HOLA! It´s hard to believe I have already been here in Chile for 2 weeks, yet at the same time it´s hard to believe it´s only been 2 weeks.  In some ways I feel like I´ve been here for so long—we just jumped right into life here.  I have my route to the University on the Metro down, my Chilean slang is coming along (well…I´m trying? :) ), and I have a great, comfortable relationship with my host siblings and mom.   But the routine is never boring, since there is so much to do and see.  For example, although I am used to going to class in San Joaquin by now, our class ends 2 days from now.  A few days ago, I went with Stephanie to watch a French documentary about Chilean rock.   A few days after that, I went after class one day to take this amazing old elevated car system up a mountain to see a zoo and an amazing overlook of the whole city. This past weekend, which was a 4-day weekend because of a national holiday, Allison P. and I went with my host mom and sister, my mom´s friends, and their kids to a beautiful town about 2 hours outside of Santiago called Zapallar.  Later this week we start transitioning into our volunteer work, which is the real reason we came to Chile.
  

One of the reasons I already feel so comfortable here is my host family.  The day I arrived I knew I had been put in the right family.  I live with my host mom, Angélica, two brothers Juan Pablo (22) and Jose Domingo (18), and a sister, Javiera, who is 20.  They have been welcoming since day one and we have been laughing all the time from the start. Also, the boys are both musicians, so there is music here every day, from various instruments and recordings.  One of my favorite moments so far was when we all went to our uncle´s birthday party, who lives just a few blocks away in the house where Angélica grew up.  Just greeting people at a family event is a process, as you have to go around and give a kiss on the cheek to every person invited to the party (though I love this warm acknowledgement as a greeting).  After talking to the cousins and aunts and uncles for a while, cousin Francisca, who is a year or two older than me, announced that there was going to be a ´´concert´´. 

At this point, the entire family and guests, about 25 people in total, piled into the ´´music room´´ where there were drums, a guitar, a microphone, amps and more set up.  Francisca took the microphone to sing, and one of her three brothers sat at each instrument.  Then, my brothers started playing keyboard and guitar, too.  The concert began with a Mariah Carey song from the 90s (translated into Spanish) and progressed into quite an impressive number of tons of different kinds of songs, in both English and Spanish.  When they started singing the Beatles, the entire family started yelling for me to get up there, so after trying unsuccessfully to politely decline I got up there and sang some Beatles with Francisca—after which all the older members of the family came up to me with big smiles and hugs.  It was so fun and musical and reminded me of a Chilean version of when my mom´s side of the family (the Southerners) all gather and sing at the piano in Houston.  Angélica still talks about it, and she announced to her friends during lunch this weekend that I got up there and sang with them.  On the walk home, she kept beaming about the musical family they have, and I told her I loved it.

This past weekend was such a nice change of pace.  We went to Zapallar, where we stayed in Angélica´s friend´s house, an adorable old beach house with bright colors, a chimney where we could sit by the fire every night.  We cooked a lot, hiked along the coast, and walked along the beautiful beach.  Even though it is Fall here, the weather has been mild.  It was nice to be able to spend more time with Angélica (she works all day at a tour company) as she is hilarious and we had the best time with her. The last day we went to the country in a town called Puchuncaví, where Angélica´s friends have a house and a property with horses, etc.  It was fun to spend the day there seeing another view of Chile; talking, riding horses, walking around, and seeing how being invited for ¨¨lunch¨¨ here can sometimes last from 2 in the afternoon until 10 at night.

I have been learning a lot about Chilean society and language and culture, mostly through conversations with my family and their friends.  For example, I have learned some distinct things about Chilean culture on the Metro and the Micro (the trains and buses), which are:  a) residents of Santiago can fill a train and bus so full that you have to start getting up to move toward the door for your stop a few minutes in advance and b) if you do not look like the other people on the train or bus, they will look at you.  My family and our teacher have all said that it is not just outsiders they look at, although there is clearly a lack of diversity in Santiago.  Here in Chile, it is not uncommon to blatantly stare at someone.  My sister said that she knows that in other countries, if someone stares at you, you start wondering, is something on my face?  It took me a minute to realize that here, people just look at each other, feel each other out—and it´s no big deal. 

In addition, Chilean society is blatantly classist.  There are distinct lines between the good and bad areas to be from, and when we went out in Bellavista one night, my sister explained that up ´this way´ is considered the good part, while ´down´ is the worse part, with one plaza separating the two areas—and that´s just the way things work.  In addition to my observations, the reverse is also true, and people get to ask me questions about the U.S.  My brother Juan Pablo and I have had some great conversations about the differences and similarities between our two countries.  They have ranged from talking about Obama, food, the differences between people from the North and the South or from the city and the country in both of our countries, as well as a question about why people in the U.S. don´t kiss each other when they walk into a room, they instead hold our their hand (as he was watching an American movie and saw two people greeting each other).

Overall, things are really good so far. Everyone we have met wants to know about us, why we are in Chile specifically, and what we think about Chile so far.  I am trying to speak as much Spanish as possible and meet/talk to as many people as possible. I am excited to begin working at Moviliza in a few days, where Stephanie and I will be working 3 days each week.  In addition, we have already visited a campamento on our tour last Saturday, and heard a powerful story from one of the residents there, but we do not know which campamentos we will be working in yet, which will be our work for two days of each week. It is hard to summarize all that we have been doing, so I tried to give a brief overview! Once our work starts, I will definitely write about my experiences there!