It's Finally Getting Warmer, Yaaaaaay!

It's spring! Not that it's actually that warm, but anything is better than having freezing wind every day. It gets a little old when you walk to school for 5 minutes and your hair is a big knot when you get there. So time is going by waaay too fast. I go home in a month and a half and even though I want to see everyone, I would love to stay longer. So towards the end of October I went the the penguin colony with my family and they were really cute! There weren't that many though because they go to Brazil for  the winter and it was still pretty cold. Then there was Halloween, which is not nearly the big celebration here that it is in the US. I saw some little kids out trick or treating, but not everyone goes and kids over 12 don't really do anything to celebrate. I ended up going to a friends house to celebrate her birthday. Also I only saw one house with decorations. Even though I like halloween and it's fun to celebrate, it was interesting to see how they celebrate it in another country because I had no idea how different it was.

November went especially fast because I had so much to do. First I had my birthday and the Saturday before my friends were really sweet and threw me a surprise party! During the day I had gone to the mall with a couple of my friends and we usually hang out there for about an hour or two, but they kept wanting to look in every store and waste a bunch of time, so we were there for about 3 hours. Of course now it seems really obvious but at the time I had no idea what they were doing. Then my parents came to the mall to pick me up and decided that they needed to go shopping too, so we spent another hour there. Then finally I got to go home and I walked up the stairs and all my friends jumped out. It was so cute, but I was so shocked and I had no idea what to do. It was really fun and of course there was cake, which I love. It's called cookie cake, but it's nothing like the cookie cakes in the US that are just giant chocolate chip cookies with frosting. This one is made with sweet crackers, they're not exactly cookies, and manjar, which is like a thicker carmel kind of spread but it's not as sweet. Then it's baked so the crackers soften up and I'm obsessed with it because it's so good.

The weekend after my birthday I went to Torres del Paine, which is a mountain with these rock tower things, with a group of other AFS students in my area. On Friday I took a bus with two of the other students in Punta Arenas (Pim and Alberto) and one of the volunteers (Maximiliano) to Puerto Natales, which is the next closest town about 3 hours away. We spent the day touring Puerto Natales with the students that are living there. It's really pretty and a lot like Punta Arenas because it's next to a lake and has mountains, but it only has about 30,000 people. Then we stayed over night and got up nice and early the next morning to get on another bus to Torres del Paine. In total there were 12 of us; Pim, Alberto and I from Punta Arenas, 3 AFS students from Puerto Natales, another girl from AFS that lives up north but was visiting, 3 students from YFU (another program like AFS) that go to the same school as the students in Puerto Natales, and 2 volunteers. Saturday we had a full day bus tour where we stopped at all these other landmarks like a big cave, lots of pretty lookouts, and lots of lakes. One lake called Grey Lake we actually got out at to walk around, so we hiked a little big and went down by the shore. That the probably the most wind I have ever experienced in my life. We could literally stand and lay back into the wind and not fall because it was so strong. It was also impossible to take a decent picture because everyone's hair was flying around. Also the little pebbles on the beach were picked up by the wind and would fly and hit you in the face and they actually hurt. After we were done with all that we went to the campgrounds to set up all our stuff. That night we just hung out and talked, which is always fun when it's with other exchange students because we can share stories and all that. I learned from the two Thai students that there are three different words that are all "ma," but they each have a different intonation of the voice. One means horse, the other is dog, and the last is come here... it would be so confusing! Also we kept seeing rabbits while we were there and someone asked how to say rabbit in english (talking in Spanish of course) and Pim who is Thai said it was "labbit" because she's not used to the r sound. Of course after that we only called them labbits just to make fun of her. After that we even had to cook our dinner over a mini fire. They're really protective about fires in that area because a couple of years ago some foreigners burned down a ton of the forested part when they tried to burn their toilet paper. On Sunday we got up really early again so we could start hiking the actual mountain. It was a lot harder to climb than I was expecting because it's almost all uphill. The first part took us about 3 hours with lots of little breaks. I was in the group that walked a little faster so we got to wait for the other group to catch up, but of course the people with the lunches were behind us so we were starving. Then came this part that is really steep and has lots of rocks that you have to climb over and it was definitely the hardest, but after that we reached the actual Torres del Paine. Los Torres (towers) are these three big rock structures that stick out of the mountain and to me they kind of look like popsicles. They're really cool and it's hard to believe they're natural because they're not like anything else. After that we had to do the whole thing backwards to get back and even though it was mostly downhill it was still hard to keep from sliding. In total it took about 8 hours and on the road that led to the campgrounds I was literally walking with my eyes closed because I was so tired. Once everyone arrived we took the bus back to Puerto Natales and every single one of us was sleeping. We stayed one more night in Puerto Natales and then Monday morning we headed back home to Punta Arenas. It was really fun and I was not expecting to like it as much as I did. It was so pretty and where I live in the US it is completely flat, so I loved getting to hike up a mountain.

