What did you actually DO?

There are probably at least three or four of you out there in cyber space that are slightly curious to know what I did on my trip to Colombia (I considered saying five, but I want to stay realisitc...). Well, the three or four of you can read on as I am about to indulge you, the rest of you can go ahead and log off!

I actually went on the trip with a German friend of mine, Johanna (she is the "so what do you think of abortion?" girl, to give you some perspective!). After a five hour, early morning flight, we arrived in Bogotá at about 3 PM. Johanna has a Colombian friend named Ana that she met on previous travels, and Ana was gracious enough to meet us at the airport. I spent the afternoon with the girls, and then met up with Jorge and his girlfriend later in the evening. It turns out that I spent a fair amount of time with Ana and Johanna while they were in Bogotá because Jorge is in medical school and has a pretty demanding schedule, but it worked out great because I had a great time with both of them.

There were a lot of great places that I visited, but I think the highlight would have the be the Catedral de Sal, or the Salt Cathedral. About an hour outside of Bogotá there is an active salt mine in which this cathedral was built. After an area has been completely exploited, a huge dwelling remains, that is nearly as long as a football field, probably 75 feet wide and 125 feet tall. After mining the area, there is no use for this space, so the miners decided to create a mine, reflecting their religiosity as well as desire to be protected by the patron saint of mining (I cannot remember the name...) since their work is extremely dangerous. The cathedral is comprised of many different parts, all with symbolic meanings. There is a large part that is meant to represent symbolic parts of Christ's life towards his crucifixion. There is also a large part that is actually a cathedral that has a huge cross carved into stone. Other highlights include the reflection pool and the movie theatre. Besides the sheer size of the cathedral, all of the lighting made the experience awesome.

Another great place that I visited was the Museo de Oro, or the Gold Museum. The museum hosts thousands of relics from pre-Colombian societies. It was simply awesome to see all of these pieces. Although it was a little bit repetitive after a while, I definitely enjoyed the experience. There was a really cool exhibit that showed how archaeologists excavate relics and how they interpret their findings. The best exhibit was a huge oval room with literally thousands of gold pieces hanging on the wall around you. After walking in, doors close behind you and it is pitch black. Soon, a light show starts, along with sounds of what is thought to be of an indigenous offering to the gods. The lights illuminate different parts of the room, and along with the sounds, it creates an incredible inundation of the senses. Along with this, other highlights include the Botanical Gardens, the Botero Museum (Botero is the artist that is well known for his pieces that exacerbate the physical body size of the people, making them almost reminiscent of a cartoon), and the National Museum, that had an interesting piece on Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, and other revolutionary artists of Mexico and how it influenced Colombia.

There is also some great night life in Bogotá. Although I never went out alone, there were a few times that I went out with friends. It was really cool to meet a bunch of Jorge's friends as they were really fun and seem really kind. It was also a lot of fun to go out dancing. The area that we spent time in was called the T-Zone. I guess you could think of it like a pedestrian mall like Pearl Street in Boulder, or the Ped Mall in Iowa City, but I have to say, there was a lot more going on there and I would choose to go out there than the others hand down if I had the choice!

As for my cultural experience in Colombia, I think it was pretty unique. One thing that I said once I got back to Chile was, "I like that there is some latin cultural influence in Colombia, mixed with western culture," however, I quickly was corrected, begin told, "and what exactly is latin culture?" I still have not come up with the answer, and I am not sure if I will, or if it is just an expectation I have in my head of Spanish speaking countries. One aspect that I definitely enjoyed was the food their. There is a lot of food that you can find anywhere, but there also were a lot of regional foods available, and I did my best to eat as much Colombian food as I could get my hands on (I also bought a used cook book to try it out myself!). Seriously though, I absolutely loved my time in Colombia and would like to return soon. I only saw areas around Bogotá, and although it was nice having a lot of time there to do a lot of different things, I would enjoy to see other parts of Colombia as well.

