Atacama Desert and How I Floated Like Jesus

Blasphemy, you say? Most likely.

Last weekend our group headed north to the Atacama desert, both the driest and oldest desert on the planet. The humidity level in Atacama is around 5%, which is a far cry from what we're used to in Minnesota, where humidity rarely drops below 50% in our driest months. The aridity was felt right away because when you breathe it feels like your breathing in sand and the air seems to cut your throat on its way into your lungs, a metaphor that is barely even that, since after just one night some of us were coughing up blood in the morning.

Part of the desert oasis where we stayed, San Pedro

Our second day, after stopping for a break after biking for an hour in the desert, I realized I had never been to a desert before. The wilderness I'm used to includes lively lakes, rivers, and forests, and although the profound silence we felt whenever we stopped for a water break could have been meditative, I found it be practically unnerving.

Later that day we hiked Valle de la Muerte, a huge valley crowded with sharp rocky outcroppings and cliff edges. Hard on the knees, you ask? Yes, ma'am! But I'm still alive, so there's that. We also ran/rolled/fell/floated down the valley's hot sand dunes before catching our ride to the Valle de la Luna to watch the sunset.

Valle de la Muerte

Geysers in the sunrise

The next morning we were up before the sun even had the chance to hit the snooze button a few times, and at 5:30 we were on our way to the geyser field. Nestled between low mountains at over fourteen thousand feet above sea level, these geysers are more impressive for their quantity rather than quality and are more like bubbling rivulets or the occasional boiling water stream shot out of a rock than the Old Faithful we were expecting. What was impressive was the steam emanating form the ground all around us. But it was so cold since we had arrived so early in the morning and were so high in elevation that some (myself included) were getting headaches and other early symptoms of altitude sickness as we ascended. It's probably why Frodo and Sam had such a difficult time getting to the top of Mount Doom.

More geyser action

Our day got warmer when we found some hot springs to soak in. I say found not because it was an accident, but because I have no idea how one can find their way through the desert in a vehicle. Sure the sand and rocks might be packed harder on the main roadway, but there are infinite offshoots and paths leading to different sites. It was a navigational nightmare, and I was glad I could just zone out on the sand and rocks.

Later that day we had the option to go on an additional afternoon excursion, which I almost didn't go on because it had an additional cost and my head was still pounding from the morning sickness (the altitude kind, not the pregnant kind). But I'm glad I was able to throw frugality to the winds. Our smaller afternoon group visited three lakes within the desert. Lakes? In a desert? Exactly what we thought. But they're for real, and salty. Our first stop was this first lake pictured below, with a salt content so high we were easily floating without moving at all, a weird but welcome experience.

Lake #1: floating like Jesus

Next up was this lake that apparently is more like a filled crater, being that its depth reaches 300 feet. What's interesting about this one is that the surrounding landscape is composed of more clay than sand, and the compactness of the clay helps to sieve out a lot of the salt. So while it's not necessarily a fresh water lake and you can still taste the salt, it was still better than a mouthful of ocean water.

Lake #2: Clay crater

The third lake we visited might have been the most interesting. It was easily half a kilometer across, but never more than 6 inches deep. The reason it looks so white is because there was no sand under the water, it was all salt. You could scoop up handfuls of salt in your hand: yum. Or you could simply dip your hand in the saturated water and watch it turn white as the water evaporates in seconds.

Our afternoon crew on ubersalty Lake #3

All in all, a pretty amazing day full of things I had never experienced. The desert was exhausting, and I have no wishes to live near one. But I was glad I visited. Standing in a desert and gaping at the enormity of it as you look around you is something everyone should have to do as it reminds us of how insignificant we are in comparison to the rest of the world. My friend Craig had some incredible photos on his camera. But as his memory card decided to go kaput, I guess a lot of those memories were meant to be just that.

