Orientation week in Chile

My first week in Chile I lived in a hostel with all the other volunteers. The hostel was actually pretty nice, and I liked sharing a room with the other volunteers, but it was a little frustrating to live out of suitcase for a week. Now I live in a small apartment with four other people. My roommates are Isabelle, I share a room with her and she is actually from Boulder (small world!), and Benedicte and Eric, who are a couple from Canada (Ben is a girl, just so there is no confusion). It’s interesting to live with a couple, but it’s fun to see how they function together. Everyone is really great, and I think it’s going to be a good month. Our lease for the apartment lasts for a month, so each month we can decide if we want to stay in the apartment or move out. I really like it here, so I’m planning on staying in the apartment the whole six months. Eric and Ben originally wanted to live alone, but haven’t had that much luck finding a new place, so they are going to stay for the next month and see how that goes. Isabelle, like myself, really wanted to live with Chilean roommates so that she would be forced to speak Spanish, so she is still trying to find another place to live. We’ll see how that works out.

My first day in Chile, I went to a market place with some of the girls from the hostel, and we bought some fruit. Fruits here are extremely cheap, so looks like I’m going to be eating a lot more healthy foods while I’m down here. I hope my body doesn’t go into shock! After the market we went and climbed up a small hill, took about 10-15 minutes to get up, and it had a castle type building at the top of it. The view from the top was pretty great. You could see the whole city, the mountains, and the lovely Santiago smog.

Later in the afternoon we took a free city tour. It was actually pretty interesting, and I learned a couple things (well actually I learned a lot because I didn’t really know any of Chile’s history before coming down here). I really like the architechture here. All the buildings look very different from each other. There is also a good mix of short and tall buildings, so the city feels more open than Buenos Aires did. I like it.

One thing I did not do before coming down the South America was research the history of the countries I was going to be living in. Looking back, I should have done that, but it’s been really nice to learn a lot about both countries’ history while actually living in the city.

During the tour, I tried this strange typical Chilean summer drink. It's peach juice, with big chunks of peaches in it along with some sort of grain. It actually wasn't that bad.

Orientation lasted for a week in a half. It was everyday from 10:00-7:00, it was intense and sooo much information! Looking back at it though, pretty much everything we learned was really important. We got snacks in the morning and the old volunteers made us lunch and Once everyday. We ate like kings and queens the entire week and a half, and I loved it! Once (pronounced the same way you say 11 in Spanish), is basically snack time (eaten anywhere between 4:30-7:30), and you eat breads with butter, jam, or manhar (which is dulce de leche). However, they were more creative and we had a good variety of foods for our Onces. I’m always a fan of snack time!

Thursday, I went to my institution and met the girls I’ll be working with. They all seem pretty great. Their ages range from 2-16. I was only there for a few hours and was exhausted. I can’t imagine how I’m going to feel after working everyday for 6 hours during the week
I tried introducing myself to the girls as Liz and they didn’t quite get my name, so I said it was Elizabeth, but they still didn’t get it, so I am Eli (Ellie) in Chile as well. All through out orientation we have been told that Chileans are very blunt. They will say things like, you look fat today, are you pregnant, why did you stop working out, you look really skinny, etc. They don’t mean these things as insults, but merely as observations. While we were eating Once, one of the older Tias (one of the women in charge) asked if I have ever had plastic surgery and if my hair and eye color were real. I thought that that was funny. After snack time, the girls listened to music and danced. The dancing was so inappropriate! It was very sexual, and kind of sad to watch. The kind of moves the girls were doing were moves you would find in a rap video. That’s something I’m going to need to get use to. After visiting the girls though it made me really excited to start working there everyday!

Something that I learned during orientation that is kind of disappointing, is that I am not allowed to post pictures I take of the girls online. These girls have been neglected and/or abused, so it’s for their protection. So I won’t be able to show ya’ll pictures of the girls till I come home.

