50 aka Ferrari F-50

OK, I’m back, yep, still alive…you wouldn’t believe how hard it is to find a free day to sit down and write.

So what’s happened since July? Good lord, too much.

All of my exchange student friends are gone: Cesar, Vale, Lara, Vivi, Carlos, Enrique…the internationals all went back to their countries unfortunately. Tell you the truth, I enjoyed hanging out with them more so than with the Chileans, perhaps because we were all in a foreign country and had something in common together in this strange land.

Quick shout out to Timmy Burke because I said I would…what’s up kid?

I went home for Johnstock in August and it was incredible, really great to see everyone from home and Johnny absolutely killed it on stage. I’ve seen Blues Traveler live and my father rocked the greatest version of “Runaround” ever performed. They rocked until “officer friendly” shut them down at 10 p.m.

Highlights of the trip home:

Dancing with Nonie to the Who’s “Baba O’Reilly”. Yes, she was jumping and laughing, not going to lie, I thought she was going to fall over with her bad foot, but we both came out unscathed.

The campfire after. Benny held court talking about world politics. We didn’t agree about anything, and I think he was wrong about a lot of what he said, though on the domestic stuff he was on point with FDR’s “New Deal” and so on. 24 year old Nunes screaming how hot the 19 year old Emma Taylor is right in front of her. Also I thought Sean Kelly was going to end Benny’s life when the conversation shifted to familiar issues mixed with the US. Sean was talking about workers not getting compensated sufficiently after accidents and Benny comes out with “If you don’t like the United States you can get out!” Way off topic, but all was forgiven the next day. Benny’s since shipped off to the army, best of luck, bro. The most liberal, peace loving friend I have and he joins the army, there is no sense in this world.

Foxwoods. Best decision of the trip home. We were coming home from Fishco in Providence at about 2 a.m. We were on 195 and the road forked in two options, 95N and 95S. North takes us home, South goes through Connecticut. Nunes coyly says “Foxwoods?” Benny says “No way” and I’m screaming “Asbolutely”. So we took South and Benny pouted for about 15 minutes and then snapped out of it and was ready to have a good time. I was all about promoting the road not taken that night and Brian was eating it up. Nunes ends up winning $325 on a game of craps and he won a lot of money for the fellow players as well. There was a giant, fat black man screaming at Benny and me, “if you ain’t gonna smack ya boy in the butt, step away from the table. DO WHAT YOU DO BOY! SMACK ‘EM IN THE BUTT! The dice is gonna get cold, SMACK ‘EM IN THE BUTT, keep ya boy hot.” Benny and I decided to simplify things and we played roulette. We kept things very simple and put $25 on black. Low and behold the ball lands in black. So we put $50 on black, what do you know, black again. I’m content walking away with $50 a piece but Benny isn’t having any of it. So we toss $100 on black, and it’s killing me because I know we’re just throwing away $100 and neither of us are rich, I’m lamenting the decision until BAM, black again. OOOKK. Benny wants to toss $200 on black but I say no way, I say I want my $100. Benny agrees and pulls his money off too, and what do you know? The ball lands red on the next spin, we bought some victory cigars and in the gift shop and rolled home all grins and yelps, we spent two hours in Foxwoods and came out $525 on top, who says gambling’s bad?. I got home at 5:30 A.M. and my whole family was up, Dad was going to work and all the girls were going wedding dress shopping for Kate that day, after telling them what happened that night they just laughed.

Trips to Nonie and Jim’s house and to the camp to see Nana and Bups. Nothing crazy in these events, just awesome to be with grandparents, makes me feel grounded after wandering the world with people I don’t really know.


So that was the very brief recap of the trip home, I’d never been to 4 karol Drive for a vacation, but it was one of the best ever.


I broke another heart in Chile, I think this time more so than in any other situation. I’d been running around with this girl Jessica for a few months. I met her right before I went home and we’d hang out once every week or every two weeks. Truth be told I was never that into her, but she was cute and I had fun going out with her. I was just having fun and she told me that she was in love and wanted to date officially. I told her that I couldn’t offer her that and she told me it would be too hard to see me again. Two weeks later she sends me text messages at 5 a.m. on Saturday night telling me that I’d already forgotten about her. The next day she sends me IMs telling me that she used to feel things for me but “ya me paso” meaning not anymore. We went through this drill about three times with her telling me she doesn’t want to see me again and that she doesn’t like me any more and then she calls me and sends me texts, this last time it was for real for real though. I walked her to the metro and told her “Eres buena honda, ojala que no me odies, espero que podamos volver a vernos como amigos” I said that I wanted to be friends with her because she’s really cool, but I think that will be impossible on her end. Things really couldn’t have worked out between the two of us, she’s a single mother living at home with her mother. I could offer her zero stability as I’m leaving Chile in March. It’s not easy breaking up with someone whether you’re doing it or receiving the sentence. She was looking at me with doe-eyes about to cry and I just had to give her a quick peck and said “cuidate” and walked away. I haven’t contacted her since nor she me, which is for the better.

Chile is very excited about Barack Obama being the 44th president of the Untied States. Like the rest of the world the Chileans were all tired of the Bush Administration.

I am now a proud citizen of the USSA (United Socialist Sates of America). Do you think that Karl Marx would have ever dreamed that the US would be one of the countries to implement his ideals? No one even forced us to do it; we did it on our own and under a very conservative Republican president no less! I thought capitalism was Darwinist, the best companies survive, the ones who can’t hack it die. Essentially Merrill Lynch, AIG, Goldman Sachs and so on ran themselves into the ground while making mountains of cash for their CEOs and top executives and what are the consequences? Some of the execs have been fired and have received sickening severance packages and now your average American is suffering. Most of the executives, however, still will hold their prestigious posts in these companies and they will continue to still be able to work while there are many Americans who are now without jobs who can’t cover their basic needs. This is a deranged form of Socialism that we are running in our country, one that leaves the poor poorer and sustains the rich.

They have an expression here in Chile - “Cuando el gigante estrornude, todo el mundo se resfria” – “When the giant sneezes, the whole world catches a cold”, and they say this in reference to the United States. Our country has more influence in the world than we can possibly imagine. The whole world depends on the economy of the US to function well. When things are bad financially in the US, things are bad in the world as we can see in the markets all over the globe. I know hundreds of thousands of US citizens are without work right, but we’re not the only ones with problems. Chile, one of the most economically viable countries in Latin America is now feeling the effects of our crisis. I have had the pleasure to teach English in one of the most important companies in Chile, Molymet, but this multinational, multimillion dollar corporation is already having problems. The prices of molybdenum and copper have fallen drastically over the past couple of months and this is greatly affecting the company’s bottom line. They aren’t making near what they did only a few months ago. The company is very concerned with cutting costs, and though they have not laid any one off just yet, they have stopped hiring new workers. This is a company constantly in transition with people being moved around, people being replaced, new workers with new ideas coming into the company. I can count 8 workers that I know personally who have been hired over the past 6 months, and the company has decided not to hire any new workers for at least the next year. I suspect lay-offs will be coming in the not-so-distant future. This company has run an English program for the past 4 years, and I have a sneaking suspicion that our contract will not be renewed for next year. They have cut all training programs from the budget next year and English falls into this category. This is a terrible idea, though, they need English teachers more than they realize. Much of my job is pure conversation, keeping English fresh in my students’ minds so that when they have to talk on the phone or make a presentation in English, their English flows instead of having to search of the words, also in many classes I help them put together business presentations and I translate technical documents from Spanish to English so they can send information about important studies they have conducted in Chile to their plants in Germany and Belgium. Being a company with plants and offices all over the world, communication between the different locations is all done in English. If they do cut the English program completely next year, they will quickly realize they needed us more than they knew.

Feel good side note: If Molymet does cut the English program I am pretty sure I’ll still be able to continue teaching there. I have been approached by four students already who are concerned about the state of the program. They told me that if Molymet does cut the program they will pay me out of pocket with their own money for me to continue to come to teach them. They find the classes fun and they can tell that they have definitely improved their English over the course of my 7 months with the company. It’s going to be a rude awakening when I leave the teaching world and work for a company for real. The young guys in the company, the people from 26-30, are usually the ones working their way up the ladder, they go about their business without my attention from the big executives. I walk around the company like the mayor saying hello to all of my students who are the most important people in the company. The CEO, who’s not even my student, walked by my office the other day and saw that I was unoccupied, stopped in, shook my hand and wanted to shoot the breeze for a couple of minutes before his meeting, I certainly have an over-inflated sense of importance in this company.

