To wrap up a week of anniversary celebrations the teachers went to a bar on Saturday night. In Santiago all the fellow volunteers told me about the wonders of Pisco Sours, a local drink I couldn't try for myself since I was on antibiotics. Finally two weeks ago I got around to trying a Pisco. Pisco is a grape brandy that is mixed with lemon juice, egg whites (Chileans find a way to slip eggs into EVERYTHING they eat or drink), and some other things to make the Pisco Sour. I wasn't crazy about it and found the drink a bit too bitter. However, returning to the same bar a few days later on this particular Saturday, one of the teachers convinced me to try a PisCola. Though the name doesn't sound to appetizing to a gringo like me, I have to say that pisco and Coke is delicious. I spent the evening practicing my Spanish, learning cuss words from the professors, and watching people sing karaoke to various Chilean songs.
I got to know a really interesting language teacher at the school. His father's family is directly related to Gregor Mendel (the pea plants genetics guy) and he has the same last name. His mother's last name is Tudoro, and he thinks he's related to the Tudor dynasty of England, through some illegitimate cousin or something. Though he doesn't have more than a few generation's worth of word of mouth, and isn't 100% certain of the claim. Either way, super awesome guy who made me feel like I was back in a college classroom when I spoke with him. He was amazed when he heard about my Polish background, and he kept going on about how crazy it was that both our relatives had to escape central Europe during WWII and had such similar roots, even though the 2 of us lived worlds apart. He ended up inviting me over to his house for a birthday part the next week (which was this past Friday).
So that's what I did this weekend. Went over to Jorge's house and got drunk with a couple of teachers in their 40s. We had another asado, this time much smaller, but complete with three types of meat, PisColas (mandatory), and even the edible center of a specific kind of palm tree. We discussed all sorts of topics, and as I fell further into the zone, my Spanish seemed to improve drastically, as I always seem to think it does when I drink. So I ranted left and right about the US: the Katrina disaster, new anti-immigration laws, and the state of public schools in general. It's crazy to see how much other cultures idealize our country and the prospect of the American Dream. When I casually mentioned how some schools don't have running water, or various gang issues in the communities, the other teachers straight up told me I was bullshitting them. They absolutely refused to believe a school in America could go for days or weeks with broken plumbing, so I started describing how some CPS schools look, and specifically the big brawl that led to the death of one high school student a year ago, that was caught on cell phone camera. We also compared the earthquake and tsunami that his Chile in January 2010 to Katrina in 2005, and the federal response of both governments. Of course, its not all bad.
I discussed plenty of the positive aspects of living in the US and the various social changes we've seen in the last few decades. Hearing stories about the Pinochet dictatorship of the 80s and the current no-bullshit-tolerated attitude of the police force reminded me how nice it is to have the 1st Amendment. Living in DC, I spent four years avoiding, complaining about, laughing at, and actively participating in dozens of protests of varying sizes in front of the Capitol and the White House. Seems that many of those activities would be unthinkable to stage in other parts of the world. So after drinking and politicking for a night, I spent the rest of the weekend bumming around at home. I've been catching up on play-offs, blogging, and sleeping. This week is Semana Santa and though its not as big as it is in Spain (check my FB albums of the huge parades and KKK-style wardrobes) we still get Friday off. So I'll be spending the weekend on the mainland in Puerto Mont, Chile as a guest at the family of my head English teacher, Mauro. My host family is going on vacation Tuesday, so I'll be staying with the vice-principal of the school for a night or two. Initially I felt like a little child when my host mom didn't want to leave me home alone, and instead found me a baby-sitter. But the truth is that this house is in the middle of nowhere. The outskirts of nowhere. And without a car, to arrive at work on time I'd have to leave at like 6 am to catch the two buses I need.
I'm also considering extending my time here, but that's for another post. (Also, be sure to check out the first half of this two-part blog below.)
