Buscando

O hey!
So today was the first day we had to commute into Santiago centro to la casa de SIT. Mi padre works muy cerca de la casa SIT, entonces, he took me on the 403 bus into the city. The whole trip took about an hour and I was trying really hard to remember land marks because the signs that say the stops are so small and you sometimes have to get off the bus in the middle of the road if there is a lot of traffic and it can't pull to the side. So I'm not so sure I could do it by myself. ay dìos mìo, In la mañana we had a spanish evaluation to determine our level of expressive and receptive spanish (i'm such an SLP). This only took a few minutes so afterwards five of us went to a cafe cerca de casa SIT. Fue muy lindo (cute, nice, pretty). Despuès de almuezo, we had el drop-off. Basically Alex and I were given a place- la estaciòn mapocho- certain modismos or idioms and two foods. We had to find the place by ourselves, observe there, and then ask a stranger the significance of the place and find out what the idioms mean and find out what is in the foods. Well, yesterday, I asked mi abuela sobre la estaciòn. She drew me an extensive map of how to get there from la casa SIT so Alex and I were all excited when everyone else had to find their spot with maps but we already had a hand drawn one. ha ha. Here's where it goes wrong. Mi abuela me dijo (told me) to be very careful in la estacion. She said dont eat the fruits that are sold there or any of the food because they are not safe and clean. Also, there are a lot of lodrones (robbers) there (don't tell mi madre americana) so keep your bag in front of you. So Alex and I set off expecting to find a big market place with tons of people. We get to what my map says is the place and there are literally two stands selling water and chips next to this giant building. So thinking we were lost, we walked around the area for probably and hours hoping to find a big market place and lots of people. The building said Centro Cultural de La Estaciòn Mapocho so we thought it was the cultural center of the lugar (place) que se llama La estacion mapocho. So finally we said that mi abuela must be wrong and we asked like five guys that kept saying- ask the guy in the blue jacket he knows- o algo asì. Finally we found a crazy little man that knew about the significance of the building- turns out la estacion is the building not a market place. He said that it originally served as a train station from 1910 hasta 1991 when it was turned into a cultural center. He said a lot more than that but he talked so stinkin' fast that I was only able to write that much down. He answered all of of crazy questions and then proceeded to aks us if we know spanish swear words. We both said no, feeling more an more uncomforatble as this man old enough to be my grandfather said that the first thing we should have learned after leaving the airplane is swear words in spanish. He the continued to tell us the swear and explain what it meant. We told him we had to go and he brought us to the subway and told us how to get home. The more I interact with chileans the more I learn how amables (friendly) y hospitable (hospitable lol) they are. Crazy but friendly.

So that only just begins my adventures of the day en Chile. I took the bus into the city but I wanted to take the subway back because I wasn't sure if I could recognize my stop on the bus. So around 5:15 I went on the subway with my friend who lives a few stops down on the blue line and I thought o good mi abuela drew another map about how to get home from the subway stop. (disclaimer: you can read on only if your name is not Kathy Oaks and you promise not to tell mi madre americana, she will not like it). So I am all confident and get off the subway at Simon Bolivar. I walk up the stairs and si Salida Av Ossa and Salida Av Alguno differente. So two exits. I pick one go up the billion stairs. Walk a little bit. I don't recognize anything, nothing matches the map. ok. dont panic. I went bakc down stairs and asked the lady selling PIB cards and she says up the stairs to the right. OK back up the billion stairs. Finally I find Av Simon Bolivar and I see the movie theater that is near my house. so I start walking down the street when I realize that quizas I am not going the right way. So I go back and go into HOyts to call mi madre. She told me to walk down Bolivar away from the mountains and my street is off of the about 6 blocks away. I walk 7 or 8 cuadras (blocks) away from what I thought were the mountains although it was dark and foggy so I could not see the mountains which might have been an issue. Then I call mi madre otra vez and I said i'm on Parque Tabalaba. A street she had never heard of. O good. SO i walk in the other direction and finally come to a street she recognizes. I am approximately 15 blocks away. o good. It's dark by now. I should have been home an hour ago. O good. So finally after a few more wrong turns and 15 blocks later, I get home. Here's the thing: I should have gone out the other exit :-). But I learned a lot about Ñuñoa and now know exactly how to get home. So needless to say my 2 hour adventure home exhausted me a little bit. So I'm off to bed now. Our first day of classes is tomorrow. Also I played mis hermanos in Wii basketball and kicked their butts. haha.