The other weekend on Sunday we went to our cousins' parcela, which is like a little cabin in the "country" about 20 minutes outside of Punta Arenas. They just finished rebuilding it so they had lots of family and friends over for a barbecue. My family usually goes there to celebrate Christmas and New Years and also whenever it's nice out and they want a barbecue. I ate lamb for the first time, which I didn't really like because it has a lot of fat and the fact that it's a lamb, but at least I tried it considering I was a vegetarian for 9 years before I came to Chile. The rest of the day we just hung out and I went on a walk with my mom to see all the other parcelas that are in the area. It's really interesting to talk to her because she went to Illinois on an exchange program in high school, so we have a lot in common and it's fun to hear her stories.

Now I only have about a week and a half left of school, which is so hard to believe because everything has gone by so fast. We're basically just taking tests to finish up the units we are learning because they don't take finals here like in the US. Then once we're done with those we have parties in almost every class because there's nothing else to do. And theeeen the Sunday after that I leave to go to Brazil on my class trip! By now everyone is so excited and it's all anyone is talking about. It should be really fun because there's all sorts of places we will visit and activities we'll do, plus it's with all my best friends so it will be ten times better. I'll post again as soon as I get back because I will have tons to say!

The cutest little penguin. I want one! 

Some of my friends and I at my surprise party.

Laying into the wind.

Again, the wind.

All of us that went on the Torres del Paine trip.

Torres del Paine!

Me with my Thai friends.

Cooking the lamb.

My cousins and sisters and I at the parcela.

Alianza Verde!

So basically I'm terrible at keeping this updated, but I've been so busy. Lots of going out with my friends, birthday parties, shopping and all that. I finally made pancakes for my family! Of course they're obsessed with them because their pancakes are more like how we think of crepes. They weren't great because I made them from scratch and I usually just use the box, but they were good enough considering how much I missed them. They also really like syrup because it's not common here, but we were able to find it in one of the supermarkets because Punta Arenas gets a lot of imports. About two weeks ago we also had Teacher Day, which was fun. In the morning we had an assembly kind of thing where some classes or groups sang songs, did dances, gave speeches, or did imitations of the teachers. Then in the afternoon we didn't have classes, so it was kind of like a holiday for the students too.

