Anecdote About Men

I know being blonde and over 5'6" in South America can cause quite a stir, people automatically think you're looking for some Latin love. Men, women and children stare at you like you're an alien. Strangers approach you with their camera phones and without any hesitation or permission take a picture of your face. "Rubia" "Que Heromosa!" "hermoso cuerpo" and  "Rica" are some of the first spanish words/phrases I learned because they were being constantly whispered or shout from rooftops and moving cars, also the sound of a dramatic kiss smack will forever haunt me. 

All this was very hard to handle the first couple of months. I was shocked, apparently Kansas breeds the most gentlemen-like men or almost every woman in Kansas has blonde hair and blue eyes so I am boring to them and they never hollered at me, but this was intense. The most intense interaction came one Saturday afternoon at the corner grocery store.

I walked in wearing a t-shirt and jeans and right away the security guard at the front door exclaimed "BEAUTY!" (in English) I smiled nervously and walked quickly past him. Trying not to make eye contact with everyone who turned around to see the "beauty" I darted down the aisles grabbing random supplies and headed straight for the wine rack. As I am loading my cart up with wine I catch a figure in the corner of my eye, standing staring, I blink and the figure comes closer..and closer until it's standing right behind me.
"Hello beautiful German, I speak English" 
I turn around to see the old man(being mistaken for a German girl happens quite often).
"Hello" I say and walk to the check out line.
He stands next to me in silence for a few moments, then starts asking me questions about Germany, I am a little caught off guard, I couldn't even think of a city I could say I was from so I said "actually I am from the United States"
He goes on to tell me how he has never seen such a beautiful woman, I politely say "Thank you" through gridded teeth. I am desperately looking around the store to see if there is someone who can help, or maybe I could catch some homeless man stealing some beer and point the guard in that direction..not today. Luckily after a few moments of awkward doting he is summoned to the cash register. 

Behind me are two men probably no more than 20 yrs old with 45 bags of rice. One boy starts speaking to me in Spanish, I just stare at him, then he repeats in English "Can I practice English with you" "Of course!" I say a little too excited because this will prevent the old man from coming up to me again. We spoke for 15 minutes, a very sweet curious kid, he asked me all about my time in Chile we laughed about the Chilenismos I knew (when people ask me "how is your Spanish" I always say "not very good, but I love Chilenismos!" then I go on and tell them all the phrases I know and it ALWAYS results in laughter and appreciation and they no longer care that I can't handle a full conversation in Spanish). As I am getting ready to pay, this kid leans in and says "you have really cute eyes, I have never seen green eyes before" I blush and turn to the cashier to pay and all the sudden the old man is at my side, 4 inches from my face, he lowers his voice and says "I would kill for you!" I stare at him not quite sure if I heard that correctly, "what?", he answers loudly "I WOULD KILL FOR YOU!"..."ok, thank you" and I take off, practically sprinting out of the store. 


I have been back to the store with equally as creepy interactions with this man. He once followed me around for a whole minute singing to my back as I ignored him and as the rest of the staff openly laughed at the situation. He has asked me if he could walk me home to make sure other men won't talk to me and he simply ignores me when I point to my wedding ring and say "yo tengo un esposo!" Andrew really needs to start doing the shopping around here.

Update

Well we have reached a point in our journey where we finally feel at home. Nothing seems too strange or out of the ordinary to write about so our blog has been stagnant for months! So an update until we can figure out something more interesting to write…

My class that started in August has recently ended and I started a new program with the largest broadcasting station in the Country. My new students are cool, one can communicate with the dead so the conversations are never boring. This group is a little older than me which is always intimidating. I told them that I do not speak Spanish, but the first day they were asking me to translate certain vocabulary from Spanish to English and I was able to, so now a few students think I can speak Spanish and have stopped trying in English, jokes on them!-Andrew and I will collaborate on an English Teaching Post at a later date.

We booked our HUGE trip for almost the entire month of August. We will go to Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. We are super excited and I am practicing my Spanish more than ever because we hear that those three countries are easier to understand than Chileans. Then we will head home to Kansas and see what’s in store after that.

Andrew is my hero. What an awesome year for us. I can’t wait to start our next adventure.

Street Vendors/Performers

The streets are their workplace.  I imagine this can be good and bad.  No cubicle, plenty of sunshine.  But also pigeons and drunk people at night (and during the day if you are in the western half of the city).  They have little protection from the elements and deal exclusively in cash.  Their best marketing campaign involves rapidly shouting the name of their product over and over again.  I secretly suspect that some of these people are actually making a killing and just keep their operations humble to avoid getting robbed.  Street vendors/performers sell everything from songs to empanadas and everything in between.  But whatever they are slinging, they all have a story to tell.

