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Ok I'm highly aware of how easy it is to slip into forgetting/not writing about ones experience, so seeing as yesterday marked one month of me being in Chile, I think now is the time to write up my experiences out here for the Blog.
After several months of worrying, planning and organising to go abroad, it didn't exactly sneak up like the gap year. Going abroad on an intercambio involved an elaborate series of phonecalls/arguments/confrontations with a most unhelpful Embassy staff in London who seemingly had no desire to let foreign students into their country let alone represent their country in a positive light. After finally forcing my way into the Chilean consulate in London and ignoring their excuses that they were currently closed/busy/reconstructing the embassy/just not generally helpful-in-any-way-at-all, I managed to garner a student visa solely on the back of the fact that the guy working at the embassy was a fanatic for the middle east, and my visa for my xmas trip to Syria with the boys was enough to win him over to my side (after a two hour conversation as to everywhere we'd both visited).
Before long, both Dad and I were sitting nervously in a café at Heathrow airport discussing the year ahead, with me ardently proclaiming that 6 months, wasn't a long time and that I'd be back in England for xmas before I realised it. Neither of us could really comprehend exactly why this trip was causing such anxiety over all my others, but I think it really stemmed from the fact that whilst all the other trips were merely passing through, this was a seriously 15 month engagement with another country in which I was to live, study and learn in a totally different one to which I was accustomed.
The first of my 20 hours of flying went surprisingly well, I was sitting next to a Canadian guy with hippy-esq long hair. We had a quick conversation about our lives and why we were on the flight. He was a professor of art coming back from teaching in Singapore, I was actually more interested in the fact that he flew back in one of those large new A380s on his way back from Asia than anything to do with his life, and I think he figured that out pretty quickly as the conversation dried rapidly. I was fascinated with a thing on the inflight entertainment which I could program to show me a compass with the direction the plane was flying in and the directions of London and Santiago with the distances. I was also lucky to be sitting in the emergency exit, solely because the guy at the checkout counter at the airport had conducted my entire baggage check -in in Spanish on realising I was off to study on an exchange program. I changed in Toronto and had to wait for an age as the flight down to South America didn't have any pillows on it and then we were off. That flight took 10 hours, but I was sleeping for most of it and the seat next to me was free which only served as a bonus.
On arriving in Santiago, the first thing I noticed was that it was cold. Really cold. I had always known it was going to be winter, but I think I thought that nothing could be colder that England at any one moment in time. I managed to get a minibus taxi to my hostel whence I was met by a little old man called Jaime. I was later to learn that Jaime spoke fluent English, however - whether out of some malicious game with English-speakers or sheer laziness, he conducted the entire tour of his some what ramshackled accommodation in Spanish which, after jet-lag and a long flight was exhausting. I quickly realised I was the only non-Spanish speaking guest in the place and on being left in my room took a shower and jumped into the bed absolutely freezing. I don't think I've been so cold here as that day as I was convinced at least some form of frostbite must be on the cards.
I pretty much slept for the entirety of the next 24 hours, waking up in the evening feeling starving but not really wanting to leave the hostel at night when I didn't know the area (good thing too, there's nothing around in this area!) so just downloaded a movie and watched it from the comfort of my bed! The next day on getting up I had Spanish classes booked in for 2 but got totally lost on the way to the metro (walked in the opposite direction) but quickly realised by 30 minutes lateness to class was completely acceptable if not the norm in Chilean culture!
All the students on exchange were hanging outside two classrooms where the professors - both middle aged women - were conducting interviews in Spanish. A few of the girls were attempting to speak in Spanish to the rest of the students but in mine, and the boys estimation, this was seriously uncool. I quickly realised my few key phrases such as 'the Andes are beautiful' and 'My name is Paul' could only go so far in a serious conversation so dropped the pretence and spoke in English all together. I think on exchange there's this myth that one needs to just be speaking in Spanish the whole time else one will learn nothing at all but I believe the opposite. When learning a new language one is destined to come across like a slightly socially retarded person anyway with plenty of mistakes so its better to just cut out the embarrasement and have a few English speaking friends to rely on. However, I still keep finding the odd (usually American) girl who insists on introducing herself in Spanish. I suppose they're only here for a semester and thus need to learn as quickly as possible!
