Primer día

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1/23/07 11:51 PM
Hola queridos,
I am in Santiago, Chile. Today was my first day here. The internet connection is weak in the hostel and I don’t have ALL that much to write about, but today was an eventful day nonetheless and I want to write about it, so I think I may start keeping a log or something and sending it out periodically.

The whole trip went pretty smoothly. Mom and I drove down to LA Sunday morning, had lunch with my beloved godbrother Derek and his girlfriend Arlene, and then settled in at my uncle and aunt’s house. My aunt, Jenny, has a friend who just married a Chilean guy from Santiago, so they had them over for dinner, and Claudio told me all about Santiago city life and drew all over my map with places to go and what districts are most interesting.

Sunday night I spent in an in-between state of sleep and consciousness with a wrenching pain in my stomach, and woke up the next morning nauseous with the terrible pain persisting. I’m sure it was mostly nerves but I attribute it a little to something I must have eaten the day before. A bad combination. But because of this, the first plane ride was a cinch cause I just passed out from being exhausted and nauseous all night and morning, and slept almost the whole way from LAX to Atlanta (which was only 3:30 because of strong tailwinds). The second flight was very, very long. I sat next to a 75 year old Chilean woman who didn’t speak any English. I tried to talk to her at first, but she had one of those leathery/leafy/papery old lady voices and a very thick Chilean accent and I couldn’t understand a thing she said. I began to dispair that this was going to be a long, conversationless and somewhat awkward night, but about 20 minutes into the flight the old woman reached into her bag and handed me a small candy, so I smiled to myself and realized that it would get better. Later she had me help her read the very small print on her re-entry documents, and we skimmed the Duty-Free magazine together, which had nothing of any use to either of us. I could understand some of what she said. Maybe 60% after I pieced together certain things and made some inferences. When I tried to help her fill out her documents, there were 2 numbers on her passport; her passport number, and a booklet number. I explained to her several times that I could read on her passport that both numbers were distinctly labeled as “numero de pasaporte” and “numero de cuadernillo”, and that the passport number was on top, but she insisted that it was the number on the bottom, so I just asked her once more if she was sure, (even though I could read that she was wrong) and at her insistence wrote the wrong number on her documentos. I think she may have been a little senile because under “estado civil” (or marital status) she put “vida,” though now that I think about it she may have meant to write “viudo” which is widow.

Anyway, I got very little sleep on that flight and woke up passionately hating the small baby in front of me who cut into my rest, and the flight attendants scurrying around the aisles with unappetizing meals. My nausea had mostly subsided since Atlanta and the horrible pain was reduced to an infrequent stabbing feeling in my. Endurable but it still made being hungry a conflicting experience. We arrived in Santiago, I got a taxi without a hitch, taxista was very nice and gave me his card in case I ever wanted to go to the coast with some girlfriends or something. Oh, the woman at immigration thought that I couldn’t speak Spanish, but it was juts because I couldn’t understand her accent and I couldn’t see her mouth because there was part of a window pane in the way. BUT I had a very nice, easily flowing conversation in puro español with the taxista.

So, yeah, got to the hostel, yadda yadda, couldn’t check in yet. I left my stuff at the desk and wandered around a few blocks to go to a money changing place (stupid bank didn’t understand that I wanted my debit card shipped in 3 days, not 10 days, so I had to leave without a debit card, and I’ve forgotten the PIN to my credit card, so all I have until my dad can mail me my debit card is some cash that my mom half gave/half lent me). Then I slowly wandered aroud and came back. Claudio was saying that I’m going to be amazed at how exactly like the U.S. Santiago is, but it seemed SO much like Mexico to me. It smelled like Mexico (those of you who know that smell know what I’m talking about- like the water in the gutters on a hot day or something… but not gross like that sounds), felt like Mexico, even in many ways is laid out and looks like Mexico, except it lloks like a lot more people have cars, and a lot more diverse kinds of cars, and it seems more open and spread out, and a little more ethnically diverse. There are more European-american people, but like, Italian and Slavic and dark German-looking people. Not many blondes. Some Asian people. And the people seem to dress a little more like Americans. I think there’s more of the laternative culture here that I was missing so much in Chiapas when I was there (all those years ago!). And there are stray dogs everywhere. And no beggars. I think you could replace all the beggars in Tuxtla with stray dogs and you’d have Santiago. And there are tiendas on the corners under apartment buildings, just like Mexico, and the big buildings are all painted different interesting colors, and … what else? Different kinds of plaster and brick in all the different houses. Flat roofs. American and some kind of soft latin music (no mariachi) playing from newspaper stands on the streets.

After awhile I came back to the hostel and checked in, came upstairs and met one of the people from the EAP program. Her name’s Sarah and she was in CSSC doing food systems at UCSD (for those of you who understand what that means). How crazy is that? The first person I really meet is a sustainability person. Crazy, huh? Anyway, I won’t get into all of the people I met today, but there are a lot of women on EAP and one guy who is in some way involved with ESLP at Berkeley (once again, for those of you who know what that means. For those who don’t, check out www.eslp.net!). Got to know about 5 girls who are on the program with whom I share a room here in the hostel. At first, when I was wandering around Santiago, still exhausted from lack of sleep on the damn plane (stupid baby) I was starting to freak out. “I’m supposed to be here for a year? What the hell am I thinking? How can I do this? This is not possible.” And then later sitting with some of the girls who were talking about things I just didn’t care about (like what the swim team did in high school and what so and so’s little brother’s middle name is and how she wanted to be a mailperson when she grew up instead of a veterinarian like everyone else) I was feeling kind of dismal, but by the end of the night I had met many interesting people who had lots of incredible plans for traveling, and everything seemed to be alright. It’s all going to be just fine. And now I have to go to bed because tomorrow at noon we meet our host families. Some of us are going to share cabs to get to the university where we meet everyone, so I’m all set for companionship for now. Ok, buenas noches, que todos duermen con los angelitos.
-Sophie
12:40 AM

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