JANUARY IN CHILE!

Saturday January 3rd- Thursday January 8th

Saturday was my first day solita in Santiago. I was woken up to my host family calling from Valdivia, sweetly remembering that my Mom had left the day prior and wanted to see how I was feeling about my new place and how the travels went. I did some unpacking and shopping. I began catching up with some friends from home. Started my eating out frequently and alone which has been quite the change.. my neighborhood is fantastic, cutest outdoor restaurants with umbrella covered tables and live music heard throughout the street. Daily street fairs full of jewelry, art, clothing, etc. Definitely already missing my home cooked meals but the food in my ´Barrio Lastarria´ is thankfully delicious and diverse. Went out a couple nights with my roommate Lola and her friends, it has been fun getting to know more of the chilean youth. I went to a museum where there was an exhibit called ´The Madrid Project´where kids from all over Latin America went to Madrid for a photography project which was really cool to see. I went to a cafe where I was probably too exited to discover icea tea of various flavors. I saw a french movie that had spanish subtitles, I was pleasantly surprised to understand the film.

First week working with the organization ´Servicio del Desarrollo de Los Jovenes- SEDEJ´ or Services for the Development of Youth. Monday I met the woman, Annette who helped me set up my apartment in Santiago at her office along with the two girls working with the organization as well from the United States. Annette then took us to SEDEJ for our meeting with the director and one of the project site teams. Here I thought maybe my spanish would be advanced compared to the two girls coming from the US but their families are from Mexico and speak spanish fluently. Pretty funny. In SEDEJ we met Don Rene - the "main man" running the organization.. the boss. We went into the largest room in the main office and introduced ourselves to one of the SEDEJ project teams. They liked my experience in Honduras and that I am a psychology major, I almost chose their project team to work with but Rene thought it was too tough of issues for my first experience. He told me he wanted to have fun on the job site as well, which would probably come from working with kids and a younger aged team. This particular project site is working with people who have always lived homeless, equivalent to never having had a social security number "lost in the system" with usually addiction problems. After a few interviews and introductions around the main office of SEDEJ in downtown Santiago I went with Annette to her apartment to get my suitcases that safely arrived from my host family. They dropped them off when they drove through Santiago to bring my host sister to the airport to visit a past student that studied here who lives in the US. On the walk to her apartment a giant splash of paint drooled on the front of my new white shirt I wore for the first time. Why do these things only happen to white clothes?
On Tuesday Jan 6th the two other interns (Mayra and Jenny) and I toured the project site in a community called "El Monte". We arrived to the main office in downtown Santiago at the planned time 9:30am and waited until 11:00am for someone to take us to the community. Chilean time. We took the subway then a bus for about an hour to arrive. We presented ourselves and our goals during our internship to the project team. At lunch time we walked around the community and bought sandwiches. After lunch we met some of the kids that pass by the house for a few hours in the afternoons. A young girl asked me my name and when I told her "Theresa" she gave me the strangest look and asked why my name was so… "Spanish." Typical question here because my name isn't spoken in Spanish like Theresa in English but like Teresa. Then she started giggling. Suddenly I was so happy to be with kids again. I went with a few of the people in the team to give some of the families in the program invitations for a late Christmas party. I saw some of my first family interventions, a glimpse of therapy and extremely poor living environments. I felt like all I'd learned and experienced up until now surfaced. Psychology, babysitting, Spanish, living in poverty in Honduras, my experience thus far in Chile.. etc etc it was a difficult first day in the field but I felt content with the job to come. The team seems to have a great relationship with the kids.
Wednesday Jan 7th I went to SEDEJ in downtown Santiago, waited for an hour and a half in the early morning then Rene came to tell us we didn't need to work that day. It's a good thing I'd read some of the culture shock/workplace packet to recognize how accustomed I am to the punctuality and fixed schedules of the workplace in the states and how that varies in various countries. I decided to take a day to the mall to get a few things for the apartment; hangers, plastic drawers, towels, soap, etc I'd also changed rooms from a small room without a window to a larger room with a window… I was so happy this room opened up! After the mall I finally unpacked and felt settled, or the most you can in the middle of a foreign country. My roommate Tiare and her friend Andres cooked dinner and I was really happy to begin some Chilean friendships in Santiago.
Thursday January 8th I got to sleep in! Had a great lunch at a restaurant across the street from my apartment. Met at SEDEJ downtown after lunchtime then Loreto (the project director) in the community called "El Bosque" came to pick us up to tour/interview that project site. We didn't get to go inside the houses in this community so I didn't tour the project site in the same way I toured "El Monte" but the team seemed more in my realm of knowledge, more psychologists than social workers. That night I went out dancing with my Chilean roommate Tiare. All of the English music got my mind mixed up between the two languages, I even tried to comment about a song in English to Tiare- pretty funny.


