Day 2

So even though we have only been here for only 2 days, we feel like we've been here for several days already. Yesterday, we met up with Allyson (our Field Program Director) and walked past the Presidential Palace (only offices, no residence) and a huge decorative sign that says "Bicentario 2010". This year, Chile is celebrating 20 years of Independence from Pinochet's rule. We found out that we'll get 2 days off from school in September (not just 1) to celebrate Independence Day here... yay! We heard it will be 4 days of lots of food, drinking (them of course), cueca (National Dance), and music. The volunteers and I hope to go do some short local day trips out of our towns.

We walked to the "Instituto de..something" where we will be holding the rest of our classes there. This is like a community college where WorldTeach probably rents out one of their classrooms for our use. It got very cold 2 hours later as there is NO central heating anywhere.. except (not so ironically) at the US Embassy where we visited later yesterday. We took the Metro subway and walked to the embassy which looked like a huge bank fortress taking up 1 entire block (so typical of Americans, right?). We met with the consular who will be the one will try to get us help if there is a National Disaster and if we go missing or need a new passport. We also met 2 ladies (teachers before) who collaborate with the Ministry of Education to make education better.

We learned that there is a HUGE disparity with education in Chile. The government provides more subsidies and better education to those who already have money and can afford "privados" (private schools). However, 67% of students go to public schools that have very little resources and only a small percentage of these students ever make it to universities. These are the schools that we will be teaching at. In fact, our services are in fact needed as it is usually a school te0acher that requests for help from the Ministry for our volunteer services.

Chile appears to be developed, but that is only the case in Santiago. 1/3 of Chileans live in Chile. The government has put most of its money into building highways, buildings, etc., and would like to be taken off the 3rd world country list, but education is still greatly lacking. Our Director mentioned that Chileans are often very concerned with the outside appearance (i.e. she got yelled at when she wanted to step out of her host's family house with sneakers, another volunteer got yelled at for not ironing his clothes before going to his school). Therefore, Chile would like to appear to be 1st world/developed.

I highly encourage all of you to consider teaching or volunteering abroad at some time in your life and perhaps even though WorldTeach in Chile if my experiences here inspire you to do so = ).

After classes and visiting the embassy, we walked 1.5 hours back to our hostel to see the city sights. There is much we want to go back to see when there is daylight out. However, our days are jam packed with classes and tours. I am very excited for Sunday's tour to an old torture center/prison where Pinochet had held many people prisoner back in the 80s. Our tour guide will be someone who was detained and tortured at the center so I hope to learn much from him about his experience.

PIctures to come...