Lately I’ve been bringing in articles from the Harvard Business Review which these hot shots are just eating up, talking about management styles, how to be a more efficient manager etc, things that are very relevant to their lives. I’m being paid to be educated by these successful businessmen because during the course of these conversations they talk about their styles and the reasons for why they manage like they do. One of the managers in particular, Mr. Pacheco, takes these classes seriously and has told me that he has now incorporated some of my suggestions in his office. I tell him “I’m not just here to teach you English, I’m here to change your life” which he gets a kick out of.

50 Cent came to Chile a week and half ago, yea, that happened and it was AWESOME. 50, Lloyd Banks and Tony Yayo in Chile…who knew? I’ve got only one complaint; there was no opening band and we didn’t enter until 9:30 and missed a half hour of the show. They played a crowd of about 6,000 in a half-full arena movistar. He played all his hits: “In the Club”, “Candy Shop”, “PIMP” and so on. Lauren will swear that they never played “Candy Shop”, but they did, get over it. I like how they didn’t even try to speak any phrases in Spanish during the concert. They just yelled in English, no “Hola”, no “Gracias” nothing in Spanish, I was expecting at least a little effort. I was quite impressed with the crowd, though, their level of English was far higher than your average Chilean. Not many people speak English in this country but I spoke to many people in English at the concert and when he said “take your lighters out” everyone did, suprising.

So the 50 concert marks the second time I’ve been threatened with a knife in a foreign country, cheers!

The first time was in Spain, but that doesn’t really count since I didn’t actually see the knife, I just took off running from the angry mob that had already beaten the crap out of me when one of my buddies yelled “KNIFE, RUN!”

Being the classy folks that we are, the four of us (Andres, Lauren, Alexis and I) were sharing a box of wine outside of the arena before going into the concert. We were talking amongst ourselves when we a drunk, drugged up old man of about 65 comes stumbling up to us. At first he was friendly enough, he told us to be careful about the wine because there are a lot of police around and they could arrest us for drinking in public. We thanked him for his advice, but then he didn’t leave. He said that he had stickers and was selling them for 100 pesos. We told him no thank you in a friendly tone and then he became persistent. “Stickers, solomente cien pesos!” (same word in English and Spanish except they say “steeekers”). Alexis, a native Chilean said “no we don’t want any stickers” in a hard tone and this drugged out old man’s eyes turned wild. He swaggered back and forth and then said “Do you know that I’m from La Legua?” The Legua’s a real nasty part of town with a lot murders. He then pulled out 4-inch butterfly knife from his shirt pocket and stuck the blade right in front of our faces. He was standing between Lauren and I stuck the knife in both of our faces. Being as it was dark, Lauren didn’t realize what it was until after he put the knife back in his pocket and said “OK, now you know” as he staggered into the darkness. To tell you the truth, none of us were really scared for some reason, it happened really quickly and the man didn’t seem dangerous. He was wasted and decrepit; I like my chances against him even with a knife.

My roommates Cristian and Claudio are both gone right now which is why I have some free quiet hours to sit and write, which is very nice. They’re good guys, but sometimes it’s refreshing to have the apartment to myself and just relax for an afternoon. Cristian’s travelling for business in the South of Chile and will be gone for two weeks. Claudio’s working on a project in Lima and will probably be gone for about a month.

So that’s about it for now, the state of Dan in Chile. Not quite as creative as the oKtober report presented by your friend and mine, Tom Kerrigan. I will try and write more soon, I know a lot of people were asking for an update. Hope all is well, emails, calls always welcome. Hasta la proxima.

Momma, I’m comin’ home

I can not tell you how excited I am to be coming home. I am not even close to being ready to leaving South America for good, but it is going to be so much fun to go home for this week and a half respite. My plane leaves Santiago on August 13 and stops over in Lima, Peru for about four hours. My plan is to meet my boy Cesar in Lima when the plane arrives and go explore the city and eat Peruvian food for a few hours which is divine (I’ve got a Peruvian restaurant across the street from my apartment). After that, the next stop is Newark, NJ of all places where my plane should get in around 7:50 a.m. and then it’s a greyhound bus to Providence or Boston, whichever is easiest. I was going to take the Fung Wah, but have since been advised against it.
Like everything else so far in my adventure in Chile, my trip home was exceedingly unexpected. My mom wrote me an email telling me that they were all excited for the party (rock show) and I wrote back that I hope everyone has as much fun as I had last year. The next day I get an email saying that if I want to come to Johnstock, they’ll pay my plane tickets there and back, certainly an offer too good to refuse! This trip home comes at a perfect time for me, it makes for a perfect segue for the next stage (chapter three) of this trip. Chapter two will come to a close at the end of next month, and I must say I’m more than a little sad to see it go. My best friends here in Chile are, without a doubt, people who aren’t from Chile. Most every weekend I spend with Cesar (Peru), Lara and Valeria (Brazil), Viviana (Colombia), Enrique (Spain) and Carlos (Mexico), and we’ve been having a blast together, mainly having barbecues on the roofs of our apartments, going out to bars and clubs at night and occasionally playing soccer.
Last Saturday, a group of us went over to Lara and Valeria’s apartment to polish off the ribs I cooked for the weekend before (4 kilos of the 10 I bought remained), we went over around 2 in the afternoon and then went out to a club around 10:30, aside from having fun and dancing Foho (traditionally brazilian dance) and Cumbia (Peruvian dance) I was touched by what they told me. (Side note: they all danced, I tried and then took pictures). Lara told me that I was their angel here in Chile. For some reasons, Lara and Vale never integrated well with the Chileans, they’re both really friendly, super-funny people but for some reason or another (mostly I think they don’t like the people from Chile) the only friends they made were Cesar, Viviana and me. Viviana had some problems with her Chilean boyfriend and fell off the face off the earth for a couple of months and Cesar kept in contact with them occasionally, but I would call them to hang out (go out, watch a movie) at least weekly and they told me that I was best thing about Chile. Talk about a compliment, I’m still touched. Lara told me that she and Vale would cry almost every day, but once I started calling them and inviting them out that they actually started having fun here and stopped wishing to be back in Brazil. Later on that night (this weekend was just a cute little love fest) I was feeling very nostalgic as the time in Chile for all of these intercambistas from all over the world draws nigh (they all leave at the end of the month or sooner) I told Cesar that I really don’t want them all to go yet. He told me something that I funny and again touching: “Dan, nunca habria pensado que mi mejor amigo en Chile seria un maldito gringo” and with that we laughed. (Dan I never would have thought my best friend in Chile would be a damn gringo). I went out the Thursday night before, too, with my roommates Cristian and Claudio. I’m equally as good of friends with them as with the intercambios, but in all seriousness, they are some of the only Chileans I hang out with consistently. So we went out Thursday, I had no desire to go out as I had to teach on Friday, but Cristian had just got back from a week and a half business trip and Claudio and I wanted to welcome him back so we all went out for “una sola cerveza” (just one beer), impossible. 4:30 a.m. rolls around again and we were all tired and still out and Cristian got sappy on me. “Se que estas pasando bien en Chile, pero estas pasando bien con nosotros?”. (I know you’re enjoying Chile, but are you enjoying living with us?) We all thought back on how I randomly ended up living in the same apartment as them and how like everything else with my stay in Chile, it was a thing of luck. He knew the answer to the question, but like a girl (or a man who’s been away for a week and a half in a hotel with no friends), he was looking for some reassurance and positive feedback.
Ok enough of the Cheese, but this past weekend I was able to reflect on how much of an amazing experience this has been so far. I played with the questions, “Why am I here? WhyChile? Where will my life go from here?” and like outer space, religion, friendships and just about anything else interesting to talk about and wrap your mind around, there is no definite why. I mean, there is, but if you ever got to the bottom of it your head would cave in. Though there is no definite answer to these types of questions I love thinking and talking about it (I call these philosophical conversations “spinning my wheels” because things are definitely moving in my head, though I never end up in a final destination, though it’s still fun to think about). With no conclusions to why? How? And what next?, I am only able to deduce that this has all been such a success. More than just learning a mountain of Spanish, I have made friends from around the world. I feel like I have been a gracious ambassador for the United States. The US to most of these people is some far off fantasy land where there are three guns in every house, Jocks beat up Nerds, no one knows how to play soccer and everyone’s afraid of the outside world. There are some startling misconceptions about the US down here and I’m happy to know that at least a few more people down here know the truth about my country. It doesn’t matter where you are from, or what language you speak naturally, people are people no matter where you go. There are some South Americans I get along with, and some I don’t, just like North Americans. The people I get along with like to laugh, go out, have fun and talk about language, religion, life, girls, future plans and a whole other range of topics. I’ve been able to connect in Spanish to a lot of people here better than I’ve ever been able to connect to some of my friends back home.
Professionally, personally, financially, intellectually Chile has been nothing if not a success and like Che Guevera once said “I don’t know how just yet, but my Journey through this continent has changed me. I am not the same I that I was when I left”.