And now on to the alianzas, which have been my favorite part so far. Basically the alianzas are a big competition where each class is put onto one of three teams and given a color. I was on Alianza Verde (green alliance) and each team also needs a king, queen, prince, and princess, and I ended up being voted queen. The little kids mostly just voted for me because I'm "blonde" and have blue eyes and it's so uncommon here. Also they're adorable and now they all say hi to me at school. Every day last week two people from each team were allowed to skip classes to walk around town collecting money for a charity that helps kids with special needs. Each day the team with the most money got the most points and I thought it was nice that they incorporated raising money for charity into the competition. We also had to pick a mascot, so ours was Oscar the grouch. The yellow team did pac man and the red team did a red angry bird. Every day of the alianzas you have to have someone actually dress up as your mascot, and you also have to use the mascot when decorating the doors of the classrooms of each class on your team. It was crazy how elaborate and creative people were, but they're been doing this for years now so they get super into it. The actual games started last Wednesday afternoon and each team had to do a skit based on a tv talk show. Because I was queen I had to me in it but my friends were smart enough to only give me one line to say. Of course when it actually came time to say it I messed it up and everyone thought it was really funny. Thursday morning we had the pairs dances, the group dances and the imitations. For the pairs dances there were three different typical latin dances for each of the three categories, kindergarten-4th, 5th-7th, and 8th-seniors. Then with the group dances each team had to choreograph something using a bunch of different songs and students from each category. With this too people were really creative and used all sorts of costumes and makeup and all that. The younger kids in our dance did Thriller so of course they looked like zombies and we also had a human swing in the middle of it, which is really hard to explain but looked really cool. The imitations were definitely the funniest because there were lots of guys dressed up as girls and everyone was just over the top crazy. Thursday afternoon and into Friday morning we had Factor Darwin, which was singing, dancing and humor competitions. Friday was also costume day, so I dressed up as Sandy and Danny from Grease with the king of my team. They also gave points to the team with the most creative costumes. Then the rest of Friday morning was these random games like pulling all the tissues out of a box the fastest, stacking dice on the edge of a ruler while it's in your mouth, sticking as many sticks as possible in one person's hair in a minute, throwing sticks in the air and trying to catch them all in one hand, putting cookies on your forehead and only using your face muscles to get them into your mouth, and other ridiculous stuff. That was also really fun because everyone was all excited and cheering and stuff. The last way to get points was by putting together boxes of canned goods, but there was a specific list of stuff that had to be in the boxes. The yellow team didn't have many, but at this point they didn't have much of a chance. We had 16 and the red team had 22, but then they figured out that all but 6 of theirs were missing the rice. Then there was this whole discussion over whether or not they would still count them or not, but basically they were the deciding factor of who would win. So my team decided to rebel and join with the yellow team to make Alianza Azul. At this point the yellow team wanted us to win because there are two senior classes and one was on yellow and the other was on red, and they didn't want the other class winning. They went crazy with it though and Alianza Azul stood on one side of the gym, while Alianza Roja was on the other. Someone even made a flag by tying the green team's flag, the yellow team's flag and someone's blue costume skirt together on a pole. Finally they decided and announced that we had won! It was so crazy and everyone was jumping and cheering and stuff, I can't even begin to explain it. So then Friday night we had a school dance, kind of like homecoming in the US, and I got a crown and a sash because I was now the queen of the school since we won. Everything was really entertaining and I loved it because with the school system in the US the kids are too young to lead it in elementary school and my high school is too big to do it, so it wasn't something I'd ever done before. 

 Us after we won! (you can kind of see the flag)

Some of my friends dressed up as girls for the imitations. 

Me and my sister before the dance. 

Me and the king getting our crowns at the dance. 

Our group dance. (I'm wearing the red hat)

The green and part of the red sections watching the games.

Calafate & September 18th

Sorry I'm terrible at keeping this updated, but I'll try and explain what I remember. A couple of weekends ago I went to El Calafate, Argentina with my family and it was gorgeous. That Friday at school we had the cueca competition, where a pair from my class came in third, and then we went back to our classes and ate anticuchos, which are like shishkabobs. Also I couldn't figure out for the life of me how to work the small camera that my family gave me to use, so I don't actually have any pictures from that day. The kindergarteners dancing were my favorite cause they're like 2 feet tall. Yeah so after we came home and ate lunch we left and drove for about 3 hours until we got to Rio Gallegos, Argentina, where we stayed for the night. Then the next morning we got up and drove another 3 hours to get to Calafate. The drive there was super pretty and parts of it were like when I went with my family last summer to Costa Rica because we would drive on these curvy roads and it felt like a car was just going to come at you from around the corner, but the roads are better in Argentina so it wasn't as scary. Also I've never seen a llama in my life so it was so weird to look out my window and have them staring at me from the side of the road. So when we got there on Saturday we basically just walked around and ate lunch and dinner. It's this really cute little town on the side of a mountain with a lake right there and there's a bunch of shops with a lot of native american influence. On Sunday we drove about an hour and went to the Glacier Perrito Moreno. It's this giant thing of ice and it's gorgeous. It was cool because you would be looking at it and see a chunk falling off, then you would hear the sound of it breaking off, then you would see it fall in the water, and then there was a huge noise from it hitting the water. But the sound was so delayed. After that we went back to the cabin we were renting and just hung out for a while. Then later my parents decided that we should go drive around to see the town. It was really dark outside the cabins and when we went to go pull out onto the road the lights turned on and there was a wild horse in front of our car eating. Yeah so that kind of surprised me so I said "oh my god!" and my family thought it was funny that I had said it in English. So then we pulled up next to it and my mom wanted to see it better, so she pulled a flashlight out and shined it at it. That probably wasn't a good idea cause it freaked out and ran into our car and then ran away. Probably one of the funniest things thats happened. Of course I felt bad for the horse, but it was still funny to see the side of the car with a big smudge mark.