The other students were amazing, really cool bunch, I was impressed! Collectively we formed some bizarre form of UN, and I was strangely the only person in the Intensive Spanish Course from England! There was a great bunch from Oz, the US, Germany and Norway (we bunched the Germans and the Nordics together and called them the 'Nordic Contingent' much to the Germans disapproval!)! We went out loads in the first week for drinks after class and food it was really fun to get to know everyone and their cultures as it was a totally different experience. In one way I'd say it was like starting university in England again except less immature. The beginning of uni in England is usually marked by the smell of either vodka and cokes or vomit, or occasionally both combined with over-keen, overtly-friend hungry teenagers fresh out of school ready to redefine themselves away from their parents control. Exchange is refreshingly different. The average student out here is only here for a semester and they are here to learn, plus it takes a bit of an edge to just get up and go to a totally different country and culture so there's a great bond between everyone in that we're all in the same mindset. We're also keen to laugh at our own cultures, with the Aussies constantly (if not incessantly) making jokes at Englands expense (normally revolving around poms etc) and the nords being teased for being whale hunters/vikings etc.
In fact, the only people who seemingly failed to understand the self-effacing nature of the exchange appeared to be the Americans who, at a party in the first week of exchange took me into the kitchen and explained that they felt the Europeans on exchange were being 'anti-american' a factor they found extremely hurtful and asked if I could inform the others to stop. Attempts to explain the nature of sarcasm and its nuances failed to such an extent that the result was a promise to be more careful when speaking around the subject of the USA in the future. I later found out that several other Europeans - particularly from the Nordic contingent - were also subjected to the same Anti-American conversation. Its amazing how a certain style of humour is appreciated throughout Europe and Oceana but fails to penetrate America.
The Intensive Spanish Course was really good but not for its desired purpose - Spanish. I personally didn't feel I learnt too much from the course and attempts to change class failed. It was more of an introduction to Chilean culture although in typical Latin American style one had the impression the teachers didn't even know what they intended to teach us at times! It was the largest class I had ever been in for Spanish, at around 12-14 students in comparison to the courses I had been doing at the UCL nightschool. Don't feel I've progressed too much (if anything it revolved a lot around us lot just joking around at the back of the class) but at least I met some awesome people and at the same time learnt a lot about Chilean culture.
One of the most bizarre things I learnt from the course was the pessimism of the Chileans. Whereas the Brasileans and Argentineans are famous for their extravert nature, craziness and openness, the Chileans adopt a totally different form of approach to life. Maybe it's the result of living under a severe military regime and feeling a need to keep to oneself but the Chileans keep to themselves, and in particular to their families. However, I've noticed that once one starts speaking to a Chilean the cold frosty exterior evaporates and they are extremely friendly and welcoming. Maybe its just a survival technique. Chileans also seem to have a severely depredating view of themselves in a world spectrum. Constantly one hears not only in class at the university, but from Chileans themselves that their country is just viewed as a backwater muddy Latin American country by the rest of the world.
As a result of this lack of self believe, a different form of culture has emerged in Chile which perhaps explains why in comparison to the rest of Latin America it is one of the most successful economies, suffers the least corruption and is relatively European in style in comparison to countries such as Venezuela. The Chileans appear to work hard even if they do adopt the 'manaña' attitude in all their negotiations. They're sick of being that 'little country next to Argentina' because technically their country is cleaner, harder working and more organised then any of the other Latin American countries. Just today in class our professor was explaining the difficulty of defining 'Latin America' in that it almost presupposes that an absolutely enormous are shares the same cultural values when in reality the mixture of cultures is insane. In Chile much of the slang is derived from the Mapuches that used to live here before the Spanish. Therefore, a lot of the words used here such as 'guagua' (for baby) are only used in Chile and would sound ridiculous if used elsewhere. If anything, Chile scarily seems to have developed its own unique form of Chilismos… understanding the kids at university is like understanding martian speak. For example, the word 'Weon' (derived from the word huevon which means 'man' in Peru) can be used to describe ones best friend, enemy, an a*******, an idiot, a family member or even used in mere passing depending on the context.. Additionally words such as 'bakan' (which means cool) sound so out of place at first that one could be convinced they were speaking of that mornings breakfast..