You all probably remember that girl Connie I’ve mentioned before, the one who called me when her uncle died. Turns out things got super-complicated with her; uncomfortably so. I’m guilty of being completely oblivious to knowing when a girl likes me, but in this case it was over the top apparent. I would hang out with this girl as a friend, mostly because I she was nice, and fun and I sometimes I liked to go out and speak English when I was tired of speaking in Spanish. We’d gone out dancing a few times, and I had thought we were just friends, but the last time when she went for the kiss, I knew she wanted more. I played it off, laughed, and we hung out for the rest of the night. I wanted to keep in contact with her because her family is still in China and she’s essentially got no one here in Chile since her uncle passed away. Out of respect for her uncle I’ve been continuing to go out with her and check up on her to see that she’s doing alright. A few weeks ago we went out for a couple of margarita’s at TGIFridays (sometimes Americana is so refreshing) and we got to talking. I’d expressed my interest in traveling to a few places in Chile and Argentina and she’d immediately jump in with “Oh I need to rearrange my schedule so I can go, too!” and “We’ll have so much fun there!” Sweetheart, I never said, “we” it was an “I” that wants to go. (I’m going to hell, I just know it). So the evening at Fridays drew to a close and I had plans to go out for Viviana’s birthday with Cesar and the Brazilians and I had fun, but didn’t want to continue the night with Connie. We walked to the metro and I told her, “OK, I’m going to meet up with my friends.”
“Where are WE going?” she asked.
I pretended not to hear and said “OK I’M heading towards San Pablo, you need to catch the metro going to other way towards Escuela Militar”.
“You mean, I can’t come?” She said with her bottom lip quivering.
“I mean you can if you want, I guess.”
“Gracias por invitarme!” (thanks for inviting me) and with that she ran off to the other side of the metro in tears, great.
I knew she was upset when she dropped Spanish on me. I ended up calling her the next day and explained that I just want to be friends with her and she said that she never wanted anything more than that from me either. Though I know that wasn’t true, I accepted it at face value and we’ve agreed to go out as friends. I invited her out to a BBQ last week and we hung out, no problem, which I’m happy about since she’s a real sweet girl.


Flaite (noun, Chilean origin): a shady looking character who most probably is on drugs looking to rob or inflict violence on passersby.


To celebrate the fourth I decided to cook up some more baby back ribs and have a BBQ. I think I’ve made half of my friends because of my ribs; these kids down here are crazy for them. The BBQ was held on the roof of Enrique’s apartment which is about ten minutes walking distance from my apartment. He lives on the north end of the metro stop Santa Ana and I live at the south end. The night was a smashing success, though relatively low key. It was a very mellow night, the only one who was drunk was Carlos from Mexico, I know there’s a joke in there somewhere, though there are some things better left unsaid. I felt it more than a little ironic to celebrate the 4th of July with people from Chile, Spain, Peru, Mexico, Canada and England, but we celebrated nonetheless. Earlier in the night I sang the “Star-Spangled Banner” from the balcony of my apartment, alone, getting strange looks from those walking by. It needed to happen.
Amazingly, two girls from Chicago ended up coming to the BBQ; they are in the same volunteer program as the British girl we had met the week before. It was the first time I had hung out with Americans since my arrival and I thought it was going to be more fun than it was. These girls were real duds. They asked me where I was from and I told them about a half hour south of Boston. They looked at me incredulously saying that I don’t speak like an American, one said she thought I was from Puerto Rico, whaaaaat, I guess I’ll take that as a compliment since I look about as gringo as a football. Unwittingly I’ve been putting a Spanish accent on a lot of my words in English, plus due to being an English teacher I’ve been stressing good pronunciations of my words making my English sound unnatural, and just straight weird. In trying to get my students to understand what I’m saying I have to slow down and enunciate “T’s” among other letters. I know this good English will be corrected once I get back home where everyone speaks like “theaa boohdahline rataahtid” hahah I miss home so bad right now!
So the night passed without incident, we all ate ribs and had a very relaxing evening. My roommate Claudio took off with his girlfriend in a taxi around 2:00 a.m. and I stuck around until about 3:30 helping Enrique clean up the meal. I thought it was dumb to take a taxi since we live about ten minutes from Enrique so around 3:30 I left with Cesar, Connie and Cesar’s new Canadian roommate Jean Pierre. The streets were deserted at this hour in the night, and we didn’t see anyone until we were about two blocks from my apartment. We walked by this guy who looked out of his mind high on something, and we all passed and he didn’t say anything to us. About ten seconds later he yelled “Oye, Peruanito!” (Hey little Peruvian) and a jagged rock about five lbs in size (no joke) flew over our heads by about a foot. Startled we stopped and a liter bottle of beer came crashing down at our feet. We all booked it to my apartment not looking back. I don’t know if that waste-case was with anyone else, but I didn’t care to find out, and fortunately no one followed us to my apartment. That was the first time that someone had attempted to assault me here and I hope it’s the last. We were all shaken up by the incident imagining if that rock had connected with any one of our heads. This guy was obviously out of his skull on drugs and definitely racist. (Recurring moral: take a taxi when you got out, come on man!!!)
A giant problem with the lower-class Chileans is that they are intensely racist, in a manner that I find exceedingly cowardly. They are only racist against Peruvians and Bolivians (probably against blacks, too, though I’ve only seen eight since I’ve been here). Though they resent Argentineans, they aren’t racist against them. I’m going to play Sigmund Freud / Frantz Fanon and Psychoanalyze the Chilean mentality. Chile, a country very small, isolated from the rest of the world by the Pacific Ocean and the Andes mountains, has an extreme inferiority complex. Historically a very poor nation, Chile has only recently become the country with the best economy in South America. Always playing at best third fiddle to Argentina and Brazil, the typical Chilean mentality (especially among the lower class) is one of a resentful middle-sibling. Though traditionally inferior to Argentina and Brazil economically and almost equally as important, athletically, Chileans have long found an outlet for their aggression on Peruvians and Bolivians. These are two bordering nations who have always been in a worse state than Chile, making them easy targets to pick on. With the economies of Peru and Bolivia being terrible (Peru is making a steady upward climb recently, Bolivia seems to be hopeless), droves of people from these countries have come to Chile in search of a better life. Chile in some cases is like the United States with a good economy and unwanted neighbors coming in to work as farmers and nannies. Akin to the Mexicans who come to the US, the vast majority of Bolivians and Peruvians are uneducated and poor, desperate for a better life. Like in Mexico, the cream of the population stays in these countries and prospers. Though Chileans dislike Argentineans for being snobs and thinking they are better than those from Chile (which is the general opinion, though many have never left Chile to find out first hand. I have heard from many well traveled Chileans that Argentineans are actually quite a nice people.)
Resenting Argentineans and Brazilians, (more so Argentineans) Chileans take out their aggression stemming from a feeling of inferiority, on the Peruvians and Bolivians who come to Chile to work. These peoples are a target for abuse since many come illegally and have been known to take the jobs of Chileans because they will work for less money. My friend Cesar from Peru will no doubt be ten times more successful than that “Flaite” who threw the rock at him, but he is Peruvian and a target here. Cesar speaks three languages, plays classical guitar, dances all kind of traditional dances, writes poetry and will soon have a University degree, meaning he will no doubt succeed down here. It’s a shame that senseless violence is the outlet of choice for many poor Chileans with an inferiority complex.
Note: I have not researched this; these are only the opinions of an outsider looking in.

Adios to a good friend

I put on my shirt, tie, and my 1970’s blue Tony Montana suit and headed out the door. I was on my way to my 4th class of the day, my 4:00 in Pudahuel when I got a call from Anita, a woman who I teach on Wednesdays and Fridays.
“?Anita, Como estas?”
“Muy mal, Daniel. Muy, muy mal”
“?que paso, Anita?
“Cesar…el acaba de fallecer…murió, Daniel…murió”

This woman I teach works at Molymet in Santiago centro and she told me that Cesar (the loan shark) had a heart attack and passed away and was lying on the floor in the middle of the office. I work with this man three days a week, and on Fridays he works in el centro. I suddenly got sick to my stomach…it’s a very strange feeling to be dressed in a man’s suit at the time of his death. Two weeks ago I was over Cesar’s house for his wife’s birthday party and I wasn’t wearing a coat. He gave me an old suit-coat to wear and the pants to match. It’s a blue suit that looks like something out of “Miami Vice,” but I hadn’t brought a suit down to Chile and was grateful.
“Here, take these homeboy, they don’t fit me anymore…we can’t have you dying of cold here in Santiago.”