...And a little bit about what I have been up to now that I am back. Last Friday, I felt an earthquake, but when I asked people about it, they looked at me like I was crazy and I could not find any information about it so I gave up. WELL, it turns out there WAS one... just that it was too small for people to notice or care, ha. It was a weird sensation though, feeling like your insides were wobbling, like you are being scrambled. It was only small, but definitely disorienting knowing that the earth literally is shaking below you (and you are 4 stories up!). Other than that, things continue to go well in classes. I have finally gotten some papers back, and got a 6.6/7 (like a 94%) on my first psychology paper, and a 7/7 on a paper about Pablo Neruda (did you catch that they grade on a scale of 7 here?). Considering class, I am still surprised how readily time is wasted in my classes, yesterday class started a half of an hour late and we chatted about a lot of ridiculous stuff, including pretty much every political and religious belief (or, perhaps disbelief) the professor has. The highlight of my time back would have to be going to the opera last night. I saw Turandot in box seats just to the right of the orchestra pit. Amazing.

"Ooo aah, ooo aah, my boyfriend's back"

After a wonderful trip, I am now back in Chile! Where, you ask? I spent nine awesome days in Bogotá, Colombia. Those of you from high school know Jorge, one of the international students that spent a year at Peak to Peak. Well, connecting that dots, you may have come the the correction conclusion that I indeed went to Bogotá for a visit!

To be honest, I did not have high expectations of going to Colombia because, well, the country does not really receive positive attention from a US perspective (although, in all fairness I hear time and time again from international friends I meet that the US also has a pretty shameful reputation as a country, perhaps this is a good blog entry for another day). In the US, Colombia is often associated with drug trafficking and insecurity, and as a South American country, I believe that many people fixate on the fact that it is a developing nation rather than a first world country. So yes, I admit that with these thoughts in the back of my mind I was hesitant to go. However, my preconceptions were kicked soon after arriving in Colombia and I have fallen in love with the country (in fact, the tourism slogan for Colombia is el riesgo es que te quieras quedar, the risk is that you will want to stay--a little bit dorky but pretty much true).

So, yes, Colombia does have some security problems still and there are issues with drug trafficking, but as a nation these concerns have been addressed and security gets better and better every day. There are policia everywhere, and security guards posted at literally every public building. You cannot enter a mall without having your bag searched, a museum without going through a metal detector, or a parking garage without having your car inspected by a bomb-sniffing dog. There are still risky areas in which revolutionary groups such as the FARC has control, but as a smart traveler or a Colombian resident, you know the appropriate ways to stay safe and make good choices.

Enough about all of that debbie-downer stuff, there are so many great things about Colombia that deserve to be proclaimed to the world! With Spanish as a second language, Colombia is the perfect place to go if you want to feel successful in your ability to communicate, it's great--they speak like the textbooks tell you they will! I know that sounds silly, but it really can be disappointing to spend years learning a language, and then try to use the language in a place where you feel like you have learned nothing. Luckily, I have gotten used to how they speak here in Chile (remember that they take pride in speaking to worst form of Spanish there is!), but I totally felt defeated as I got used to it all. On top of that, I am not accustomed using so many words and phrases that are Chilean, that when I used them in Colombia, they had not clue what I was saying... thanks for that one Chile... ha. To be fair, all countries have certain phrases and words that they use. In Colombia, I was reminded of the word chévere, to mean "cool." They also used this word in México, which makes me think that they probably use it in Central America as well, but I totally forgot about it, which is good because if I use it here in Chile I can guarantee I will be laughed at. Here, bácan (not bacon, that would be tocineta) is used, and it actually has caught on in other places as well. In Colombia, they also say the infamous Chilean huevón, having literally 15 uses/ derivatives, but most commonly used for "dude," "dork," or "a-hole." One phrase that I enjoyed was instead of saying, ¿cómo estás?, many people would say, ¿qué más?, "what more?" as in, "what more do you have to tell me about what's going on in your life?"

