Trip to Chillán

Spent Thursday-Sunday with my 19-year-old host sister Vivi and her 3 friends at a cabin in a small town near Chillan, close to Concepcion where I was the previous weekend. We tried to go skiing, but a wreck (a "taco") blocked the road so there was a three-hour wait, which made it impossible. I barely caught the bus on the way there because we got to the station (they already with their tickets and me without mine) and the bus was already full. We made friends with a guy at the bus company and he managed to work my on at the last moment. So I had the pleasure of sitting in the seat that isn't really supposed to be sat in (I think). Leg room: 2 inches (my seat nearly touched the seat in front of me), so my legs sat in the isle. Seat back: at least 90 degrees with a head rest curling over me like a breaking wave. Location: 12 inches from the bathroom, which left just enough room to open the door and for the smells to mature as they wafted outward.

The bus on the way back was a collective near-disaster. Something happened with the car at the last minute so that two of our friends couldn't meet us at the station, so we didn't get on the bus. They finally arrived and we met them across the street (something happened with the police but I have no idea what) from the station. We waited on the sidewalk down the street from the station, hoping that the bus would pull out and turn our way. It did and we ran out in the street hailing with our tickets. They stopped.

I have also learned that "having a cell phone" doesn't mean anything. I have four now and I'm hoping that the one that worked today will work tomorrow (for the second day). My others either don't have a charge cord, don't get service, have a broken screen, or ring (or whatever) whenever and only whenever they wish.

Thought on learning a second language

It is much easier to understand when I am listening to a conversation rather than being directly addressed. Probably I don't notice how much I don't get when I'm only listening because it isn't so important that I catch all, but my comprehension still seems higher. It feels like my brain, when I'm being addressed, is having to carry out other functions as well, not just listen. It requires an intensity of attention, often embarrassment for some reason as well. And becoming embarrassed seems to be the best way to learn new things. My brain remembers information very well when they are attached to embarrassment and revelation of ignorance. Making a mistake is powerful.

My comprehension is much lower earlier in the day (or after I've just woken up) and improves as the day progresses. At night it's decent. Maybe because my brain is still switching back to English while I sleep? I have dreamed in Spanish one night and I suspect that as that increases this phenomenon will dissipate.

It is easier to just say that you understand sometimes even when you don't.

People talk about you in third person when they don't think you can understand. Often that's when you actually understand what they are saying because they use your name to refer to you and it triggers your attention. There is a very fine line between being talked to and being talked about because both are often happening simultaneously.

It is much easier to understand someone when they use your name at the beginning of the sentence instead of the end because it makes you pay attention. Attention is the main factor. If I really try, I can get it, but it takes too much effort to do so all time.

Switching is hard. Just now I was addressed by my host father (in Castellano of course). But because I had been typing in English, I replied to him in English. This happens every time I answer and email or write in English: My Spanish brain shrivels and it takes me a few moments to recover it.

I can't play with language in Spanish. Not (just) because my control of the language is inadequate, but because people just expect you to be using words incorrectly, not creatively.

I tend to repeat everything (and hence I am a Loro) because I often can't think fast enough to say anything else in response.

I am unable to say goodbye as I would like to because the situations come fast and I can't express emotion (gratitude) very well. Emotions are expressed very sensitively in language and I don't yet have the sensitivity in Spanish do so. It's always coarse or trite. When I get excited, at a basketball game for example, I accidentally shout things in English. Expletives are so much better in your mother tongue.

You have to surrender control because you often agree to all kinds of things you didn't intend. I have eaten so much food (and gone places) because of this.

Trip to Concepción y Talcahuano

On the road south to Concepción by bus.




From the roof of the house of José, Alfredo, René, and their mother Cecilia.


Out the window of my room in their house, where I stayed 3 nights. I love this window! Reminds me of a Salvador Dali painting of his sister.







José, Polín (my sister and José's girlfriend=polola), Alfredo, and René.


From the bus on the ride back, which took far longer than it should have. 5 hours there, 8 on the way back.

Concepcion y talcahuano

I am sitting in a desk chair in an attic staring at the computer screen and listening to the ocean wind knock against the windows. Seagulls pass across the computer screen as it reflects the sky behind me. It rained this morning and now the sky is patched with grey clouds and open blue.