Friday January 9th - Sunday January 11th : Vina del Mar, Valparaiso, Renaca Beach

Friday January 9th-Meeting downtown at SEDEJ office from 930am-200pm. Saw all of the different project sites present to one another what they've been working on, goals, etc. This helped Jenny, Mayra and I make our final decisions about which project sites we'd like to split up and work with. When we told the groups we made our decisions, "El Bosque" told us they had chosen one of us as well and we'd meet on Monday to talk about it. This made me nervous because I had hoped to work in their project site but obviously Jenny and Mayra's native Spanish is better than mine and I didn't expect them to pick me…
Jenny, Mayra and I left to the beach two hours outside of Santiago after the meeting. We arrived and talked to a tourist agency at the bus terminal and quickly had a great deal on a hostel and city tour the following day. After we dropped our things at the hostel we walked around, took a carriage ride to the beach then met some of the beach entertainers and strolled through the market. Henna! I met a local from Rapa Nui (the island I went to with Mom who had an amazing tattoo on his face!) and a clown. There were great sculptures of sand along the beach and tons of locals playing music. Beautiful sunset. Dinner at the grand opening of a restaurant—great cheap prices and deals. When we got back to our hostel we had a note from 3 argentines staying in the same building. We ended up going with them to the dance club Tiare had told me about called "Tutix." It was tons of fun, I love how all Chileans know the words to every song that gets played and sing LOUDLY. Always an experience. We ended the night at a Mexican kareoke restaurant with nachos and watched people sing.
Saturday January 10th- City tour. Packed full van. Visited the Vina soccer stadium, pretty lagoon, saw a great view overlooking Vina del Mar, Vina flower clock that actually works!, beach, casino that looked like a beautiful antique hotel, racetrack and more! Then we went to Renaca beach and had some free hours there… we laid in the sun and admired all of the great looking argentine men that hopped the border for the weekend, lots of them playing sand soccer. Saw some more pretty views as well.. seals on the huge rocks in the ocean and planes practicing like the Blue Angels in San Francisco. Then we went to the port city of Valparaiso- took a cart up one of the notorious Valparaiso hills, built in 500 b.c. Saw some cool street art vendors, murals, one of Pablo Neruda's three houses in Chile! A gorgeous old church, Arturo Prat monument.. we were exhausted by the end. We found a hostel in Valparaiso and ended up staying there for the night. We went out to dinner at a place recommended to us by a guy I ran into who has a mutual friend attending the University of Oregon.. small world! This restaurant was so beautiful, we sat out on the patio overlooking a panoramic view of the ocean, all of Valparaiso with its crowded colorful houses on every surrounding hill and we enjoyed sunset! Gorgeous moon.
Sunday January 11th- Went back to Vina del Mar, tried to go back to a museum that was unfortunately closed and then took a bus back to Renaca and hung out by the beach. At lunch with beach view then head back to Santiago. Got back early evening. The weekend was pretty rushed so I was exhausted.

Monday January 12th- Sunday January 18th: Work continues..

Monday 12th Jenny, Mayra and I waited three hours for Loreto to show up in the downtown Santiago office to tell us who they'd chosen to work with them in 'El Bosque.' I guess it was a misunderstanding, she thought we were going to El Bosque to meet her. More time for me to read my Spanish book I was almost finished with! When she arrived she told us they had hoped I would work with them because of my psychology background. I had chosen to work with them as well so it worked out perfectly, I laughed because it had been a worry in the back of my mind all weekend. I went with her immediately to two family interventions. We then reviewed the cases with the rest of the team, I liked the environment and noticed how important it is to talk the observations out with the group because one person may notice the tiny details that you can't. In the evening I helped my roommate Lola finish her picture presentation of the schizophrenic patients she worked with.

I had a really good day at work and was thrilled that I choose a project site and they chose me as well, but I couldn't help but feel a bit homesick and taken aback that I was truly beginning a whole new lifestyle once again and that I was only about 5 months along a year abroad... really missing my family. Lots of friends had recently been home and ate in Dad's new restaurant and that was hard too. But quickly, I adjusted to the rhythm of my new lifestyle.