Since Bogotá is a large city in South America, it was fun for me to notice similarities and difference as compared to Santiago (mind you that these are all personal observations!). I feel like Santiago does a better job of public services... for example, the parts of Santiago I have spent time in are always extremely clean. I think I have mentioned this before, but they pay tons a people that are responsible for keeps sidewalks, parks and streets impeccably clean. Another example is public transportation--in Santiago the bus system runs extremely efficiently and there is a state-of-the-art metro system. In Bogotá, public transportation is not governed by the municipality, and because of that, it's a nightmare. There are a few main thoroughfares that have a system called the Transmilenio that is like a normal bus system, but it's very limited. On all of the other streets there are OLD privately owned buses that have between 8 and 15 rows of seats, called busetas or colectivos. Each one is different than the other, and many are totally pimped out the the driver's liking. They cause huge traffic issues, as they drive extremely dangerously, I mean, I cannot even describe how dangerously they drive, and they stop wherever they want to in order to let people on and off of the bus; there are not consistent bus stops. Considering driving, the Colombians drive like maniacs, and enjoy their horns like Chileans do. The only difference is Chileans honk sitting in traffic, whereas Colombians honk when they are cut off, which happens roughly every 2 seconds. In Bogotá, I was surprised to see that all motorcyclists were required to wear a very unfashionable vest that has their license plate number on it while driving, very foreign to me (I am told it is a safely measure). Here in Santiago, there are stray dogs all over the place, whereas the parts that I saw in Colombia only had an occasional stray. A welcomed difference was that shopping in Colombia was a lot less expensive that Chile, although Chile is still less expensive than shopping in the US. This is interesting though because as a country, my understanding is the Chile is poorer than Colombia (but I cannot like, I have not actually verified this). Both countries have lots of street vendors (although in Colombia a lot of people sell things out of jimmied up shopping carts and in Chile there tend to be more kiosks), and both love eating ice cream!

I think that my favorite thing that Colombia does that I have not seen anywhere else in the world is the sale of minutes. Sounds weird, right? Well, the phenomenon that has developed is that rather than people using pay phones to call people, there are vendors EVERYWHERE that will sell you minutes to use a cell phone to make a call! They have vests on that say minutos or attach some type of sign to themselves to advertise they are available. It is an art form, some people will have cell phones for every single type of provider and offer you a choice of which service you want, some people put the cell phone on a chain so you cannot run away, and the cost varies depending on who you use, ranging from 100 to 300 Colombian pesos a minute ( US $0.05-$0.15 a minute). Why not use your own phone you ask? Turns out that there are different fees for calling a phone within your network our outside of your networks, and once people use up their alloted minutes, they can no longer make out-going calls unless they recharge. So, it can be economical to use your local minutes dealer than use your own phone. The next time you are walking down the street and you hear, "¡llamadas, llamadas!" (calls, calls!) or, "minutos," you will know exactly what's up!

Well this looks like enough for today, I will do my best to post again soon and talk some about what I actually DID in Bogotá!

Re: Out of Office Notification

¨I will be out of the office until September 24 and will get back to you as soon as I can.¨

Really though, I am going to be out of town for the next nine days but look forward to writting all about it when I am back in town!

Spanish Update

So, I have been here in Chile for two months now, I am still thinking in English, and I have gotten very involved with the idea of whether or not my Spanish is progressing at a fast enough pace. My biggest fear is to leave Chile not feeling like I am fluent--when I expressed this to my Spanish professor I was told that there are different levels of fluency... aka, everyone uses the word but means something different by saying it. So basically, I am forever stuck in a purgatory of never knowing how to express my abilities... or disabilities... in Spanish because, ironically, the thought will be lost in communication.

When I first got here, I felt like I lacked a vast vocabulary. What I realized was that, although there were a lot of words that I needed to learn, the bigger issue was learning how to experience Spanish in a Chilean context. That is to say, know all of the local cultural influences, concepts, sayings, products, streets, landmarks, and influence of the ancient civilizations that has lived in these parts for hundreds of years. I was expecting myself to know a lot of things that I would have not had any previous exposure to since they are words and concepts unique to Chile, yet I never realized that this was the issue that I had come up against. For example, instead of calling the police policía, they are called carabineros. When going to the supermarket, they ask you if you want to pay en cuotas, which always confused me because I had no clue what it meant (making me feel like an idiot), but finally came to understand that it is normal in Chile to purchase something and pay the debt off in smaller installments rather than all at the time of the purchase. In the states, police are police and it is uncommon to pay installments directly to a retailer, rather than paying the lump sum at the time of purchase (although I suppose our solution is credit cards!).