At the end of orientation on Friday we learned about Chilean foods, and got to try a bunch. Obviously, that was the highlight of my day! The foods were pretty good too. They have empanadas and alfajores here that are pretty tasty, so I’m glad I still get to eat those tasty treats! I learned that they have sandwiches here, which they didn’t really have a wide variety in BA, so I’m really excited about being able to eat sandwiches again. After orientation, I went and got a cell phone! It’s good to appreciate the small victories while I’m living in a foreign country, keeps me sane.

Friday night, everyone in the program went out to dinner. When we first sat down, we tried ordering tap water, but they were like, "No, we don’t have that." Then some people ordered some alcoholic drinks and then asked for tap water and they brought the water right out. So dumb! I was still able to get some free water though, so that’s all that mattered. Then when it was time to order, the waiter told us that they only had three available dishes for each pasta selection. Huh??? That was so weird. But again, I got to order what I wanted, so all was good.

After dinner, 12 of us went out to a bar and hung out for a bit. Then only about 5 of us went out to a club. It was sooo fun! I ended up staying out till about 4:30. The music was really good, and I recognized some of the Spanish songs that I had heard while in Argentina. Another big plus here is that the guys are not as aggressive and pushy with you. So when I would say, "No I’m ok I don’t want to dance with you," most of them would walk away. Or if I did dance with someone, once the song ended I would just say, "I’m going to go back to my friends," and they would let me go, no problem. So that was really refreshing. However, there was this one guy who crossed the line with me. We were dancing, and everything was fine, and then all of a sudden he asked me, “So is the party here or in your panties”…ew! I just looked at him and told him to leave. Later he tried dancing with my friend and she turned to me and was like, “Is that the guy from earlier?” And of course it was, so she shoved him pretty hard to make him leave. Ha it was actually pretty funny. But yeah, over all, it was a really fun night!

Our orientation ended on Wednesday, and that night we had a big feast at the director’s apartment. The dinner was on the rooftop of his building and the view was absolutely beautiful! The food was so yummy and we all did skits. It was so fun to do our skit! We basically made fun of the people who work in the office (they all ran different workshops during orientation week), and acted out different experiences we have had with Chilean culture. It turned out really funny and everyone nailed their parts! The people who work in the office sang to Lady Gaga’s Poker Face, but changed the words. My favorite line was, “Can’t hide my, can’t hide my, no I can’t hide my Gringa face.” Haha, so great!

The following weekend everyone went to the beach. It’s really cheap to get a round trip bus ticket and the beach is like an hour and a half away. I have been traveling around a lot since Brazil, so I decided not to go. I just wasn’t really in the mood to travel again and stay in another hostel for a night. Orientation kept us super busy, so I hadn’t done much exploring of the city yet. I’ll save the traveling for when the city starts driving me crazy. Most people left Friday and came back on Sunday, but my roommates came back Saturday night. Isabelle left Saturday morning and came back Saturday night. So on Friday we went to this street that has blocks and blocks of really cheap clothing for sale. Isabelle was looking for a towel, and I was just going to check it out. There’s soooooo many clothes! It’s nuts! But it was fun to check out.

Afterwards, Isabelle took me to this frozen yogurt place, and oh my goodness was it delicious! I got bananas, strawberries, and mango in mine. They blend everything together so it’s kind of like a really thick smoothie. Man it was so good! It was a little pricey, but definitely worth it! I will for sure be going back to that place a lot while it’s hot out. Side note, I just found out that they have this place back home, so google a location near you and go try it!

Saturday morning I went to this park that is near the apartment to take a work out class. Man oh man, I felt so awkward and so far out of my comfort zone the entire hour! Ha. The class was more so of a dance class, and well I’m not the greatest dancer. I don’t mind dancing in a club where it’s dark and everyone is dancing in a big, close crowd, but out in the day light, spread out...that’s very different. The majority of the people in the class were a lot older, but apparently everyone in this country is a professional dancer. So I just felt super self-conscious the entire time, but despite all of my uncomfortableness, I really enjoyed myself.