Also, on another note. Sorry if my blog is hard to understand. It is sort of stream of conciousness and I realize that sometimes I use spanish so sorry if it un poquito confusing. After speaking in spanish all day my brain has trouble switching to english so it comes out as just a bad mix of english with some spanish words thrown in. So...sorry. but my brain hurts. a lot. it's mush... and this is what comes out. :-)

Con cariño (love, affection),
Kim

PICTURES en Picasa

one of these should work. Let me know if they dont. These are the pics from orientation:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Kimioaks/Orientation?authkey=Gv1sRgCLaR5s_8kJW_9wE&feat=directlink
y

Orientation

lol i dont know what im doing.

Mi Familia

Hi from Ñuñoa,
It is my second day with mi familia chilena. They are a great family and I think it is going to be a good match. The mother, Macarena, works with children with intellectual disabilities and language issues. We had a long conversation about the special education system in chile. She was told me some horror stories about certain homes for severly disabled children and the poor quality of care. It is also really expensive to give good care to children with special needs so a lot of the families and not involved with the children. Es muy triste la situacion de los niños quien necesitan educacion especial. Macarena will be a great person to talk with about the things I learn in my education seminar.

Mi padre, Fabian, works in a bank in santiago centro so I will be able to travel with him most mornings. He is very funny and laughs a lot. I also have dos hermanos. Martìn is 12 (not 6 like I was told) and Vincente is 4. He turns 5 on tuesday so it will be fun to celebrate his birthday. They are a little shy but are starting to open up all ready. They are both very wild and full of energy. It is funny to watch as someone new to the house but it drives the mama crazy. haha. I also met mi abuela, the mother of Macrena and her son (macarena's brother) cristobal who is 23. They are also muy simpaticos.

While I love my chilean family, the communication has been very frustrating. Chileans speak very fast spanish so I miss a lot of what they say. When they are talking to me I am able to understand most of it, but when they speak to each other it actually sounds like a different language. It is definitely going to take a while to get used to their form of spanish. It is frustrating and overwhelming to be focusing on language constantly-it takes all of my concentration to understand their words. When I was in Perù, they talks much clearer and slower, but here it all blurs into one word. It's kinda like when I talk in english haha. Hopefully I don't miss anything that important. I think it will get better after a while but it's exhausting.

Overall I am having and overwhelming but wonderful time get accustomed to life en Chile! Tomorrow I will brave the metro for my 45 minute commute into the city ( Ñuñoa where i live is still considered santiago but the SIT house and Universidad Alberto Hurtado are in santiago Centro, Santiago). I miss you all.

Paz y Amor,
Kim

Orientaciòn

Hola! Estoy aquí finalmente. It seems like I have been planning my study abroad experience forever. Now that I am sitting here in Chile it seems unreal. I can not begin to explain how nervous, excited and overwhelmed I felt before I left and how I feel now.

In there airport I met four girls in my program. It was awesome to know some people After a ten hour flight and a semi-uneventful trip through customs (I almost couldn’t pay the tax because there were small rips in almost all my bills and they wouldn’t except money with rips in it) I was greeted by Roberto and the rest of the SIT staff. They are all so amazing and friendly. They speak very slowly so that we can understand and are very patient with us. All day on Thursday and Friday we had orientation and discussed the safety concerns and ins and outs of living in Santiago. We are staying at a hotel right next to the ocean and it is gorgeous. We walked down to the beach, that is what the picture is from. The weather is very cold, it's nice in the sun but I have been wearing a lot of layers.

I found out that mi madre se llama Macarena and I have 2 hermanos; ages 4 and 6. I also have a Chilean padre. Elena said my family is very young and very nice. Mi madre works at a school for children with language disabilities. I think it is so awesome that Elena matched us with families that share similar interests. I almost cried when I found out about my family. We go into Santiago tomorrow and meet our familias so I am so excited and nervous.

Tonight we spent about 3 hours at a restaurant. Chileans are a lot more laid back about rushing and being on time. I think I was born to come here because I am chronically late. Haha. But it is weird but kinda nice to get use to a culture that is so chill. I think if you spent 3 hours at a restaurant in the states they would kick you out. Today we also went to the house of Pablo Neruda who was a Chilean poeta and politician activist during the time of the Coup in Chile. His poetry is awesome and he writes a lot of cool things about the sea. But I think that I could write poetry like that if I had the view of the ocean that he had from his house haha. Definitely check out his bio and his works he is a pretty interesting guy. His house is full of collections of crazy random things from all over the world. It’s awesome.