I really haven’t been fair in my portrayal of Cesar in this blog. I refer to him as the “loan shark”, which I confirmed he was, but that paints him in a very negative light. He may not have been the most morally upright or law-abiding citizen in some situations, but he was very good to me. He took me in to his home and made me feel like I was part of his family. His wife (girlfriend of 6 years), her daughter, and Cesar have all been so nice to me. In my three months here, I’d been over to his house about 10 times to watch soccer, to have lunch or to have dinner. I was invited to Pillar’s (his girlfriend) birthday party and got to meet all of her family, too. They were always sending me off with doggy-bags of the meal we had just eaten and dessert, making sure that I was eating well.

“Homeboy, call your moms, you know I’ve got that international plan…let your moms know how you’re doing.”

Every time I’d go over there he was making sure that I had spoken to my family recently and he was always having me call home from his house. He was my “padrino”, my godfather, here in Chile.

I mentioned Connie before in this blog, too…the Medical School student who had been living in China last year. She is Cesar’s niece. I got the phone call from Anita and she wanted me to call the family of Cesar to let them know what happened. That was not something I was excited to do, nor did I feel my place to do, but she asked me to do it so I called. I got in touch with Connie and told her that I had some very bad news. She told me not to worry; the paramedics had called Pillar and told her that Cesar had passed out. With this I was confused, but decidedly relieved.

“Anita overreacted,” I thought to myself, “he just passed out.” I continued on my route to work and was about to transfer buses when I got a call from Elba, the boss of Manhattan Institute.
“Daniel, did you hear?”
“I’ve heard that Cesar’s dead and I’ve heard that he just passed out. I don’t know what’s going on.”
“Yes, that’s correct, he passed out and he’s dead. He had a heart attack.”

With that I turned right around and headed back to the apartment. I’m really not in the mood to teach today with this news looming. Connie called me about five minutes ago, crying, telling me that he’s dead and that she’s there in Molymet and they haven’t moved his body anywhere yet. I had nothing to say other than “I’m so sorry” over and over. I want to go visit them all tonight after the dust settles. I feel like I’d be more distracting than comforting at this point in time. Cesar was only 46 and looked healthy. He had a gut, but I wouldn’t call him fat. A steady diet of cigarettes, coffee and pork and cheese sandwiches did him in.

He was having chest-pain yesterday and had to leave work early to go to the hospital to go through some tests. I thought he might have some heart problems, but figured the doctors would take care of him and that he caught the problem before it was too late.

I ask you all to keep Cesar and his family in your thoughts and prayers as they go through this difficult time. He was my padrino here and there are a lot of us who are going to miss him.

Chapter Two

(Some picutres from our apartment innauguration and a night on the town)

To those who are interested in what I'm doing…
A thousand apologies for the delay in getting these new entries up on the internet. In the new apartment we are no longer able to rob wireless internet from the neighbors and my work now blocks my blog site so it’s difficult getting this out to the internet.

Like I may have mentioned, life’s less of an adventure, but it’s still a great deal of fun.

It’s Saturday…I taught two classes this afternoon to my kids which I’m really enjoying. After few classes they’ve really relaxed with me and have started to open up. A few of them are really eager and really cute. Before class they were asking me what kind of music I like listening to and about what sports I play. I let them pass around my ipod during a break from the lesson on “split infinitives” (real riveting stuff) and they were loving it. “ayy leeessten to tha same music!”

During these past few weeks I’ve become much better friends with my roommates, too. Before, we’d exchange some pleasantries and Cristian and I would laugh at Claudio and call him a “momma’s boy” for no good reason other than the fact that Cristian loves the phrase “Claudio…momma’s boy! Yes!” I’m going to chalk it up to the fact that my Spanish is much better than when I arrived and we are all comfortable and used to each other. Before, they would always go off to Valparaiso for the weekends, which is about an hour and a half away on the coast. They’ve stuck around for the past few weekends and we’ve been going out to some bars together and they’ve become friendly with my international friends too.

Last weekend we inaugurated the new apartment for real for real this time. I had thought that we were all going to invite our friends to the event but when everything was settled I had 9 guests coming and they had one between the two. The majority were “intercambios” from the Diego Portales University who I’ve met through Cesar. We had a great world-wide showing with representatives from Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Spain, Chile and yours truly the loan gringo. The event a huge hit with the last of the guests leaving at 8:00 a.m. If that’s not the mark of a successful party, I don’t know what is. Similar to the last time we entertained, Cesar played the guitar for a couple of hours with Spanish, Portuguese and English songs with everyone getting into it and singing along…the boy truly is impressive. With 13 people, our apartment was at full capacity with all the chairs occupied and people lounged out on the floor. We, however, did no endear ourselves with our new neighbors that night. By the end of it we had had three complaints from the concierge asking us to “!apaga las musica, por favor!” We did turn it down, but inevitably after about 30 minutes somehow the volume always seemed to be where it had been originally. Five or six days a week I’m a responsible “profesor” and the other one or two I’m right back where I was last year in apartment 300…some things never change…and why should they?

There’s been so many hang-ups getting my visa squared away and processed. Just when I think I have everything handed in with documents stamped by a notary I find out that I need a copy of a different part of my passport and a “tarjeta de turismo” which I need to get from a special office. I showed up to this office to get this document on Friday at 2:45, but the office shuts down at 2:00 and is only open M-F. Therefore I’m going to have to go to get this sometimes next week (Wednesday due to the work schedule). It’s looking like I’m going to have to make the border run to Argentina to renew my visa since my 3 months runs out June 7 and it’s doubtful that my visa will be processed by then.

Tonight I’m off to the 45th birthday of Ricardo, one of the owners of the Manhattan Institute where I work. Apparently they’re turning the institute into a disco with a DJ, a bar, and strobe lights. They’re clearing the classrooms of the tables opening it up for dancing…this I have to see. Out of the 13 professors working for the institute I am one of two who got an invite to the party. Cesar (the loan shark) and I got the invites. There are teachers who have been working there for years and somehow I get the nod after two months, I don’t understand it, but I’ll take it. I was warned that I will be the youngest person at the party (along with their 17 year old daughter) so I’ve invited my brazilian friends to come along with me tonight. They’ve finally found some playing cards (we’ve been looking for over a week now) so I’m looking forward to playing some Kings tonight. It’s not going to really work the same in Spanish, though haha. “five for guys” is “cinco por…?” we’ll figure it out, though.

I’ve been hanging out with the niece of the loan shark for the past two weeks and she’s been an absolute godsend for my Spanish. Her father is the Chilean military attaché to China so she was over there for the past 14 months and just came back to Chile in March, when I got here to go back to med-school. Her English is excellent and she speaks Spanish instead of Chilean (the exception being an occasional “huevon” or “cachay”). Sometimes when I’m in the middle of trying to make a point and I make some mistake like “estaba reindo” instead of “SE estaba reindo” she cuts me off mid sentence and corrects me right then and there. It’s more than a little annoying, but very necessary. Most people tell me I speak really good Spanish but she’s a tough critic which is what I need. I want honesty so I can improve. I didn’t realize how many mistakes I make in everyday conversation but every few sentences she let’s me know where I’m screwing up.

At this point in the trip I am missing home sometimes. Usually on Sundays after the fun’s over and I have to prepare for lessons and do laundry I get to thinking about people back home, wondering what I am missing out on. With that said, I have no desire to come home any time soon. There’s more adventuring to do when the weather gets nicer and I have some more money in my pocket and I have so much more Spanish to learn before I’ll be ready to come home. I made an exchange with my corpulent student, “Big Boy”, Fernando Espereguez. We got to talking about books and he had just finished “En el Camino” which is the Spanish translation of “On the Road” which I had recently finished. We made a trade; I gave him the English version and he gave me the Spanish. I’ve started reading this book which is full of all kinds of obscure Spanish vocabulary which is helping me by leaps and bounds. “Big Boy” told me that he’s going to start charging for teaching him classes. In Spanish he said “one pays to go to the cinema to laugh, so since you laugh all class you’re going to have to pay me.” The man’s like the jolly brown giant with a real friendly manner, goofy laugh and relaxed stride, I can’t help but have a good time with the him. I really do enjoy my job thoroughly. I’m not ready, at all, to come home, but if I had to, this will have already been one of the greatest experiences of my life. Chapter one of the trip is over, we’re on to chapter two.

Settling in Nicely

I’m sitting in my new apartment right now, after cleaning everything up, this place is “la raja, huevon”. Your boy’s lounging in his own KING bed. I got the sheet, towel and bathmat situation squared away…I’m good to go.

So right when we moved in there was a problem with the hot-water heater, we couldn’t turn it on. With a lot of “finesse” (you know, punches and jabs with a screwdriver) I was able to turn the dial and light the pilot. The only problem is that once anyone turns on any hot water there is an explosion that will take your hair off if you’re within two feet of it. With this occurring every-time (you can hear it when you turn on the shower across the apartment), I am going to be showering in cold water until we can get this fixed up on Monday. I really don’t want to die in a gas accident in Chile.

