It's Been Awhile Since

.....we've contacted the world. And I know last time we left you all with some interesting news. It's true damas y caballeros, Hannah and I were robbed. But fear not, we are fine, we finally got our credit cards replaced and I just recently replaced my camera. Let the lack of photography end. Sometimes a girl just has to have a bad week. And a bad week it was. After being robbed at bottle point in Santiago, with our now good friend, and part of team robbery Kevin, we returned to Santiago poorer, and a little worst for the ware. Over the next few days, I was sick, accused of being an illegal immigrant, and unfortunately for our host mom Mirta, her dog died. Never have Hannah and I done anything more flaite than bury a dog at 1:30 in the morning.  But enough about the downers finally the week from hell was over and things have much improved since then.

We've started classes and while some of them are more enjoyable than others, its good to be back in the swing of things. Some of our teachers are a bit sassy, and I think I love it. Our Politics teacher has taken to asking himself questions he thinks we have and then answering them. It's quite fun to listen to. All in all I think our Spanish is also improving, so that's wonderful, I wasn't sure it was going to happen, but we're definitely getting there.

So after Valparaiso we started class, and that weekend we experienced the santiago pub crawl. It's an activity for the foreigners where this company takes you around to three bars and club after feeding you lots of beer, wine, and pizza the first hour. We danced, we drank, we had lots of fun. It was a great release after the previous week. The next week we visited the Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos. It basically took you through the dictatorship of Pinochet and the atrocities that were commited against the people. I would recommend that anyone who comes to Santiago go to see it. It's very eye opening, and since it's more recent history the museum does a great job of integrating media into the displays.

                                                              Hannah and I at the Pub Crawl!

That Thursday I had an interview with Youth For Understanding Chile, that went really well. Paola is working on getting all of us internships and I can't wait to start wherever it is! Hannah could possibly be interning at Centra de Estudios de Justicia de Latinamerica. We can't wait to figure out more about it.  Then Hannah and I saw Los Juegos Del Hambre (aka the Hunger Games) which was fantastic! I enjoyed it very much, and it was nice to be able to see it here in Chile. This is also the day that I replaced my camera, so yay for pictures! I can't wait to get started taking photos again! Then you can all more easily stalk us. I know it's becoming difficult without the pictures.  The next day Hannah and I went to a house party with some of the other students in the program. We taught some of the chilenos there how to play flip cup, and after some language barrier complications, they finally understand and really enjoyed playing the game. The party was very relaxed and it was great to meet some chilenos. Afterwards we returned home and experienced our second (and the next day third) earthquake here in Chile. However, both of them were under 8 on the richter scale, which in Chile is just known as a temblor or tremor. Apparently these are no big deal. So while I was scared out of mind, everyone in Chile was calm. In the words of Mirta "It happens."

On to the third week of school. Classes are getting into more of a rhythm, but a lot of is still don't have internships so we still have Tuesdays and Thursdays off to do what we want. Hannah, Megan, and I went to the mall on Tuesday, but didn't have much luck finding cheap things that we wanted. So on Thursday we invited some more friends to come with us to Calle Bandera. It's honestly one of Santiago's best kept secrets. It's a street filled with thrift stores that sell some really amazing cheap clothing. We picked up some awesome clothes for lollapalooza and found ourselves at La Piojera. This is where we finally tried the Chile famous Terremotos. It's a wonderfully strong and tasty drink involving sweet wine, pineapple ice cream, and a shot. Delicious.Here's a couple of photos of this wonderful day!

Thrifting and breaking our terremoto and tsunami virginity. 

FANNY PACKS FTW.

So here we are, all caught up mas o menos. Sorry if I skipped out on the details, but it's been awhile. This weekend is Lollapalooza Santiago and we're so excited! We're going both days, so we'll have to let you know how that goes. Then Hannah and I have a trip planned to Cordoba and Mendoza Argentina. Sightseeing and Wine Tours here we come! After that is our trip to Easter Island, so we've got lots of traveling to do! But don't worry, we'll keep ya'll informed!

                                                                                                        Team Robbery thrift style.

Orientation, travel, y otras cosas

The past two weeks have been incredibly busy!! We completed orientation with our program, which consisted of Spanish grammar classes (that were debatably successful), trips around the city to see a lot of the historical landmarks, and cultural experinces (we read a poem by Pablo Neruda and then discussed our feelings about it in Spanish). This has all been taking place from 9am-1pm everyday in the university's library. University of Diego Portales is goregous. It's worked into a few blocks downtown-sort of like GW-but is so modern looking and oldwordy at the same time. Almost building has a courtyard like area and there's a river that runs through a couple of the connected buildings. While orienation has been fun I am excited to start real school tomorrow! Our earliest day of classes starts at 10 (thank god, we are not morning people).

Orientation trip to the top of Santa Lucia!

In addition to fake school we've been doing a lot of traveling. Last weekend we went to Tongoy, a small beach town about 5 hours to the north of Santiago. We laid on the beach, ate 61 fried empanadas between our group of 13, and went to a carnival. We rode the mini montana rusa aka a child sized roller coaster. It was the best.

Thursday-Friday of this week our prgram took us to Vina del Mar and Valparaiso to end orienation before school starts! We went to Isla Negra to see another Neruda house and it was goregous. He had the most amazing view of the Pacific and rocky beach. Allende visited him in that house so that was also totally cool. Megan totally thinks Neruda was a hoarder, he just had three houses to put all of his stuff in, instead of one. She's a little sensitive on this issue... Then the program took us out to a nice dinner in Vina and then on a walking tour of Valparaiso the next day. It was beautiful-a lot of hills and colorful houses. Our tour ended with lunch at a resturaunt on the 5th floor of a high rise. Valpo is more of a shipping port town than a beach town, so we had a great view of the bay and we're fed wine, piscos, ceviche, and steak! Good to see my AU-abroad dollars at work!

We also discovered a fun game that Kevin and Megan like to play. Everyone tries to find the most inspiring piece of graffiti and then we decide if the graffiti is fact or poetry. So far the count is 2-2 with one disqualification for vulgarity. Megan's personal favorite was besame amame soy un pirata. (aka kiss me, love me, I am a pirate) You can not imagine how much conversation ensued on this point, but just so everyone knows, it's poetry.

We decided to stay for the weekend in a hostel in Valpo with the other kids from AU. Our hostel was charming and we found a great Chilean kitchen nearby. But unfortunately we don't have any pictures of the weekend. On Friday Megan and I and one other person from our program were jumped and robbed while we we're opening the door to our hostel. We're okay-so there's no need for anyone to worry. But we're a little shaken up and back home resting. Sorry for springing this on everyone at the end of our blog post but we honestly didn't know what the best way to tell our friends and sisters who we wanted to know. We will have more ( and less dangerous) stories to come soon!