FOOD & NEW FRIENDS

Every day, our Chile WorldTeach Director, Allyson, gives us 2 "regalitos" (little gifts). We've received a dry erase marker, highlighter, a money wallet with 2 metro tickets and lunch/dinner money. She's also brought a variety of Empanadas:

That's Roman (originally from Ukraine and wants to be trilingual with Spanish while I probe him to practice Russian with me). Stephanie (from N. California has a kind spirit who has an awesome smile and is very skinny.. I think her host family is going to think she's starving and will try to keep forcing food on her. This is a problem that some volunteers will encounter) I'm personally scared of getting an additional Freshmen 15. THAT IS WHY I GOT UP EARLY TODAY TO DO MY Jillian Michael's Yoga Meltdown video on my netbook!




Allyson also brought a delicious Chilean styled lemon meringue pie which is not as tart as the US', but has a tart shell. I tried stuffing my mouth with a huge piece since we had to pass it around in class, but then I dropped half of it on the carpet enroute into my mouth.



I would've eaten more, but we have been eating hot dogs, hamburgers, white bread, etc. Chileans LOVE mayo. (See above, I had to scrape most of it off. ) In the markets, you can find mayo in large plastic bags. They have different flavors of mayo.


Many of us girls are SO HAPPY when we find a "ensalada" (salad) on the restaurant menus. When we can get salads, we can usually a wide variety of vegetables. Chileans are big on "Palta" (Avocado) which makes me SUPER happy! A wide selection of vegetables and fruits are supposedly inexpensive in Chile, but just not commonly served in restaurants.


I found a fruit I had never eaten before. It was purple/yellow on the outside, avocado shaped, tasted like cantaloupe, with the texture of a crunchy honeydew.

Yesterday, we were supposed to have class at our usual "Institute..", but it was closed due to a National Religious holiday even after our Director had reminded the administrators to keep a classroom open for her repeated times. Allyson told us that it is very common for plans to change and for people to not call you back to cancel and so forth so we need to be "liquid" while we're here and not get easily frustrated or resentful when things don't go our way. Therefore, all 11 of us plus our director and assistant had class in the lounge of our hostel and also piled into volunteer rooms to watch videos/movies from a volunteer's laptop. It was pretty funny to see all of us piled onto volunteers' beds to watch the film. (See Below- Having our class in the hostel's lounge while passing around Chilean lemon meringue pie to eat).

I recommend the movie "Machuca" which depicts the disparity between the social and educational classes before (Right Winged-Marxist)/after (Left Winged-Dictatorship) Pinochet stepped into power in Chile. Parts of the movie were based on a true story.


So far, we have found our group to be well traveled. I am quite impressed by their stories abroad (i.e. teaching in Mexico, building orphanages in Romania, teaching kids in Bosnia, etc.). Age ranges from early 20s to 40. Professional backgrounds or majors include English, Psychology, IT,

Left to Right- Tim (the Aussie who is staying at our hostel for 1 more week whom we've adopted), Hannah (from Seattle who loves REI and Trader Joe's like I do and does a good amount of hiking/jogging), Katie (from Michigan with a bubbly personality whose Spanish is pretty darn good), ME, and Stephanie.












Jennifer (from Los Angeles/San Diego) and I tried Pisco Sours which is like a national drink. Peru and Chile always argue about who invented the drink. It's rare to get it in the US. It tastes like rum and lime.



Stephanie and Tim enjoyed their Hearts of Palm "Palmito" Pizza with a semi-deep dish crust.