Pololos and Pololas

Yesterday we went to a Chile version of Oktoberfest, which consisted of dozens of beer vendors set up in what appeared to be an abandoned old train station complex. Complete with games, food, and live music, you could buy a beer or two and/or simply enjoy a small sample from every vendor, which is what this guy did. But this post isn't about Valpobier. It's about what I've learned about relationships between Chileans and an assuredly feeble attempt to connect that to my own host family.

Let's start out with the dating practices here in Chile. For the rest of the Spanish-speaking world, the words novio and novia mean boyfriend or girlfriend. But, in Chile, these words imply that you are engaged to be married while the words pololo or polola are used to reference boy or girlfriend status. Now, I don't pretend to be an expert on Chilean dating customs (or our own, for that matter. Just ask Addie) but to the two month trained eye, there seems to be less exclusivity in the average Chilean couple. Or rather, many relationships seem to be more along the fling side of things. To put it yet another way, when my host mom, Sandra, found out I already had a girlfriend, she said something along the lines of, "So? Just because the waiter just brought chocolate cake doesn't mean you can't order one with lime as well."

This shocked me as, at the time, Sandra had barely finished explaining to me that she divorced my host brother's father (thirteen years her senior) the year before because he had left her for the girl he was cheating on her with. This seems to happen far more frequently here in Chile, as the people I've met who are still on their first marriage are few. Granted, I realize I was privileged to be raised in private Catholic schools my whole life where you're probably not going to find as many single parents. But, all religion aside and despite my lack of knowledge or experience on the subject, I can't help but draw a connection between Chilean courting early on, or pololeando, as a precursor to a potentially unhealthy marriage.

Their divorce naturally brought my host brother, Elias, and Sandra much closer. But, I don't get to see a lot of the evidence of the strength of their relationship because at fourteen going on fifteen he's at the height of proving to the world that he's a man, and mere grunts or nods of approval make up the majority of his interactions. I'm sure there's also the fact that without a man in the house, he feels pressured into taking that role earlier than usual, but I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on him or these sorts of issues either.

What did surprise me was that when I got home last night, during the naturally appropriate hours of the morning, I noticed on my way to the bathroom that Elias and Sandra were huddled together in her bed, having fallen asleep to another late night movie. This wouldn't normally be that uncommon except for the aforementioned frequent distantness Elias tends to emit. That, and most of his time in the house is spent playing videogames with his door closed. In the morning, I found out why. Sadly, a fellow student of my host brother killed himself the other day, jumping from the twelfth floor of the apartment he lived in. And while he didn't know this particular student very well, one of Elias' close friends was friends with him, and my host brother is worried about his close friend because he knows he suffers from depression, too. It's not known exactly why the student jumped, but it's speculated that there were problems between the parents like shouting, fighting and other domestic issues.

Divorce was just made legal in 2004 in Chile, previously the only country in the western hemisphere without a legal divorce process. My host mother admits and laments that widespread divorce is hard on the children, as it is anywhere in the world, to be sure. But, after a tragedy like the one involving his classmate, I was struck by the fact that my host brother immediately became concerned for his friend. Not only do I feel it's a testament to how Sandra has raised him in arguably his most formative years, but their constant support for one another in troubling times is something I know I will never forget.

Shall we meet Halfway?

This week will mark the median of my life in Chile. Few things of note have happened since the holidays here besides our pottery attempt last week in Pomaire. Also, the weather is finally nicer here than it is back home. That only took two months. So, I'll need to squeeze this post in before I scoot off to the beach!

As I'm on the downhill in terms of my time here, I thought I'd take a minute to think about all the random things I miss that I can't get here in Chile. Obviously, I miss my family, girlfriend, dog, friends, and Collegeville in general really. But these are things I miss besides the obvious:

Job/income- I'm not dying for forty hours a week here. I just miss working a couple hours a day so that I'm not going into more of a financial hole than I already am. The occasional drink(s) at a bar or the compliance with "hey, let's check out that restaurant!" really add up. That doesn't even include the trips we make and the activities we do. All of my expenses have been absolutely worth it, I just wish there were more pesos making their way into my wallet instead of into others'.