Monday we drove back to Punta Arenas, and then Tuesday was Independence Day. We all wore the typical Chilean outfits and went to my cousins' house for lunch where I met even more relatives. That was probably the most meat I've ever seen in my life. I've also decided that I'm destined to be a vegetarian because meat is not my thing, but I have liked trying it all here since it's a huge part of the culture. We also got to eat my favorite, empanadas. After lunch we went to the field across the street to fly kites, which it a big tradition here. Now it makes a lot more sense why so many people were selling kites on the side of the road. Later we didn't do too much but we did go to another school for a little where there was a festival type thing where little kids play games and win candy.

I still had the rest of the week off, so I went out with my friends a lot and I got to go to the discoteca, like a club, which was crazy but so much fun. I also really like the music here cause it's all super upbeat. The popular types are reggaton and cumbia. I also went for a run one day along the coast of the Straight of Magellan. It's so cool that I can just run along the water when I want. The next week we went back to school and on Tuesday I had soccer practice again. Thursday I had my first game, which was outside in a stadium. I play for a team called Sokol, which is based at the school, and Thursday was the school's 100 year anniversary so it was a really big deal and all the teams played and there were tv cameras and everything. We won 3-1 which was good because my team is used to playing futsal, which is indoor soccer with 5 people per team on the field, and actual futbol is a little different. I had another game on Friday, but it was a futsal game and I didn't end up playing cause our team is the size of a futbol team and they all have a lot of experience playing indoors. After that I went with my family to a party for all the families in my sister's class. There was lots of food and they even had a dj, so there was dancing and all that and it was pretty fun. On Saturday I had my chapter meeting with all the AFS students in Punta Arenas and Puerto Natales, a smaller town about 3 hours away. There's 7 of us total and 2 girls have been here since January because they're doing the year program that started then. The students from Puerto Natales needed somewhere to stay overnight, so one girl Beatrice from Italy stayed at our house. We had lunch at our house and then went to meet up with the other students at the mall. Then we went to the chapter leader's house to eat and talk about how everything's going. It's so nice to talk to other exchange students because we have a lot of the same situations and some differences. After that we walked around downtown to show the Puerto Natales kids cause their town is pretty small. On Sunday we met up at the mall again to actually shop this time because they don't have many clothing stores there and definitely not a mall. Then they left around 5 and I went to the cemetery with my family like usual on Sundays. My mom's dad and my dad's mom are both there so we just go visit for about 15 minutes. I have a couple bigger projects and stuff to do for school, but it's crazy because we only have 2 months left! So tomorrow I'm making american pancakes for onces because their pancakes are more like crepes and they want to try them. Hopefully I won't mess it up because I usually just use the box and I have to make them from scratch. Well here's some pictures from Argentina.

Shops in Calafate.

It's giant.

More Calafate.

September!

