He's cute AND domestic

Who doesn't like a guy who helps out around the house?

He helps with the laundry...


He helps make the bed...



He helps me pack...



He helps take clean the bunny's cage (he gets the hard to reach places)...

He even helps take care of the bunny...



And last but not least, he cleans the tub (although maybe he should use more water pressure, and focus more on cleaning than on drinking the water...).

Thanks, Charlie!

FRUSTRATION

I think I have a lot of pet peeves. I try not to manifest or complain about them a lot, because usually they have to do with the way other people act and how that differs from they way I think they should act. I don't want to come off as a Judgy McJudgerson because, guess what?, judgmental people are one of my pet peeves. It's a paradox that I have to live with.

Anyway, I reserve the right to complain on this blog, so I'd just like to share a few of my main pet peeves that I happened to experience today.

File this one under: Things That Don't Make Sense

A little background. Here in Chile, when you want to cash a check, you can go to any bank that issued that check, and with the proper ID, they give you cash. In the case of having a check from Banco de Chile, BCI or Banco Security (and maybe a couple others I'm forgetting) you can cash them at ServiPag, which is a place you can go and pay all of your bills. Instead of trapising around Santiago and going to the electricity company, phone company, cable company, etc., you can just go to ServiPag.

Anyway, so the issue here is the definition of proper ID. In the past, B.C. (Before Carné, the Chilean ID card) I used to go to Banco Santander, and with my passport, cash my checks from the Institute. Then I got my carné, and did the same thing, but with my carné. Then I got direct deposit and a bank account and my life got way easier. However, I still have private students that pay me with checks, but I occasionally have to cash a check, usually at ServiPag, using my carné. In May, my carné expired. I still cashed checks after that. One time I used my passport. One time I used my expired carné. However, my visa is finally ready and therefor now I can renew my carné. Today I went and did the trifecta: got my visa, registered it, and went to renew my carné, all in one day, which is quite a feat. However, your carné takes about two weeks to be ready. In the meantime they give you a peice of paper, called a comprobante, which (according to the Registro Civil) serves as your carné for the two weeks you are waiting.

So today I went to cash a check at ServiPag. I had three forms of ID: my old, expired carné, my passport and my comprobante. I asked the lady which form of ID she preferred. She promptly told me that none of them worked. This doesn't make sense, because:
1. I've cashed checks before, both with my passport and expired carné, though maybe the time I used my expired carné the person didn't notice it was expired. And...
2. How is anyone supposed to be able to cash checks if their carné isn't ready yet?? I asked the woman. She said it was impossible, unless the check is "left open". (This is another crazy thing about checks in Chile. Unless you cross out the words "o al portador" or draw some sort of fancy lines on the check, it's basically like writing a blank check).

I tried to explain to her how all of this doesn't make any sense. I'm sure a lot of Chileans can't afford to go two weeks without cashing a check, but I realized it wasn't her fault that this silly rule exists (if it even does, I'm half convinced she was mistaken). In the end, she cashed the check, but in her name instead of mine. I got the money. However, in the process, she committed the second carinal sin in the Bible of Abby.

Acá in Chile...

"Here in Chile," the ServiPag lady told me, "We use our passports to travel, not to cash checks."

GAHHHH! There is nothing I hate more than being treated like I'm a tourist, or like I don't know how things work. Granted, there are times I don't know how things work, and I'm actually very self-concious about this. I like to know the system. And due to my powers of observation, I actually can figure things out pretty quickly.

But this ServiPag lady was out to get me. First, the not making sense, then the telling me how things are. I mean seriously, did she think I didn't know that we use passports to travel? DUH.

Which leads into point number three...

Trying to cheat the system

I understand that there are people who honestly don't know how something works. For example, getting a visa or doing some other sort of errand at Extranjeria can be quite confusing at times. However, there are pretty clear instructions prominently posted. For example, on the third floor, it says that everyone must have a passport. If you don't have a passport in your hand, they won't give you a number. In addition to the posted signs, there was even a man telling us that this morning. Yet, despite this, the guy in front of me presented his carné and proceeded to argue with the man giving out numbers when he refused to give him one.

Then, after you get a number, you go and wait for your number to be called. Taking a number happens a lot in Chile, from Extranjeria to the pharmacy. However, in the time I was waiting (which wasn't long, I was number 9), THREE people marched up to the desk WAY before their numbers were called.