Minnesota Nice- This isn't to say that Chileans are mean. In fact, I have heard of no assaults, gunshots or any violence aside from the occasional drunken disagreement, and you will often see teens giving up their seat on the bus for the elderly, for example. But I'm from an area where you smile, nod or greet someone (or some combination of the three) when you pass them on the street, whether you know them or not. Instead of these, you get averted glances, women tightening their grip on their purses, and parents toting their children closer. I thought I was just an innocent gringo, I didn't know I gave off the "I'm going to rob you or worse" vibe.

Milk- It's very different here. Apparently, because many might not have a refrigerator, the milk here is pasteurized at much higher temperatures than in the US and, without needing to be refrigerated, has a strangely long shelf life inside an insulated box. The extreme pasteurization makes most kinds thinner and gives them an almost condensed-milk taste that they cover with flavoring like strawberry, banana, and vanilla.

Free public bathrooms- Not that they break the bank or anything. But ranging from anywhere between 200-500 pesos (so .40-$1) means you have a lot of guys that simply drop trou and find a bush or, more commonly, a wall. All aesthetics aside, what this does is just make it really inconvenient for women, as the wait in their lines can easily exceed half an hour on busy days at the beach or at gas stations in traffic on the highway.

Green- my favorite color, and there's not nearly enough of it here. Sometimes, one just needs to take a nap in a meadow or go for a walk in the woods. And while this might have been possible two weeks ago in Chiloé, the only green areas in Viña are either private or covered in dog crap, but usually both.

Gary's Pizza. Enough said.

Islands, Penguins and Barn Dances

As written in the previous post, when the rest of our gang returned to Viña to celebrate Fiestas Patrias (Chilean Independence) on the 18th, my friend Craig and I headed further south to Chiloé. Also as sheepishly mentioned, while our first night did force us into the adventurous sort of mood (what with staying at a random woman's house, unsure if we would wake up the next morning), it was hardly an ideal start. And while I realize this was our own damn fault, conditions did improve as we explored the most beautiful place I have yet seen in this geographically diverse country.

Chiloé (pronounced Chee-low-AY) is an island just off the Chilean coast roughly twice the size of Stearns County. But despite its proximity to the mainland, it's residents are known for being fiercely independent in maintaining some of their own traditions and practices unique to the small island. For this reason, Chiloé is frequently described as a distinct enclave with a deep territorial attachment not only to their rain forests and rolling hills but also to the sea that has supported communities living there for over 7000 years.

So let's start where we left off: with more bad news, both related to the timing of our trip. First of all, as much of the country takes the week off to celebrate independence,
the majority of buildings were closed, leaving us in a veritable ghost town. Most stores as well as tourism information areas were off for the week. Museums and internationally recognized churches, sites my parents taught me were staples when visiting any country, were also all locked up. There was also the conspicuous lack of people roaming the streets, something that made us feel like we were in a veritable ghost town as we had gotten used to bustling Viña.

The weather was also unfortunate due to our timing, although it could have been much worse. Many assume that since I went south to study abroad that it's summer all the time. However, after the equator, the further south you go the colder it gets. It also means our seasons are switched. So while Fall just started back home, we were in Chiloé in its last days of winter. And while there may be cool temps of 50s and 60s in Viña, we were down to to 30s and 40s on the island. Mix in some strong sea breezes and rain, and you've got the recipe for the climate we were in for four days. To make matters worse, insulation is more foreign to Chiloé than we gringos. So not only could we hear the couple on the other side of the hostel, but it felt like an earthquake whenever a bus drove by our hostel. Lack of insulation also meant that the difference in temperature from outside to inside was very little, so we were in 2-3+ layers for a few days. But the sun did poke through the clouds every once in a while and hey, there was no tsunami, so I can't complain too much.

But enough with all that downer stuff. We're from Minnesota; it could have been -30s and we still would have enjoyed Chiloé!