After the class I went on a mission to find hangers. Pretty early in the search I almost gave up. The map we all have of Santiago is not of the whole city. All the stores that would have hangers are further out of the city; therefore, not on my map. Also, all the streets are not on the map. It’s all kind of frustrating. I’m not that familiar with the city, so all the street names that were coming up I couldn’t find them. BUT eventually I did find one on a street that I knew and it looked like it was really close. Ha I was wrong again. It took me about an hour to walk there, and during that hour all I was thinking, “If this store does not have hangers I’m going to be pissed!” They had hangers though! I was so relieved! I ended up taking the bus back home, and it was only a 15 minute ride. I was quite proud of myself for finding hangers. Ha again, small victories are very important.

Orientation was very long, but it allowed all of us new volunteers to get to know each other and we became a small family. It's going to be a great 6 months here in Chile.

Until Next Time,
Liz

Family Vacation in Argentina

The family came to Argentina! I found out some really big news too. First, I found out that my brother proposed to his girlfriend and now they are engaged. Pretty crazy! The wedding isn’t for a while, but still very exciting news. New sister on the way. The funny thing is her name is Elizabeth as well, so when they get married there is going to be another Elizabeth Jones…we are slowly taking over the world! It’s weird to think that she’ll have my name, but it is a pretty good name to have, if I say so myself ☺ The next big news is that I found out that I made it into UGA’s Social Work program. I’m going to graduate school!!! UGA was my top choice, so I’m pretty excited about that too. I have a place to live next year already lined up! I’ll be living with my brother’s fiancé, so I’ll have a good roommate, and she told me it’s in a really good location.

The first couple days of the family trip, we stayed in Buenos Aires.

The first day we just walked around the city for a bit. We took a tour of Teatre Colon. After the tour, we went and ate empanadas and pizza.

The second day, we took a city tour with a private guide. It was a pretty good tour. We went to La Boca,

San Talmo,

the Recoleta Cemetery,

Café Tortoni, and a few other places as well. Our guide was pretty great too. He showed us the narrowest apartment in the city.

This is where slaves would live back in the day. Once it was made illegal to have slaves, owners started building these really narrow apartments and would tell people that their slaves were actually tenants. Pretty crazy! After the tour, I went and showed some of the family the big metal flower, and we walked around the market place. Only a few venders were there, but mostly everybody was able to find some good stuff to buy.

I took the family to Antares, a bar/restaurant where they brew their own beer. The food wasn’t the best, but the beer was wonderful, which everybody loved, so I was glad I found that place. I also introduced Argentine ice cream to the family, and of course everybody loved it, especially the banana split flavor, which is clearly superior to all the other flavors.

The next day, we had a half-day tour of Tigre and some of its suburbs. We had the same guide as the first day, so day two of touring was good as well.

Our hotel was in the business part of BA. We were walking around one day and noticed that there was an abnormal amount of paper on the ground (normally there is trash everywhere, but we were seeing a lot more than usual). Then we would see that the paper was falling from the sky. We were so confused, but we were told that the last day of the year that people work on, at the end of the day they throw paper out the window. It’s an interesting way of celebrating the New Year.

We had an unfortunate incident at our hotel though. Long story short, a maid stole $100 from Jason and almost stole my passport, along with all my credit cards and driver’s license. Jason and I had left our room for not even 5 minutes to go give something to my mom 3 floors down, so we had left our safe open, but figured since we were coming right back we would be fine. NOPE, we were wrong. We walked in on a maid in our room with the door closed. Since we surprised her, she had slid all of my stuff under the bed, near where she was kneeling on the ground. It sucks that Jason lost $100, but I’m really thankful that my passport and credit cards were found. Those are a lot harder to replace.

Our first trip outside of BA was to Patagonia, and oh my goodness, those few days in Patagonia were incredible! Our first day, we just walked around the town and relaxed.