-Paul
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Aniversario de Darwin
Haven't blogged in a while, so this one's gonna be a two-parter. My facebook album pictures are explained here, the rest of what I've been up to is up above. Last week the school celebrated its 11th anniversary. Though schools here don't do homecoming, pretty much every school celebrates its anniversary instead. Just so happens that Colegio de Charles Darwin has its festivities in the fall (with the whole southern hemisphere thing, we're in fall now bracing for winter), around the same time we would have our homecoming. This year's activities were circus-themed. Here are pics and an explanation of what went down:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?fbid=894348271784&id=5321418&aid=2419785&l=e56efea87d
The entire school split into two halves, one representing the Circo Chileno (tradition Barnum and Bailey type with bright colors and clowns) and the other repping Circo Europeo (more mimes, elegance, Cirque du Soleil-esque). Wednesday and Thursday afternoon kids participated in various activities held in the gym and outside. Everyone, including some of us teachers, dressed up in costumes and face paint and played various games. The kids introduced their equivalent of the homecoming court, made designs out of shoestrings, and mashed grapes with their feet, then drank their nasty foot juice. Games included musical chairs, jenga, karaoke contests, and a game in which people sat under an inflating balloon while answering trivia questions. Once your question was answered, the next person took your spot under the balloon, until it eventually popped and spilled some orange gunk all over you. But my favorite games by far were the ones in which kids had to eat and drink nasty concoctions. The younger students drank raw eggs, vinegar, and shoved their faces into plates of flour. The older kids chugged a 1 liter bottle of sparkling water, drank tomato juice mixed with all sorts of stuff, and ate a full onion covered in aji (a hot spice) and manjar (best described as something like peanut butter, though the two are quite different). Though one of the kids puked after chugging the water bottle, I was still disappointed by the lack of ralphing. As one of the students chowed down on the onion, I kept making gagging noises behind him, to no avail. Clearly I'm a positive influence in the lives of these kids.
On Fridays we have half days. So in the morning both teams choreographed and performed a dance and a team chant. We then decorated parents' cars and drove into the center of town, rolling 12 cars deep in our caravan. In the evening we came back to the school for a few more activities. The student council prepared a slide show for the parents recapping the week, and then the parents played a karaoke game to win points for their kids' teams. As as aside, let me just say that the entire week was planned by the student council (a whopping four students, including my host sister) with no help from the teachers. The school tries to teach the kids to be autonomous, and its incredible that everything ran so smoothly without help from the staff. The older students on each team took command and guided the little ones through everything. It was pretty sweet to see.
Finally, after announcing the winning team--the Chilean Circus, my team, naturally--the students in 7th to 12th grades had a dance. Since the school is so small, the dance ended fairly early. It only went until 1am. Yup, in Chile everything goes mad late, and everyone has assured me that its normal for school dances to go until 5 or 6am. That means that people my age go out around 10 or 11, party at the bars until 5 or so, and then hit the after-hours joints until noon if they really wanna. I guess you can afford to do things like that when your entire culture doesn't revolve around binge drinking. I've tried explaining to people how hard it is to stay up past 3 when you're busy chasing keg stands with Jager bombs. And my love-hate relationship with America continues...
Before the night-time activities, I went with a few teachers to eat down at the port. There you can find plenty of palafitos, houses standing on wooden logs inside the water. Since the entire week was unusually sunny and warm, the views outside the windows were as beautiful as the seafood was delicious. Speaking of food, after the dance I went with the family to an asado that ran until about 3 am. Asados, like very big barbecues, are are very popular here. In fact, I ended up at an asado my very first night here in Castro. Basically, giant chunks of meat (pork, lamb, beef, anything that moves on the island basically) are slowly roasted and heavily salted. Then these meats are oftentimes passed around on large trays and shared communally. Eventually everyone gets their own plates and fills them with the meats and salads. Of course, various booze are plentiful. The biggest difference between our own cookouts and the asados here in Chiloe is that weather is never a factor. Since half the year can be filled with week-long downpours, people see asados as a way to stay warm and well-fed during the shitty wet weather, as opposed to specifically seeking out sunny summer days to grill. To read about other times I got drunk and ate delicious meats, check part two (above this post).
