definitely scared after all this, but this episode just means that I need to be a little more careful and smart about certain situations. Just another exciting chapter in my life down here in Chile....

Being Sick in a Foreign Country

Being sick in a different country is not an experience everyone should deal with when they travel! I would say for the majority of August I was sick with something. I'll start with the beginning....

When we first got here I wasn't sick and my body seemed to be taking in the changes pretty well until I got a horrible sore throat! I was a little scared because I had strep earlier in the summer! But I new it was because I was getting use to the atmosphere, smog, and cigarette smoke. Everyone and I literally mean everyone smokes down here. It's not like Colorado where it's illegal to smoke indoors. People smoke in the clubs while they're dancing! It's ridiculous and a horrible problem. My body is use to really clean air coming from Colorado and especially Crested Butte where hardly anyone smokes cigarettes! Anyway my sore throat went away after about a week, which made me really happy. I went on fine for about a week.

Being in a new country there are tons of new foods to try that are typical for Chileans. So one weekend we tried tons of new things such as sopapillas (our mom taught us how to make them from scratch!) with all sorts of toppings for Friday night onces, Saturday we tried all sorts of new seafoods (interesting because I've always loved shrimp, but this was all sorts of different clams to try), Sunday night we had left-over pizza that had sat in the box overnight and all day. Needless to say Jeannie and I got really sick sunday night throwing up. I still think to this day that I got food poisoning from the pizza! I will never eat pizza after it's sat out all night and day! So I was sick pretty much all week with my stomach not feeling 100%. Thursday of that week I had the worst stomach cramps because there was so much gas bottled up inside of me. One second I would be fine and the next second doubled over in so much pain! I basically crawled to one of the many pharmacies here and got something for my stomach! It helped a ton and my body is back on schedule... literally!

Now it's been over a month here and I was fine for a few weeks until I went out one night for a friends birthday and the next morning I woke up with a horrible cough that I've never had before! I figured it was only because I was in a smoky place the night before and my lungs just needed fresh air. However I was also having a sinus headache that day too... I had a feeling it wasn't right. Well about a week passed and the sinus headache had gone away, but my cough didn't. This cough sounds horrible like I'm about to cough up a lung or something. My mom here is pretty good at taking care of me especially when Jeannie and I were really sick with our stomachs. She gave me cough medicine that helped but only worked for just a little while. After a week my mom said I needed to go to the doctor, so she took me to the clinic at the hospital. After waiting for over an hour I finally got to the doctor. The consultation lasted about 15 minutes and consisted of me trying to convey what was going on with my body. My mom did most of the talking but the doctor was like "If.. you... talk.. really.. slowly.. I... will... be .. able.. to.. understand.. your.. English." I said it was fine and a lot easier to talk in Spanish after I saw how long it took to get out that sentence. After everything was said and done... I didn't have Bronchitis which was what I thought I might have. I had searched it on WebMD before going to the doctor and had all the symptoms except the fever. In the end I have something with my bronchioles and my trachea but my lungs are fine... so he says. I have antibiotics and cough syrup. But I still think something is wrong with my lungs because I'm wheezing. That might because I have junk caught on my bronchioles. Who knows really. I just hope that within these next couple of weeks I'm free of sickness!

I have an exciting adventure ahead of me because Celine Cooper, my best friend who is also studying down here, and I have our other best friend Bailey flying in on Friday! Starting the 14th through the 18th I don't have any school because it's "spring break" or really just a huge party for Chile's independence! So we're taking advantage of the week off and traveling north! So stay tuned for our huge adventure to the north of Chile! Hope everyone is doing great and this finds you in good health! Take care! Besitos y abrazos! Hugs and Kisses to everyone! Chao!