Last weekend was the weekend of the Asados…I went to three in three days. The asado is the Chilean version of a barbecue…they cook steaks, pork, chicken and chori-pan (sausage on bread). I’ve made the mistake of telling everyone at these barbecues that we’ll be having one as soon as we got the new apartment. Well, the time has come, we have the apartment and I think I’ve got 50 people on the guest list. We might have to spread this out over two or three asados.

The second of these asados was very memorable. I met a girl from California, surprise surprise (every American in Chile is from CA) who just graduated from Berkley in Boston. She played guitar and sang her own songs…she was incredible and supports herself for now by playing different bars around Chile. I told her about teaching English, and when she found out that I was making double what she does, she’s considering putting down the guitar some and picking up some text books. There were a group of girls at this asado who call themselves the “warenas” which means “the giant rats”, these girls like to drink cheap beer in alleys seven days a week. Everyone at this event was an English teacher in one form or another. All of the Chilean professors teach elementary school and hate their lives. They’ve all got classes of 45 or more kids who couldn’t care less about learning English. They tell me that in the 45 minutes in class, they are able to teach for less than ten; they spend the rest of the time trying to keep order. They were in disbelief when I told them that most of my classes are one on one to engineers who really want to learn English. Well one of these “warenas” fancied me quite a lot. In no uncertain terms she announced to the party what she wanted to do with me that night and tried on no less than ten occasions try to kiss me while we were sitting around the kitchen table. I was flattered but not really interested in the rat-girl and we ultimately left on less than friendly terms.

There was a funny guy at the party who’s very interested in languages. The sausages they have here are called “Longanizas” and he’s convinced the etymology of the word is English, and that they were originally called “long and nices”. Needless to say “long and nices” was the main subject of the jokes for the rest of the night.

This past Sunday was a phenomenal day here. Cristian, Claudio and I received the keys to the new apartment and decided to a do some entertaining. Claudio invited his cousins Sandra and Lara, Cristian invited his buddy Cristobol and I invited my Peruvian buddy Cesar over. Inadvertently I ended up going out with his friends that he introduced me to and we were unable to contact him to invite him out too. I robbed his friends for the night and felt bad so I had him over for some steaks to make up for it. I was dead from two asados that went late into the night and wasn’t really in the mood to be social Sunday during the day. Usually I prepare some for my classes and get to bed early on Sunday, not this one. We watched soccer on the new TV and had an asado here. Sandra brought an electric grill and we fried up steaks, pork and chori-pan on it. Sandra lives only two blocks away and when she found out Cesar plays guitar she went to her apt and brought over and old, out of tune guitar. Cesar tuned it up and we all sat around the living room jamming for the next five hours. He played a lot of Spanish songs that I didn’t know, but this kid’s a real whiz on the guitar. He plays mostly classical style guitar using all his fingers and thumbs, but he knows how to play Green Day’s “Dookie” cover to cover along with some Radiohead, the Chili Peppers, Beatles, Zeppelin, Pearl Jam and countless other random songs…the kid is incredible.

Sandra started calling me Brian from the backstreet boys and we staged a mock interview like I was doing a show in Chile. Cesar played and we all sang “that way” and I think I’m less of a man than when I began the day. There’s a video of all this on Sandra’s computer that I hope never gets out to anyone I know. Oh but it was great fun. We changed apartments so we could invite people over and entertain and we did just that. There will be more intimate gatherings in the future.

Let’s back up a tick…I left Cesar in the lurch the night before. He called me earlier in the day to go to an Asado with some of his international friends from the University 45 minutes away in Maipu. I got a text from his Brasilian friend telling me to meet up at a subway stop at 8. I ran out of minutes on my phone on the way there and when I got there no one had called Cesar and no one had any minutes. I hopped on the subway expecting to get off at an area where I could buy minutes to call the kid. We ended up having to ride the subway for a half hour to La Florida and then take a car from there to Maipu. The car was full with no room for my Amigo. I robbed my pal’s friends and felt like a scum.
So at this cook-out I met some exceedingly interesting characters. I talked to this girl Stephanie who gave me some interesting insight into the Chilean mentality. If someone is from the U.S. or Europe she told me the Chileans will instantly like them. They think that everything in the U.S. is better just because it’s from the U.S. It seems strange to me, because back home we are very amiable to other people from the U.S. and on the whole are very xenophobic. The Chileans are less friendly to their own and are very warm and open to people from the U.S. because they think we are better than them in all respects. This country has a serious inferiority complex and it shows in the people. In the United States people are loud. People talk on their cell phones loud, the yell in the streets, if someone is in your way you tell them to move. Here the personality of the people is much less flashy, much more humble and modest. If someone is in your way you say in a very quiet voice “permiso” as you pass by. No one yells in the streets. This place could definitely use some hip-hop culture.
At this cook-out I met this kid Huesar. He’s real up on hip-hop unlike most Chileans and he says “Me llamo Huesar, como ‘WESTSIIIDE” hahah. The kid was a clown but an interesting character. I politely declined to do drugs with him and his gangster buddies on some sketchy hill in San Bernardo (San Bega Sigue) after work on Tuesdays, though I appreciated the offer.

The Cumbre Wachaka

“Estamos juntandonos al hostal a las 9:30 y despues por la Cumbre Wachaka”

Pato, the manager of the hostal I was staying at when I first arrived, sent me this message around 4:00 and when I sent one back asking him about what is the “Cumbre Wachaka”? he didn’t respond back to me…I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

I show up to the hostal around 10:00 to find that Pato and Helen were nowhere to be found. I spent an hour or so talking to Angie, the receptionist. We worked out a deal that I will be teaching her 4 days a week from 8 to 9:30 Monday through Thursday.

I had no intention of going out late Friday, as I’m now teaching classes two Saturdays a month from 9:00-12:30 and last Saturday was my first class with my new students (children, mind you). I wanted to be awake and animated for these kids so I told myself that I would head home around one a.m. We didn’t even arrive to the Cumbre Wachaka until around midnight.

I dare you to try and leave the Cumbre Wachaka after only one hour, impossible! Let me explain:

The Cumbre Wachaka is a traditional Chilean party that goes from around 5:00 p.m. Friday evening all the way until 5:00 p.m. Saturday, and it only happens once a year. I told Pato initially that I couldn’t go.
“Danny are you American or are you a God Damn Canadian? Are you a man or a little girl? The Wachaka only comes once a year”

Nobody, I mean nobody calls me a Canadian! Truthfully, I’m so used to Pato’s inane insults that his chiding didn’t bother me. I was more interested in seeing what this Wachaka was all about. This party is held in the Estacion Mapocho which is an old train-station in the center of Santiago no longer in use. It is massive and has been beautifully restored. We show up around midnight and this place is packed with around 6,000 people all dancing, drinking, eating and singing. The entry fee was expensive (about $14 US), but once you got into the station, everything was a picada (bargain). At the front of the station there was a band with trumpets, trombones, guitars, cellos and all kinds of different percussion instruments. The music blared through the whole station and everyone was enjoying themselves. The place was packed, and thw ages of the participants ranged from five to 75. Shortly after arriving we saw perhaps the eldest participant at the festival too intoxicated to stand up. A group of three men hoisted this elderly gentleman up in his plastic chair and carried him out of the Wachaka to a rabid round of applause from the lookers on. Numerous banners adorned the station walls saying things like “Socialist, communist, capitalist, atheist: we are all Chileans tonight!”, and “God bless the drunks, because when he comes they’ll see him twice”. The atmosphere was lively and everyone was set on dancing, laughing, and having a good time.

I dare you to try and leave the Cumbre Wachaka after only one hour, impossible!

I joined right into the Wachaka and tried to dance the traditional Chilean dances. My friends laughed at me and told me I was doing it all wrong, but, hey, I thought I looked good on the dance floor and laughed right along. I was confused when everyone grabbed napkins off the table and started swinging them around there heads, but grabbed one myself and swung it around, too. Girls were coming up to me asking if they could take a picture with me. I was a rare sight at the Wachaka – a Gringo in a backwards Red Sox cap and work boots swinging a napkin around his head – I loved it.

So one a.m. went as quickly as it came and I stayed jumping around to the “Negro Jose” and other timeless Chilean songs until about 4:15 a.m. Great Dan, real responsible. Needless to say when my alarm sounded at 7:45 I felt like I had been run over by a steamroller. I felt like a wad of chewed gum, but regretted nothing: the Wachaka comes but once a year.

My classes went surprisingly well, the kids seemed to get a kick out of me, and seemed to enjoy the class, perhaps because I was still delirious from the Wachaka and funnier than usual. I quite liked teaching a class of children…it was nice break from the one on one classes with engineers. These kids told me they’re big Pearl Jam, Chili Peppers and STP fans, we’re going to get along just fine. Next class I’m going to bring in a CD with a few songs and I’ll have them follow along reading the lyrics and have them fill in a few blanks with the appropriate lyrics.