That night the kiddies all went to a bar to celebrate the New Year. We didn’t stay in the bar till midnight, but stayed till about 10:30-11:00.

The bar was filled with people from all over the world, and whenever it was midnight in their home country they would celebrate. Kind of neat. We went back to our hotel, which had a really good view of the whole town, and drank some wine till midnight. Once it was midnight, there were fireworks going off for like an hour or so. It was so great. AND is was the first time Jason and I got to spend New Year’s Eve together, so that was really special ☺

The second day there, we went hiking on a glacier. It was unbelievable! The drive to the glacier was beautiful as well.

As we were riding in the bus, to get to our boat that was going to bring us to the glacier, our bus driver slowed down, put on some music and as soon as the glacier came into view for the first time the music was turned up and the climax of the song was playing. It was awesome and hilarious! The bus driver was smiling the whole time.

The next day, we went on an all day boat ride to check out various glaciers. Again, it was pretty cool! We saw a couple different glaciers and a bunch of big icebergs. And yes, there were Titanic references, naturally. I really recommend taking a trip down to Patagonia to see the glaciers. It’s so incredible!

After our Patagonia trip, we made our way to Iguazu. We flew from Patagonia, to BA, and then we were suppose to fly directly to Iguazu, but again we had another little hiccup along the way. Basically, the airline kicked us off the flight, even though we booked our tickets 4 months ago. They overbooked the flight, and gave our seats away without asking us. The told us they were putting us on another flight that landed in Posados, a town that was a 90-minute drive from Iguazu. They said they would provide the cars for us to pick us up at the airport and drive us. Obviously none of us were too happy with this, but there was nothing we could do about it. We get to the airport in Posados, get in our cars, and find out that the trip is nowhere close to 90 minutes, but 5 hours…and yet another lovely Argentine surprise.

The next day we had an all day tour of the falls. Incredible! Jason could not have said it better, “That’s a lot of water.” Haha a wonderful and true observation! It was pretty amazing.

At the end of it, all the kiddies went for a boat ride to get soaked by the falls. It felt great!

The boys soaked afterwards.

My sister and her husband went to Mendoza for two days, and the rest of us went back to BA. These next few days we all just kind of relaxed and all the couples did their own thing. My brother and Elizabeth went on a bike tour, my mom and dad went and bought malachite pieces, and Jason and I just enjoyed our last few days together (6-7 more months till we see each other again).

There were a few speed bumps along the way during this family vacation in Argentina, but overall it was a really great trip! I’m glad I got to show my family and Jason where I had been living the last 3 months, and it was truly amazing to see some of nature’s best work. I had so much fun seeing everyone, and was sad to see them leave. However, now I have a new chapter ahead of me, a six-month long adventure in Chile. Here I go!

Until Next Time,
Liz

Time to Reflect

Before I chat about my wonderful family vacation, I’m going to reflect on my time in Argentina. I know that I haven’t talk about my volunteering work that much in my blog, but this post is all about it and some of the things I learned about myself.

The past three months, volunteering in Argentina, were so great and very eye opening. I’m so glad that I was exposed to the things that I saw. The kids were so amazing and so cute! Each day at work was different. Some days were better than others, but for the most part I always had a great time at work. It’s kind of funny though because almost everyday I didn’t really want to go to work (because I was too tired, it was too hot, or for whatever reason), but I always ended up having a great time with the kids.

I worked at two different institutions, Los Angelitos (I worked there on Mondays and Wednesdays) and La Union (I worked there on Tuesdays and Thursdays). I loved going to both of the places. All the kids were wonderful and so cute. The girls at La Union drew me a bunch of different pictures, and some of them were pretty good. It was really cute, one day a girl came up to me and handed me a note and then left. The note said something like I had a wonderful heart and a beautiful soul and that she loved me with all of her heart. After I read that, my heart just sank. That was honestly the sweetest note; she was so cute about it too. I will definitely be holding on to that note! During my time in Argentina, I felt like I wasn’t really having an impact on the kids’ lives. I only saw the kids twice a week for two hours, hardly any time at all, but then when she surprised me with that note it made me feel like maybe the work I have been doing so far with the kids has made some sort of an impact on their lives (even if it’s small).

