So much for Roll out the Red Carpet

Let's see this last weekend was spent at home. Sometimes you need a relaxing weekend en la casa. Friday night we had a dinner party. We sat down for dinner at 11:30, and cleared the table around 12:30-1:00am. Then we had some drinks and called it a night at a reasonable 4:00am.

(Rodrigo and Elizabeth with the spread of meats we cooked up Friday night. Notice the clock on the wall. They call me Bencito, which is kind of a joke. Bencito is like saying, Benny or Benny-boo-boo. It's a term of affection. And Oliver wrote it on my food cupboard.)
Saturday was spent playing with José Tomás and then we had some completos and a rocket for dinner. Completos are glorified hot dogs with avocados, tomatoes, red onion, and ketchup(mayo if your Chilean). In essence, they are high blood pressure, sodium, and fat content on a plate. They're good about once every other month. Any more than that and you get burned out.

(Completos and a rocket for dinner, what a classy combination)

Sunday was the big day for the Brasil/Chile soccer match. Brasil is the equivalent of the USA's Dream Team. Watching the players warm up was amazing. When they warmed up I was able to see just how talented each player was. Juan Pablo, Stefenia and I arrived to the crowded stadium 2.5 hours early and we struggled to find a place to sit. By then the Chile/Paraguay woman's game had started and we watched that. The whole time the crowd would spontaneously erupt into songs and chants. One of them roughly translates to, "If you don't jump around for Chile, then you're a bum from Brasil." Then when the Brasil players were announced the entire 80,000 people in attendance would shout, "Screw you." Once again, I am roughly translating the phrase into PG terms. It was quite funny. Then the game started and everyone was focused on the game. We came out and seemed to have control for the first 15 minutes, but then the athleticism, skill, and strength of Brasil outmatched Chile. After the game, the fans for Brasil had to wait about 20 minutes before they were allowed to exit. I guess it's a common practice to make the away fans wait before they exit for their safety(I don't think Michigan had it that bad). Nonetheless it was fun, and I'm heading back to the stadium in two days for the Chile/Columbia game.


(This was taken 2 and a half hours before the game started, it's a little different from our late arriving students in Madison)
(The Huaso Peregrino leading the cheers in the stadium before the game. This guy goes to every game, home or away to lead this cheer.

Cheee!
Laay!
Chi chi chi, lay, lay lay. Viva Chile!!!)

I signed up to run a 10k in Viña del Mar October 5th. That should make me stay motivated to run around Santiago.

Hiking around

Teaching is still going well, after I realized that there is only so much I can do to help students learn three weeks of material in one class. I had students who showed up for two or the six classes and well, big surprise, they did terrible on the first quiz. We'll see how my intermediate students fare tomorrow during their first quiz.
Last weekend I headed to Viña del Mar for some hiking at La Campana. It's located roughly between Viña and Santiago and provided us with a healthy challenge as we attempted to summit the peak. Unfortunately it took us longer than expected to navigate taxis, buses, subway, and then another bus, so we had to stop about 2 hours short of the top. But we plan to head back in a couple weeks and do some camping at the bottom so we can head up first thing in the morning. Of course we celebrated with a big bbq Saturday night and had a great time enjoying the food and drinks.

(The hiking crew, senior picture pose)


(This was taken during what may very well been the end of third quarter in Madison for "Jump Around"

(Christmas card 2009)
In domestic news, Angie and José-Tomás moved into the apartment so we now have a 1 year and 3 month year old in the house providing entertainment at all hours of the day. It's really fun. Angie is Oliver's(my "brother") girlfriend, and José-Tomás is their son.
This Sunday I'll be going to the Chile-Brasil soccer match which should be wild. This is a World Cup qualifying game. I know that doesn't mean much to most American's, but in the rest of the world, it's a huge deal. The tickets have been sold out for a couple weeks now, and only about 2,000 $300 tickets are left. The game starts at 9:00 pm as well, which will make it even crazier. Normally the big soccer matches are in the early afternoon to avoid problems with drinking and partying(think Badger football games) but they scheduled this game for late because historically Brasil is not as comfortable playing in cooler temperatures. Talk about home field advantage.
The flowers are out lining the streets, and everyone is getting super excited for the September 18th celebrations. Since day one, I've been told about how amazing that week is, so I'm joining the rest of Chile in building up excitement.


(The clearest I've seen Santiago in six months. This is after a day of rain. August 28th at 8:30am. By 2:00pm the smog was back)

¡Primavera está aquí!