One of the highlights of our time here was the natural life; mainly dolphins, penguins, seals, and even the occasional wild horse or two. It was almost a strange feeling knowing that I was not in a zoo and there was no glass between us and that colony of penguins. Such exposure and almost vulnerability reinforced in us the feeling of being a part of something, not above it.

Another highlight was our adventure on the 18th, the day of Independence. Our hostel owners told us that a certain area in the south of Ancud (where we stayed) was the place to be for the festivities. So that night, with only a hand drawn map of the city, we found ourselves very unsure of where the heck we were until we heard music from the hill we were at the bottom of.

Passing various drunk citizens on our way up the street, we noticed the music was coming from a large barn. What we found was essentially a Chilean barn dance, with a live band playing songs on demand. Adding to the small town feel was that either everyone knew each other there, or was too drunk to care, and everyone danced with everybody else for hours. We were pretty sure it wasn't the festival our hostel owners recommended, but it was a damn good consolation!

Arguably my favorite part of Chiloé was the presence of natural green. There's not a lot of green in a concrete, steel and sandy beach city, and man did it feel good to have those rolling green hills and forested bluffs to admire. Most of our time on the island was spent doing nothing but walking around and appreciating what we'd been deprived of for over a month now.

See what I mean? If I was Chilean I'd take a whole week off for Independence too, just out of pure pride for where I live. It was pretty easy to take a day (how about 4?) to simply explore this island. What I loved most was the small town feel of everything on the island contrasted against the enormity and seeming infinity of the ocean as a backdrop. It reflected the character of the inhabitants of the island because they live in small villages yet depend greatly upon the sea for their livelihoods. Such experiences and lessons remind me of why I decided to study abroad, and are validating the decision more effectively than I could have ever imagined.

-JJ

Chile Brings Out the Genius in Me

The summer before last, a friend I've known my whole life stayed in our house because he was working on campus that summer. Now, I would consider myself near the far right of the evolution of man sequence, but because Brian and I spent so much time together that summer and next two semesters as roommates, he was the main audience to all the idiotic things I do that would make my parents scratch their hands, baffled that common sense had to fight its way through such a thick skull. Whether is was putting on a rain jacket before remembering I was just going to the shower, placing an empty bowl in the microwave, losing my fishing rod in a tree branch on shore, or flipping over the front of my bike because I was trying to juggle a soccer ball and steer at the same time, Brian developed a simple accusation that fit the act: "that's the stupidest thing I've seen you do!"

This post is mainly about mind lapses, brain farts, or whatever you want to call them. And since every new lapse was the 'stupidest', I feel like I might have upped the ante with these two.


To preview, I approve of the amount of time Chileans elect to take off to celebrate their independence. For the fourth of July we get maybe a day off extra in the states, but in Chile no less than a full week is required to celebrate the 18th of September. Given such a block of free time, we gringos decided to hit the road south to Pucon!

Filled with mountains, wooded trails, ski lodges and coffee shops, Pucon emanates Colorado-like vibes from each breath of fresh air to each drink of clean spring water. We kept ourselves pretty busy in this active town. We went hydrospeeding which is pretty much boogie boarding down rapids. And contrary to popular belief, wetsuits do not keep one dry or warm, but are merely uncomfortably tight rubber suits that are impossible to put on or take off alone. We also rode horses up a mountain with a Mapuche guide, the Mapuche being the indigenous people of that region. He explained to us how the Mapuche view modern religion as mostly a political tool for colonization because it has disturbed the eco-spirituality that is the basis of their faith. It was a new of thinking that we rarely hear, and after our traditional lunch, I could feel myself becoming a little more Mapuche myself! Hot springs were also involved in this weekend, and it occurred to me that since I was on crutches all summer, it was the first time I had submerged myself in a body of water in over a year! I hope that length of time never comes to pass again.

A day of biking was also on our Pucon menu. We rented bikes with a the plan to find our way out of the main drag and out into the country to some waterfalls into a nearby lake. With the less than ideal equipment we rented, I was just hoping we would all come back in one piece. These hopes indeed came to fruition. But no thanks to yours truly, as apparently without a sibling, parent or girlfriend here to smack me when I do something stupid, I let my guard down and decided I would hop the curb when we stopped for a bathroom break.