-Pablo
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?fbid=894348271784&id=5321418&aid=2419785&l=e56efea87d
The entire school split into two halves, one representing the Circo Chileno (tradition Barnum and Bailey type with bright colors and clowns) and the other repping Circo Europeo (more mimes, elegance, Cirque du Soleil-esque). Wednesday and Thursday afternoon kids participated in various activities held in the gym and outside. Everyone, including some of us teachers, dressed up in costumes and face paint and played various games. The kids introduced their equivalent of the homecoming court, made designs out of shoestrings, and mashed grapes with their feet, then drank their nasty foot juice. Games included musical chairs, jenga, karaoke contests, and a game in which people sat under an inflating balloon while answering trivia questions. Once your question was answered, the next person took your spot under the balloon, until it eventually popped and spilled some orange gunk all over you. But my favorite games by far were the ones in which kids had to eat and drink nasty concoctions. The younger students drank raw eggs, vinegar, and shoved their faces into plates of flour. The older kids chugged a 1 liter bottle of sparkling water, drank tomato juice mixed with all sorts of stuff, and ate a full onion covered in aji (a hot spice) and manjar (best described as something like peanut butter, though the two are quite different). Though one of the kids puked after chugging the water bottle, I was still disappointed by the lack of ralphing. As one of the students chowed down on the onion, I kept making gagging noises behind him, to no avail. Clearly I'm a positive influence in the lives of these kids.
On Fridays we have half days. So in the morning both teams choreographed and performed a dance and a team chant. We then decorated parents' cars and drove into the center of town, rolling 12 cars deep in our caravan. In the evening we came back to the school for a few more activities. The student council prepared a slide show for the parents recapping the week, and then the parents played a karaoke game to win points for their kids' teams. As as aside, let me just say that the entire week was planned by the student council (a whopping four students, including my host sister) with no help from the teachers. The school tries to teach the kids to be autonomous, and its incredible that everything ran so smoothly without help from the staff. The older students on each team took command and guided the little ones through everything. It was pretty sweet to see.
Finally, after announcing the winning team--the Chilean Circus, my team, naturally--the students in 7th to 12th grades had a dance. Since the school is so small, the dance ended fairly early. It only went until 1am. Yup, in Chile everything goes mad late, and everyone has assured me that its normal for school dances to go until 5 or 6am. That means that people my age go out around 10 or 11, party at the bars until 5 or so, and then hit the after-hours joints until noon if they really wanna. I guess you can afford to do things like that when your entire culture doesn't revolve around binge drinking. I've tried explaining to people how hard it is to stay up past 3 when you're busy chasing keg stands with Jager bombs. And my love-hate relationship with America continues...
Before the night-time activities, I went with a few teachers to eat down at the port. There you can find plenty of palafitos, houses standing on wooden logs inside the water. Since the entire week was unusually sunny and warm, the views outside the windows were as beautiful as the seafood was delicious. Speaking of food, after the dance I went with the family to an asado that ran until about 3 am. Asados, like very big barbecues, are are very popular here. In fact, I ended up at an asado my very first night here in Castro. Basically, giant chunks of meat (pork, lamb, beef, anything that moves on the island basically) are slowly roasted and heavily salted. Then these meats are oftentimes passed around on large trays and shared communally. Eventually everyone gets their own plates and fills them with the meats and salads. Of course, various booze are plentiful. The biggest difference between our own cookouts and the asados here in Chiloe is that weather is never a factor. Since half the year can be filled with week-long downpours, people see asados as a way to stay warm and well-fed during the shitty wet weather, as opposed to specifically seeking out sunny summer days to grill. To read about other times I got drunk and ate delicious meats, check part two (above this post).
-Pablo
Saturday, April 2, 2011
One Week in Chiloe
Yesterday marked exactly one week living with the new family. This week of work went smooth, but I didn't have to actually do anything, I just shadowed the two English teachers in their classrooms. Monday I will actually start leading short exercises in the classroom, and that will quickly lead to me taking half the class aside to work independent of the head teacher. Yesterday the principal showed me my new room, and it is baller. It's a new addition that, due to bureaucratic red tape and local regulations, can't be used yet as a permanent classroom. But I guess it's cool for me to use several hours a week. Plan is to have kids decorate the walls with flags of English speaking countries, their own projects, and I'll try to print out some big name Chicagoans (Oprah or MJ maybe?) and turn it into an ''English-Only'' classroom. We'll see how well that goes in a few weeks; for now I just have to come up with some short speaking and listening activities for the kiddies.