Then, speaking of pharmacies, I went to a pharmacy this afternoon to buy some hand cream. At the pharmacies, you can only pick out certain items yourself, namly non-medical items such as shampoo, toothpaste or hand cream. If you need Tylenol or ibuprophen or a prescription, you have to take a number and ask the pharmacist for it. When you go to pay for your hand cream, or other purchases that you picked out yourself, you also have to take a number to pay. Today, I had 89. They were on 86. So I waited patiently until they got to 89. Just as I was about to walk up to the counter, an old lady barges ahead of me and goes, "I have 90! I have number 90!" I calmly said, "Excuse me, ma'am, but I have 89." But she didn't budge. I told the pharmacist I had 89. The pharmacist politely asked her to move out of the way. She repeated "But I have 90!"

Then I ripped my hair out and banged my head against the nearest display case.

Well, not really. Finally she moved when the other pharmacist called her number.

Then, I swear, not five minutes later, I went to Castaño, where you don't have to take a number, but you do have to wait in line to pay for your items. I was paying when another old lady came into the store and marched right up to the cash register where the cashier was getting me my change. "I want two boxes of sopaipillas," the woman announced, and planted herself firmly in front of me, practically on top of my purchases. "I'll be right with you, ma'am," the cashier told her as she finished getting my change. Then the woman sighed and started tapping the box of sopaipillas against the counter. And when I said "permiso" to try to squeeze by her, she moved approximately 1/2 centimeter.

Anyway, I probably should just chill out and not let these things bother me so much. However, when they happen one after the other all day long, it's hard for me to ignore.

Little Boxes

I love the show "Weeds". I first started watching it a long time ago when it first premiered at a friend's house. But because I didn't have Showtime at my house and this was before I knew how to download things from the internet, I didn't watch more than the first three episodes. Anyway, so I recently started watching again. The opening song for the first three seasons is Little Boxes by Malvina Reynolds. During seasons 2 and 3 a different artist or band sings the song for every episode.

When our family first got a computer circa 1996, in addition to coming in a cow-spotted box (do Gateway computers still exist?), it came with a CD-ROM called "Music 1997" or something like that. It was this program where you could watch music videos and listen to music from the entire century, in addition to read about different artists and bands. I loved it. One of the music videos was this:



Anyway, ever since 1996, I've loved this song. It's such a simple little song with such a powerful message.

So I posted some lyrics from the song on Facebook the other day and Leigh posted this video, which is a Chilean version sung by Victor Jara.



Here are the lyrics:

Las casitas del barrio alto (The little houses of the rich neighborhood)
con rejas y antejardín, (With fences and front gardens)
una preciosa entrada de autos (A beautiful driveway)
esperando un Peugeot. (Waiting for a Peugeot)

Hay rosadas, verdecitas, (There are pink ones, little green ones)
blanquitas y celestitas, (little white ones and little light blue ones)
las casitas del barrio alto (the houses of the rich neighborhood)
todas hechas con recipol. (are all made with recipol)

Y las gentes de las casitas (And the people in the houses)
se sonríen y se visitan. (Smile and visit each other)
Van juntitos al supermarket (They go together to the supermarket)
y todos tienen un televisor. (And they all have a TV)

Hay dentistas, comerciantes, (There are dentists, businessmen)
latifundistas y traficantes, (Landowners and traffickers)
abogados y rentistas (lawyers and bondholders)
y todos visten polycron. (and they all dress with polycron)

Juegan bridge, toman martini-dry (They play bridge, drink martinis dry)
y los niños son rubiecitos (And their kids are blond)
y con otros rubiecitos (And with other little blond kids)
van juntitos al colegio high. (Go together to the high school)

Y el hijito de su papi (And daddy's little boy)
luego va a la universidad (then goes to the university)
comenzando su problemática (starting problems)
y la intríngulis social. (and social trickiness)

Fuma pitillos en Austin mini, (He smokes joints in his Austin mini)
juega con bombas y con política, (Plays with bombs and politics)
asesina generales, (He assassinates generals)
y es un gángster de la sedición. (and is a gangster of the sedition)

The song has to be understood in the context of the mid-late 1960s in Chile, hence the line "everyone has TVs," which seems silly now because literally EVERYONE does have TV in Chile now, not just the "barrio alto". I think it would be fun to re-write the lyrics for modern day Chile. I'm no poet, but I did think of a couple of verses (in English, but talking about Chile):

The apartments of Providencia
Las Condes and Vitacura
With conserje 24 hours a day
Sala de eventos and a swimming pool

And the people in the apartments
All went to La Catolica
Or La Chile or Diego Portales
And if stupid to Santo Tomas

There's a doctor and a lawyer,
commercial engineers,
an industrial engineer, a bio engineer
and a chemical engineer

Haha. I crack myself up.