Every now and then I would go and work at the “hospital” location. It was really interesting to see the differences among the kids depending on where I worked. At Los Angelitos and La Union, the kids mostly came from Bolivian families, and at the hospital location the kids came from Argentine families. The kids at the hospital were crazier. I was told, and saw first hand, that Bolivian families raise their kids to be a little quieter, more polite, and they end up not being so crazy. The kids were great everywhere, it was just interesting to see the differences.

I really miss seeing all the little kiddies. I wish I could have communicated with them a little better than I did, but I was able to get by. It really saddens me that all these great kids have a really hard life ahead of them. They have so many things going against them and so many obstacles to overcome. It’s not fair at all that I have had such an “easy” life compared to the adversities these innocent kids will have to face. Life should not be easier for me because of the family I was born into, that is nothing I earned. I know that this is a reality of the world we live in, that life isn’t fair, but it’s part of the reason why I want to help troubled youth. Troubled youth need to have positive role models in their lives to help guide them to make good decisions, and I want to be a person in their lives who can help them with that, even if it’s in a small way.

Working in Argentina with the kids really made me appreciate my life. I have always known that I’m extremely lucky to have everything that I have, and I never take my life for granted, and it was really good for me to be reminded of that. I look back at things that I have complained about and all of them seem so petty. These kids have so much less than me, and yet they are so happy. I never heard them complain about anything, not even once. I really admired that about them. I think that something I really took from volunteering in Argentina is that there is always someone in a situation worse than mine, and that I just need to be thankful for whatever I have. When I am put in a situation that I’m not too happy with, I need to try harder to look at the positives rather than focusing on the negatives. It’s human nature to always want more, whatever “it” may be. For example, I really wanted a nice watch, and I remember really focusing on it and thinking ok that is going to be the last nice thing I get because after I get that, I won't want anything else. But then as soon I got my watch I moved on to wanting some other materialistic thing. My watch can be any number of things. The point is that once I get something that I have been striving for I immediately move on to something else I really want. Rarely do I reflect on the things I already have or realize that anything that I may have can be taken away from me in a heartbeat. I’m not saying I should never strive for more or a better life or a new goal, but I can’t forget to truly appreciate the things I already have. I feel really fortunate that I put myself in a situation that allows me to truly appreciate what I have and to enjoy life as it happens, in that moment. I think that is the biggest lesson I took out of my three months in BA. It’s really important to enjoy life in the present and to stop dwelling over the past and worrying about the future (I’ve said this before, but it’s important to say it again, to be reminded).

I met some really amazing people during my three months in Argentina. It was really neat to meet everyone so far out of his/her element. We all came to BA alone to volunteer, to teach, or have an internship. Some of us could speak Spanish really well and some of us were just starting to learn Spanish. I think when anyone is put in that kind of situation (live in a foreign country where they speak a different language), you can’t help but learn a lot about yourself. Before coming to BA, I had never explored a big city by myself. I have never really done anything by myself. I think the last thing I did kind of by myself was leave the South and go to school out in Colorado (even then I knew someone from my high school). That’s not even that big of a deal though because going to college is a big step in a lot of people’s lives. But anyways, my first weekend in BA I was pretty much alone (I wasn’t going to meet any of the other people till Tuesday), so I had to explore by myself (I wasn’t going to sit inside, alone, my first weekend in BA!). That was a big moment in my life, as small as it was. It was my first time really relying on a map and exploring a city by myself. And I didn’t get lost once!

I really enjoyed my time volunteering in BA, exploring a new city and country, learning a new language, and meeting new people. I never had a dull moment while in Argentina. I’m so excited for my next chapter in my South American adventures!

Until Next Time,
Liz