On Tuesday 13th I got lost going to my job. I did okay taking the first 12 stops and changing subway lines to take the next 6 stops (30 minute ride more or less) but afterwards I chose to take the bus which is cheaper then the collective taxis you can take. I couldn't find the button to press so I could get off! So I traveled a couple stops past where I needed to go and then was really confused. I asked several neighbors (made LOTS of friends! Haha) how to get to my street but practically no one had a clue! But finally I made it and the nice thing is that being punctual certainly isn't part of the culture here. I was introduced to the street market that goes on every Tuesday in the neighborhood where our house that I worked in is located. The street markets here sell everything you could think of.. from clothes to dvd's to fruit, fish, veggies, school supplies. It's so much fun! And cheap! Generally I traveled the majority of the way home from work with two of my co-workers Maca and Paloma, which was nice. After work a friend from my program in Valdivia and her Mom were just finishing up their long travel on the similar route that Mom and I did so we met for dinner at a great restaurant across the street from my apartment. I ate delicious gnocci and we shared a fruit fondue. I got teary exchanging travel stories thus missing my Mom and watching them still get to be together.
Wednesday 14th I got to work without any complications, which was great! I planned more of my project I was going to do with the kids for three hours every Friday because I had to present my plan to our team of about ten people on Thursday. After work Carine (a friend from France I made through my roommate Tiare), Tiare and I went salsa dancing. It was hardly the relaxing outlet I was looking for, the twirls were really complicated and my partner was like an aged, boring man. I've learned who your partner is REALLY matters. I thought I could dance the salsa really well but after the lesson I realized the firemen in Valdivia can dance the salsa and were just really good at making us feel we could dance it too haha. At midnight Tiare, Lola and I celebrated Lola's birthday.
Thursday 15th I had my first several hour meeting with the team at work. I presented my idea to make a creative video with the kids and they loved the idea. I found a favorite sushi restaurant that evening in my neighborhood.
Friday 16th we took a big group of kids to the pool. It was about a 40 minute walk each way in high 90 degree weather. Definitely summer time. This pool was horrible.. there was a huge tent that covered the pool and there was so much chlorine it hurt to breath and swimming was almost not an option for me because it made me rub my eyes like crazy. There were lifeguards and each time they blew their whistle I literally thought I could go deaf. But boy was it an experience. Probably some of the best people watching I've done in my life and I always had a great time with the kids there because it was the comfortable environment to get to know them like good friends. Afterwards we shared snacks on the grass. In the evening I went out to eat at my favorite caprese sandwhich spot in my neighborhood (have you caught on yet that my neighborhood was amazing? And I probably gained like 20 pounds from it but it was worth it!) this sandwhich place is called "Victorinos" but I refer to it in my dairy as 'cute waiters' haha. My roommate Lola had a birthday party at our apartment. I had my first 'Earthquake' drink .. white wine, Granada and pina colada icecream. After a couple hours my other roommate Tiare, her friend Andres and I went to an apartment party of one of their friends. Italians.. French.. Chileans.. it was really fun hearing Spanish spoken from other native languages. Then we all went out dancing. It was fun getting to go along for the ride, didn't have to plan anything and my roommate knows all the public transportation so I got to just follow her lead. Great night out in the city.
Saturday January 17th-
Went to the Bellas Artes museum next to my apartment. I saw Roberto Matta paintings which was really amazing, I like his work a lot. In the evening I met Carine and we went to 'Opera Catedral' for desert, it's a beautiful restaurant with outdoor seating on a high balcony. Then we went out dancing. Carine can speak 5 languages- German, Italian, Spanish, French and English but we only speak Spanish together. What is nice is that if I don't know a word she's been in Chile about 6 months more than me so she usually knows the word if I ask her in English.
Sunday January 18th-
Went to lunch in "Bella Vista" the bohemian neighborhood a five minute walk from my apartment. We took lots of pictures around the neighborhood and went to Pablo Neruda's house, we saw the nobel prize! It was a really pretty afternoon and one of those days when I got to stop and notice.. wow, I'm not in Kansas anymore!

