Buenos Aires and such.

Well, Mom and Dare came to visit. We basically went straight to Buenos Aires and stayed there for 5 days. The hotel decoration was horrendous, but the city's architecture was wonderful. It has a lot of European influence, so the buildings were like those in France and Italy. It was pretty nice there and the weather was decent. Dare had caiparihnas everywhere and Mom stuck to the pisco sours. (The first or second night they were here, before we went to BA, we went to a restaurant called Mestizo and had pisco sours before our meal that were delicious. Pisco sour is basically the national Chilean drink. So Mom fell in love with those there and drank them for the rest of the time she was here). We ate at a couple great places and even tried our luck at La Cabrera, one of the famous steakhouses there. The food was good, but we were disgusted by the meal for a couple of reasons: first, we weren't seated until about 11 pm. While you wait they give you cheap champagne and sausage. When we ordered, we all ordered half portions, Dare with chicken, and Mom and me with steak. When we got our food we realized that we could have ordered one half portion to split between the three of us. What was unfortunate was the amount of food wasted; after the customers finish eating, they throw away the leftovers, even if its a chicken breast or something that hasn't been touched. Sad, really.

We also took a day to go to an Estancia. It's basically a ranch. They had a show for us after lunch with tango dancers, so Mom, Dare, and I took a couple of bottles of beer and headed outside to escape the hokey-ness. After that, there was a horse show, which was really neat. First they grouped the horses by color and had them run around in groups. In each group there was a lead horse with a bell around his neck. After that, they put little metal pins (hanging) and the gauchos ran the horses and had to put a pencil through the metal hoop. All three of us were singled out: Mom and I both got these metal hoop pin things and two kisses on the cheek, and Dare and I rode on the back of a horse with one of the cowboys. Interesting to say the least...I think Dare's tailbone might still be sore.

When we got back to Santiago, we all (with my three roommates and my 3 gringo friends) had dinner and drinks at Cafe el Patio. It's a vegetarian place with a great atmosphere and pretty good pizza (of which we had 5!). After dinner Mom and Dare went back to the hotel and the rest of us hung out at my apartment. It was great to see my friends again and be able to hang out and not have to wake up early for class the next morning.

So since then I haven't been doing much because the students have been gone. They're starting to come back now, so I'm picking up a few more badly needed classes and waiting for my translation money to come in so I can pay rent! The only news is that Adoum moved from an apartment near me to a house not too far away. It's a pretty sweet house-7 people live there, Americans, French, Chileans, Germans maybe too? It has a humongous patio out back thats fantastic to eat in and chill in. I slept there last night and was amazed and shocked at how quiet it was there. In my apartment the noise from the busy street comes in through the window and wakes me up in the early mornings. I'm jealous of his solitude!

Tonight we are going to La Piojera, a dive bar in Santiago, pretty close to where Katie Barkstrom lives. There they serve their traditional drinks, Terremotos (spanish for Earthquakes) which are comprised of wine and pineapple ice cream. Needless to say, after 2 of these the night starts getting a little hazey. But we will be chill there so that we won't be hungover tomorrow. Tomorrow we are going to a barbeque at the house of one of Paposo's friends to drink, swim, and eat. We have to take a train there! I'm stoked! It's gonna be AWESOME. First train ride in South America!

vamos a ver...