Fiestas Patrias,

In my classes we are reviewing and practicing past tense verbs. For an exercise I had them talk about what they did for Fiestas Patrias. This is how it went: ¨ I ate empanadas, I drank vino, I ate more empanadas, I drank chicha (a local sweet wine/alcohol), ate lots and lots of bbq meat, slept, ate anticucho (a kaboob with meat and veggies), drank more, etc...¨ You get the picture. And that is pretty much how it goes here. Fiestas Patrias is Chileans version of July 4th. The actually holiday is Sept. 18th however it turns into a week-long celebration. Most people stop showing up to work the Friday before (even though its not technically a holiday) then there is no work Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and a lot of places are closed Thursday and Friday. Basically a week of celebrations.

Last year I was really sick and spent all my Fiestas Patrias vacation in bed so I didnt relaly get to experience the real thing. This year I did. Carlos told me I was going to see how the rich chileans and the poor chileans celebrate. I did. Hear are the pics of the ¨not so rich people¨ Enjoy!

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