When we first started noticing that many of the vendors operated out of shopping carts we thought it was odd.  Why not put down roots, get something more permanent, like say a nice aluminum hut?  It’s not called “Pizza Cart” after all.  However, we realized the basic advantage of mobility when one day, while walking out of the subway, we heard an urgent cry of “Pacos!!!” and saw all the street vendors quickly grab their wares and scurry away from 2 policeman coming down the street, certainly ready to issue several tickets to unlicensed vendors (which I would guesstimate is around 99.9999% of all street vendors).  There was a distinct difference in the speed with which the various vendors fled.  The quickest to respond were those whose products were efficiently integrated into their sales platforms – think earrings hooked into an old afghan that you can easily grab and run away with.  Operations encumbered by excessive infrastructure, say an array of old buckets holding socks, bras, hose and sundry other undergarments for sale, will not be able to respond quickly enough to changes in the market place (i.e. an actual market place).  In this fast-paced world of street vending the bottom line is can you meet your customer base where they are, and after meeting your customer base where they are can you flee from the cops if necessary?  If you are working in an old, rusted-out Wal-Mart cart, the answer is yes.  In contrast to the United States where the only real demand for old shopping carts is among teenagers looking to reenact Jackass stunts and dried up creek beds that haven’t quite achieved that depressing look they are striving for, Chilean street vendors see these gems’ real potential.

This stuff is called anticucho and it is DELICIOUS.  And much like many fast-food treats it’s tastiness is multiplied by a power of 10 when you are drunk!  On a side note, that is the incredibly basic and incredibly true idea behind the celebrations of Chile’s independence day, and pretty much any other barbecue here – alcohol plus excessive amounts and varieties of meats equals pleasure.  Anticucho as a dish is not trying to reinvent the wheel – just some pork skewered and grilled over an open flame.  You can see in the picture a common variety of the shopping cart store front, the shopping cart with half a grill laid across it – it takes the concept of “watch your food get cooked in front of you”, first pioneered by Mongolian Grill, to a whole new level.

It is very common for street performers to jump onto crowded city buses and perform their craft for a few stops.  It’s a captive audience and they milk it by walking around the bus after their performance and asking everyone for money.  A little less subtle than the open guitar case. 

This guy was very interesting.  His was by far the most basic, and in some ways the most impressive street vendor/performer set up.  Like the other bus-hoppers mentioned above, he just jumped on the bus and started performing his craft.  Only, with this guy there was no instrument, JUST FREE STYLE RAPPING!  He came on and bid everyone a good afternoon, addressing everyone on the bus with the authoritarian air all street performers must adopt, and then proceeded to ask the people nearest him for any words they could think of.  He then took the words he was given and formed them into a free style rap that was actually pretty darn creative.  Needless to say I decided to reward his creativity by giving some serious moolah, 100 pesos - USD value 25 cents.

This vendor also had a product that was both simple and ingenious.  He just took a llama to one of the popular tourist spots and charged people to sit on its back while their friends took pictures.  The women in the background were haggling over prices while our friend Ryan got his turn on the llama.  Great pic. 

The fire juggler – my personal favorite.  Many street performers choose busy intersections for their venues.  They wait for a red light and then run out and do their thing until the light turns yellow.  Then they quickly walk between the lanes of cars looking for people to roll down their windows and give a few coins before they speed on through the intersection.

This guy played a very convincing cover of “Touch Me” by The Doors at our local street market.  Music from the US is hugely popular here.

"What's up?" - "Nothing, just playing this huge harp in the metro."

Apparently the metro is a great place to perform as these guys regularly play outside our metro stop.

Wherever there are people gathered, be it the metro, a market, or a stop light, there will be street performers trying to entertain them and street vendors trying to feed them.  They are on the margins of society - receiving minimal pay and no benefits, having no office or formal job title, and certainly paying no taxes - and yet they are also everywhere, filling the cracks of our collective daily routines, providing some entertainment, or a snack, along the way of our ceaseless journey from place to place.
~Andrew

The Peace Crane

To start, Patagonia was unbelievable, there will be plenty of blog posts about our journey through the “w” of Torres Del Paine, but I wanted to begin with our odyssey, out epic trip to the Penguin Island, and I may not even get to the penguins…

First off I was completely thrilled that we even were able to go to Isla Magdalena that I forgot how sea sick I get on tiny boats. I boarded anyway and we took off. Here is a picture of the inside of the boat.

inside the boat

You may not be able to see but there is a little door on the ceiling on the front  of the boat, half way to the island (across the Magellan Straight!!) they open the door up and you can stick your head, or half your body, out if you want to feel the ocean breeze and check out the waves. There was a group of Japanese tourists, who were sitting near the door so they were able to try it out first. After fifteen minutes I really wanted to do it so I asked the German couple in front of me if they were going, they said no. I stood up to make the wobbled journey to the front when two Japanese tourists jumped back up the hole. Literally two seconds after I sat back down a huge wave came over the boat and completely drenched the two.

