Las Penas

Living in Chile since March,

Today is my 7th month here in Chile.  I thought that my Spanish would be perfect and I would running around slinging Spanish around like I do English.  However, this is not the case.  My Spanish, I mean has been improved GREATLY since when I have arrived.  But I still get stuck with some phrases and words, that I don't know.  The Peruvians speak much better and slower, easier to understand.  Even the Argentinians sometimes sound like they are speaking a different language.  The Chileans, yes, have a very different way of speaking Spanish, it is very difficult to understand, the joke here is that the Chileans do not speak Spanish, but Chilean.  They also can sometimes turn into 'flaite' speakers of Chilean.  More or less like ghetto talk.  I can not understand 90% of what the say when they do this.  And it's not everyone, but when people get mad, or are on a rant, it sometimes comes out, oh and in the many jokes as well.  My speaking abilities are decent, but I need to be thinking in Spanish for at least 5 minutes to speak 'my version' of perfect Spanish, which is not making huge mistakes.  But the hardest part is trying to teach in English or speaking to a gringo in English and trying convert/change back over. Because I sometimes don't change the structure of the sentences.

Ok enough about Spanish. I have been living here for 7 months and it feels like 2.  I do miss everything gringo, and I want to go home for a bit, but I could stay here if I wanted to.  The biggest difference that I have is with the shopping, everything is tiny and the nightlife.  I seriously don't like dancing every weekend.  In fact, I could dance every weekend if it was American Pop.  I cannot however dance reggeton for two consecutive weekends, unless there is a very attractive girl or I am hamboned... eh to more important subjects. Two things have occurred that are blog worthy. Las penas, and a Gringo Asado(US BBQ).

La virgen de las penas

So there is a religious festival near Arica, in September and December.  You drive on a one lane road to get there for about 45 minutes, and to get to the one lane road it takes about another 45 minutes (Another Chilean told me this is one of the most secluded religious 'festivals' to get to in South America).  There is a huge 'parking lot' after the one lane road, then from there you begin your trek.  However, the trek to get to the church where las penas is, is a hike.  My group did it in about a 2 and a half  hours(there, 3 hours back), walking, and your not just walking, but traversing up and down hills, in sand majority of the time, looking down so you don't step on a stone and roll your ankle.  Tearrie the other volunteer went the next day and she said it took her group 4 hours there, 4 hours back.

I went with my school, host parents and host brother.  Once we arrived to the church we had a mass with around 75-100 students that made the trip as well.  I think the students wanted to get out of class, as we went on a Friday.  But we left the school at 5 am and didn't get to the church of las penas until 11. After we had lunch there, everything was quite expensive, but they had a lot of parades and people selling religious things.  The reason they call it las penas(the pains) is because of the walk to get there.  The reason majority of the Aricians make the pilgrimage, yes for faith, because the face/body of the virgen de las penas is actually part of the rock/stone that the church is built around.  Also, there is a river that flows the entire way to las penas, there are around 3 different way to get there. The river way(easier, cooler), the half river/hill way, and the top way, which is the hardest where you traverse up and down the hills and are in the sun the entire time.  I took the hardest way there and back.  We still had to cross the river from time to time as it was winding in the valley where the paths are.  Once you got to the church, its a tradition to take off your shoes and soak your feet in the river. And I can see why, the river is really cold and after 5-10 minutes your feet feel extremely better.  Here are some photos of the area around Las penas, river/bridges, students.

Fog, Starting the trip with the students.

Foggy at 6 am.

One of the many 'bridges' over the river.

Sand, Desert, Hills.

Looks like something the Road Runner and Coyote would battle in.

Students freezing/ice bathing their feet.

La virgen, As you can see her face/body is part of the rock.

Parades/music comes through the tiny, very tiny like center of the town.

Church.

Video:

Gringo Asado.


Burgers are good.  My host family and host dad's Friends believed our BBQ's were fome(lame). So I decided to cook them hand-made burger.  My parents sent me my cajun spices long ago and I finally got to use them. I would have rather made my mom's oh so delicious ribs, but they don't use the oven here very often.  However, I like Chilean BBQ's in general, because they have literally have huge pieces of steak, with some chicken/chorizo on the side.  Pictures will do the talking, invited the other volunteers as well.(Nicole took the pictures, my camera was set on widescreen, from las penas)

Tearrie cooking her soy,because she is a vegetarian.

Ingredients, missing my spices and 3 huge bags of potato chips.

Fun in the Kitchen, Me, Tearrie and Valentina.

Grill/Parilla

Finished result, with Juan Fernando his daughter Valentina, and Alejandro looking on.

They all said the burgers were good.  We used Carbon, which is a type of wood instead of charcoal or gas grill, a lot different, especially as you can see their grills do no have tops, it is definitely a slow cooking approach.