Thursday was an unusally sunny day that was actually fairly rain-free. The island and the views from the school are just absolutely gorgeous. I tried to enjoy the rare sunny weather and walked around town after school. I checked out the old Jesuit all-wooden church in the town square, chilled out down by the bay (everything here is built on rolling hills, so getting from the water to city center requires hiking up San Fransisco-like winding roads), and visited the open air market where locals sell wooden carved trinkets and wool-knit goodies. Also on Thursday, before school I met a fellow American. The mother of one of the students is a New Yorker who married a Chilean, and eventually settled down here in Chiloe. She was super nice and gave me her number in case I ever want to vent about life abroad or simply speak English to a native speaker. Additionally, there was a meeting for the English Opens Doors program on Tuesday at which I met Tyler, another volunteer who came here in the summer, did 6 months and returned home for a bit. Now he's back working until July. The fact that this is the third American who has either stayed in, or returned to, this rainy region of Chile is a bit comforting to me.
I'm finally finishing up the online course I should have done a month ago to be TEFL certified (qualified to Teach English as a Foreign Language), but since its not a requirement for the program my delayed response means nothing more than a slight inconvenience while living abroad. But of course now that this is done, I just found out there is another online course, this one provided through the Minestry of Education and the EOD program) that will help me get an internationally recognized certificate declaring my level of proficiency (or there lack of) in Spanish. So hopefully that'll help with eventual grad school apps and real-world jobs. Today the family is taking me to another one of the local markets full of artisan goodies. That, and we'll be buying fish for lunch. Everything here is either home-made or locally grown. Jams, cheeses, meats, etc. Yesterday for example, the vice-principal of the school gave me a ride home. First we stopped by his house (more beautifully scenic views from the living room) and he offered me home-made jams and spicy spreads. I asked him how people can live in such terribly rainy weather (apparently there is a tourism office here that offeres full refunds if it doesn't rain during your stay here), and he responded, ''by eating a lot.'' To drive home that point, we ate several sandwiches and crackers with cheese, at which point I was finally ready to come home for lunch. Ha, I can get used to this kind of living.
-Pablo
Thursday was an unusally sunny day that was actually fairly rain-free. The island and the views from the school are just absolutely gorgeous. I tried to enjoy the rare sunny weather and walked around town after school. I checked out the old Jesuit all-wooden church in the town square, chilled out down by the bay (everything here is built on rolling hills, so getting from the water to city center requires hiking up San Fransisco-like winding roads), and visited the open air market where locals sell wooden carved trinkets and wool-knit goodies. Also on Thursday, before school I met a fellow American. The mother of one of the students is a New Yorker who married a Chilean, and eventually settled down here in Chiloe. She was super nice and gave me her number in case I ever want to vent about life abroad or simply speak English to a native speaker. Additionally, there was a meeting for the English Opens Doors program on Tuesday at which I met Tyler, another volunteer who came here in the summer, did 6 months and returned home for a bit. Now he's back working until July. The fact that this is the third American who has either stayed in, or returned to, this rainy region of Chile is a bit comforting to me.
I'm finally finishing up the online course I should have done a month ago to be TEFL certified (qualified to Teach English as a Foreign Language), but since its not a requirement for the program my delayed response means nothing more than a slight inconvenience while living abroad. But of course now that this is done, I just found out there is another online course, this one provided through the Minestry of Education and the EOD program) that will help me get an internationally recognized certificate declaring my level of proficiency (or there lack of) in Spanish. So hopefully that'll help with eventual grad school apps and real-world jobs. Today the family is taking me to another one of the local markets full of artisan goodies. That, and we'll be buying fish for lunch. Everything here is either home-made or locally grown. Jams, cheeses, meats, etc. Yesterday for example, the vice-principal of the school gave me a ride home. First we stopped by his house (more beautifully scenic views from the living room) and he offered me home-made jams and spicy spreads. I asked him how people can live in such terribly rainy weather (apparently there is a tourism office here that offeres full refunds if it doesn't rain during your stay here), and he responded, ''by eating a lot.'' To drive home that point, we ate several sandwiches and crackers with cheese, at which point I was finally ready to come home for lunch. Ha, I can get used to this kind of living.
-Pablo
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