Aqui empieza el cuento de mi viaje en Chile hasta este punto…
Entry 1
I arrived in Santiago Tuesday night and stayed in a nice hotel near the airport. This is where my adventures here started. When I tried to check out in the morning, the employees told me that I had not paid for the room (which I had gotten from Expedia a month before), and that I couldn't leave to meet my group until I paid in cash (which I did not have enough of). I had to wait for the Expedia reservations manager to get into his office, and I almost missed the group bus at the airport. However, while I was waiting for Expedia, I read in the newspaper that there was a huge music festival in Vina del Mar, where I'm staying for a semester…
Anyway, there is a huge music festival here, the biggest party of the year for this city, highlighted by the final performance of my favorite Spanish band, Bacilos. Sounds perfect, right? The only problem was that I needed to go to orientation for 4 days in a small town an hour away from Vina and I would miss most of the festival.
I won't bore you with too many details, but my first impression of the other Americans in my group was not good. It was very strange to hear so much English being spoken on the bus. Anyway, my first impression was wrong in some cases, and right in others. I have met some cool people. There are 37 chicas and 12 chicos, but only about 20 total that seem like people I would have fun with. There are a couple cute girls, but there are only Americans (there are no Brazilians!). Also, it seems like everyone has pololos and pololas here (that's the Chilean word for boyfriend/girlfriend – here "novia" means fiancée). Many of the girls were always sitting in the lobby on Skype talking to their pololos and not meeting new people – dumb idea.
Entry 2
Orientation was good – we had a lot of boring meetings but we partied hard and slept very little – we went to bed at 3 am the first night and woke up at 8 am, then went to bed at 4:30 and woke up at 9, then went to bed at 5:30 and woke up at 9:30 the last night.
I was worried/a little pissed about missing the Bacilos concert, but the first night they showed the concert at the bar the first night and we drank a lot and sang along to all of the songs – Caraluna, Pasos de Gigante, Tabaco y Chanel, Mi Primer Millon, and Besela ya. The first night eliminated my fears about meeting good people – we had a lot of fun. The second night we went to the same bar (I should explain that this town only has 1 plaza, 1 hotel, 1 bar, and 1 store) and the band there played some more Bacilos songs and others, but it was only 2 guys playing and they could not sing well so we just sat and talked.
The third night we went to some guy's house (he was a Chilean about my age named COOKIES, but I don't think that was his real name), for 2 hours, then went back to the same bar where they had a large band where we danced salsa to both salsa music and more Bacilos songs (I think the concert incited Bacilos fever all around this area), and sang Karaoke (Hotel California, some Creedence Clearwater songs, and the Spanish version of Save Tonight). The night ended with me saving some girls who had drank a bit more than usual from some 60 year old guys they were dancing with, then hanging out with some guys in the town square at 5 am with a couple of friends. I was always in the last group returning to the hotel every night. In the end missing the concert didn't matter because we got to hear Bacilos songs every night at the bar, and my roommate and I were always singing it.
Entry 3
We took a much needed nap from 10-1 pm after we missed the bus leaving for the hike in the morning by about 30 seconds. This turned out to be a very expensive nap. Since we didn't turn in the key by noon, the hotel manager (who was a complete A#@HOLE) made us pay 60,000 pesos (20,000 or 40 dollars each) for the hotel room. I was very pissed off about this at the time. I knew that other people were coming to use the room that next night, and he was being paid for it already, so if I had had the time, I was going to go in and demand that he give me the key for that night, since we were paying for the room, just to see the reaction on his face. But alas, I did not have time.
Entry 4
¡Finalmente he llegado en Viña del Mar!
It is amazingly beautiful here. It seems like a mix between San Diego and Hollywood. My room here is bigger and nicer than my room both at home and at school – and my family is fantastic. The father is 62 but acts younger, and the daughter (39) seems fun. I haven't made up my mind yet about the mother, but Marta is a tough act to follow, so maybe I'm just expecting too much.
This is my room, and one of the first sunsets.
Entry 5
I just had my first real Chilean dinner with other guests and everything. It was the same exact meal that I had for lunch 5 hours earlier, but it was good both times. I'm just wondering if that is a trend that will continue. Anyway, I was sitting at the table and finding that I could understand a lot of what they were talking about. As soon as that thought crossed my mind, the conversation somehow switched from a mall in Buenos Aires built primarily for children, to the Mafia. I know it seems like a subtle change, but I didn't catch it. After that I didn't understand much. Here they say all sorts of funny filler words – por ejemplo, "si poh" is like "yeah, dude" but you use it for everything and everyone and POH is used every third word or something. I think the next post will be about me not understanding this crazy Chilean Spanish.
Hasta el proximo post,
Jeff
