So I did my best to try and take advantage of this final free week the best I could. Monday I attempted to pickup my Chilean identification card, only to be denied once again and told to come back in a week. I also had to head over to the college campus to make sure that my desired classes still existed and the meeting times stayed the same. This was not the case and had to rework my schedule a bit. It's all taken care of now.
On Tuesday I spent the afternoon at the oldest bar (circa 1916) in Santiago, La Piojera. The strange names comes from a story that a former Chilean president Arturo Alessandri was invited by the leader of a workers syndicate to this bar and upon entering he exclaimed, "Have you brought me to a lice-house (piojas->lice...piojera) or what?" Since then the place has taken on the name. They are famous for their chicha (fermented corn, apples, or other fruits) and their 'terremotos(earthquake),' a mix of fermented white wine, pisco (part of the brandy family, made from distilled grapes) and ice cream. The place has a real Chilean atmosphere.
Thursday I went out with some buddies to have a traditional Chilean dish called a Lomito, essentially a gigantic pork sandwich with guacamole and tomato. Solid. Afterward we went next door to a cafe that also doubles as a social group for people who want to practice their English as well as for others, like me, to practice speaking Chilean. The place is open Tuesdays and Thursdays, and sadly attending will begin to conflict with my school schedule. Hopefully I can just scoot over after class from here on out.
Friday, few girls in our program hosted a EAP beer pong tournament at their new apartment on the 11th story of a downtown complex. It turned out being very fun despite being entirely gringo since my fellow Santa Cruz slug friend and I were declared technical champs. I saw technical because the landlords cut the power to the apartment after one warning. Pretty strange, Friday also a Chilean holiday and the electricity is cut to the place before 8 p.m. That's some gringo hate right there.
On Saturday, a couple of friends and I went out to take a visit to a famous concentration/torture camp during the coup called Villa Grimaldi. My friend's host-brother has a relative who redesigned the site as a place of reflection and was able to give us the inside scoop about all the architecture, murals, history, etc. Current president Michelle Bachelet and her mother were even tortured here. It was a powerful experience and I could draw many similarities to my trip to Cambodia. Dictatorships from what I have seen/read are almost have a formula. I can draw so many parallels between Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, Stalin's Russia, Pol Pot's Cambodia, Peron's Arentina, and Pinochet's Chile. Sickening.
I would like to end this entry with a shout out to Michael Phelps. what an Olympian. An inspiration to all athletes and Americans. Too bad for Fernando Gonzalez of Chile. He was the last hope for Chile to get a gold medal this year and got crushed this morning by Rafael Nadal in the tennis finals. I woke up at 5 a.m. to watch the match and had to head back to sleep following the second set. The Chilean have still been able to recognize the success and joke, he is the master of the metals...being the only living tennis player to win a gold, silver, and bronze medal. The American Basketball team (no longer the Dream team but the Redeem team), should be able to bring the gold back to the U.S. They are looking absolutely dominant. There is a big Olympic soccer match on Tuesday: semifinals between Brazil and Argentina. I'll be up at watching at 6 a.m. EST cheering on the baby blue and white.
I just received the travel plans of my grandmother who is due to visit during the national independence weekend. I am so excited and can't wait to see her. It's going to be a lot of fun.
That's all for now, I'm out.