In the first week out here we went skiing. This was entirely amazing for me and I loved it although the bruises on my body the next day bore testiment to my learning experience! We had to get up incredibly early and then meet at Baquedano which is the Picadily Circus of sorts out here for Chile. Seeing as the mini vans took a bit of a while to come we started taking photos of the sun rising over the city framed by the mountains which was amazing! I took about an hour and a half to get up to the mountains which was a bit unnerving as we kept turning perilous corners which made one hold on to the corner of ones seat with sheer terror at the drop below! In the end it was better not to look and to just trust the driving skill of the minibus drivers! When we reached the top it was surprisingly warm and we went and got fitted. Because I was a beginner I had paid about £10 more for a lesson so spent the first two hours learning how to ski on baby slopes. However, being typically South American, after the first two hours were up the instructer just left before wishing us good luck. This was all good except for the fact that he hadn't yet got round to teaching us how to stop so an overconfident/reckless me set off speeding down the nearest slope I could find. I was rather enjoying it before I realised there was a barrier approaching me at a rather rapid speed. Attempts to apply anything I had learnt failed to apply as I was going too fast. The resulting crash probably did more damage to the barrier than to me but my ego was definitely left lying on those slopes. After half a day messing round on the slopes I was coaxed into going to the top of one of the highest mountains by some of my friends who were also skiing. It was at this point I realised I'd made somewhat of a mistake going with Germans and Scandivians - the word pro would seriously be an understatement as a description of their abilities. At the top of the mountain I just saw a steep slope below me and realised that without my knowledge of how to stop it could be a somewhat long descent! Luckily one of the Germans, Hans, stayed with me the whole way down whilst the others managed to descend and ascend three times in the time it took me to eventually get down and the story is still one of their favourites when wishing to embarrass me as to my series of record-breaking crashes on the way down the slopes!
On the way home we chilled in the back of the bus listening to Hispanic hip hop and funk and laughing about stories from the slopes before getting ready for uni after the weekend. There was a party that night at some of the Americans house so I headed over, but on getting home at 2.30ish I got locked into my hostels toilet! This proved a somewhat disastrous moment as I knew no one in my hostel and with attempts to call reception failing I resorted to banging on the door of the tiny cell-like loo (there was no way of escape!)! After half an hour of civilized banging I resorted to more manic banging to such an extent that an hour later I was rescued by a rather small and rather frightened English girl who revealed she had spent all her time in Chile locked in her room as she was scared that South America was some dangerous hell hole.. I spoke to her for a bit but couldn't really share her fear of South America seeing as I'm somewhat enamoured by it, I invited her and some equally paranoid aussie mate out for a drink with my friends the next night to prove South America wasn't that dangerous but they only succeeded in annoying my friends with their incessant whining that I decided not to invite them out in future (although they keep trying to follow us!)! Perhaps what is most amusing is that on going to the supermarket the next day with one of them I encountered my first near mugging in Chile as some guy tried to grab one of the paranoid girls bags, we got in a taxi and got away which was all good but didn't help their somewhat dire view of Chile and life here in general..!
After three weeks of the intensive course university finally started. This was a bit weird as, after so long here in Chile, we couldn't quite believe there were other people coming to our university to study! There were people from all other the world it was crazy although the Americans stayed in large groups - or programmes - organized by their universities, some universities even bring their own professors over with them which is very weird! We made a few more friends for our group who joined us which was lovely and we all kept seeing each other for lunch at this cafeteria which is on a roof top with a really good view of the humanities section and the Andes. It was weird walking into uni for the first time. Classes began for me at 10am so it was really hard to get up and then get on the metro - its hard enough in London where I only live 10 minutes walking away! I was also struck by how high school esq university is out here. Classes are taught in well.. classes not lecture theatres and, rather than just choosing one subject like history and sticking to it the students go to whatever they like so there is no really training in the discipline of history which makes things a little amateur at most. I went to one political science class and was struck by how ignorant some of the questions the Chilean students were asking - one kid actually started reciting some conspiracy theory about the two towers he had blatantly seen on some late night American tv show. If anything the kids mainly seem to recite their parents poltical stories which seems a bit linear to me.
My 20th century social history course is really good though and the teachers great but my 16th and 17th century Latin American course is taught by a sympathetic old man called Hugo Rosati who looks like he's come straight out of a story book. He paces up and down the class stroking his beard and reciting what seems to be one long fairy tale story of South American history. The story normally revolves round - Chile is poor and underdeveloped because of Spain, Europe and the USA. He also has a penchant for blaming Chiles ills on Europe. For example: Chile is buerocratic because of Felipe II who needed it to run his Spanish Empire, Chile is classist because of the Spanish rich being traditionally the ruling elite etc etc etc. My favourite moment coming quite possibly when, on talking about England and how Bristol was our major Atlantic seaport, he located Bristol as being in Southern Kent! I'm just taking it all with a pinch of salt. However, that said it doesn't make things easy out here. The readings and lectures are all in Spanish and I haven't taken any courses in English like I thought I would. This year counts heavily for me so its important I do well but then again understanding what the lecturers say is like trying catch a river of sand. I'm currently getting loosely a third of all said by the lecturers which the secretaries at the UCL History Department (with whom I'm in touch with) wrying stated is probably more than the average student in the UCL department!
