Here is a picture of a cactus outside a rest stop on the way to La Serena. Like the novelty of palmtrees, cacti never fail to entertain me. You can kind of get a sense of the scenery of most of our drive from this picture...dry hills littered with cacti. Some of them were blooming and had clumps of little red flowers!
After we finally arrived in La Serena, we got settled and went out in search of food, which proved challenging due to the size of our group and the fact that it was Labor Day, and on holidays in Chile everything prettymuch shuts down. I had started to have a scratcy throat at about noon, so by the time we decided to eat dinner all I wanted was soup, so I hit up a Chinese restaurant. The next day, we were up early to drive up the Elqui Valley, which La Serena sits in the mouth of. The Elqui Valley is known for its vineyards, and the drive up was beautiful. It kind of reminded me of the Yakima Valley in Eastern Washington, with the dry dusty hills and the rich cropland. Some of the leaves were changing on the grape vines, so some fields would be green and others bright red. The contrast was lovely. No pictures, unfortunately, as we were on the move! Farther up the valley, a dam created a huge reservoir and the contrast between the deep blue water (littered with wind-surfers) and the brown, cactus-filled hills was also breathtaking.
Our destination was Vicuna, a cute little touristy town of adobe houses, also known as the birthplace of the renouned Chilean writer Gabriela Mistral, the first Chilean to receive the Nobel Prize. We wandered around the artisan booths in the plaza and found amazing jewelry, dried fruit, and other cool stuff.
This is the main church on the Plaza. I love how all the buildings are painted in such bold colors in Chile!
A carving in a gnarled tree in the Plaza de Armas.
Perhaps the highlight of the day was that we decided to go the the Gabriela Mistral museum, which was pretty cool but not very meaningful to me as I have yet to read any of her work. Standing outside the ticket booth we ran into our friend Todd, another ministry volunteer that lives in between Valparaiso and Vina del Mar, four hours south of La Serena! He was on his own, touring the Elqui Valley, so we ended up spending a good part of the day with him.
Todd and me at lunch...please note he is wearting his let´s learn english shirt!
Todd, Steph, me and Sarah at lunch.
After lunch we wandered around town some more, and then went to a nearby pisco distillery. If I haven't mentioned this yet, pisco is a grape brandy that is wildly popular here. The ubiquitous pisco sour is a delicious concoction of pisco, lemon juice, and egg white. People also drink piscolas, which is pisco and cola. Anyway, we toured the plant, and it was in Spanish, but even with little understanding of what was being said, the tour was a little lame...or as we say in Chile, que fome! (how boring!) Basically, they just want you to spend money. Boo.
A view up the valley from the pisco distillery.
Piles of grapes that we watched being shoveled out of dump trucks onto the conveyor belt to be destemmed.
A toast with the complimentary swallow of pisco we were given!
The only major letdown of Vicuna was that the tours to the observatory were full. At first, I was devastated because I had my heart set on looking into the sky through telescopes, but as the weekend wore on, I realized I would have to come back to La Serena anyway, so I think I will have another opportunity for star gazing.
The next day, the adults of our group wanted to go to Coquimbo, a nearby city, but we were feeling in need of some alone time and wanted a chance to poke around La Serena, and our day turned out to be super! It all started at Cafe Continental, with some crepes filled with papaya (Northern Chile is known for its papaya!) and REAL COFFEE!!!! The Continental is far too classy for nescafe!
Me with my REAL COFFEE!!!
La Serena is the most beautiful city I have visited in Chile. It is right on the beach, and the architecture is very colonial, so the city has a very European vibe. It was really fun to just wander the streets and soak in the beauty of the architecture, which we did after meeting up with Todd after breakfast.
A view down the street looking toward the Plaza de Armas.
Another view of the pretty city as we walked to the market.
La Serena had a really cute market with really friendly artisans, and we spent a good part of the afternoon poking around. I bought some dulces to take home to my family, and some papaya marmelade to give to my mama for Dia de la Mama on Sunday! She loves marmelade!
Then, we walked about two miles out to the beach, and on the way there was another funny coincidence. We ran into a gringa and stopped to chat, and she ended up being with another WorldTeach program--the one that works with adults. She lives in Valparaiso, and it just cracked me up that we are in a huge country like Chile and had run into two people we were somehow connected to!
Sarah and Steph on the beach.
We spent a couple hours watching surfers, wading, and watching the sea birds dive into the water. Pretty relaxing...just what I needed to unwind from the stress of navigating the education system of a foreign country!
Oh, and because stray dogs are as much a part of my Chilean experience as chileanismos and besitos, I must share the following annecdote with you!
About a mile and a half from the beach, this stray dog ran over with a huge grin on his face, did a somersault on the grass, and promptly followed us all the way to the beach. When we realized he wasn´t going to leave us alone, we named him Max. Max plopped down in the sand next to me, and for the next two hours, any time another dog or person would come near, he would growl or stand up and bark at them. I felt really bad that I didn´t have any food to give him! At the end of our lounging, Max followed us until we got in a taxi. I have to admit, I was pretty devastated to say goodbye to him, and I really wanted to snuggle with him on the beach, although I know better. What a good dog! He was so cool!
