hasta ahora....

Well, I figured I would write a wee since I am procrastinating doing my presentation on a region of Chile that I do in class tomorrow. I'm all moved in as of last Wednesday, and the apartment is freezing. That is the norm in Chile. There are no internal heating systems and this building is made out of concrete. So there are ups and downs: freezing in winter, cool in summer though. Less likely to burn down in a fire, more likely to crumble to pieces in an earthquake. Go figure. I bit the bullet and bought a heater because I can't concentrate on HW when I can see my own breath in front of me in my room. I couldnt find any that blew hot air for less than $40 (and I didn't even want to spend that much), so I just got one of the ones that has hot oil in it that are comon in Europe--it's not big so it's not significant, but it does make my room a little warmer/livable and it was about $25. I can sell it to some meager freezing American who arrives next year...

I've almost got everything I need to live adequately. The light in my room is weaker than a light you'd find in an over, so I bought a desk lamp because I'm always in shadows. Got a cheap one with a good flourescent bulb and after I put the bulb in and turned it on, the bulb exploded. I have no idea what happened, I got the correct wattage and everything. So I went and bought a new stupid bulb and it hasnt exploded on me yet. The girl who was living here before had bought a thick blanket for the bed and a mirror, both items which were lacking from my room and bathroom so she sold them to me and I gladly took them because blankets are expesive (especially like this one, its part wool). Then I can take them with me if I move. My pillow is about 2 inches thick, so my friends and I are on a mission to find a store like ross where we can find cheap stuff, and maybe a frying pan cause the ones in this apartment are destroyed and everything I cook in them sticks--that means my egg yolks always break. I got a little espresso can coffee maker (cheaper than a regular coffee maker) to make coffee with since Chileans mostly just drink instant coffee like in Korea. Interesting. You'd think coffee would be super popular here, well, REAL coffee anyway since huge amounts of coffee beans are grown in Latin America. But not so much. Mostly just Nestcafe is what you get here. There were only two or three brands of real coffee beans or grounds in the grocery store but about 15 types of instant.

I was wrong when I said i had two spanish roommates...I have two french roommates (guys) and then there is one girl from Spain. One of the guys arrived two weeks ago and he's doing a semester at University of Chile. The other french guy just finished studying and he's working for a bit before heading back to france in a month. the girl also works and is going back to spain in a month. They are all pretty cool and easy people to live with.

We have language classes, which are 9 to 12.30 until next thursday. They aren't that bad, I really like our teacher. He's youngish--maybe 30something and really knows the grammar well and explains it well. He doesn't give us busywork HW and is really laidback. We just sit and have conversations about world events and things in Chile for about an hour every day to practice speaking and learn about Chile.

August 3rd we start classes, or as our advisor, Sofia, told us, the class shopping period begins. And class dont really start till August 21st--you just sit in until you find classes you like then registering starts the 10th but lots of teachers don't come. So that 2-3 weeks will be a nice stress-free time of no HW and class work. Yeah. And then classes go until november 25 and the exam perioud is november 25 until december 15 or something. I kind of like that the exam period is spread out, it will lessen the chance of having 2 or 3 or 4 finals all on the same day or two days, which I so often had in SF.

I'm learning how to Salsa dance and I LOVE IT!! It's realllly fun. Maritza and Elvira have both been doin it for years so they're trying to teach me. AND Sofia (the advisor to all the students from CSU, she's realllly nice and super helpful) sent us basically a giant handbook for going to school at PUC or la Católica as it's generally called (my school), and there was a section I was reading about where non-credit courses are offered. They are mostly sports, dance, art, or music classes and cost $22,000chilean pesos (about $45) per semester to enroll in the prgram and take as many of the classes as you want. Basically they are kind of like extracurricular or intramural sports--I'm super stoked. I might take soccer or photography--we'll see. But definitely I want to do the Salsa/merengue class. Two nights a week for 1.5 hours each. A great way to meet people too. Sofia said too that a lot of chileans that do these classes are looking to meet foreign students, which is good becasue aparently chileans are realllly hard to talk to just sitting in class and so you have to seek to talk to them, and generally its going to be a non-studying environment.

Some of the kids may be going up to the Andes this weekend to go snowboarding which sounds pretty epic, but it seems a bit pricy given the fact that all I have is a coat and gloves. Eh, I'll wait and see if there is going to be a group trip through school, which I hear there is, and it's much cheaper.

Well, I suppose I ought to start my HW. It's raining outside and chilly. brrrrr. Hope you are all roasting in California.