Monday January 19th-Sunday January 25th

Monday January 19th- Work. Went with Maca and Paloma to hand out invitations for the beach trip we were going on the upcoming Thursday. Maca really didn't understand anything I said to her at first but then I never understood Yukio- another coworker so it was just a circle of confusion but funny. I got to meet a lot of different families and kids, not always the easiest living environments to see but always important to recognize how differently people live all over the world.
Tuesday 20th- OBAMA Inauguration! I couldn't get sound on the computer at work but we left the live news on all day. Chose hope not fear. We are stronger now then before. Miraculous that a man entered the White House with the same race as MLK JR and the day after his MLK Jr Birthday, an inspirational man who is of a generation above mine but of people still here today and prayed for a day like this. I watched the news all night, it was strange not to be in the US but great to see the happiness and receive congratulations from people from all over the world.
Wednesday 21st- Meeting at work with the team all day. It was the boss' birthday so we shared fruit skewers, crackers and pizza.
Thursday 22nd- Barley made it to work on time because I didn't 'hear' (who knows) my alarm at 630am. We had to get there early because we were taking two huge tour buses to the beach "Las Cruces" with about 60 kids and 20 adults. The beach was about 2 hours from my work which I'd already traveled about an hour to get to so it was a long day. Beach soccer, volleyball-game like musical chairs but with towels. There was a big stage set up on the beach playing reggaeton music and little kids were really dancing! It was hilarious. The first half of the day it was really cold but the kids kept swimming and swimming and swimming! It was some of their first times to the beach!! Incredible. I found a hair in my hot dog at lunch.. all my co-workers were like 'This is Chile Theresa!' haha a common joke here. After the 12 hour day I got a quick bite to eat with Tiare after work then had a great nights sleep.
Friday 23rd- Only two boys came to work on my video project, next week I'll have to call more to come. Their script was really cute, "The spys." We think the majority of the kids were still wiped out from the beach. I got off work early, which was nice but came home and realized my debit card was lost. In the evening I hung out at the apartment with my roommates and their friends then went out dancing.
Saturday 24th- I went back to the parking garage where I thought I could have left my debit card in the ATM (after I'd already canceled my card) and my card was there! What are the odds?? Too bad the card had already been canceled. Had lunch at 'cute waiters' and finished a few postcards. The post office was closed so I bought stamps from this man selling them out front, I had to lick each stamp and they were huge so sorry if you all got confused by what I wrote on some of the cards. While I was putting the stamps on a janitor cleaning the front of the post office kept accidentally spraying me with the hose, it was a struggle. I went for a haircut but I'm not even sure if the woman even cut all the way around my head.. I guess that's what I get for going for a five dollar hair cut. I went out to dinner at the little restaurant that's actually on the bottom floor of my apartment building, Utopia and the two cutest kids came up and asked for food. I wasn't going to finish my empanadas so gave them each one. They were so adorable. Waiters and waitresses are starting to get to know me.. I'm gonna have to learn how to cook soon! Haha. After dinner I went to Carine's apartment, we had waffles and nutella then met some of her French friends at an outdoor terrace. English, Spanish and French was being thrown around during the whole evening. A French boy told me in France being bilingual and studying abroad is normal and being tri or quad-lingual is sufficient. Different world. A guy who grew up in Haiti and New York works in Santiago, Chile and Buenos Aires now.. he was probably one the most funny people I've ever met. We all went out dancing and met some characters from Madrid. We stayed out until the club closed at 530!
Sunday 25th- 5 hours or less of sleep and got myself up for the day adventure to Pomaire about an hour away known for clay work. We also went to the beach called 'Las Rocas'. Went with Carine and her other good friend from France. It was soooo hot. Fresh squeezed fruit juice and empanadas mmmm. The clay work was really impressive and the pueblo was really quaint and pretty. Then it was about another 40 minutes to get to the beach. We were directed by several people to get to the beach all sorts of ways but finally we arrived to the 'famous beach' as Carine would say. We relaxed for a bit then had to take the bus back because I wanted to go to the show in downtown Santiago with the giant copper doll. It was a long bus ride back, tons of traffic, hot and our bus driver was honking at other people almost the entire time. He interrupted several naps I almost got into with his potential car accidents. The show was amazing, outside infront of where the president words 'La Moneda' or 'The Coin'. There were acrobats, a firework show, confetti and a million people or so. It felt like New Years did. They closed the metro so I had to walk three metro stops alone which wasn't too bad but it took a long time full of people.

