french toast!

this morning i made french toast for the vergara family. they dug it. tried to explain maple syrup, but i think they were a little baffled by the tree part. (it does sound kind of primitive, if you think about it.) so guess what i used for syrup instead.....manjar!! i put some manjar (which comes in a consistency of like peanut butter) and milk in a pan and heated it and stirred it until it became a sauce. put it in a little pitcher and they loved it. (of course also bought some "azucar flor" - powdered sugar - to sprinkle on top.) i think it was a success! we also had yogurt - which is really runny down here; they treat it more like a drink - with banana slices. later today bea was like "from now on every weekend we will have french toast!" haha. little do they know i'll be sending them some maple syrup after i leave for christmas :)
then i went to chillan with kelsey. spent a lot of money....got a lot of neat stuff :)
am really excited to come home. can't believe i only have 2 days left.

President Hopkins

President Hopkins presented diplomas to the 3 of us who graduated this past weekend, since they weren't able to attend the actual ceremony.

Thanksgiving Dance

This year was by far the weirdest Thanksgiving I've ever had. It was pretty cool though! The President of Wright State, David Hopkins, was in South America with the Vice President of International Education, whose name I forget right now. So, for Thanksgiving, they came here to Concepcion, to tour the Thomas Jefferson School and have a nice lunch with us! It was awesome! The school was so excited about it too. All week my sister had been talking about how she needed to find her "corbata" (tie) for her uniform, because everyone had to wear their ties on Thursday. The first graders put on a presentation of pilgrims and stuff for us in the morning, and then at lunch the elementary choir came in and sang (Kelsey said it was in English - I couldn't tell), and then the coolest part was the high schoolers' dance. Several of the high schoolers dressed up in traditional Chilean dress to perform the Chilean national dance for us. Check it out! I also tried to zoom in a few times, in hopes that you could catch a glimpse of their mullets.

pic by the sea

me, carlitos, ignacia, and guaton yesterday

we caught the mullets!

success!
Today at school, Jessica and I ventured into the high school to find some of her students with mullets. The first one we found, he was really good-natured and funny and asked if we wanted him to go get some of his friends. Jackpot!! the boy went and returned with 2 other dudes, all with long hair in the back. We felt like a few apologies/explanations were in order, but when we told them that it used to be common in the United States, and no longer was, they laughed and smiled and proudly brushed their parties in the back. The first was like (in his english) "How do you call it, something like mullet?" and we were like "yes! that's the word!" to which they all laughed. So we took a picture straight on, but as the west virginia waterfalls didn't show up as well, we had them turn to the side for a second photo op. They were so cool about it.
One of the American guys who works at TJS, Jared, was listening to our conversation about the mullet hunt, and jumped in like, "yeah, I got my hair cut down here not too long ago, anddd...they asked me if i wanted to keep it long in the back. I was like, 'no.'" and they we all LOL'ed.

Chillin in Chillan

If it looks like this is a container of aloe vera-flavored yogurt, that's because it is. The convo went down a little something like this:
Jessica: My mom packed us some yogurt, you want?
Me: Sure.
(yogurt is exchanged)(Julie reads label with puzzlement)
Me: What is this?
Jessica: It's aloe yogurt. It's not bad!
Me: ...Can you eat it?
Jessica: Yeah! I mean at first, it's kinda like, 'Am I eating lotion?', but then it gets better. [end convo]
I mean, I've eaten worse. In Mexico we had "napales," which is cactus. I tricked myself into thinking it would taste like green beans, and it did not.
Anyway, the aloe yogurt was strangely fragrant, so it was a little bit like eating lotion. But not all bad.

I also died and went to heaven this weekend, as you can see by the picture at right. Yes, that is me inside of a giant guitar. We visited the museum of the pianist Claudio Arrau, and this was part of the "interactive room." Apparently Arrau is a very famous pianist. While he did not compose any music, he was famous for his amazing performances (of Beethoven, Handel, whatever it be.) He is from Chillan, Chile, which is the city we visited this weekend. Minus the long-winded guide, it was a worthwhile visit.
We also saw the famous "mercado" of Chillan,
where they sell all kinds of "artesania," which means arts, crafts, jewelry, etc. (janelle- i have the best gifts for you!)

Had to snap a photo of the Marley hat, as I'd just mentioned it in my last post. the marley hat is actually pretty common in Chile. my sister has one, i dunno.




Not really sure what the Escuela Mexico is, but it was pretty, and the Mexican in me is really aching for its home.