Hi everyone! As always I'm having so much fun and becoming more and more comfortable with my life here and all the cultural differences. I'm able to have longer conversations with my family and get to know them better, and I can tell my friends have noticed that I can understand more too because they explain more stuff to me rather than just being like "come on Alli let's go!"And yesterday I had my first soccer practice, which was fun. I finally had something to do after school since I don't really have homework. My teammates seem really nice and they're all really good, but that could be because most of them are 20-25. There's only one other girl that's 16 and the rest are older. I guess I expected that because I was in Chile that more people would play soccer, but because of the cold weather and the small size of most of the schools, there just aren't as many opportunities to make teams and to learn at a young age. Even if they don't play it they still love to watch it though. Yesterday there was a big game in which Chile played Colombia and we lost, but it was really entertaining. A bunch of my classmates got together in my friend's quincho (lots of people have these, they're like an extra little building next to the house where people can hang out, eat, and watch tv) to watch it, and we even got out of school early for the occasion. Even the people who don't play or really understand soccer like to watch and they all get really into it. Of course they taught me the Chile cheer that goes C-H-I chi! L-E le! Chi chi chi! Le le le! Viva Chile! Everyone knows it, it's awesome. They kept asking me what the US's cheer was and they thought it was strange that we don't have one. Also they think it's crazy that we don't have a national dance, cause they have the cueca which they learn when they're really little. I've been learning it in gym class, but I'm terrible! On Friday everyone will wear the typical Chilean outfits to school (I promise to take pictures) and there is a cueca competition between the three best pairs from each grade. In other words, we get to watch people dance instead of going to class. I'm excited. Then, when we get home from school we're leaving to go to El Calafate, Argentina for the weekend! Everyone I've told is jealous because it's so pretty there and I can't wait to go hiking. The following week will also be one big celebration because September 18th is Independence Day. My family keeps telling me all about it so I can't wait to see it all for myself. Apparently I'll get to eat the best food there is in Chile, but I love all the food here! Our dinnertime conversations are also very entertaining, especially with my dad who is currently learning English. He likes to try and practice with me so one time he was offering me butter and asked if I wanted some "butterfly" because he thought they were the same thing. Another time he was trying to tell my Grandma to look him in the eyes, but he said "look me in the ass." My mom, my sisters and I, who all understood what he said, were dying laughing and we keep making fun of him for it. And here's some differences I've noticed from the US.

-there are lots of things to do with school, like I mentioned before
-you never have to pump your own gas because there are people whose job it is to stand outside in the cold and do it for you
-they don't have parking meters because instead there are more people that stand outside with little handheld machines that tell them how much you owe for how long you were parked and then you pay them... either of those jobs would be sooo cold.
-they don't really have phone contracts, everyone just has some form of adding money to their phone when they need more minutes
-lunch is the biggest meal of the day, which is always home cooked and always eaten with most if not all of the family
-there are four meals: breakfast, lunch, onces (tea time), and dinner, but sometimes we only have onces and no dinner
-people don't usually follow the speed limits, even more than in the US
-usually only the driver and front passenger wear seat belts
-almost all of the cars are stick shift
-everyone knows everyone! even though the city of Punta Arenas has 150,000 people, my parents are constantly saying hi to people, and everyone at school knows everyones parents and where they live
-in general, they are much more friendly and polite
-they do errands as a family on weekday nights
-almost all of my teachers are the parents of kids that go to my school

There are a lot more, but I can't think of them at the moment. Here are some pictures:

This is me and Kuki in our school uniforms on my first day of school.

This is my with my family on Kuki's birthday.

This is me with Kuki and Martina when they picked me up at the airport.

This is me with Martina and my mom and the Winter Festival fireworks.

This is me and my sisters with Punta Arenas in the background.

A Whole Month!

So I've now officially been gone for over a month. It's crazy how fast it's going already. I can already see my spanish improving, though I can understand much more than I can say, so it still gets frustrating sometimes when I can't say what I want to. It's also tiring trying to process and think about spanish all day, but it is getting easier. My family has started to play this game where they randomly ask what the name of the street we're driving on. It's actually really helpful because it makes me feel like I'm getting to know the city of Punta Arenas better. Another thing that I really enjoy is that my family likes to take random hour-long drives through the city and the surrounding areas in the evenings so I can see everything. I love getting to see all the different neighborhoods and mountains and views of the Straight of Magellan. It's also a nice way to break up my time after school because I'm used to having hours of homework every night, but here I barely have anything to do. Hopefully that will change soon though because tomorrow I'm going to Sokal (another school in Punta Arenas) to talk to the soccer coach about playing for the girls team, since my school doesn't have one. They don't have as many opportunities to play sports here, especially for the girls, so I'm really happy that I'll be able to do something active like I'm used to back home.