By the way, I hope no one gets offended! For the record, I live in an apartment in Providencia with a conserje 24 hours a day and studied for a semester at La Catolica, so really I'm making fun of myself.

Happy Birthday Chi-Wi!!

If you were to ask me who I want to be when I grow up, I'd probably say: my sister. She's got it together in so many ways that I wish I did. She knew exactly what she wanted to be when she entered college, got a degree in that field, and now, come August, will start working at exactly that. She just rented an awesome apartment with her boyfriend (who is also really cool). She's kind, generous, funny and gives the best hugs. Her laugh is contagious. She's an artist, an athlete and a great friend.

And, today is her 22nd birthday!

Happy Birthday, Cha. I love you so much and am so proud of you!

Can you tell I'm stressed?

Despite just having a three day weekend, I'm crazy with work. In anticipation of this week, my self-conscious was at work last night telling me ALL about it. I had five or six dreams, all of which featured one or more of my past or current pets (even the bunny made an appearance) and in every dream, I was forgetting something super important about this pet. In one dream, I forgot to feed my horse Nutmeg. In another, I forgot that I had locked the bunny in the bathroom, and taken the key with me to visit my parents, so no one could open the door to feed him. Then I had two versions of the same dream. In both I was going to visit my parents (who happened to live only two hours away by car, miracle!). In the first one, I forgot to bring Charlie with me. In the second one, I brought him with me, but left him in the car. Then I had a dream that I was on the farm, and Ruby was in a parked pickup truck. I went to say hi to her through the window and the pickup truck started moving and rolled and crashed into a fence. I forgot to open the door to let her out, but I don't think she was hurt.

Okay, and here's the weirdest one. In one dream I FORGOT I HAD GIVEN BIRTH TO A CHILD. Yes, that's right. I had a kid, then forgot. Again, I was going to visit my parents (another reoccurring theme last night) and in the middle of driving there, I remembered that I had forgotten my baby. No, not just had forgotten to bring him/her along (well, that too), but had forgotten I had even given birth. It was so bizarre.

Needless to say I've been super careful all day that I haven't forgotten anything.

Datos

Something I've noticed about Chileans is how they looooooove their datos. Literally, data, or information, un dato is basically a referal. For example, if you need to go to the dentist, you can ask someone if they have a dato about a good dentist. This goes for anything, literally. From where to get a good cup of coffee to what colegio to send your kids too. If you don't believe me, you should come listen to the teacher's lounge at the Institute some night around 6:30pm, right before evening classes start. Datos fly through the room, from where to buy cute baby clothes to good websites to use for class.

Yesterday my new boss and I ordered sushi. Of course we asked L., who works in the office across the hall, for the menu of the sushi place she had ordered from yesterday. No way could we order from just any sushi place, we had to have a dato first. It was a good dato, I have to admit!

It would be interesting to do some sort of market study (I'm looking at you, Andrea) to see how much business is generated through the passing of datos versus advertising. I have a hunch that it might take awhile for businesses to get established here, because no one knows about them. It takes a few brave souls to venture in and vouch for the establishment before other people will check it out. Maybe (and I'm just guessing here) that is why foreign companies that have changed the names of businesses, like Home Depot, haven't succeeded because not enough people ventured in and vouched for them. Whereas everyone knows WalMart owns part of Lider, but I doubt Lider has suffered because of that.

Anyway, living here for as long as I have, I've totally jumped on the dato bandwagon. I love giving and recieving datos. Luckily, I'm also pretty adventurous so I like to check out new things and then start giving out the dato, like to a cute little café that I went to near the Starbucks on Ricardo Lyon (behind Paris) that has delicious lattes. A fellow teacher, who happens to be Chilean, is going on vacation to Montreál, and I happily gave her a few datos about things to do while she was there. She was tickled pink and eagerly wrote them all down. Another teacher, who is not Chilean, asked her why she was writing them down when she could easily look up things to do on the internet. She replied that it's better to do things that people know are good and fun, versus trusting a stranger's opinion.