I tried out some other courses, some of which I really didn't like such as 'Defense and its Challenges' which had been recommended by a lot of kids on campus. I just found it a bit of a joke. I couldn't understand how a country which has just come out of a military dictatorship could enthusiastically run a course on the use of military forces - the same forces which had run Pinochets death camps and flown the Puma helicopters which dumped so many innocents mid-way over the Pacific just for their political believes. The professor running the class was a somewhat squat fat little man who jumped around excitedly whilst explaining military strategies and how important it was for a country. After he had finished bigging his own not so impressive accomplishments up (which surprise surprise included being an Officer in Pinochets navy) he introduced his co-professor who represented a joke of a man. He looked like one would imagine the wand maker Olivier from Harry Potter to resemble. Tall, somewhat lanky, balding with a nineteenth century moustache and goatee which flicked out in such a way that no one could possibly take him seriously. The most amusing moment for me was when he introduced himself as having studied at some distinguished military academy in England before flashing the name of some indistinguishable polytechnic up on the screen.. I had to suppress my laughter! Although some of my American friends enjoyed the class I'm not here for comedy and personally don't see how I could possibly benefit academically and intellectually by studying military techniques (Also UCL would probably throw a fit if they knew I was studying that!)!
One thing that has really shocked me out here is political rightness taught in history out here. My university - La Catolica - whilst seen as the Havard of South America is about as right wing as they come. Not only was it Pinochets favoured institution but many of his former ministers/cronies/supporters teach there. I found this out most shockingly the other day when sitting in my 19th century history class and instead getting an hour long lecture about how Chile would have been nothing without the dictatorship. Perhaps even more alarmingly is the attitudes of the kids at the university. They seem to embrace this view of history so that their views depend entirely on those of their professor or what their Dads have told them. Seeing as La Catolica is only full of the richest kids from South America - all of whoms parents owe a great deal to the regime - the word 'liberal' is about as hard to find as Iraqi WMDs! For example, the other day before we all us gringos went to a beach party myself and some friends got chatting to a rather pretty Chilean girl in a coffee shop on campus. Whilst at first rather enamoured, any thoughts of attraction were soon swept out of window when she stated 'yeah Pinochet may have killed some people but it was worth it to make Chile what it is now'. . Expressos were doubtless finished rather quickly after that conversation lifter..
About two weeks ago I finally moved from the halls where I'd been staying for my first month to a house in Salvador which is right in the heart of the city. House hunting in London is a nightmare but compared to its Chilean equivalent it resembles heaven on earth. Finding a place in Chile involves contacts, websites and a lot of phone calls.. After 2 weeks of looking I became discouraged. The first place I visited struck me as just a little strange. I rocked up a bit late and was then forced to wait for twenty minutes on the couch for the guy who owned the house to finish his shower, give me a 5 minute tour of the house and then say goodbye. To make matters worse the house was rammed with French people and they all spoke French not Spanish..! He also looked rather toad like which I wasn't too fond off so when he called me back I didn't pick up! The second house was in a high rise near Plaza Italia - the official heart of the city and a pretty old area, but in Santiago the nice areas are nearer the mountains as the rich people have an obsession with building as high as they possibly can on the mountain slopes (this craze has developed to such an extent that there are now limits as to where buildings can be built although the most exclusive places have a tad of mountain snow floating about - something that never touches the city!). This second house was just tiny, owned by a Spanish guy who struck me as weird due to his statement that he was a trained dentist but was now earning money just by owning two apartments in Santiago. I didn't like his hard sell, lack of space and the people so called quits on that one two.