Max, you will be missed.
That night for dinner, we ate sea bass and drank white wine on a balcony overlooking part of the city. We were on an American eating schedule that night (6 p.m.), so the place was deserted! After dinner, we packed up our stuff and that night I went out for a beer with Sarah and Julio. My Spanish is getting decent, and we were able to talk about things like the challenges of education in Chile and America, stereotypes of Chileans, engineering, all sorts of things! It was pretty fun, and Julio lives nearby to us in Concepcion, so one weekend soon we are going to go visit. He also wants to take us camping in the spring--after making sure we are hard core enough to live without bathrooms and running water, which I am (in small doses).
All in all, I really enjoyed my weekend, but it also proved to be a giant test of my patience in some ways. One thing about Chile that has been really difficult for me is having to adjust to not being in control or planning everything in advance. I like to know plans or what is going to happen, and many Chileans I have encountered have a way of not telling you pertinent information like where we are going or what time we are going to eat until five minutes before they want to leave. This frustrates my very American sensibility of wanting to know what the entire weekend is going to look like before it is even close. On our vacation, Ruth, Steph's coteacher, would tell us the night before that the next day we were going to Coquimbo, for example. Traveling with the adults at times was a very vexing problem. The lack of planning also backfired when we couldn´t get to the observatory. Also, it was very hard to travel with a large group and not be in charge of my own destiny. However, there are several things I got the opportunity to do that I would not have done on my own, like visiting the Elqui Valley, so everything has its tradeoff.
Another irritation was this man that traveled with us. He was trying to be funny, I think, so prettymuch the only thing he would say to us was, "Nice to meet you!" in English! This was cute like two times, but after that it got really annoying. I think he was just trying to be nice and say something in English to connect to our culture, but seriously, this went on all weekend and the day we got up at 5 a.m. to leave and I heard him say it to Steph out in the hallway, I nearly exploded. But, on the car ride home he got sick and threw up, so I will call that karma!
Julio asked me this weekend which place is better, America or Chile. This is an obviously loaded question, and one that has been posited by other Chileans as well. While it is clearly impossible to answer, I really enjoy thinking about it, because the thing is, neither place is better or worse. You can compare them, but to make judgements is far too simplistic, because in many ways they are so different that it feels unfair to have a preference. Honestly, if all my friends and family were here with me, I would be able to adjust to live here for the rest of my life. Steph and I were talking about how normal it feels here sometimes, even things that seem strange like not flushing your toilet paper or having to light the hot water heater before you shower. It has not been so difficult to adjust to many of the daily routines. There are many things about Chilean culture that I really like and wish I could bring home with me. For example, I love how physically affectionate this culture is. It is completely normal to see two girl friends holding hands. I love getting kisses and hugs from strangers when I meet them. Zuni asked me if I was cold the other day, and in response I nuzzled her with my ice cold nose...I love that! I love holding hands with my host brother, having students kiss my cheek, having mama Emma snuggle into my arm when she tells me a joke on the street. I love touching my friends and family, and I wish Americans were more comfortable with the simple act of touch. I am trying to just soak it up here, because I will miss it a lot when I leave. On the other hand, I love love LOVE the institutional efficiency of America. At a meeting last week, our Ministry rep told us our stipends would be ready at the bank on Wednesday, and after waiting in line for an hour at the bank, I was informed they were not there yet. The bank is difficult here, because it is only open from 9-2, and it is normal to spend two hours waiting in line there. Thus, there are beautiful aspects to both places.
My last thought of the day is that I have slowly but surely formed some friendships with my family here. Zuni and I sit around with tea and talk about simple things like fruit, or the weather. Felipe and I have become pals. Last Wednesday we stayed up until midnight looking at pictures from when he was a kid. Last weekend we went dancing with our cousin Nacho and danced a lot and I was right--reggaeton is way more fun when you have partners to dance with! And now, with Julio, we have another pal willing to show us around Chile and entertain us! It feels really good, and, as someone who lived with her brother for two years and was used to a house full of boys, I am really grateful to know some boys in this town. I was starting to miss their companionship. At the end of the day, however, I really do just want to talk to my friends and family back home. All of this is not the same without the people I love to share it with. My phone calls with Daddy and Mommy never last long enough. My emails from my brother crack me up, but they are always bittersweet because we are not hanging out face to face, quoting Seinfeld, or laughing together. Every moment I enjoy, I am constantly thinking about how to describe it to people back home, how to make my experience real to them, which it never fully will be because they are not here. It is really painful to be doing something like this and know that the people you love will never fully know what it is like for you in this moment. My life here is beautiful, and I want to share it with my favoite people. I want them to feel what I feel, see what I see, and above all, be here with me.
2 comments:
Last weekend was Labor Day weekend in Mexico as well, everyone left the city and swarmed to the beaches. I think it's interesting that although the are two separate countries they still have the same Labor Day.
I was at a bar the other night and saw a pisco sour offered and had no idea what it was, but ordered it anyway. I'm sure they didn't quite make it the Chilean way, but it was tasty.
I read THE HOUSE OF SPIRITS right before I cam to USC and really enjoyed it. If you asked me now what it was about, though, I couldn't quite tell you.
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