So, got any good datos to share?

Phone Phobia

As part of my new job I occasionally have to make phone calls. I hate making phone calls. I always have. I think it all started when I was in second grade. For the first time, my mom made me call my friend to set up my play date. I dialed the wrong number, and instead of getting my friend's house, I got the local grocery store. I was so horrified that I just hung up the phone and didn't say anything.

I remember my parents used to make me call people just because I hated doing it, and they thought I would get over my fear by practicing. Calling my friends or family wasn't so bad, but calling people to ask for something was what I specifically hated. When I got Nutmeg, my horse, I had to call the vet and the blacksmith and the horse dentist (little known fact: horses' teeth have to be filed down about once a year because they wear down unevenly). I HATED calling these people, especially the blacksmith. It's funny, because I knew the blacksmith personally. He was my softball coach. He coached my sister's AAU basketball team. Nevertheless, I dreaded calling him, and hate to admit that I often let my horses' hooves get really long before I called him to come trim them.

So anyway, my hatred of calling people has diminished a bit as I've gotten older, but I still prefer email, especially when I have to deal in Spanish. I write better than I speak, and read better than I understand.

But alas, I have to call people now for my job. Today I had to call a Chilean organization to find out one of their employee's job description, because my boss needed to write him a letter. I first searched their website, but found nothing. Then I called their call center, and the woman gave me the number for their central offices. I called the central offices, and asked my question. The lady connected me someone else. I asked my question again. This lady connected me to another number that rang for about 3 minutes until it disconnected. So I tried again, and explained what happened. They connected me to the same people and the same phone line that led to no one. I did a different Google search and found another number for the employee in question. I decided to call him directly. The number didn't work.

I felt really bad because I wasn't able to finish the task that my boss asked me to do, because it was time to leave. I suppose I'll try calling again tomorrow.

How to Survive a Santiago Winter: 10 Useful Tips

Today is rainy and gray, the perfect day to talk about how to survive a Chilean winter.

1. Layers, layers, layers. Inside and outside I wear silk long johns and pants, a camista*, shirt and sweater. When I go outside, depending on the temperature (sometimes it doesn't vary much between the two) I'll add a winter jacket, scarf and hat. Also, thick socks that go up past your ankles are a godsend. Or, high boots that don't let the breeze in around your feet.

2. Hot beverages. Thanks to Eileen, I have a nice thermos that I carry around with me, filled with either herbal tea or hot chocolate. It's amazing. It keeps my beverage piping hot for hours, and normal hot all day long. Once I forgot it until the next day (I'm talking more than 24 hours since I had filled it) and the tea was still warm! Also, hot water boilers that are ever so popular here in Chile make boiling water a breeze.

3. Baking. I have a small enough apartment that turning on the oven heats practically the whole apartment. Since its silly to turn on the oven without making something, I tend to bake a lot during the winter. Yesterday I made macaroni and cheese and chocolate cupcakes. Yum!

4. Close the curtains, shut the doors. Try to trap what little heat their is in one part of your house by shutting doors. Also, I find shutting the curtains cozies things up and gets rid of unwanted drafts.

5. Adopt a street cat. There's nothing cozier than a sleeping kitty on your lap or cuddled near your feet at night.

6. Guatero or Scaldasonno. If you're allergic to cats, may I suggest a guatero (hot water bottle) or a scaldasonno (heated mattress pad)? There's nothing like getting into cold sheets. Just remember to shut off the scaldasonno before going to sleep!

7. Space heaters. My apartment technically has heat, but it's SUPER expensive. So, I have a space heater. It heats up a room pretty fast if I close all the doors. I use it sparingly since electricity is also expensive, but it saves me on the super frigid days.

8. Fingerless gloves. If you spend all day typing, these are nice to have.

9. You can stand under my umbrella... Except not. Haha. Buy your own outside any metro station when it's raining. It rains frequently during the winter, and an umbrella (paraguas) is indispensable. Yes, raincoats are nice, but I find an umbrella keeps me dryer. Also, tall boots are nice on rainy days so your pants don't get wet. OH! And stand back from the curb. Like, way back. Drivers are crazy in the rain and I swear that some of them TRY to soak pedestrians. Beware of this, because there's nothing worse than getting soaked by a disgusting puddle.

