3/6/07 9:31 PM
Well, that’s a real long time to go without writing about anything. Well, I’ve already started an e-mail that has all the details about Torres, so I’ll skip over that. What’s important about that is that Tiara, Christina and I are now very good friends with a lot of inside jokes, which is good to have. It’s great to have people to laugh with, even though when we’re together we pretty much only speak English.
School is starting this week, though all of us gringos are confused because in California you sign up for classes like 2 months before they actually start, and the first week is the most important, but here registration doesn’t start until the first day of classes, and I guess that a lot of people don’t even go to the first days, or maybe it’s not required to go in general… I’m kinda confused, and the computer is not letting me sign in to register, so things are difficult. But I went to my first class today. It was Literatura Hispanoamericana Contemporánea, or Contemporary Hispanoamerican (I don’t think that’s a word in English) Literature. This morning I definitely had one of those “What am I doing here? Am I really doing this?” moments, and was pretty nervous about going to class, and wondering if people could tell I was a gringa just by looking at me. But everything was fine. The class was very small, less than 20 people, and the first four people who came into class were exchange students; me, two guys from the east coast, and a German girl. And then Tiara showed up later. I could understand the professor pretty with very little difficulty, and I even asked some of the students a question and they were very helpful. But when the students asked questions I couldn’t understand what they were saying at all. As far as the feel of the formality and strictness and everything in the classroom, it feels like an American university so far. Maybe not quite as informal as UCSC, but it is only the first day. Tomorrow I’m going to go to a class on Contemporary Chilean Literature, and I’ll decide which one of the two I am going to take.
Other big news is that I moved out of Lucky and Ivan’s when I got back from vacation, and am now living in an apartment on the north end of Ñuñoa with two Chilean guys in their mid 20s. Their names are Marcelo and Pierre, and they’re both from the country in the foothills a couple hours south of Santiago, and came here to work and study. They both also play music, Marcelo loves blues and plays guitar and harmonica, and Pierre plays guitar in a Jazz band. We’ve actually hardly seen each other cause the day after I moved in Christina, Tiara, and I went to the beach for the weekend, and both of these guys work all day.
My room is very noisy because it’s facing Irrarazaval, a very busy street, and the place is messier than I thought when I first interviewed, but I like it. The kitchen is very small and doesn’t have an oven or microwave or shelves, and the stove is really a camp stove with a propane tank under the tiny improvised counter, and one of it’s burners doesn’t work. My room is big with lots of sunlight, and blue and yellow walls, and Pierre gave me a ficas. When I moved in it also had small posters of SpiderMan, ACDC, and “El Señor de los Anillos” (Lord of the Rings) which I’ve left up. Someone also wrote “Te Amo Juan” (I love you Juan) and “Juan y Pamela” with hearts all over one of my walls. I left it all up cause it’s kind of funny and makes me happy, but Marcelo says the apartment manager is going to have all of the walls painted and the bathroom and hallway floors redone at the end of the month. One kind of interesting thing about the apartment is that my room has two walls of newly painted blue, and two of old-lookinng bright yellow, our large living room is half white and half lime green, Marcelo’s room I think is orange and green, and Pierre’s is blue and green. When I asked Marcelo why this was, he laughed and said that he always gets bored after two walls. Tiara thought that was hilarious, and I thought it was pretty great, too. Also, Marcelo wants to make a couch out of an old mattress he has and some extra wood that he found somewhere and is storing in a corner of the kitchen with a hacksaw. For those of you who know me well, I imagine that the homemade couch and half-painted walls are enough of an explanation of why I’m moving in, despite the tiny dirty kitchen. And Pierre said that he just ordered a washer and dryer online, so we should have those in a couple weeks. The biggest drawback besides the noise (which Pierre says I’ll get used to, because he also has a street-facing window, and for which Marcelo’s mom made me some curtains) is that there is no internet, which is very painful, and Internet is very expensive here; something like $80 US to start up, and then around $40 or $50 monthly. Blech. For now, though, there are 3 internet cafes across the street, and Tiara has wireless internet at her house which is a 15-20 minute busride away.
Now that we’re back from Torres I can tell how ugly and terrible the air is here. Transantiago is working better. I actually like it a lot better than the old system. The buses are a lot cleaner and I understand the system in general. People are still mad, though, and buses sometimes pass bus stops with people for no apparent reason, but I think passengers forget that the old buses did that, too.
That was a surprisingly short passage. Before saying goodbye I’d like to let you guys know that my cellphone must have fallen out of my purse on the bus to the beach this weekend. I’m trying to get my old number again, but it’s kind of a pain, so I’ll keep you all up to date. Just don’t call me on it any time soon. However, after daylight savings time this weekend I’ll be only 3 hours ahead of you all, so it will be easier to be in contact if I ever do get internet and skype.
Much love, and I hope you’re enjoying the coming spring as I’ll be enjoying the coming fall.
-Sophie
3/6/07 10:20 PM
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