On thursday, I took a five hour bus to Concepcion with my Poli`s (pollo`s), one of my sisters, boyfriend (pololo). He goes to university in santiago for architecture but his family lives down south and he visits them often. I am stayign with them - a 25 year old sister, 20 year old brother, mother (named cecilia, as is my host mom), and jose, who is 23. They are all really nice and entertaining and, again, more hospitable than I can handle without feeling a bit guilty. The house is amazing! depending on how you count it, it could be 6 stories. It´s basically one big stair case, which to me explains why jose is studying architecture. many small wooden levels and twisting stairs and little doors that lead to other rooms and sort of other leves as well. each room is at a different level in fact. And it sits on top of a hill, of san francisco-esque steepness, looking over the port of talcahuano. There are swarms of seagulls and in the evening, if the wind is right or you are driving, you cant escape the smell of fish being processed. its very powerful, heavy, and you can almost feel the salt particles in your nose. its very windy too so the seagulls can pretty much pull up a chair, plop down, and stay aloft until the smell of sea creatures draws them to the water.

yesterday we went to quillon, about an hour and a half drive through forested hills. Actually its somewhat similar to what ive seen in vancouver where on one side of the road you can see pristine forest. out the other window are bald bounding hills. a paper factory owns a large portion of this forest, which is the largest in all chile. you can see it billowing smoke from a distance because no trees remain to hide its menacing stacks. they call the factory infierno - hell. we went to a camp ground that an uncle owns near a lagune. Jose was working to construct a new building out there, applying his fancy architecture computer programs to the project. alfredo, the 20 year old, and i hung out most of the day. he is really into capoeira so he taught me all about it. i am now invincible.

of course, a ton of food and i told everyone that i would never eat again but ive already had to recant. the stand out dish was a cazuela, which is a great brothy soup wit chicken and potatoe and cilantro. its definitely one of the national dishes, and i was reading that it is especially so because it blends spanish and indigenous elements. food and language both especially seem to separate classes. we identify with them very strongly and an almost constant basis, repeat repeat repeat until you dont notice them until theyre not there. everyone ive eaten with here so far eats really fast! i cant keep up. and a ton of sugar. i really like onces, which is tea snack time around 6 in the evening. they eat these flat frisbee shaped white bread rolls and yesterday in the country they made them in a little brick oven outside. really good when hot! sometimes i don´t know what im eating, which is highly amusing for everyone. in buenos aires i had a dish that many cultures make but that i hadn´t ever had. i didn´t know what it was so it was pretty good. dried blood. and yesterday i was afraid to eat this jelly looking stuff called membrilla because the cognate would be something like membrane. but i found out that its just a marmelade and that membrilla is a lemon like fruit. its now my favorite bread topping. they also eat palta, avocado, on everything. i was already really full before writing and now im about bursting. i hope the airline doesnt mind that on my return flight im going to weigh 25 pounds more.

Photos from 7/9-7/12

Ahh Buenos Aires. I think this is San Telmo. Very pretty, streets of warn stone and a skyline of spires.


Ahh the classic Buenos Aires tourist experience: a tango show. Que sexy! I love the music. That is one thing that I've missed already about BA is the bandoneon. We also some frighteningly impressive folklorico that involves spinning ropes with hardened leather on the ends to smack against the floor, sounding like a tap dancer with four feet.


A really cool bookstore that used to be a theatre.


Buildings constructed by immigrants who had nothing but the material from their ships. SO they used that.

The rest are pictures of the customs office when entering Chile. Now I can't complain about my commute. So beautiful. And that road, like taffy draped over the mountain side.

Arrived in Santiago today around 13.00 after 20 hours on the bus from Buenos Aires. I am used to the Greyhound between Houston and Austin, and if that name is an apt title for the bus line (which, speedwise, it isn’t, though boney-ness wise it is), then the South American buses are poodles (in all their glorious plushness). It was great! I sat across the isle from a man and his 85-year-old mother traveling to their rural home in Southern Chile. We talked off and on the whole ride, the man and I anyway. His mother I couldn’t understand for the life of me. She kept telling me how to concoct traditional remedies with lemon and a bunch of other fruits and herbs I’ve never heard of in order to combat la gripe porcina (swine flu). The man kept telling his mother, He’s not going to understand what you are talking about. He’s not from here. But that only seemed to invigorate the sign language she used to describe the mysterious fruits.

