Chileen in Chile

I cannot believe that we are already halfway through October. Halfway through October means more than three months into my time in Chile, and as of yesterday, only two months of our program remains. That may sound like a lot, but I only learned how to get discounts at the supermarket using my RUT (Chilean ID number) a couple of weeks ago! And after this past week, I just fell even more in love with my time in Chile and in South America more in general. This place is nestling into my heart quite comfortably. The week started with two tricky moments. Hey always better to get the bad news out of the way first. Last Tuesday I experienced what can only be called the Milk Explosion of 2017. During my internship (hey remember about that ole thing?) I was hanging out with a little three year old nugget whose name I will keep to myself because #HIPAA (I'm not a doctor, I'm not in the US, and I took no oaths before working at CONIN, but humor me). Anyway, for the first time since I sta...

Hello to all my favorite humans! First of all, I promise this every two week blogging schedule will not continue to be a pattern. Last week was midterms so there was a) not a whole lot to blog about and b) I was sick and tired of typing after my three papers. A side note here: if you are an educator that asks your students to type papers please please please do not have them use size 11 font and 1.15 spacing. It is a cruel and unusual punishment that I did not enjoy. The only possible upside is that I am now a self-proclaimed master on the Costanera Center and its relationship to mercantile cities, Santiago's international rebranding goals, and capitalism! As tedious as the writing process was, looking back on it now, I am really fascinated by the new construction happening in the eastern (wealthy) parts of the city, especially in the neighborhoods of Las Condes and Providencia, where not so coincidentally about half of the Jumbos in Chile reside. Due to a new all glass skyline t...

Hello hello hello!!! After my week long hiatus, I return with plenty of new stamps in my passport! Last Thursday, six of the Jumbos in Chile headed out for a week long journey to Peru. (Due to different schedule preferences and flight plans, the other portion of the group left on Sunday). Our fun adventure began in the Santiago airport when we realized that, when leaving Chile, you have to go through backward customs. How fun is that? Well not so fun when you don't have the PDI paper that word on the street is that you need to leave and then return to the country! But only 33.333333 (repeating)% of our group had said paper so the other 2/3 of us hedged our bets knowing there was absolutely nothing we could do at that point, accepting possible detainment. I rolled up to the PDI officer (kind of like the FBI of Chile but also still considered half of the chilean police force) a little nervous with all forms of documentation I could produce. He made a joke about my last name ( "...