All is well.

Fake it 'til you make it

(Pictures from Vina del Mar)

So where did I leave, off, I’ve found sufficient work and am getting along well with my apartment mates…

I’m enjoying my work tremendously right now. Compared to my job at Mercer, I’m making peanuts, probably about half of what my salary was there, though I’ve never enjoyed a job as much as I’m enjoying this one. I’ve always known deep down that I would like to be a teacher…I like speaking in front of groups of people and I like to tell people what to do. Knowing this I’ve had thoughts of becoming one later in life after being more financially stable. Here I am, teaching in Santiago. So far all of my students are businessmen and women of Chile. I’m working from 8:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Monday, Tuesday and Thursday at a company called Molymet just outside Santiago to the South in Nos, a barrio of San Bernardo. I’m there ten and a half hours and get paid for eight classes each day. Teaching eight classes in a day definitely wares on you, especially eight classes with engineers – some of them are quite dull. This company I’m teaching at (www.molymet.com) is a big-time molybdenum and rhenium refinery, this place is expanding by leaps every year. I’m working with some of the best and brightest in all of Chile and I get to tell them what to do…I love it. In my other job I was a nobody, one of 200 answering phone calls in a quarter-cubicle getting bossed around by some people I know I’m smarter than (Not you, Allan, you're money). With this job I get my own office, the front wall is all made of glass and I get a phenomenal view of the whole property. I’ll put some pictures up, but I need to get clearance from security before they let me take pictures of the plant. I’ll have to ask my 9:15, Fernando Gomez, head of security. This guy is a serious man, a former artillery officer in the Chilean army; he’s packing wherever he goes. This refinery is in the middle of a pretty scummy area with a lot of gangsters. He’s been telling me about the different gun battles that have gone down on the plant between the security guards and local gangsters. All the guards have shot-guns at night. No one’s died yet, but one of his best friends was hit in the arm with shot-gun spray. Every weekend, without fail, these gangsters try to break into the plant to steal the very expensive rhenium and molybdenum deposits and it’s not uncommon for him to have to roll out of bed in the middle of the night and come to the plant with his pistol. He tells me the police want nothing to do with these gun fights and never respond to the calls.

Almost all of my classes are one on one, and for the first class I’ve elected not to do any work, I like to have a discussion with my students so that we can get to know each other so we can be more comfortable together in the learning process. After that I liked to have each student bring in a news article in English, they have to read it and then we discuss it for the first ten minutes or so before getting into grammar. Most have been bringing in articles from the Miami Herald, CNN.com and the New York times…This one guy “Big Fernando”, the man’s an absolute giant at about 290 pounds (we translated kilos into pounds for one class exercise) got really creative on me…he printed out an article from the “Norton Mirror Online” I almost fell out of my chair laughing, I was touched. He remembered I was from Norton, Mass from our first discussion and printed out an article about South Eastern Regional Vocational High School and whether or not they are going to extend class hours.

I feel like I’ve been in Spanish chemistry class for the past two weeks. Getting to know these people, we often talk about their work and their interests, and invariably we talk about refining molybdenum and other work they’ve done. You want to build a cell phone tower…I’ve got a guy, you want to brew large vats of beer…I’ve got a guy, you want to convert a brine solution into lithium ion…I’ve got a guy, you like potassium…I’ve got you hooked up. You want to convert Magnesium Sulfate into pure magnesium and hydrochloric acid; first you add water and then ask Victor, I forget the rest. We’ve been getting in depth with the different chemical processes, and I’ve been strangely fascinated by it all.

To walk through this plant you need to wear a helmet, safety glasses and protective shoes. I have no need to walk through the plant as a teacher and I don’t have the necessary gear to do so. The self-proclaimed “Big Fernando” is going to hook it up though; he took my shoe size and is getting me all the gear; I’m going to be decked out like an engineer and will be able to walk around the plant with impunity, again pictures coming soon.

Though I really dislike getting up at 5:30 a.m. to catch the company bus three metro stops away, getting paid for eight hours of work three days a week makes it worth getting up to take the hour bus-ride. Another part of the job that I really like is that fact that I’m 23 and I get respect from everyone in the company. The “Profe” (Profesor) is someone they all respect there. My three youngest students are 26, 28 and 32, my oldest is 50 and the other 20 or so are somewhere in between 35 an 45 and they all shake my hand and thank me for my time after each class and I can tell they really mean it. The vice-president of this quarter-billion dollar a year company had to interrupt my class to speak to “Big-Fernando” and he apologized to me for disturbing my lesson. I’m a nobody, a phony, a kid with zero teaching experience…apparently they didn’t get that memo yet.

My new life motto is “Fake it ‘til you make it”. You know that scene in Boiler Room where Ben Afleck is giving that super-cheesy speech about “act as if”? The movie was absolute garbage, and the speech was overly crass and contrived, but I’m taking Benny Boy’s advice to heart. I’ve been strutting into every class decked out black dress pants, shirt, tie and wing tips, lap-top, head up and smiling…you’d be surprised at how many people think you know what you’re doing when you don’t let on that you really have no business teaching English to highly educated businessmen. I’ve been faking it so well that even I’m beginning to think I know what I’m doing…scary, really. At first I preferred the one on one classes, they are easier, less eyes on you. After sitting teaching seven one on one classes I’ve been welcoming the last class of the day which is always a group class. These group classes have turned out to be the most enjoyable of them all, I get to stand up move around, call on people and write on the board. I can tell the students have been having a good time with these classes too.

I work with this really crazy guy, Cesar. He’s 46 and lived from age 15 to 30 something in Miami and California. He’s a Chilean, but considers himself an American and has a strong affinity for Americans. He’s been overly generous to me over the past couple of weeks. He’s been teaching English for over five years now and has built up a very big client base so now he has more private work than he knows what to do with and is kicking his extra work to me. He’s already set me up with some private lessons with a girl who’s moving to Australia in three months. I’ll be seeing her for an hour and half five days a week. I’ve been to his apartment three times now for lunch and dinner with his family. He and his girlfriend have been very nice making sure I have everything I need. Every time I leave their house Pillar packs me a doggy bag with left-overs, bread and some dessert, making sure that I’m eating alright. Last Thursday Cesar sent me off with a jar of peanut-butter (a novelty here) and some Oreo cookies. As I mentioned above, Cesar’s an absolute nut, I don’t think he’ll ever grow up. He enjoys telling me stories about all his current girlfriends and the difficulties that go along with loan-sharking, his other, more exciting means of income.
“Big boy you just stay in the car, I’ve gots to have some words with this mother...boy owes me some money!”
From what I could see from the car, it looked like he just went into a convenience store to buy a pack of smokes.
I really can’t tell if he does run a loan-sharking business or if he’s full of hot air. Either way, he’s a wildly entertaining character.

This past Friday night was the most fun night I’ve had since arriving here, everything came together for me that night. My Colombian friend, Viviana, invited me to come to her apartment for a party on her roof. She’s studying abroad here for a semester and all her friends are people from the University as well. Everyone had to bring a dish from their own country. I had a tough time figuring out what to bring since the food in Chile is very similar to the US. I was debating bringing a bucket of KFC, but decided on cooking my own baby-back ribs instead. I really wasn’t sure how they’d turn out since I’ve never cooked them before, but they were a wild success. The South Americans were going crazy for them. Finding ribs was easy; finding barbecue sauce in Chile is another story. I eventually found some BBQ sauce at a giant grocery store 45 minutes away by metro called JUMBO. It was in the small “Ethnic Foods” section next to soy sauce and “Old El Paso” taco sauce. I was shocked at how good they turned out with only “Hunt’s” sauce and an oven…the key is to boil them first for an hour or so.

Unfortunately my Peruvian pal Cesar had to take off around midnight because he was changing apartments on Saturday. He’s the one I know the best out of all of them. I’ve hung out with Viviana and the two Brasilians before, but I didn’t know anyone else. I was having such a good time I decided to stay even though Cesar took off. Around 2 we ended up moving the gathering down to Viviana’s apartment where we all sat around, talked and listened to music until about 6. I was thrilled with the night because I was able to hold down conversation in Spanish for 10 hours straight, it was beautiful. I enjoy talking with the Brasilians because they speak Spanish very slowly. I’m amazed by them: They decided to study abroad in Chile without knowing how to speak Spanish, but speak about as well as I do and understand more after being here a little over a month. After knowing Spanish, I imagine Portuguese wouldn’t be too hard to learn. They’re from a city in the north of Brasil called Fortaleza, and it sounds awesome: they tell me it’s always hot and the people are very friendly. Judging from the “torta de pollo” they prepared, the food should be unreal as well. They told me not to come unless I’m ready to stay forever; a lot of Americans go down for a visit and end up making a life there. The other Latin Americans all seem friendlier, warmer and outgoing than the majority of the Chilenos. Like any place though, there are good people wherever you go. I hung out with some Chilenos that night who were some of the coolest people I’ve met so far. They all had a lot of questions about the US, and they weren’t the typical “Why did you elect George Bush twice?” which is getting old now…I didn’t have anything to do with it, I promise!