10. Down Comforters. I find that with my down comforter, I don't have to have 5000 blankets on my bed. I have a sheet, fleece blanket, down comforter and quilt. My bed is very cozy. The only drawback is that I rarely want to get out of bed in the morning...

I hope these tips help any newcomers to the Santiago winter! Stay warm.

*What's a camista, you may ask? I believe Eileen coined the phrase: panty-hose for your arms! They are shirts made of nylon or microfiber that go under your clothes. They are quite tight fitting, and I find they're better than long underwear shirts that often get stretched out and bunchy. You can buy them at places like Caffarena or Monarch.

Winter here vs Winter there

Winter is upon us here in the southern hemisphere. In Santiago, the Andes are snow-capped and look quite stunning when you can see them through the smog.

When people here from Vermont, they automatically make a comment about how cold it is there, and how much snow we get. They then inevitably say something about how I must be used to the cold because in Vermont it's so much worse.

Therefore, I've been analyzing whether that's really true. Overall, I'd say no. Don't get me wrong. Winter is rough in Vermont. In bad years, winter starts in October and ends at the end of April. Yes, six months of winter. It snows, and quite a lot. We have ice storms. Driving gets very tricky and even dangerous.

Some memories I have of being really cold include waiting for the bus in the winter (with wet hair, which then froze into icicles, and no, I didn't get pneumonia). Also, throughout my early teenage years I worked in the calf barn. Cows are creatures of habit, and therefore must be fed (and milked) at the same time every day. Every other weekend, I fed the calves. Their morning feeding was at 6:00am, so I had to wake up around 5:30am. In the winter, this was torture. The worst part was the fact I had to deal with milk, which is wet, making it hard to wear gloves.

I'm not exactly sure what month this was taken in, but I imagine either fall or spring because although I'm wearing a really attractive flannel quilted shirt (super warm!), I'm not wearing a hat or scarf, so it must not have been in the middle of winter.

But, despite having some memories of being extremely cold, the good thing about winter in Vermont (and other northerly places of the US) is central heating! So yes, you get really cold outside. It might be so cold that you can't breathe, but as soon as you go indoors, it's toasty warm. Also, winter can be fun in Vermont. Sledding, skating, skiing (if that's your thing), snowshoeing, etc. The snow, although cold, provides hours of entertainment.

In Santiago, on the other hand, the weather is much milder. The coldest I've seen it is around -2 degrees Celsius (about 28 degrees Fahrenheit). It barely snows, although it does rain. Winter lasts, at most, four months. Also, there's the veranito de San Juan (Saint John's little summer) which happens at the end of June/beginning of July which provides 4-5 days of warm weather. This year, it happened last week and temperatures got up to 22 degrees C (72 F).

However, the coldness that does occur is quite damp. It chills you to the bone. Then, you go home and you're so excited to be warm again....

Buy, no. Not likely. The vast majority of buildings in Chile do not have central heating. Chileans heat with estufas, either gas or electric. There are days when it's colder inside than it's outside.

Also, my life style here means that I'm outside a lot more. I don't have a car, so I take public transportation. The metro can be quite warm (body heat, yummm!), but micros often have faulty windows that don't close, and when it rains the seats get wet. Also, I walk a lot.

And because I don't ski and don't have a lot of money, there's no snow for me to play in.

All in all, during the three winters I've spent here in Santiago, I overall have more negative feelings about winter here than winter there, although I have to admit I'm a warm weather girl, so really, winter anywhere gets me down.

Coming soon: How to Survive a Winter in Santiago!

New Job Craziness

I love my new job so far. It has taken some adjustments, however.

My days are long. I leave my house at 9:00am, can sometimes return for an hour or so at lunch, then I'm out the door again until at least 9:00pm teaching private classes and classes at the Institute. That means by the time I get home, I don't have much energy for blogging. Luckily, one of my "classes" at the Institute is a substitute position, meaning sometimes I don't have to sub (like today) and I can get caught up on important things like blogging.

One of the biggest benefits of my job so far has been the fact that I speak Spanish all morning. Teaching English in Chile sometimes means that you spend too much time speaking English (professional hazzard) and then your Chilean friends tell you that your Spanish is suffering. However, I think this solid four hours a day of speaking only Spanish is really going to help me continue to improve my language skills.

Also, I get to write. I love writing. And I get to help people. I love helping people.