When I say “drench” I am mean it in its purest definition form, head to toe, sopping wet, so wet that when you walk around your shoes squeeze out water and it makes that funny squishy sound. Everyone in the boat gasped everyone but me who could not stop laughing. I know it’s horrible; I tried to silence myself by putting my head in Andrew’s armpit and trying to breathe. It was like being on a water ride, one where you go through a waterfall. It looked like the water came down in a solid form the shape of the door. After I calmed down I felt really bad about how hard and how long I laughed. I don’t know if you know this but being that close to Antarctica makes the climate very cold. They were going to have to walk around a freezing windy island completely soaked. So I decided to make up for my laughing and show that I am not the worst human being ever by giving the girl (the guy was too big) my fleece I had on under my rain coat which she happily accepted.

So we landed on the island and walked around to see some Penguins:

 

Windy and sunny

On the way back we circled around another island full of Sea Lions, I got up to check them out but the boat was rocking so bad I knew I was going to be sick, I just sat down and focused on the horizon. I started to hear some disturbing things like “do you have a bag”, “GET ME THE BAG! GET ME THE BAG!!”. One girl behind me and one girl to my right simultaneously started to throw up. I covered my ears and kept looking at the horizon, my mouth started to dry up, but I was able to hold everything back, but I was unable to see the Sea Lions. A few minutes later Andrew emerged from the back deck and said everyone out there had been throwing up, it was an awful 45 minutes back to Punta Arenas.

Only shot I took, and the only good look I got, which is sad because I love Sea Lions

Once we reached dry land the young Japanese girl came up to me with my jacket and couldn’t stop Thanking me, she kept bowing and saying “arigato” I kept saying “you’re welcome” (she spoke English) and she kept saying “arigato” this went on for a few seconds, which was a neat experience in of itself. We had to take a bus back to the tour agency and when we arrived she came back up to me and handed me a little origami crane and said one last “arigato”. We spoke to her for a few minutes, she was currently on a 3 month cruise aboard a ship named “Peace Boat”, we had seen this in the Bay and were curious, did they donate the proceeds to Peace organizations or was it just a huge advertisement for Peace, when we asked her why it was called the “Peace Boat” she responded “because we like Peace”. It was so sweet, I decided to name my origami The Peace Crane. 

Peace Crane

Guatita llena, corazón contento

A full stomach makes for a content heart

One great experience of living abroad is the food, unfortunately Chile's cuisine is not my favorite. I do not prefer hot dogs with a mountain of Mayo, or sliced pork(with mayo), or mayo which I am pretty sure is a main course here. If I don't see Mayonnaise , or vanilla pudding, anything that resembles mayo, for the rest of my life I will be very very happy.
Despite the Mayo there are some interesting things we have fallen in love with, EMPANADAS! Ceviche and all the fresh fish and produce! My cooking skills have reached an ultimate high and I have achieved an iron stomach. Andrew and my favorite meal is served out of a shopping cart on a bridge over a dirty river, and we haven't died yet!

La Vega, 3 blocks of produce

 During our trip to the South we had a lot success with great food. After almost getting eaten alive on our horrible hike we went to La Olla in Puerto Varas and had a fabulous dinner

Salmon topped with Shrimp in a Cognac-cream sauce+ "risotto"

This was so much fun to eat and try out all the different little sea creatures

Fresh Salmon about to be turned in to tartare

homemade tartare

Ceviche was a very weird concept to accept, fish cooked in Lemon juice...might as well try to make it

Brewing some Ceviche

looks like brains, tastes like heaven

our New Year's dinner: SUSHI

Best Empanadas: seafood in Chiloe, I want to cry thinking about them

Had to talk Andrew out of getting this every night from a street vender, so good, yet sooo greasy. Cheese Empanada, sopapilla and fench fries

Lomito Italiano. Pork, Avacado, Mayo and Tomato(same colors as the Italian Flag, hence Italiano)

Carne a la pobre, the only dish with meat I will eat down here. French Fries topped with a flat greasy steak, onions and fried eggs, great hang over food

Simple yet delicious: cazuela, chicken, green beans,rice,corn,pumpkin in broth, so good

Pastel de Choclo, Andrew likes this...a corn casserole

The Vegetarian: apparently tuna is considered a vegetable   

CEVICHE, CEVICHE, CEVICHE!!!-we heard her call and knew she was an angel

Shopping cart heaven

words can not explain how gooooooooooooood this is!

they love their juice here, and we do too

Tony is trying out for the Blue Man Group

can I offer you a 3L bottle of Coke?