Do we all remember Gandalf's depressed face when Frodo volunteered himself to take the ring to Mordor? That was my face and the face of those few reading these words when, after such a daring act as to jump a 5 inch curb, the air hissed out of my tires faster than you can say "that'sthestupidestthingI'veseenyoudo!" But as my older brother will attest to after an upbringing of losing to me in various games of chance, I seem to be the luckiest piece of crap on the planet. For just as I was internally kicking myself in the groin for being so stupid (which really was only necessary internally as our bike seats took care of it externally), I noticed a trio of Germans on the side of the road who had the same exact problem with the same exact curb. But the lady at the bike shop seemed to approve of them over the gringos, as they were fully equipped with more than enough patches to go around.

So after a mere twenty minutes and much patience tried on the part of my fellow bikers, we were on our way yet again and enjoyed a glorious day on the waterfront. Except for we never found the waterfalls or glistening lake, but instead a random river below an eerie abandoned shack. I guess precise decision-making is contagious, so you're welcome.


Not only is it contagious, but the effects seemed to linger.
On the day that most in our group headed back to Viña, my friend Craig and I headed even further south. Our plan was to make it to an island called Chiloé, just off Chile's coast. This meant another long bus ride first to the mainland city closest to the island, Puerto Montt.

Having purchased these bus tickets long in advance, I made sure to get my times right. So when the lady at the bus terminal said the bus would arrive in P. Montt at ten, I thought I was in for a marathon night as my ticket said "departure, 16:10." I'm not sure where I went wrong the most, if it was in failing to find a map and determine just how far Pucon was from Puerto Montt, or if it was in mistaking the time of arrival for ten a.m. All I know is that when Craig and I set foot in an unknown city at the same time temperatures were nearing freezing (that's right, it's not all sun and beaches here, it's barely even spring!), we were prepared to either find a bar and stay up all night, or slum it old school or Tom Hanks style and sleep in the terminal.

However, when a exhausted and zombie looking strange lady offered us a room at her house, we ultimately decided to take the much safer option C, agreeing to get into a stranger's car in the middle of the night in a foreign country to pay to stay at her house overnight. Yet again, Mom and Pops, I make you proud with my demonstration of everything I was taught growing up. Don't get me wrong, we were not naive to the stupidity of what we were doing. In fact, we were practically betting on who would be murdered first. But, surprisingly we did in fact wake up the next morning, making sure to get the hell out of there before anythingone else woke up and headed for Chiloé!

JJ

It's the Economy, Stupid

Maids

When I first learned that a member of our group going to Chile had a maid in their host family's house, I was shocked. We were given the impression that the families who hosted students in Chile were mostly single mothers who needed the extra income of the stipend they receive for housing a gringo. So when after a few days of living in my modest townhouse with my small family my host mother told me the maid was going to come in the next day to clean, I was even more surprised as I knew no one growing up who had a maid and had only seen them in movies.

But where I had perceived maid employment as a sign of elite status back in the states, it's much more commonplace in Chile. I asked my host mother why maids were so popular, and she responded with an answer she clearly thought was obvious: because the economy is terrible, there aren’t a lot of jobs, and these women need the money to keep them from attempting to get money elsewhere, like prostitution (by the way, transvestite prostitutes are apparently very popular here and one even lingers on our street corner). Her answer caught me off guard because in the mountain of research from reputable websites I sifted through before leaving for this country, I had concluded that the Chilean economy was quite successful and was the leading reason behind this country being one of the more stable and safer ones in Latin or South America. Hell, their unemployment is only 6%. Not enough jobs??

From my perspective, one only needed to take a simple trip to a Viña grocery store to understand what I thought was a plethora of job creation. Now bear with me now as I know this graph is true... 