With the sun shining and the temperature hitting 20(~70F) this afternoon I think Spring is here. I've been told the worst part of winter is over, so I feel that I can comment on winter now without it coming back to haunt me. It really wasn't too bad. Maybe it was because since day one, people were warning me about how cold, rainy, humid, windy, etc it gets in winter, so when I was in it, it didn't seem as bad as I imagined. Don't get me wrong, my room hasn't been warmer than 58 degrees since April, and days strung together when my towel never dried because it was too cold and humid in the house, but overall, it wasn't too shabby. It didn't snow and the nighttime lows got below 32 only a handful of times.
This weekend was another "family weekend." I'm such a family man. Friday, Rodrigo came home with a Schopdog Rocket, so we obviously tested it to make sure it works.

(Oliver, Raul and Me testing the efficiency of the Rocket. It worked)
Then I met up with some CIEE friends and went to a Duoc Professor party in Bellavista. Saturday night we went to a restaurant called Espadeiros, in Las Condes to celebrate the birthday of my Chilean Mamá. We left the house at 9:00 pm, and finished up our buffet style dinner around midnight after some salsa dancing. Around 11:00 a band started playing some Elvis and Sinatra then transitioned to some hot salsa. After dinner we came back to the house and had tea, and some drinks. Once again the ten of us started dancing, and all of a sudden it was 2:30, so I turned on the TV and we watched the USA vs. Spain Olympic final. We won, and then we looked up and it was 6:30am, so we decided it was time to hit the hay. Today was a wonderfully lazy day spent walking around outside and hanging out with the windows open.
Teaching has been going really well. I enjoy my students, and they seem to have an interest in learning English. After having a semester of experience I really feel like I'm a much better teacher.

More pictures from the parent's visit

(Family picture, minus Jay, Brooke and Mika of course)



(Our favorite mark of wine by far, or perhaps the only one we know)


(Our amazing three hour lunch with Juan Pablo and Stephania)


(A mixture of Spanish and English being spoken, and Mom smiling. Both languages came up with the same conclusion. We don't really know where we are)


(Translates to roughly:
We're colleagues
Companions
Partners
Friends
We're such good friends
Best buddies
Man, I love you guys.
You get the idea)


(Professor Benjamin Creagh)

Mom and Dad in town

My parents came and went last weekend. Their plane touched down Thursday morning and then they left Monday evening. But in between we filled our time together sight seeing and hanging out. They were able to see my city, my neighborhood, my university, sample Chilean food and drinks, and meet my family and friends.
Thursday we didn't really do too much because my parents had the "we just tried to sleep on an airplane" feeling so we just walked to my apartment and had Churrasco sandwiches.
Friday we did Santiago. We started the day by going to La Chascona(One of Pablo Neruda's three houses). After that tour we took the Bellavista Funicular up to the top, then took the Teleferico down.


(On top of Cerro San Cristobal)
After that we took the metro to Plaza de Armas where we did some people watching and then walked down to the Artesianal shops across the street from Cerro Santa Lucia. Then we walked to Bellavista for a liter of beer, and then dinner at El Tablao. Then we went to the Parque Balmaceda to watch the fountain light show.


(Parque Balmaceda)
After that we sampled some gelato at Bravissimo and then headed home after a long day of walking.
Saturday we traveled to Valparaiso and Viña del Mar. We spent the day walking around the hills of Valpo and toured another of Pablo Neruda's houses called La Sebastiana. They we met up with Juan Pablo and his girlfriend Sephania and we had a nice three hour lunch overlooking the ocean. After lunch(which we finished around 5:00) Juan Pablo drove us around and we finished off the night walking down the beach in Viña del Mar.
Sunday we went to the vineyard of Concha y Toro where we became experts about wine. Then we went out to a great pizza place because it was Día del Niño (Children's Day). It was so considerate for my parents to come down to Chile just for Children's Day. That night we walked to my apartment and my parents met my Chilean brothers and mom.
Monday we went out to a great restaurant and then went back to the Chilean shops by Santa Lucia and then my parents left. I sent them to the airport in a taxi and that seemed to get them to the airport and back to Wisconsin.
It really was wonderful to show my parents around and have them meet the important people in my life down here.


(Mamá y su hijo)

Winter Break!

I'll try to write down most of what I can. I don't want to write too much with the fear of the US population taking too much time read my blog instead of working, thus further hurting our economy. So with that in mind let's begin.