Apart from needing to learn of the ins and outs of everyday life here, the fact does remain that in order to articulate myself better, I do need to learn more vocabulary. I keep a small notebook that probably contains 500 new words that I have read or heard, although I cannot say that I have actually learned them all! A lot of the time though, I have found that I am learning a lot of synonyms of words that I already know. It is easy to convey an idea to someone with a limited vocabulary, but to understand you need to be able to grasp onto the important words and concepts. In order to start picking up on more of these words, I have been reading the newspaper daily. I have only been consistently doing it for a week now, but already I have found it easier to read, even though there are still a lot of words I do not know. I should be watching TV in Spanish, but I did not watch it much at home, and I do not have the urge to do it here... especially considering the TV is ancient and there is not cable!

One of the other big issues that I have come up against is that, although I can effectively communicate most ideas, I feel my Spanish is currently a science rather than an art. I mean this in the sense that I always string words together that I know belong, but if you think about it, there are tons of times in English where you use a word that does not directly mean what you are trying to say, but in that specific context fits well. The first example I can think of is the Skittles one-liner, "taste the rainbow." WHAT THE HECK DOES THAT ACTUALLY MEAN? Luckily, with a strong command of English, we are able to understand what it means without thinking twice about it. I definitely am not at the point where I can use Spanish in that way. Nonetheless, with my English, I have begun to note all of the times that I use forms of slang or colloquialisms that would seem bizarre to a non-native speaker. For example, the other day I was talking to a friend in Germany and I said to him, "I bet you're eating that up," to mean that he must be loving it; right away I knew that he would not know what that means, and his response was a simple, "What?"

I was curious to know how I am doing on verbs, and so I went through my 501 Spanish Verbs book to see which ones I didn't know. I still do not know if I am happy or sad about the fact that there are 120 that I did not know. I guess the positive way to say it is that I do know 381 of the verbs in the book, and of course there are others that are not included in the book that I know as well (which conversely means that are a million more not in the book that I do not know...ha). When I get the motivation, I think I will do flash cards for those verbs I am missing. I mean, if I know the 501 most important verbs, I should be at a pretty good place in my ability to communicate...

The one thing that I am still missing is constant conversation with native speakers. Like I have said before, I try really hard to avoid English, but I may not try hard enough to find good Spanish. Many of my friends are international students, which is great, but I am not learning anything from their speaking. I am not picking up on colloquial phrases used, or hearing them speak Spanish as an art, rather that the science that my friends and I are currently doing (luckily, at this point our lab has not blown up!). And that previous side note brings me to my final point, I simply do not think that I have found my voice in Spanish. There is so much to be said about intonation and emphasis in what you are saying that helps convey a thought. If I were to say the previous side note in a monotonous voice, you would not necessarily get that I was being sarcastic and referring to my comment about art.

Well, I guess that is where my Spanish is. I can only hope that my skills progress exponentially, because I only have 3.5 months left!

Illness and Medicine Abroad

So I have learned that being sick in a different country is very different than being sick back in the states. I mean, sure, we have the same ailments in both places, but the way that people approach the sickness is completely different.

Last Tuesday, I noticed that I had a bit of a soar throat but didn't really think much of it. Wednesday I had a little bit of a stuffy nose and noticed that cigarette smoke was agitating me a lot in a café, but still went about my business. Well, Thursday came around and I woke up with sinus pressure and was stuffed up. At this point I started taking notice of what seemed to be coming over me, but it was too late. Thursday night and Friday night were miserable as what seemed to be a refrio (a cold) turned into what seemed to be a sinus infection. At this point, I started mentioning to people that I was sick, and holy cow, I was inundated by things I needed to do in order to get better. As said by my grandma, "When people get the sniffles in Chile, they stay in bed!" and I am pretty sure she is right on this one. Everyone told me that I needed to stay in bed, drink lots of liquids, and sleep. To me this seemed ridiculous because the only reason you stay in bed in the states is when you are on the verge of death! On top of thinking bed rest for a cold was over the top, a sample of some of the other things I was told to do includes, "make fresh orange juice and drink it within 10 minutes before the vitamin C disappears," "drink a beer with lemon and salt and then stay in bed (I heard this one several times, and I want to know what the purpose is of wasting a beer on sleeping!), and, "Do not be around humidity and steam because it will stuff you up," (which is just flat out wrong!).