I have a lot to look forward to in the upcoming weeks because Chilean independence day is September 18th. It's an even bigger deal here than in the US, and they think of September as a month of celebration. I get the whole week of the 17th off from school and there are all sorts of things downtown and at my school like traditional food (empanadas, anticuchos-"shish kabobs", and chorizo) and traditional Chilean dancing (the cueca). In addition, my family has decided to go on a trip to Calafate, Argentina from the 14th to the 17th. Calafate is a town that's not too far away, even though it's in Argentina, and is right by the famous mountains of Torres del Paine. We'll get to do a lot of hiking, so of course I'll get to take a ton of pictures. In October, my school celebrates its anniversary, which means that there will be a dance, kind of like homecoming for the US, and games during the day. I have no idea what that'll be like, since my school in the US doesn't really do anything like that, so I'm excited to see. Then in December I'm going on the tercero medio (junior year) class trip to Brazil. Every junior class gets to go, which is typical for many schools in Chile to do, so I got super lucky with my timing! Then around New Years my family is going to Viña del Mar, which is a beach town in northern Chile. I get to go so many places, so it's hard for me to not be so excited all the time. I got so lucky to be hosted by a family that loves to travel as much as I do. Now I'm going to go to bed because last night was daylight savings in Chile, so i lost an hour of sleep in addition to staying out much later than I'm used to with my friends. I'll try and keep this more updated!

My First Couple of Days!

Hey guys! I finally remembered to do this haha. So on Sunday I finally got to Punta Arenas, Chile where I will be living with my new host family for about 6 months. I live with my parents Charo and Naldo, my sisters Martina and Kuki, and my grandmother Yeya. They are extremely nice and have been very welcoming. I actually left Chicago on Wednesday though and had two orientations with AFS in Miami and then in Santiago. The one in Santiago was so much fun because it was with all the AFS students from around the world that will be staying in Chile for either a semester or a year. There were 82 of us in total from 16 different countries and 5 of us from the US. It was crazy to see and hear about the differences and similarities between everyone. For example, I met a girl from Turkey that lives in Istanbul, which has 18 million people in it. On the other hand, I also met a guy from Austria who has 20 people in his village. There was a guy from Italy who brought his guitar and would play it during our free time and I didn't realize it, but I guess everyone knows the American classics, like the Beatles, even if they didn't speak English otherwise. So we would all sing together, which I thought was so cool because it was one of the one things that was universal between all of us, although most people spoke English pretty well.
Since Chile is south of the equator, it's winter here and Santiago was freeeeeezing! It was only about 40 degrees, but the buildings there don't have heat so you never really warmed up. I ended up sleeping in my winter coat with tons of layers. Punta Arenas is a little bit cooler, but it's very rainy and windy. The winds get up to about 120 kph! I don't know what that is in mph though because I'm still trying to learn how to convert everything to the metric system. I woke up in the middle of the night last night because the wind was so loud. And I thought Chicago was windy... it's nothing compared to here! There aren't many trees here because of the wind, but the ones that are here look like paint brushes because the branches still straight up, also they all lean in one direction from the wind pushing them so much. I will be sure to take a picture of them the next time I go into downtown Punta Arenas, where they're more prevalent because they look so funny.
Today was my second day of school at Colegio Charles Darwin. It's a little different from the US because it's a block schedule, we have 15 minute breaks in between every class to talk to people, the teachers move around to different rooms instead of the students, we have a 2 hour break to go home for lunch, and we end at different times everyday. So far it's been hard and a little stressful because everyone speaks so fast and it's really hard to understand. Also, I'm taking physics (which I'm hoping to change) and biology. They're extremely difficult because in addition to being in a language I'm not fluent in, I have never taken physics and the things I learned in biology are different than what they learn here. It should get better though. I mostly just get frustrated at the fact that I don't understand it because I don't need grades from those classes for my school in the US.
I miss my family and friends back home a lot, but hopefully that will lessen as I get more comfortable with the language and culture here. Now it's time to go eat dinner (9:30 pm! or 21:30 as they say here). Every morning we have a small breakfast. Then at about 1:30 we have a very large lunch. At 6 we have tea time, or "onces" where we also eat bread, cheese, and jam (they eat so much bread!). And finally we have a smaller dinner, usually a little earlier than tonight. They say I eat like a bird but I think they just eat a lot haha. I'm especially not used to eating so much for lunch because it's the main meal and we usually have 3 courses. Well now it's time to go, but I'll try and keep this updated when I remember.