All in all, life is busy, but good. I'm sorry if posts are light for the next few weeks as I get used to my new schedule.

ETA: I know I said posting would be light then posted two things right in a row. The post on winter was one I'd been working on previously and just had to add the pictures and a few more things. So, enjoy!

Sneaky Hate Spiral

A few days ago, Emily posted a link to this wonderful blog, Hyperbole and a Half, which I have spent the whole morning reading. It's hilarious, and I feel like I can relate to a lot of the posts. One of them that really resonated with me was this one, entitled "Sneaky Hate Spiral". Go read it, then come back. Like Emily said, if you don't come back, at least you've gone on to bigger and better blog reading.

So the Sneaky Hate Spiral. What a great way to put it. I remember one of the very first times this happened to me. I must have been really little, maybe four or five, because I still struggled with simple tasks like getting dressed. I don't remember the build-up, but I do remember the turning point. I was trying to put on a sock. When you're little, this is hard. The sock kept getting stuck on one of my toes, and when I finally got it on, it was on backwards. The little heel indent was on the top of my foot. In a murderous rage, I started screaming and clawing at my foot, trying to get the darn sock off. I finally did, and threw it across the room. I can't remember if my mom was already in the room or she came in right then, and I totally blamed it on her for buying me defective socks.

Now, the most recent Sneaky Hate Spiral. Unfortunately a side effect of living in Santiago is the propensity to cause Sneaky Hate Spirals. So, the build up. Charlie doesn't let me sleep very well sometimes. Usually, when I'm gone all day and don't have time to play with him, he thinks 3am is the perfect time to wake me up by jumping on my face. So that night, I hadn't slept very well. I woke up grumpy. As I went to leave, my door wouldn't open. This has happened very frequently since the earthquake when the door jamb shifted. Usually yanking on it with two hands does the trick. Not this time. I had to set down my bag, take off my rings and put all my weight on the door, practically hanging off of the door knob. Finally, the door burst open and I found myself sitting on my floor. Gah.


Then, I left my house and got on the metro. Have you ever noticed how people eat things here? It's different. Say for example, you have a Negrita, which is a small chocolate covered cookie (see above). I would eat a Negrita in 3-4 bites. Chomp. Chomp. Chomp. Chomp. There, done and finished. Delicious. Not so much Chileans. If Chileans eat a Negrita, it's more like nibblenibblenibblenibblenibblenibble. Pauuuuuuuuse. nibblenibblenibblenibble. Pauuuuuuuuuse. Rinse and repeat. It takes them FOREVER to eat a stupid Negrita. So anyway, standing right next to me on the metro was a nibbling Negrita-eating woman. She got halfway done her Negrita and her phone rang. She had some annoying conversation and then proceed to say "Ya, chao" approximately TWENTY FIVE TIMES! Well, I started counting after she had said it probably 10 times and I got up to 15. If you're going to say "Ya, chao" THAT MANY TIMES, why not just HANG UP? Seriously.

So anyway, I got off the metro and proceeded to have my class with the Brazilians where this happened. Then it started raining and I got soaked. I went to class in the afternoon/evening and multiple annoying things happened which I will not detail here, because it's work and I should really try not to talk about work here. I'm already treading a fine line talking about the Brazilians so much.

Then I got home and was so exhausted and frustrated that I just collapsed on the couch. F. called me just to say hi and poor thing, something he said hit me the wrong way and I started yelling and crying at him. It was a conversation that we have had thousands if not millions of times, and something we really shouldn't keep talking about, but it came up and he got the brunt of my Sneaky Hate Spiral.

I've already apologized to him in person, but F., consider this a public apology for my shitty behavior. Thanks for being a great friend and putting up with me despite everything!

A little bit hurt...

I've been thinking a lot about weddings lately. No, I don't have any prospects, and for all I know I'll never get married (you know, it takes two people to do that kind of thing, and for now I'm only one). However, my host brother is getting married tomorrow and so I started thinking about who I would invite to my very hypothetical wedding.

Of course I imagined who I would invite if I got married here in Chile, then I imagined about who I would invited if I got married in the US. Then I imagined who I would invite if all of my friends and family were millionaires and could travel wherever. It's a daydream, I'm allowed to do that kind of thing.

But, back to the Chile wedding fantasy. If I got married here, I would definitely invite my host brother and his soon-to-be wife. Out of everyone in my host family, I'm probably the least close with him, but I still consider him to be family in many ways.