Well, today I went to the student health clinic at the university to get what I expected would be an antibiotic for a sinus infection because that is always what I get sick with during the winter (which means that I can expect it again when I come back to the states when it is winter!). Rather than seeing a nurse first to collect all of the pointless information about me like my weight and blood pressure, I was immediately seen my the doctor (that is to say I surpassed seeing a nurse before seeing a doctor, because I definitely waited for ever, I do not think chileans are familiar with a term to express immediacy [actually they express that by saying altiro, but it is used to mean right now most of the time], but they are definitely into the concept of tipin, meaning around a general time!). After a quick visit with the doctor, she prescribed me an antibiotic for sinusiti, a sinus infection, but she did not even check to see if I was taking any other medication that might interact!

Off I went, an hour and a half after arriving at the doctor, to a farmacia to fill my recete. Here in Chile, there is basically a farmacia on every corner, but of course, the day I needed one I had to walk forever. Once I finally found one, I went in, pulled a number like I was buying luncheon meats, and waited for just a few minutes before I was seen. I told the pharmacist what I needed, showed my prescriptions to him, and in under a minute he was back with what I requested. In the states you always have to wait for insurance to go through, the time to fill the prescription, blah, blah, blah. Here is was as easy as buy chocolate at a candy shop! After finalizing my purchase, he said to have a good day and gave my my prescriptions back. I'm thinking, "What?! Why did he give me my prescriptions back?" That makes absolutely no sense to me, now I can just go and fill the prescription again at my own leisure!

Definitely interesting to see the Chilean way of dealing with sickness, although I would have been okay with never knowing in the first place! As for the bed rest, I suspect this is a sociocultural thing, meaning that the Chileans that do this are the ones that can afford to, and they likely have a maid that will take care of their every beck and call (which I definitely did not have!). Careful though, do not tell any chileans that I am out of bed writing this blog or I will get yelled at!

Viña y Valpo

Over the past weekend, I traveled an hour and a half outside of Santiago to the coast to stay with an aunt named Sandra. She lives in a city called Viña del Mar, which means vineyard of the sea in English (it was given this name because of the fact that there were so many naturally growing vines of grapes in the area when the city was founded in the 19th century). The city has around half a million people and is located right next to Valparaíso (seen in the photo), an important port city that also has over half a million inhabitants. Combined, the two cities span for miles along the Chilean coastline, allowing for an incredible view of the ocean from the land, but also a picturesque shoreline or brilliantly colored buildings and homes. The cities consist of many different hills that intertwine and make for a great vantage point at nearly every location.

I had a great time and the trip was definitely very relaxing. I really enjoy just strolling around and taking in what is going on around me, especially when it is at the ocean! There is nothing like waking up in the morning, opening the window, breathing in, and experiencing the crisp morning air. Being on the coast definitely reminded me of being in Monterrey, California where my aunt lives, as it is one of my favorite places to be. One of the marked differences between Monterrey and Viña/ Valpo is that there are dog droppings everywhere (different than in Santiago where the same phenomena happens, but gets dealt with very quickly by, I imagine, the city employees that are responsible for keeping public areas tidy!), which adds an additional element of... excitement and surprise to one's journey. One of the highlights of the trip was going to La Sebastiana, one of the three homes of Nobel Prize winning poet Pablo Neruda. The home was very interesting, full of bizarre objects, relics of the author's past, and a rich history. In fact, I have written an essay for my literature class based on my experience at the house.

Apart from my trip, everything is going well for me. I am still well ahead of schedule in regards to all of my classwork, although I have yet to get anything back from my professors--so we have yet to know if they like the work I am producing! September is an active month here in Chile. Many people celebrate the change from winter to spring that takes place right around now, although, it has been pretty dang cold these past few days! On September 11, they mark the anniversary of when the presidential palace (La Moneda) was bombed and the coup took place ousting Salvador Allende, replacing him with Augusto Pinochet. On September 18, the nation stops to celebrate its independence day (really, the entire week consists of partying), and on the 19 the country recognizes the armed forces. The entire country celebrates with barbecues (asados) and chicha (hard cider) none stop. I am told that there is a national law mandating that everyone hang a Chilean flag in their home. After building up this holiday so much, I guess it sounds silly to say that I will be traveling to Colombia during this time for 9 days to visit a friend, ha.