The final house, the one I'm in now came as a last ditch attempt. It just came up on the internet so I went, liked it but hadn't seen the people. Also a somewhat significant problem arose when on asking why there was photography equipment in the living room I was informed that the owners friend owned a magazine for male models. Whilst this sounded perfectly acceptable - checking the owners website purveyed another story as erotically placed male models posed with weights in a way which implied that this site wasn't just designed body-building enthusiasts. The next day at university a rather vigorous debate occurred amongst my friends and I on whether this should put me off moving with the majority of the jokes being pointed towards the fact that the owner would either a) try and come on to me or b) take photos of me whilst unaware. At the end of the day I realised I was just being homophobic and decided that anything would be better than to stay in the rather horrible (horrible being an understatement) halls all the way out in Quinta Normal at the end of the metro so I just go my stuff (of which there was now a lot of) and hailed a cab there. The cab driver was useless so we got a bit lost and then I had to walk for the end but finally I arrived and haven't regretted the decision since! The owner - Samuel - works for the government in the Moneda, we haven't exactly worked out the precise nature of his work apart from its something to do with public relations and he is pro-liberal and very much concerned by the level of my education at La Catolica so keeps making me watch Pinochet documentaries which normally always include a scene in which a former torturer or bad-man of the regime is revealed now to be a professor at La Catolica (encouraging..)! However, they are highly interesting and have helped me expand my knowledge of such a difficult topic out here. There's also a woman from New Zealand - Sue - who's age in unknown although I'd put it at around 40. She got repetive strain injury after working too much in Austrailia so is now living out here doing nothing on her savings until she goes back. She's nice but isn't doing anything here so I get the impression her life and friends are us in the apartment which is a bit weird. The last person is called Niels who is from Germany (its his Birthday today). He's really nice and friendly and attend Universidad de Chile which is the left wing equivalent to my university. Its amusing as weirdly he already knew who I was before he met me due to mutual friends and our group at La Catolica being quite big and very social by now. We're all having a house dinner tonight which will be good because I get the impression I haven't been too social in the house (I never am social at home as many know), I just do what I do in London, I go out either very early in the morning for uni and come back at 4am wake up ridiculously late and then go over to a friends house for the remainder of the day. They must also think I party too much as I'm always going out but my thoughts are that this year is a great chance to get out more as next year will be a little tough being the last year of university. Chileans always organise things at the last moment so out of the three last minute dinners my landlord has announced in the last week this will be the first I'll actually be able to make which is a bit bad as apparently the last 2 were designed to welcome me oops..
University is getting really amazing.. our friendship group is ever growing. However, we're all highly wary for people we label 'Gringo Hunters'. These are Chileans (I'll choose my words carefully in case anyone is reading) who really like to hang out with foreigners. Jo (an awesome Australian girl with whom I spend most my classes) have an ongoing commentary on their antics. After watching the slideshow delivered to all us exchange students by the Commision (the official name of the group of Chilean students designed to look after us - lets just call it the gringo hunters official governing body), we noticed several guys appearing in every photo with a different foreign girl round their arm in every pic. Suspicions grew higher when we noticed the same boys - notably one boy, called Christian - repeating this action at several gringo parties we attended. This was combined with the observation that these strange foreign loving Chileans appeared to have no friends of their own - a fact confirmed when we spoke to Victoria who is a Chilean friend of mine from History who severely dislikes the hunters. The Comission organises loads of events but I get the impression they think us gringos are pretty stupid or something and can't find our own way which I frankly find quite patronising. I suppose some of the things they organise are amusing but a lot of them just seem to be a chance for a group of about 30 - mainly male - Chileans to sleaze in on our girls.
The other day, organised by the students of the La Catolica, we went to a massive beach party which the Chileans go to every beginning of term. It was amazing, scores of coaches were waiting on campus and took us 2 hours down to the sea where luckily we had a really sunny day (considering its winter)! Although we were unsure as to the purpose of the day, it became pretty clear it was just an opportunity for all the rich kids at our uni to get out of the city and then get drunk on a beach. I thought the English were bad drunk but watching these Chileans stumbling and fumbling in the sand was an altogether different matter! About 30 or so of my friends went and we formed a massive circle, ate a picnic lunch and drank beers whilst watching the Pacific ocean and just generally had a hilarious time. Lots of Chilean guys kept trying to chat to our girls but managed to just epically fail just about every time. We'd all be sitting together and some randomer would just come and join us before us boys would tell him to move on. In fact the most successful Chileans were those who brought instruments with them. Two guys with a guitar and a flutey/recorder thing became the life of the party when they sat down and started singing well known pop songs. We all sat in the most enormous circle and joined in. It was also really nice to get out of the city for a day together and we all went for a massive Chinese afterwards. However, one of us, Hans got incredible drunk and started rolly-pollying all over the beach before putting seaweed on his head and pretending to be a medusa. For such a normally sensible upright German boy it was quite amusing to watch his frolics on the beach and he soon began to resemble a comedy show before he broke his phone and started throwing it at people!
There's so much more I could write now but I'll leave it for another post as this is already approaching 5500 words! Hope everyone's well and good! x
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