Monday January 26th-Sunday February 1st
One of my favorite days at work. I heard about 25 cases get passed from one psychologist to another because one psychologist is on maternity leave. I read a few, listened to all of them, learned the Spanish vocabulary I've always wanted to learn and they even went through the majority of the words with me that I didn't know. A lot of them they laughed about because it was slang they didn't know how to explain. Had sushi with Carine and a friend from France. While we spoke Spanish in our accents two boys around our age were speaking English with a Spanish accent. I love this lifestyle.
Tuesday 27th- Work. Pool day.
Wednesday 28th- Culture shock. My boss told me she felt I was disconnected from our team and I really had no idea what she was talking about. Parts of my culture that I'd never noticed were brought to my attention.. our importance of privacy in the US, the importance of workplace status, the boss' job to give the others direction and more. She basically told me she doesn't feel like she's any more of the boss than the rest of the team. She said she wanted me to feel free to go into the job open armed asking questions or reading their case files and that no one was going to tell me I was bothering them.
I thanked her for meeting with me because it showed me my participation matters but at the same time it was hard to believe my expectations were to take this entire experience into my own hands when it was all happening in a foreign country, language and internship. The difference between being a student and a co-worker in Chile caught me off guard. I called my host Mom in Valdivia and she was great, she completely understood the difference between people in Santiago and where I'd just been studying in Valdivia and how my culture is in the US. She told me if I didn't endure these types of culture shock once in awhile I wouldn't learn as much from this experience, which is true. It was just hard for me to hear from another person that I was distant from our team when the whole time I was trying not to step on people's toes but in doing so I separated myself from them. It's hard to see your image from at outside perspective and especially one you've never noticed before in your life.. an innate part of who you are from where you've grown up.
Thursday 29th- Began asking questions and taking notes on paperwork about SEDEJ. Called and confirmed kids for the video and presented the video script during the team meeting. We had another pool day but a different pool than the Tuesday pool thank goodness, outdoor pool. In the evening I went out with the organization through which I found my apartment in Santiago.. they invited all other students and interns who found apartments through them as well. It was fun. Afterwards Tiare and I got sandwiches and a drink in our neighborhood.
Friday 30th- The same two boys, cousines named Giovanni and Naintan who had participated the week prior in the video with me came again and had been practicing their script.. dance and singing at home! So cute. I started another script with Mauricio and Carlos (brothers), Javier, Christian and Jose, "The boys from the Forest". It was difficult to maintain their attention but I still had a great time with them. In the evening I finished my first book by Isabel Allende 'La Casa de Los Espiritus'. Then went out to a friend of Carine's. There was a couple from Brazil, a few from France and an Italian. The Brazilian girl was hilarious acting like a Chilean using slang and it was nice to relate with others about how they think we are supposed to understand any of it, we're all working in Santiago and its been strange for all of us that the slang continues into the workplace as well. Afterwards Carine and I went dancing in "Bella Vista". After all the time I spent in a record store a few weeks back I knew tons more of the songs, its funny how something so simple can make you feel that much more at home.
Saturday 31st- Went out to a restaurant notorious for fish, got swordfish.. delicious! Met an argentine dad and daughter, chatted with them for awhile. They laughed at how well I spoke because I guess they weren't expecting it when they first started talking to me which was funny. I started a book by Pablo Neruda, "Confieso que he vivido". Much more difficult to read in spanish than Allende with his poetic style. Walked around Bella Vista for awhile and the Bellas Artes museum again after lunch, saw a cool exhibit on identity... how our form to express ourselves changes with every experience we endure. Then I went to a movie about Che Guevara. Tiare invited me to go out with her and her date so I could meet some of the guy's friends. We went to their apartment and we had the most random conversations but they were great. We did some bar hopping afterwards and ended the night at an underground dance club. Really fun night.
Sunday February 1st- Ate lunch and met an Australian guy apartment hunting who asked for my advice on good neighborhoods. Weird to think about how a month had already flown and I could give advice on the city that I still feel so small in! Then I went swimming at Carine's pool, great view of the Andes Mountains and all the sky scrapers. Carine and her friend from France made me crepes because it was Crepe Day in France. Funny to enjoy a French tradition in Chile. Afterwards we went for a salsa lesson at Meastra Vida in Bella Vista. I loved this class because the professor taught the steps before playing the music, I had a great partner that was like a personal instructor and after the class several locals came and danced fabulously which was a real treat.