We also got to go out in the evening, the first time for me without professors. We were staying in Chillan with Nataly and her family (an actual student teacher at the school), so she took us out with her friends. We met up with some girls at a bar called "La Louvre" and then went to a dance club. Slightly awkward at first, but I ended up having a lot of fun. We also talked about music a lot. Jessica and I couldn't stop singing Backstreet Boys songs (especially "Everybody,"- remember the video with the Halloween costumes? yes you do.) and the Chilean girls thought it was hilarious and joined in. Here we are, 2 Americans and 5 Chileans, walking down the streets at night singing and dancing the Backstreet Boys, happy as could be. We've also been asked a decent amount if in the U.S., they listen to international music. And I'm always embarrassed to be like, "um, no..not really." Like, no one hardly knows what reggaeton even is, unless you've been to Mexico or have Mexican friends. But in Chile, they listen to American music as well as everything else, so it makes sense to them that the road would go both ways. Not really.

More random pics. check out the name of the middle one!!! (suizo means "swiss")

The bug is quite common in Chile.

At the "feria," which is basically where everyone brings their garage sale crap, and it's one giant garage sale. Only, like the people are serious. These are professional garage salers. It was kinda cool, except that everything was crappy.

am i in springfield?

k so i came really close to catching a mullet today. there were like 4 or 5 high school boys that all came out the front door of the school at the same time, ALL with mullets. i had my camera and everything. but i couldn't get a shot!!! i am kind of reminded of high school, when bored on friday nights, we'd drive down to springfield to go to meijer and see how many mullets we could find. fairborn kids, do you do this? or maybe you have a similar yet geographically appropriate thing to hunt? perhaps you go to yellow springs and count guys with bob marley hats? well that's neither here nor there.

have i mentioned the excessive amount of caramel spread they consume in chile? it's called "manjar," and it is on our table at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. i'm not really sure if i'm supposed to put it on my toast, or my lasagna, or what, but the kids freakin love it. my sister, ignacia, honestly handed me a spoon of it the first day i arrived. like, as soon as we got in the house. "te gusta manjar? conoces manjar? aqui, pruebalo." big fat spoon. i had to be like "mmm, good!" in mexico, similarly, they have what they call "cajeta," which is a caramel spread that my mexican family would offer to us, with cookies, after every meal. i dont know what the deal is. i mean it's tasty, but.. like does each country have its own version of caramel spread about which they are crazy? i want to know.

also, while i'm on food, allow me to say that the instant nescafe is not that bad here. my mexican family always had instant coffee, but i'd never try it. so when i returned to the u.s., i decided i'd give it a shot, and bought some instant coffee at meijer. it tasted mainly like gasoline, with an aftertaste of dirt. hence my strong aversion to instant coffee of any variety. i was unwilling to give it a try down here either until one of the girls, jenny, told me that it's not that bad. it actually tastes a little bit like coffee! i douse it with sugar or aspartame and i'm good to go.

and speaking of the aspartame- it comes in the funniest little package! do any of you remember smints? the tiny white mints that came in a flat package? (ben [heckman] if you're reading this, i know you do! i know exactly who you're thinking of right now too!! "would you like a smint?") like, their fake sugar comes in a package, smaller than a cigarette box, and you squeeze the side, and out poops a tiny little white tablet of aspartame! i am so amused by it every time.

ah, pardon the rambling, but speaking of cigarettes, my friend bought a package of cigarettes the other day half the size of the ones they sell in the u.s. they sell packs of just 10 down here! i don't know why they don't do that in the u.s. it'd be better for people trying to quit (ahem, smokers, you need to quit!) one time when i was working at udf, this guy was like, "hi, i'd like to buy one cigarette, please." haha. and then he had to buy a whole pack. the mini pack is smart! oh, and they also glue a disgusting picture of the most yellow, messed up teeth you've ever seen (dont worry ben i'm saving it so you can share with your dental class!), as well as these really morbid messages like "these kill you more and more by the day!!" and i'm like yipes, get that thing away from me! had to ask my friend if i could unglue the little pic tho and keep it, which i did.

looks like i'm running out of things to ramble about. carlitos and his little friend are watching "the incredibles" in spanish here in me & ignacia's room (they don't have a common tv. how weird is that.) it's pretty funny. leaving for the weekend tomorrow, so i better have some more comments by the time i get back!!!! (spanish III's, don't think i haven't noticed how poorly underrespresented you've been in my comments!!)