So, grocery store and job creation: We pull into the parking lot, wave at the parking lot attendee who sits in a chair, walk into the store, and begin shopping. Down the cereal aisle, we are approached by a young woman in a space/jumpsuit-type outfit who is advertising the latest new cereal brands while her partner in crime down the other aisle coerces us into buying a different brand of spaghetti sauce. There’s almost one attendee per aisle, all advertising the shelves behind them. After many failed attempts to avoid them, we push our overloaded cart to the checkout stations that are surrounded by baggers all waiting in a line to help out the next station. After paying for our groceries, my host mom tips the bagger, we nod to the young security officers standing on a pedestal just watching the crowd, and when we leave the parking lot, tip the parking lot attendee as well.

^That all felt like a lot of employment there! But after a conversation with the host mother, I found the catch. While unemployment may be low, it’s only because there are zillions of underpaid/not paid workers. All those that my host mother tipped? Their tips are their wages. And the rest? After some back and forth, I found out that they make in a day about what I make in a couple of hours as a student worker in the states. This explains that although unemployment is low, the gap between those with and those without is about as wide as the country is long.   

So that’s my lesson/something I thought was interesting for the day. If you stuck with me through all of that, thanks mom. I promise the next installment will be a better read, as we have a week off for Chilean Independence, and I am headed south!

JJ

Santiago in Santiago

Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you are spending time in a place you just concluded was not for you? If you’ve been the only an avid reader of this here blogospherical experiment, you’ll know that this is exactly how I felt when our group stepped down from the bus into the less than pleasantly aforementioned streets of Santiago this weekend. It’s as if simply by describing my dislike for the city in an earlier post, it was planning my return in an effort to convince me otherwise. Either that, or I got some shitty luck.

Having woken up before the rest of the world

Outside the museum

 to catch the morning bus to the capitol, we unfortunately seemed 

to wander through the day’s attractions in a daze. First up on Friday was The Museum of Memory and Human Rights, which is dedicated to remembering the victims of human rights violations during the military regime led by Augusto Pinochet 

between 1973 and 1990 in Chile.

Photos of still missing victims of Pinochet's regime

After this, we toured La Moneda, the capitol building where the offices of the president and cabinet are located.

We didn’t really wake up until we found a restaurant to watch the soccer match between Chile and Venezuela, which had the streets buzzing after a sound thumping of the latter by the former. The following morning we visited various cultural centers, but were so tired from walking around for the past two days we let out a collective sigh of exhaustion upon our return to the hostel.

Another excuse for my lack of attentiveness during the day’s exhibitions was that I was excited to reunite with an old amigo. For those of you who don’t know, my family back home seemed to always be hosting an international student from some part of the world or another. During my last year in high school, one of the students was some punk from Santiago named Santiago, giving the impression that it was common here to name your child after the city they were born in. So after three years, St. Cloud (this guy) and Santiago hung out yet again. We went to a small party at a friends house before returning for the night, and I awoke the next day feeling as though I was in a paradise. My friend’s family lives outside Santiago, which makes me feel better about not liking the city especially when his father feels the same way. A large house on a private lot, they also have a large enough outdoor space for a small soccer field, a swimming pool that is used mostly by their dogs Willy and Guatón (<which literally means fatty) and a large barbeque and eating/patio area. Spotted with palm trees, I sincerely felt like I was in another world while still so close to the city.

<<el weón, Santi

I was surprised at how respectable Santi’s English still was after so much time without using it besides the occasional English class. Nevertheless I made sure to tease him about a few slips. That being said, if he slipped, then I fell disastrously in my feeble attempts to effectively communicate with his wonderful family. But as all three children of the family went through the pains of learning English, they all were aware of the effort I was expending in taking what felt like an hour to sputter out a coherent phrase or two. It was a fantastic end to a weekend with a sluggish start, but it was over too soon as I made my way solo through the metro and bus system of the metropolis to find my way back to Viña. Needless to say, the end of my weekend was surely spent with some great people and great food. And I hope to return to the Oyarzún house before my time here in Chile is up.

JJ