Well, as has become my custom, I guess I will start by apologizing for the delay between my posts. And as is your custom, you will probably not notice.
Either way, this time at least I had a pretty good excuse in that I was 1) out of town, and 2) entertaining my first (and more than likely only) houseguest down here in Santiago. That’s right; it is in fact possible to visit good ol’ Santiago. Not easy. Or cheap... But possible nonetheless.
Right now, I am sitting here in my room after a long day in which the most activity I had was dragging myself upstairs to watch Chile get pasted by Brazil in the Copa América –
Side note: even if you are not into soccer, I would definitely recommend finding a way to watch a game with some die-hard fans rooting for opposing teams. I had that opportunity today when I got to watch the game with Francisco and his friend Fernando (Chile) as well as Heloísa and Juliana (Brazil). Aside from being incredibly animated and entertaining, it is a wonderful way to learn how to say all the bad words that were so conspicuously absent from your high school Spanish lesson plans.
– so as I said, here I am, in my room, listening to Mozart (not because I am high-brow or cultured, but because my playlist is on random, and I find it too soothing and apropos for a period of quiet introspection to change the track) while I reflect on the week, life, and a host of other metaphysical phenomena... But mainly, just the week and life.
Before going into a description of last week, I definitely need to send a huge shout-out to Lindsey for coming down and reminding me for a week what an amazing group of friends I have and what an amazing life we lead back in the US. So thank you Lindsey. Hope you had as much fun as I did.
With that realization in mind, I also want to take the time to once again thank any and all of you who are reading this blog (all 4 of you). I am not sure what everyone back home thinks of the life that I am living here, but one thing is for certain: in spite of all amazing places I see, the interesting people I meet, the incredible experiences I have while I am down here in Chile, I don’t ever want any of you to think that I don’t miss you. So, in case you didn’t catch it, here it is again: I miss you. All of you. Whether I stay abroad for just a couple more months or for the rest of my life, know that there isn’t a day that goes by when I don’t take the time to appreciate the unique contribution that all of you have made in my life.
...And if you are just some rando whom I have never met and are reading this, I bet you’re pretty special too.
Okay, enough boring sappy stuff. Here is the week in a nutshell:
Thursday:
The night before Lindsey came. Got back from class. Tried to clean my room. Got distracted by music and tequila shots taking place in the kitchen. Socialized with roommates until about 4AM.
Friday:
Wake up at around 5:45AM to pick Lindsey up from the airport. Once in, we took a little catnap to recharge and then made our way around the city. We braved the stormy weather, and in spite of the rain, we still managed to stop at Cerro Santa Lucia, Museo Casa Colorada (which was basically a 6th grade diorama fair), Plaza de Armas, Palacio La Moneda, and culminate our excursion with a very late lunch at Como Agua Para Chocolate.
Depending on whom you ask (i.e. the Duoc Coordinator), Lindsey and I got "held up" (which was more of an embellishment than a lie), so I was unable to make it to my classes for the evening. Instead, Linds and I went back to rent, fittingly, “Como Agua Para Chocolate.”
After hanging our soaking clothes to dry, we then headed over to Amanda’s, where we spent the rest of the night stuffing our faces with home-made lasagna cooked by a “real live mom.” Dinner also came with copious amounts of awesome wine and awesomer cookies, and we went home fat, happy, and a little sloppy. We get home at around midnight, and after briefly socializing with the perennial party that always seems to be raging in the kitchen right when I want to go to sleep, we threw some stuff in our bags for our trip to Buenos Aires and tried to get some much-needed shut-eye (tried being the operative word). Fortunately, “Como Agua Para Chocolate” bored Lindsey to sleep in spite of the noise, and I followed her shortly thereafter at around 2AM.
Saturday:
Another early morning. This time, we are up at 3:30AM in order to make it on time for our 6AM flight. Apparently all the moving and shaking interrupted the settling and digesting, so when we got on the plane, the tint of Lindsey’s complexion matched up nicely with an under-ripe banana, and a few airplane shuffle-step acrobatics over the sleeping businessman on the aisle liberated Linds to liberate her libation.
Once in BsAs, we again plugged in for a juice booster, but managed start the show by about midday. I played my best tour-guide role as I recited what I remembered from the guide book I used on my last visit. For some reason, I was very pigeon-picture-happy, primarily because I didn’t want any repeat photos from my last visit. So if you notice an influx of flying rats in my album, I apologize.
We stopped into a great café for lunch, wandered around a few parks as well as a
pedestrian mall, and in general just walked as far as our little legs would take us. After lapping back to the hotel, we made our way out to the night hotspots for the night. Unfortunately, because there was an mayorial election scheduled for Sunday, all the bars were pretty dead. They stopped serving alcohol at midnight, presumably to promote better decision-making on the day of the election. Something about having a responsible electorate seemed pretty foreign to me... After all, I am from the U.S.In light of the fact that the night was DOA, we went back to the hotel for yet another failed attempt by Lindsey to finish the movie.
Sunday:
Trying to make the most of the day, Linds and I got up (again) before our bodies were ready. After a quick bite in the hotel, we wandered over to the Recoleta to stumble over the entombed corpses of people far more important than either of us ever will be. After a bite in another café, we made it back to the hotel to start a city bus tour. Having already been to the final couple stops, we bailed about halfway through and walked up Calle Defensa through the San Telmo artisan fair. A beautiful Argentine leather saleswoman made small talk with Lindsey about her friends from UGA when Lindsey went to try on some boots. It didn’t help her make the sale, but I found her “like, you know’s” to be pretty entertaining.
A quick stop by the famous Cafe Tortoni and a detour to buy some alfajores left us back in the hotel sipping on maté and watching bad American movies in the early evening. Blood saturated with whatever chemical infusion that maté contains, we summoned enough energy and appetite to take down the best steak of my life. At a sort of below the tourist radar restaurant called “El Establo” (The Stable) we got an absolutely stunning butterfly filet that they cut in half with a spoon to show us the velvet red interior patiently waiting to bring us pleasure. After lending brief consideration to the idea of simply hoarding the pieces of meat in my cheeks so that the experience wouldn’t have to come to an end, social norms and general rules of propriety won out, and I let my stomach have some fun with what my mouth had so thoroughly enjoyed. Pat and Becca, some friends from Atlanta who were also in Buenos Aires for a bat mitzfah, met up with us at the restaurant, and after dinner we headed back out to another hot night spot to see if we couldn’t bump some hips and butts with some porteños. Unfortunately, the strenuous day of choosing someone else to run the city’s corrupt government left most of the locals too tired or disinterested to go out, so the four of us chased down some Fernet-cola with watered-down beer and called it a night.
...And because local time is now about 5:30AM, I too will call it a night. Stay tuned for more adventures in wonderland (aka Buenos Aires).
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