The route: Viña del Mar> San Pedro de Atacama> Arica> Tacna> Puno(Lake Titicaca) >Cusco > Machu Pichhu> Cusco> Arequipa> Arica >Santiago

The Story
"él me robó"
Not twenty minutes into our trip Vinnie and I got on the metro(subway) to head to the bus station and I get pick pocketed. This whole story lasted about 20 seconds We get on the metro and all of a sudden there are five people crowding around us. Here we are two big Americas, speaking English with huge backpacks. When the metro starts to move people are kind of innocently losing and finding their balance, and that is when
I start to feel something in my right pocket. I reach down only to feel a hand in my pocket. I grab for it, but can only get it from outside my pants and his hand is gone. I immediately grab my other pocket that some other guy is heading for, and I tell him to back off. I still have my wallet and cell phone, and after a quick inventory realize my change bag was stolen from my pocket. Meanwhile I yell to Vinnie, "THAT guy robbed me! Right there. Him" But it was so loud, and Vinnie was confused, that he didn't understand until about 5-6 guys left the metro and it was practically empty. Luckily I only lost about 1500 pesos(~$3) because I had just counted it. But, I figured I'd get robbed once down here. I mean a year in a huge South American city, it was bound to happen. So I got that out of the way. The rest of the day was pretty average. We arrived in Viña and hung out with some friends before taking off the next day.
"no creo esto"
We got on the bus at 12:30 pm July 12th, and at 7 arrived in Ovalle for a bus transfer, then were on the bus from 9pm until 11ish am the following day in Calama. Then after a lunch we took at bus from Calama to San Pedro de Atacama and finally got in at 4pm. It was a lot of time spent on a bus, but at the same time fun to talk to people, practice Spanish and read, a lot. We met a guy who invited us to his house in Calama(more on this later). Once settled in Sand Pedro it took us some time to realize where were were, and what happened to the last 28 hours.

(About 20 minutes into the trip)

(Can you find my two trip mates?)
"Que bonita"
San Pedro has some amazing sights.

(San Pedro, just a little town with four times as many beds as residents. This is for the toursits to sleep in)
We did some tours and went to geysers, high alpine lakes, salt flats, and Valle de Luna (Moon valley), and Death Valley


(Salt flats)


(Altiplano)

(High alpine lakes with Vicuñas in the foreground)
The next morning we woke up at 3:30 to get up to the geysers for sunrise. It was very cold, but I fell asleep on the bus ride up there, and woke up to a crazy scene of steaming geysers and mountain mist.

(Me in front of the geyser with six layers on my upper body, and still being cold.)

(And a little later in the morning)

(Why not warm up in the natural thermal pool? I'm giving the thumbs up)
After the geysers we wound out way back down to San Pedro stopping to check out various wildlife and stopping at a few outlooks spots. We saw some foxes, flamingos more llamas, vitcuñas and some kind of squirrel/rabbit called a viscacha that would jump about 3 feet at a time. These guys were probably my favorite.
That night we went to the Valle de Luna for some more incredible geological formations and watched the sun go down.

(Overlooking the valley)
"Tienen que comer todo"
As we headed over to Arica we stopped at our new friend's house in Calama. Our friend, Mauricio picked us up and as this day happened to been a holiday his family was home, so we had a big bbq. First we went to the supermarket and bought a bunch of alcohol(purely a cultural thing). Mauricio's dad then took us on a tour of his work, which happens to be the biggest copper mine in the world. It was so intersting to get a personal tour and hear some personal stories. For more information about this place check out this link. There use to be a town right at the site, but they made everyone leave so that they could put their earth that they removed from the mine there. Mauricio's mom's house is now about 300 feet below rocks. Mauricio's elementry school is abandoned now, and the town, that was of about 30,000 people is now empty, with building still upright.

(You can kind of see here that half of the buildings are under rubble)

(Empty town)
After the tour his dad stopped by the supermarket and picked up an extraordinary amount of meat. So much in fact that I figured some other people were coming over. When we got back to the house, it was just a great time. Steve, Vinnie and I realized that we had to talk in Spanish all day since Mauricio's parents didn't speak English which was fine especially after a few German brews and vino.

(Mauricio at the grill. Note the amount of meat, which was for seven people. Right about this time Mauricio's dad told us kind of half joking, half seriously that if we don't eat all the meat he'll be offended. We decided to take it seriously:)

(Fun around the grill)

(The Wednesday afternoon crew)
We had an amazing lunch, with plenty of beer, wine, and pisco, and then we had even more food around 9pm and then they drove us back to the bus station and we said good bye with plenty of hugs and kisses. Mauricio worked in Jackson Hole, WY for a winter and he had some people take care of him and invite him into their house, so now he and his family always return the favor with other travelers. I must say when I get back I will be one of those people who bend over backwards for foreigners. I've had too many great experiences like this to not.
"somos tan cerca"
From Calama we got to Arica after a restless night on a bus and were greeted to warmer coastal weather. We walked around the city and played on the beach that afternoon. The next morning I went surfing and then hung out with the surf school for their end of the week bbq. I know, more food? It was great to be in the water again. It had been a long time. That night we made preparations to cross into Peru. We were very excited to get there. At the border Vinnie had a problem with his visa. He had the form that said he was legal, but was missing the other sheet with his picture and personal info. So unfortunate he had to return to Santiago about a week earlier than expected without seeing Machu Pichhu.
"te entendemos"
Crossing the border into Peru was like entering a different world. There was more obvious poverty, the prices were cheaper, people spoke much clearer, the food was spicy, and the beer tasted good(always a barometer of a culture, although that doesn't say much for the US with our Bud and Miller Lite).