So I’ve been trying to meet as many people as possible and have been giving everyone a chance that I meet. This has been the reason for many a good night, but also has been a reason for a few headaches. Listen to the song “Conquest” and you’ll understand my plight and my biggest headache as of late. 27 year old women in all countries are looking for a husband ASAP. Don’t talk to them, don’t humor them, and don’t let them take you to lunch…RUN! I truly look forward to getting married someday, but it’s not a subject I want to broach on the first date, ¿Cachay?

We’re still in the process of looking for another apartment, there have been a few delays, but hopefully we will be in a bigger, cheaper and better place by the end of the month. That’s all for now – I found out my cell does accept international calls - If any of you all have a burning desire to hear my voice my number is: 011-56-99-4885610.

Trabajo and Tear Gas

I love this city more everyday…Santiago has a way of growing on you. I liked it at first, sure, but day by day it gets even better. I had an uneasy feeling going into Santiago because I had neither a job, nor a place to live, I had a hostel for ten days. I’ve been in my apartment for over a week and get along famously with my roommates. We have a gym in the apartment building, and my roommate Claudio has decided to come with me the past two times I’ve gone. The first time we were in there, there were about 5 other people. Claudio looked like a fish out of water…he was moving from one machine to the other, lifting and then back to the bike for 2 minutes, then lifting, then bike. I let him do his thing, maybe there was some type of method to his madness. Come to find out he’s never been to the gym, but didn’t want to ask how to do anything. We went up again yesterday and I put a routine together for him. Claudio knows only limited English, but every time he was struggling to get a repetition he’d scream “FULL POWAAA!!”

My other roommate, Cristian, has been beside himself. He’s 25 and buying is first car today, he’s been glowing from ear to ear talking about his Ford Explorer. He’s paying about $8k US for a 97 Explorer. In the States, that would be over-paying, but here that seems to be the going rate for said vehicle. To him, cruise control is something from the future. “!Transmision Automatcio y puede controlar la velocidad con sus manos!”
“Ay si, ‘cruise-control.’” He was more than a little disappointed I knew what it was. He keeps sticking his hand out like he’s driving, bouncing it up and down and yelling “Boom, boom, boom! GRINGO, vamos a coger minas en mi Explorer.” I don’t know where all the bass is coming from with a stock cassette player, but that’s really not the point.

Last Saturday my Scottish buddy, Andy, and I took off for coast to go to the beach. When I first met Andy, I thought he was, at the most, 26. Turns out this kid is not quite a kid, 32, but I’d say we’re on the same maturity level. Rather than being a compliment to me, this is more of an indictment of him. He is a professional graffiti artist and has made enough money to take off for a year to go travel South America. His website is: http://www.asonedigital.com/ , check it out, he’s damn good. He’s somewhat of a rough character from Glasgow, but he reminds me a lot of my boy from home, DK, with the way he’s always telling stories and is DFW, down for whatever.

We had grand plans to go to the beach with our Chilean friends Yenny and Sandra, but, last minute they cancelled on us…I’m pretty sure these girls have boyfriends and have just been using us for free nights out. I told my roommates about these girls who don’t think they need to pay for anything when we go out and they told me to get rid of them “son gallinas de yeso”, something about them being ceramic chickens, haha, I think it’s a reference to a piggy bank where you can put money in, but it never comes out.

Saturday was hot here in Santiago, about 82F, but after an hour and a half on the bus, we got to the coast in Valparaiso and it was cloudy and everyone was wearing jeans and sweatshirts. We were planning on spending the afternoon in Valparaiso, but the part of the city where the bus station was just turned us off completely to Valparaiso. Everyone looked mangy and had a scowls on their faces. We get off the main avenue and right in front of us a man drops-trow on the sidewalk (Tim Kumnick, anyone?) and proceeds to relieve himself on a telephone pole, mind you this is 1:30 in the afternoon. We look at each other, thinking let’s go! We hop the next bus to Viña del Mar, which is only 15 minutes up the road and you can go for about a buck. Viña was quite nice, lots of nice buildings and hotels and horse drawn carts going all over the place. By 2:15, the weather cleared up and we ended up having a hot beach day. The beach was great, too. It was good to get some sun on my pasty, winter in Massachusetts, body. The water was FREEZING. The water on the coast of Chile is constantly cold; the El Niño current circulates water from the Antarctic to the coast of Chile making it uncomfortably cold year round. So after talking to various people back in Santiago, we made a big mistake leaving Valparaiso so soon. We landed in the worst part of the city and there are supposed to be very beautiful parts which we didn’t care to take the time to see…I’ll have to go back soon, which won’t be too hard to do since my roommates travel there every weekend to visit their girlfriends.

We got back to Santiago, ignored calls from Yenny and Sandra and went out with my Peruvian friend Cesar. He looks 15…he’s about 5’6 120 lbs soaking wet, but is actually 22. I ended up going out with Cesar, Andy and Cesar’s three friends from the University in town. One girl was from Colombia and the other two from Brazil. Talking to a Peruvian, a Colombian and two Brazilians, I had an epiphany… “wow, I do understand Spanish!” Chileans have the most garbled, fastest, slang injected way of speaking Spanish that makes having a coherent conversation with a Chileno quite difficult. I had a great time with these fellow foreigners because I could understand what they were saying and they could understand me. The Colombiana’s description of her home country makes me want to go badly. She told me that as long as you stay out of the mountains you won’t be in any danger, just stick to Bogotá, Medellín, and other major cities and you won’t have any problems as long as you keep your head about you and avoid the bad parts of town at night…seems to be a common theme in South America. She told me the people are all the people are friendlier, happier and more fun in Colombia and they have better beaches. I’m definitely going to have to get up there.

Let me be Laverne, you can be Shirley. You want to be Laverne? Fine, it doesn’t really matter… “We’re gonna make it after all!” And by we, I mean me. This week has been beyond excellent on the job front. I was supposed to have interview with the Burford Institute this Tuesday, the goal was to have them help me obtain a work visa. Manhattan, the Institute for which I am presently working, offered me 24 more hours a week; I’ll have to go to “Molymet”, a mining company just outside the city. This place is a big time refinery here in Chile, a multinational corporation. I’m teaching eight hours a day Monday, Tuesday and Thursday here. This job alone will almost give me enough to get by. In addition to this I have 6 hours more with Institute for different classes, I do have enough to get by, but just barely, and they told me they will help me with the Visa…stellar. Today, I made 60 copies of my advertisement to teach English here. I went to Providencia, where a lot of wealthy people live, and handed out about twenty on the street; it’s tougher than you might imagine having someone accept a flyer that you hand out. For every “yes”, I got about four “no”s.

Opportunity knocks where you least expect it. I was sitting on a bench, talking to a Chilean gentleman of about 60 when my phone rings…it’s this guy Cesar who’s teaching at Molymet as well, he teaches there privately and is probably making three to four times the money I am. This guy is Chilean, but speaks English with an affected British accent. “Daan, are you available to teach more classes?” Turns out he has more work than he knows what to do with and thought he’d direct his extra private lessons to me. I need to talk to him later this weekend, but it sounds like he has plenty of extra private work for me which means more hours at about triple what I make at this institute…If anyone’s thinking about coming down, do it…it’s not as hard as you think. Things have all come together for me in just under 3 weeks. I took off with a vague idea and a general plan of attack, and it has all come together better than I could have imagined.

I’m rambling now, I know, a lot happens in a week, I’m going to need to write more frequently to avoid this five page week recap…For class today, the accountant, Rodrigo, treated me to breakfast instead of sitting in his office. We just spoke in English…no book work, it was great. We go our separate ways and as I walk closer and closer to the city center towards my apartment, there were about 300 or so police officers scattered around dressed in riot gear. There were assault vehicles and police busses full of policemen dressed for battle. Today is the 33rd or 34th anniversary of the murder of two Chilean brothers at the hands of the police. This happened under the Pinochet regime, but every year people still protest their murders. The government’s completely different now, the police are the least corrupt in all of South America, but people still decide to riot on this day every year.