So here's the catch. I wasn't invited to his wedding. I went to my host sister's wedding when I wasn't even living here. I was here visiting for January of my senior year of college, and she happened to be getting married then, and she invited me and I went. She even sent me an invitation in the U.S. For this reason, and because I've been told by my host parents and especially host mom that they consider me family, I thought I'd be invited to his wedding. Also, I thought I'd be invited because his fiance sent me her codigo de novias, which is a code you can give at the major department stores here so that the couple gets points towards a hotel stay.* I even used the codiga de novias a couple of times. Plus, here in Chile, weddings are known to be GIGANTIC. You invite everyone you've ever talked to plus their uncle. Oh, and not to mention that every time I've visited my host family in the past five months all the talk has been about the wedding. How could they talk about it in front of me and not invite me?

At first I didn't really feel bad about it, but now that the big day is tomorrow, I'm feeling kind of sad and rejected. At first I rationalized that it was maybe going to be a small wedding, so that's why. But it's not a small wedding. I'm friends with a lot of my host brother's friends who will all be going, many of whom probably assume I'll be there. In fact, I owe one of them some money and we were trying to arrange how I could pay him back. He told me I could give it to him tomorrow at the wedding. I had to tell him that I wasn't invited and it all kind of hit me.

So anyway, I'm trying really hard to not have this affect me very much. I still love my host family and I won't hold it against them, but it stings. I also don't feel comfortable bringing it up with them, so I'll never know why.


*To be completely honest, I'm not exactly sure what the etiquette on this is. Maybe in Chile it's considered acceptable to give your codigo de novias to people you aren't inviting to your wedding. However, I feel like it's similar to giving someone in the US your bridal registry then not inviting them to the wedding.

A couple of things

First, and most importantly, Happy Anniversary to my lovely parents! They celebrate 27 years of marriage today. I love you both so much.

Secondly, I'm about-to-jump-out-of-my-pants happy because I have a new job! No details here, unfortunately, for obvious reasons. It's only part time, so I'll still be teaching at the Institute, but I'm excited for the possibilites this opportunity brings for my professional development. It's a career opportunity, whereas I knew teaching English was only a job. That's not to say that I didn't like teaching. I absolutely do. That's why I'm glad I'll be able to do both for now. However, I know that I can't teach English (at least here in Chile) for the rest of my life. The schedule is just too draining.

Thirdly...hmm...I'm not sure there was a thirdly. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Happy 4th to all of you from the US. Is anyone doing anything fun to celebrate?

I used to...

Today was an "I used to..." day in one of my classes, which got me thinking about a lot of things. When I was recently in the US, I had to go through boxes of my "keepsakes" because my parents are probably going to sell the house and they (understandably) didn't want to move multiple boxes filled with my spelling tests from 1st to 6th grade. I used to be a pack rat and I saved EVERYTHING. Yes, I'm talking notebooks with notes on Greek history from 10th grade, art projects that probably no one but my mother would classify as "art", every single birthday card I've ever received (I still saved those), a Rubbermaid tub FULL of beanie babies (remember those?) and everything in between.

So anyway, going through these boxes were like a glimpse into my past. Here's my version of an exercise that I often do with my students.

• I used to be good at calculus. Now, I need a calculator do figure out my students' grades.
• I used to know how to improvise over a set of jazz chord changes on my saxophone. Now, if I'm lucky, I can play a few chords of the guitar.
• I used to record songs I liked from the radio onto cassette tapes. Now I download music onto my iPod.
• I used to write childrens' stories in Spanish. Now I speak Spanish every day.
• I used to take the bus to school. Now I take the bus to work.
• I used to muck out my horse's stall. Now I scoop out Charlie's litter box.
• I used to be the secretary of my 4-H club. Now I'm very thankful that I'm not a secretary at my place of work.
  
• I used to learn how to conjugate verbs in Spanish: soy, eres, es, somos, son. Now I endlessly remind students not to forget the "s" at the end of verbs in the third person singular.
• I used to scrounge up enough change to put a gallon of gas into my car. Now I scrounge up enough change to buy a metro ticket.
  
• I used to play field hockey. Now I watch soccer on TV.
  
• I used to write in my journal. Then, I used to write in my Xanga. Then, I used to write in my Livejournal. Now, I have a blog.