Diezyocho

Diezyocho…the 18th of Sep…Chile’s independence day. It is always a pretty interesting time, the weather is nice, it involves several days off from work, and this year the government even passed an extra day, meaning a five day weekend.

Around the first of September the rawraw starts, one can feel it in the air and see it in the amount of flags that all of a sudden go on display. Fondas, an area with plenty of bbq, some dancing maybe, drinks pop up all over the place.

These are days that one thinks of the country, or campo, even in the city they bring in farm animals to some of the fondas to give you that country feel in the middle of suburbia.

This year I was stuck in Santiago as I had to work two out of the three days that were off. It meant that it lacked some of the excitement that took hold of a lot of the people around me. It was the first year that I stayed in the capital for the holiday, so I went with Caro to her mother’s house, where a whole bunch of her mother’s family showed up to have a little mini fonda…



I wonder how many pounds people put on during the holiday...meat is in no short supply


Caro and her aunt.

Great aunt of Carolina.


Caro's mother.
Bailando cueca.
Homemade empandadas.

Pomaire

Its not very far away from Santiago, just about an hour on a flat nicely paved highway with tolls.

Pomaire it’s called, a place of around 10,000 nestled in low lying hills between the Andes and the coastal region of Chile. Its claim to fame is a style of pottery marked by its dark tones and earthy appearance. While there are some artists who choose to paint their work, most has a very raw feel to it. It is for all practical purposes raw mud.

The town itself has a very held together by spit and sawdust feel to it. There are no posts that are straight in this town, there are no signs that clean, and the houses all look a bit old, with lots of dust surrounding them, giving the place a very simple but intriguing feel to it.

Of course on the long weekend surrounding Chile’s independence day of September 18, everything is a bit different……

Just a few pictures from the stay in Key Largo....

Alberto what were you thinking?

So have you heard of Alberto Fujimori? The ex-President of Peru, he stands accused of several human rights violations in the land that he once ruled, excesses of power during his 10-year rule that ended in 2000 with him fleeing to his ancestral land of Japan.

BUT HE CAME BACK!

Despite the risk of falling in the hands of Peruvian authorities he showed up in Chile in November 2005 and was detained by authorities here in Santiago. An expedition process was started soon after, and he now awaits the final word of a judge who has already received a report recommending his extradition.

The question remains, what did he have up his sleeve? He is not stupid, Fujimori had to have known that he could and would fall into the hands of Chilean authorities. So there is plenty of speculation and rumors surrounding this.

But just when it couldn’t get much stranger, a Japanese political party announces that he will be there candidate for the Japanese senate in an election to be held on July 29! Now, they are claiming “political persecution” against Fujimori from his political enemies in Lima.

What still is not clear however, is exactly what was on this guy’s mind when he thought leaving a sheltered exile in Japan to make another run for Peru! In the meantime, he is under house arrest in his country home, which is far nicer than my apartment.

Races, rides, and other madness....

One has their skills and their faults

I have an announcement to make to the world: I'm no skier. This past weekend I tried out my skill on the slopes of Cerro Colorado, located just outside of Santiago, it didn't go so well. Sort of like riding a bike with no breaks.

The place itself is very beautiful, and really feels like a different country. Some "fashionable" people up there, much cooler than I could ever be. It attracts a very elite crowd, which I think have, on average, spent more on their ski parka than I have spent in total on clothes in the last six months.
The view is one of the main attractions, you can see the smog of Santiago below, surrounded by snow capped peaks.

lunch

I stumbled upon this in one of Mexico City's largest park. It had a sort of pickled cactus, cilantro, onion, this cheese (is it goat cheese, I'm not sure) a bean paste as a base on a sort of grainy hard shell. Of course there was some of the salsa roja y salsa verde. I couldn't even finish the thing.

Drunken Dog Nap

Just a week ago I was in Mexico

28

So my 28th birthday has now passed, it was well celebrated with good food and better company, on a beautiful day at the base of Los Andes, well actually technically it wasn't the Andes yet, but at the base of a mountain.

To me 28 now means that it has been 10 years since I gained the right to smoke and be arrested. It has flown by, but then again I think about some of the places I have seen or done in those last ten years and it feels aweful long.

I suppose though, the bigger landmark is that it is only 2 years away (now a day less) from turning 30, and that makes me feel like an old man.

Long Time passed by

So its been a while now hasn't it....lots of days passed by unrecorded...hate to say that I haven't managed my daily ritual of updating and recording the events that pass me by so well...

El Pochoco

The vastness of the paved reallity

Urban life...opening doors worldwide.....coming soon to a forest near you

In the Mean Time

Just a sliver...

The sunset over the Pacific is always a spectacular sight. When it gets almost all the way down, until nothing but a sliver is left, you can watch it slowly slip away, you can see the earth move slowly, turning day into night.

Sunrise at the port

The trip from my apartment to my class room takes around 2 and a half to three hours. Going both directions twice a week can be a drag. I have to find things about it that make it all worth it, and in Valparaiso there are many. From eating fresh fish to arriving to a fresh sunrise early on a cold morning.

Justa Doggone Nap (Sola Unasiesta Cachorrondo)

While on a walk through the center of Santiago

I took a walk on Sunday through the city. Usually there are a lot of different things going on. On this occasion, the Catholic Church was putting together this display featuring sand, sawdust, leaves, flower pedals and other odd materials. It went on for several blocks, and each part was done by different high schools.

Relief

a good place to sit....

Sometimes we all need a quite place to sit back and contemplate the finer things in life...

Hungry?

Nothing like an old school RV selling some goodies on a Sunday afternoon...

Demanding change...

The momentum continues to increase for the high school students demanding changes to some of Chile's educational policies.

Mmmmm..

on the edge...

The whole process....

I went for a walk the other day through the woods and stumbled upon the rotting carcass of a dead horse. I ran past it as fast as I could, it was an image that stuck in my head....such a big animal, its eyes still open.





Continued on my way, and not two minutes after coming across the dead horse, I found myself facing a white, large, and very pregnant horse on the same trail....




The whole life process, in just a few steps....

The Feasters and the Feasted

Fuzzy Cabbage

Nestled between thorny cacti, and dry, almost desert plant life I found a soft, fuzzy little plant, the odd ball of the landscape...

Working next to the sea has its advantages...

I finished teaching my classes last wednesday, then headed over to a friend's new place. He has a house on a tall hill overlooking downtown Vina Del Mar, and at one point, a sliver of the pacific ocean.

some softer...

the place to be...

Some places are better than others...

Maybe this will become a regular ritual...

Maybe I can manage to discipline myself a bit better...ojala que si... but really, I'm going to have many more photos and captions up in the near future, this blog has been going for quite a while now. When I first arrived in Chile it was a bit of a travel blog, and although I feel that I am still traveling, seeing new places and all, there is a steady familiarity to Santiago now, especially here in Nunoa where I have been living for over a year. That along with an increased ability to speak Spanish has helped me feel more at home in a place so far away from my first home.

It is a bit crazy to live in another country one might say. No matter what kind of linguistic whiz you are (and I make no attempt to include myself in this category) no matter how adaptive you are, there will always be something that will feel different. I think that eventually you can feel at home however, but Santiago will always be a bit new and exciting, no matter what I get used to and bored of...