There will probably be another post dedicated to food so stay tuned.

Man-Eating-Killer-Flies and the Lake District

We are so lucky to have friends come visit. It is something I didn't think I needed, but now that they have come I feel more connected to back home, and very proud of where I live now. The week was exhausting, nonstop sightseeing, lots of walking and sharing small spaces with three men proved trying at times, but I survived. What I almost didn't survive were the man-eating flies and gruesome hike that I will forever hold over Andrew’s head for forcing us to take.

 We took a road trip to the Lake District of Chile to stay at Puerto Varas on the 3^rd largest Lake in South America(Llanquihue)…according to Andrew. We stayed across the lake from Volcano Osorno and had the most unbelievable sunset ever which took all our breaths away.

On the Volcanic Sand Shore of Lago Llanguihue, watching the sun set on Volcan Osorno

The next day we woke up early and drove up the Volcano and through a Rain Forrest to the Vincente Perez Rosales National Park. At the trail head we started noticing these really annoying bugs, they were flies the size of nickels. They would land and you would feel a pinch, like getting a shot, sharp and quick but enough pain to make you flinch. Didn’t think too much of these at first so we started our journey. It was supposed to me a 6 hour hike to Lake Todos Los Santos which was on Andrew’s bucket list and he really lobbied for us to take this hike with him. The trail like most trails here was very steep, rocky, arid yet beautiful. Add the killer flies and you are just asking for a complete meltdown from me.

Rain forest drive, little Kia did great!

We catch site of the Lake about 2 hours in (lunchtime) and it is truly amazing. We were hungry, thirsty and tired and we still had about 2 more hours straight down to the lake. We look down at our water bottles and realize we had about 1 cup left each, we stopped for lunch and couldn’t find any way to eat with deadly flies swarming, surrounding us. We would stop and about 20 would start landing on you, I am serious at least 20, and if you killed one, five more would show up. Joe Sebes killed about 100 that day. We couldn’t eat lunch, it was seriously impossible. I am just standing there on the side of this mountain looking down to see how far we have left, looking up to see how difficult it will be to climb back up, with no water, no lunch, the sun getting hotter I just broke down. I wanted to go back alone and sit in the car, I knew I could not go on. After arguing with Andrew in front of company for several minutes, we compromised (I won) we would all head back and drive down to the lake.

Acting civil, a moments peace from all the flies, overlooking a stunning vista

The way back was the most horrible experience of my life (shows how great my life has been so far). I kept getting bit on my right shoulder over and over again, the sun was so hot I could feel my skin getting tighter. My legs were giving out because it was basically sand dunes, I tried crying but I was so dehydrated I couldn’t produce tears, I had stopped sweating, I started to give up. I seriously considered just laying down and making them call a helicopter to save me, and all of the sudden we heard water. One sip and it felt like I could lift a car over my head. We got back to the car and made our way down to the lake stopping at  Los Saltos Del Petrohué, which was amazing. And finished the day having an incredible seafood meal in Puerto Varas, sharing a bottle wine and great company.

Andrew loves taking pictures of me in action, Lake Todos Los Santos

 Los Saltos Del Petrohué

Here are some pictures of the rest of our Southern Exposure before our Camera died in Chiloé:

Chiloé from the ferry

Something we thought was hilarious about Chiloé: we were searching and speculating where the Ferry took off and how to get on it, the maps made it seem that all the sudden the highway hit the ocean and you fly on to a Ferry...That is literally what happened, we turned a corner and all of the sudden people were ushering our car on board, and it almost immediately departed.

Joe Sebes in Chiloé pointing out the no accent mark

weird, weird church. There are 16 in one city

hands down best empanadas yet! sea food...so amazing, tasted somewhat Indian, soo good.

Last shot before the camera died :( 

Hard to imagine Andrew and I will going even further south in less than a month, and seeing possibly more beautiful site than this..I can not wait.