We stopped for half an hour in Mendoza so they could clean the bus, and I talked with the Brazilian guy I had met earlier on the bus. After he left, a bystander noticed a wallet sitting on the bench next to me. He picked it up. But instead of running off with it, he began to look through it and ask people if it was theirs. Everyone said that it wasn’t, and gathered around, forming a small circle of concern trying to determine the owner. Just as they were calling the number, the brasileno rushed up, grabbed his wallet, and breathed for the first time in several minutes. I wonder if anyone has ever pulled that stunt twice. I suppose wallets don’t interest many people at 5 in the morning.

And the Andes! What a fantastic way to enter a country, snaking down the switchbacks of snow-streaked, slate black mountains. We spent an hour standing in the early-morning cold in the customs shack atop the range and watched as the officials strew the belongings of Grandma herbalist across a table. Her bag was full of edible gifts from her family in BA, cheeses and fruits. It was so sad! But finally they let her go. I think she was cursing them on the bus afterwards, but I’m not actually sure what she was saying.

My new project: When ever anyone asks me, Where are you from, I say, Guess. Then I let them reel off countries until they pick a satisfying one. Today I am from Brazil (not Russia, his first guess), and Australia. I will be completely satisfied the day I am of Spanish-speaking origin.

I am staying at a hostel, which is nice, but crawling with United Statesians (one must remember not to say Americans, because that is imperialistic hubris; we are all Americans) and reeking of English. My Spanish is good enough in one-on-one casual conversation, but going to an asado (a family gathering and grilling of national pride in both Argentina and Chile) yesterday at Veronica’s family’s house reminded me that conversation in a crowd is another world. My Spanish is impotent in crowds, when speaking with someone who is eating or excited, when faced with slang (and probably with Chileans my own age, yet to be tested to any great extent).

Tomorrow: go to class and move in with the family.

9July2009 BuenosAires

Arrived Buenos Aires at 11.00 and bubmled my way throug the airport and cab to Veronica´s apartment, where I will stay for the next two days. She and her husband Greg are great, very hospitable and entertaining. The cultural and failed communication, translation jokes never fail. He works for an online marketing advertising company so he works all day at home. She is not working so she can show me around and she is a really good host and tour guide. The city is so beautiful. So many parks! and open spaces and expansive avenues. She thinks it´s really cold, but it isn´t that cold.

Today was a national holiday, independence day in fact, which sounded like a big deal to me, though apparently it´s not (there´s one every month), so the streets were basically vacant. It´s really beautiful and clear blue skies.

Food. By the time I hit the bus on Saturday I ought to have amassed a pretty impressive meal to time ratio. I have twelve things I have to eat in the next day and a half. Today Choripan, a sausage in bread with spices. Chocolate, a really nice thick hot chocolate. They were all out of churros so try those later. Croissant pastries. Vino tinto.¨

We went and saw a tango (sexy is redundant) show tonight. I love the music, especially the bandoneon (accordeon), so agressive and haunting. The four instruments, bandoneon bass piano and violin, mesh completely forming one sound. It´s great, one of those musics that really grabs you when you hear it live, amplified, and reverberating between the stage and your body. The folklorico dance that followed was just plain impressive. A combination of tap dancing and swinging strings with hardened pieces of leather at the ends so that they clap against the stage in concert with the shoes.

And homeless children. There are many homeless drunk guys around UT that actually have food and basic needs met, easy enough to shrug off and continue with a typical complacent day. But there aren´t any homeless 7 year olds. (no dashes on this computer.) What do you do? It grabs you and strips you of your pride, your measure of your relative social standing, and your petty frustrations. And you go on.

Oh yes, and a tidbit that any Texan would appreciate. I was talking with the porter at the airport today (hoping to convince myself that my spanish is functional) and he asked me where I am from. I said, from Texas, the United States. He replied, quite eloquently to the ears of a Texan, Oh Texas, that´s in between the US and Mexico, right? If he was fishing for a tip, he caught a whale.