(The first Peruvian lunch, complete with the local beer)
All of the principal cities in Peru have their own beer. Cusqueña is from Cusco, Cristal is from Lima, Arequipeña is from Arequipa and Pilsen is from Trujillo. Enough about that. We took an overnight bus to Puno which is situated on Lake Titicaca. Lake Titicaca sits at an elevation of 12,500 feet making it the highest navigable lake in the world. We arrived at 5 in the morning and started a two day tour at 8:00 where we toured the islands and stayed with a family on one of the islands. The lake is amazing, and kind of reminded me of Lake Superior.

(Here's the view from our house for the night)

(Apparently the locals aren't over six feet)

(Steve and I with our mother for the night)
"la ciudad de puma"
After an incredibly entertaining bus ride from Puno to Cusco, we crashed at a hostel and started exploring the city. I say the bus ride was entertaining because we paid five dollars to travel a trip that is normally 6 hours, but for us it was 9 hours, and we were the only fair skinned people on the bus. It was filled with indigenous men and women with gigantic bags of clothes, blankets, rice buckets, babies and and snacks. The bus had was filled to capacity meaning there were probably 10-20 more people on the bus than seats. Some ladies gave Steve and I blankets after telling us, "It gets cold at night, you'll need these." And they were correct. It was very cold, and after getting off the bus I looked at the roof and saw we were the bus with about 3-4 feet of luggage strapped on to the top of the bus. While entertaining it was not relaxing.
Cusco was a treat

(Packing a mouthful of coca leaves. It's very common to see people chewing coca leaves to energize themselves and help cope with the altitude. We wanted to see what it was all about. Don't worry it's completely legal)

(The Plaza del Armas in Cusco with the night lights)
We spent a day walking around the city, a day checking out Museums and then a day walking out by the ruins near the city. There are four sites that are within walking distance from the city.
Then we took a tour of the Sacred Valley and then got to Aquas Calientes. This is the town at the base of Machu Picchu. From Cusco to Aquas Calientes we got to the fringe of the jungle. The temperatures were warmer and the vegetation changed.
The valley alone could be a top tourist destination, but there was Machu Picchu waiting for us at the end of the valley. And Machu Picchu is all it's cracked up to be. It's just amazing. It's so calculated. They calculated where the exact spot of the morning sunrise will shine and then constructed structures around that point. Just amazing.

(Sacsahuamán, ruin near Cusco. These stones are over 10 tons and are still intact after the Spanish tried to use the stones for construction in the city)

(In the Sacred Valley)

(At the summit of waynu picchu. Elevation 8,600 feet. After 40 minutes of stairs we spent about 2 hours taking in the views)

(May I present to you, Machu Picchu)

EXTREME (camera work)

(The "I am in Machu Picchu, wow I can't believe it" thinking picture)
After Machu Picchu Steve and I decided to just relax the last week of our trip.

(Hail yeah I liked Cusco. We got a nice hail storm for about 30 minutes one afternoon)
Eat, read, nap, drink some more local brews and pisco, and hang out. I've never traveled like this and it was a good change of pace. We met some great people in our hostel and some fun(ny) Peruvians at the bars. We did this in Arequipa which is a beautiful city with an amazing plaza. It is much like Cusco without the people begging you to buy a hat even when you're already wearing one, or asking if you want a massage "now, later or maybe tomorrow." I actually got one for an hour and a half for $7. It was great. So Arequipa was spent reading in the hammocks and eating delicious food. I can think of worse things to do.

(This is basically where I spent my time in Arequipa)
Then after that we spent two nights in Arica. I went surfing one more day and now I'm back in the big city. My parents come tomorrow morning for five days and I'm excited to show them around my city and have them meet my family and some of my friends.

I'm back in Santiago

Well I'm back in Santiago, safe and sound. Now I have to unpack and figure out how to explain the last three weeks.
I'll get around to it soon, but just wanted to let you know I'm back and safe.

(A little place called Machu Picchu)