Sitting next to this Chilean gentleman of 60, my lungs start to burn and my eyes begin to water. I’m breathing fine, but am straining every so slightly. I look around and everyone’s wiping their eyes and covering their noses and mouths with handkerchiefs. I ask him if this is pollution for which Santiago is notorious for causing everyone’s eyes to burn…he laughs at me and says if the pollution were this bad no one would live here…it’s tear gas. A few blocks away the police tear gassed a group of rioters and the wind took it over to us. To me, the most amazing part is that the vast majority of people didn’t pay any attention to the riots, nor the police, nor the tear gas for that matter. People covered up their faces and carried on conversations, sat and ate ice-cream like it was an everyday occurence. I was apprehensive at first, but sitting next to the calm senior citizen I didn’t worry too much. I didn’t actually see any violence, and was only affected with a slight breeze of tear gas. These riots happen twice a year, March 28th and September 11th, the day when Pinochet took over in 1973. Why people still protest these things is beyond me.

OK enough for one night.

Off to providencia.

Too Much Information Eddie

So in my down time, which there’s been a fair amount of lately as I’ve only been working about ten hours a week, I’ve been going up to the pool on the roof of the apartment building and doing some reading and swimming. I pull a chair next to the pool, relax and read mostly, I feel like I’m back at Wood’s Edge condominiums where I “life-guarded” for two summers. Essentially I was paid to read and swim. Best job ever. But I digress…A few times when I went up to the pool this guy Eduardo was up there. He’s twenty three as well and has recently moved to Santiago, working as a nurse. He’s been quite friendly and had lived in the states for a couple of years so we’ve had some things to talk about. There was something that didn’t sit really well with me with him, he was always kind of jumpy, fidgety and nervous when we were talking, but I couldn’t place exactly what I didn’t like about him, I just didn’t feel at ease around him because he wasn’t at ease.

This being said, yesterday I was up at the pool reading “Oliver Twist” when Eduardo comes up there and we get to talking about the book, Boston and working out. I didn’t have anything to do today (Tuesday) until 3:00 so when he invited me to hang out and drink a couple of beers last night I figured there was no reason not to. I didn’t really want to hang out with kid, but I didn’t want to burn any potential bridges so I said “sure, why not?” Something struck me funny, though, when I asked him how his girl-situation is here in Santiago and he tells me, “Oh, I’m not really interested in going out and finding a girlfriend right now, I want to focus on my work.” (In so many words, his English is quite broken) I look at him side-ways somewhat incredulously and hesitatingly say “OK”. What single 23 year-old guy is not looking to go out and hang out with girls…I could tell Eduardo and I probably weren’t going to become the best of friends.

He was supposed to come to my apartment at 9 to hang out for a bit, but 10:30 rolls around and he still hasn’t shown. Feeling somewhat relieved that I didn’t have to hang out with kid I was about to go to bed when the apartment phone rings and it’s him on the other end. “Disculpame, estuve al gimnascio hasta las diez”, (excuse me I was at the gym until ten). “No problema” I said, but my roommate was home and in bed so we’d have to hang out in his place. We go to the store and split a six-pack between the two of us and take it back to his apartment. Eduardo was super-fidgety and nervous; he had an air of desperation about him that I found quite unappealing. He was talking in whispers and couldn’t sit still. He was half-way through his first beer and tells me in broken English, “wow, I already feel drunk”. I say, Eduardo, in the States we’d call you a ‘one-beer-queer’”. Turns out this play on words couldn’t have been more appropriate for the situation. He didn’t know what “queer” meant and I tell him literally is means “strange”, but is another term for someone who is gay. He smiles, nervously and awkwardly, though I don’t think much of it.

The evening progresses and we discuss politics, national pride, Santiago, business and a few other topics. I’ve just polished off my third and final can of Escudo, Eddie’s just downed his second beer and he’s clearly buzzing pretty hard. “Es ard fur me heer in Santiago”, he laments. “I no hab mani frennz”. I tell him I don’t either, but it’s nothing to whine about, you have to go out and meet people. I excuse myself for a brief moment to use the restroom, and when I come out he’s lying on his bed, somewhat coyly, which really makes feel reaally uneasy. He comes back into the living room and says, “Daniel, ken ay trahst en youu?” I tell him “I don’t really know, Eduardo, I’ve known you for about two hours.”
“Well I’b gonna say you this ennywayz…I’m gay, my grantfader rap-ed mee whend I was twelb.”

Talk about TMI! Good lord, man! I’m not one to keep my cards tight to my vest, as people who are close to me can attest, I often wear my heart on my sleeve, but there are just some things you don’t share with a guy you’ve been friendly with for two hours. He then apologizes and tells me that he only wants to be friends with me, but his peculiar actions definitely suggested other-wise. He asks if we can still be friends, now. Man, I didn’t want to be friends with him from the start, now that this air of desperation he conveyed was substantiated, I really didn’t want to be friends with the guy. It would be one thing to tell me he’s gay, cool, whatever, Emily would be excited I’d made a gay friend, but to be acting coyly and telling me about being raped when you were twelve, really crosses the line for things to tell a person who is essentially a stranger. It’s not like he’s even a really cool or funny gay guy, he’s just creepy and gay…I bid him ado and said I hope we see each-other around. “I hoap wee can steel be frennz.”
“Yea, no problem, take care.” My heart goes out to the kid, but truly, I have no desire to hang out with him again.

So apparently the gay guys in Chile think I’m hot stuff…faaabulouths!

After all that with Eddie last night, I get in the elevator this morning and there’s a man with flames shooting out of his ears. He was smiling flirtatiously and asking me if I’m going to work and what I’m doing here. I give some brief one word answers and bid him good day. Normally I would have been much more amiable, coming right after last night I had no patience. The gays here in Santiago are quite sweet on me…it must be because I’m such a snappy dresser (HA!).

End of week 2

(getting in touch with nature)

(view from my roof and me with all my friends)

So sometimes I’m an idiot…walking home from Bellavista at 4a.m. alone…idiot! My friend, Yenny, was trying to help me out asking how much I had in my pocket making sure I could take a taxi. She and her friend seemed over-eager asking me for how much I had on me, which made me really defensive, I kept saying “tengo sufficiente”, I have enough. In retrospect I really think they only wanted me to get home safe. I was not thinking clearly last night, brushed them off and started walking home alone. I knew it was stupid at the time but I wanted to walk. I was expecting to get robbed the whole way home. I had my fists clenched and was walking with a power-strut, ready for someone to try, I was going to blast them in the face. Luckily I didn’t see anyone once I got near my house, there were no mysterious men lurking in the shadows last night…I made it to the elevator into my apartment and then bed without any problems…brilliant! The Chileans last night kept telling me that I looked bored with the conversation, and maybe I was, only on the parts where I wasn’t included…they speak so fast down here, it’s really tough to keep up with the conversation sometimes, especially when there are inside jokes.

So that was last night, but I have over a week of things unaccounted for: So after going out with the coalition of the willing last Saturday night a ton has happened here. The two things most essential to my survival here are an apartment and a job, in the past week and a half I’ve obtained both. The apartment’s quite small, and I have two roommates Cristian and Claudio, both very nice 25 year old Chilean Engineers. It’s definitely a novelty for them to have an American living in their apartment with them now, everything is “gringo gringo gringo”, they love that word. I’ve now been in my new apartment for four nights and for the past three we’ve all hung out and talked for a few hours each night. They’ve been teaching me how to pronounce my Spanish better and I’ve been trying to teach them basic English, they essentially don’t know any. They know a few basics, “Hiii, howryoooo” and “wachuurnaame?” and that’s about it. My bedroom is a glorified closet, but I have room for all of my stuff. The apartment building has a gym on the top floor and a pool on the roof which attracted me to this place. The rent is roughly $250 American a month with all expenses included hot water, electricity, and presently we are lifting free wi-fi from some unassuming citizen without security on their wireless, thank you Mr. “T.P. Link”. Though the internet is free for the moment, the connection is shotty at best, some days I can connect for an hour no problem and other days, like yesterday and today, I can’t connect at all, I this is going to need to change.

(teleferico and the train to get up el cerro de san cristobol)

Luckily, the Chileans have all been extremely nice to me, probably because I am a novelty. I was out with Yenny last night and she told me that she doesn’t usually like foreigners, Americans, French whatever, but that I’m different than most because I can actually communicate in Spanish with her and because I’m going to be sticking around for awhile. She’s 23 and she’s acting like my mother right now telling me where to go, who I should and shouldn’t talk to, and last night she was trying to make sure I took a taxi home instead of walking. I heeded much of her advice, but not the part about taking a taxi, certainly an idiot. Santiago’s not that dangerous if you know where to go and where not to go and if you take a taxi home when you stay out late. People definitely do get robbed here but if you keep your head about you, you can avoid this. I was warned not to wear my gold chain out at night because someone will most likely rip it right off my neck. During the day there are no problems, it’s just if you stay out late at night you need to keep your head about you.

So I’ve found work now, too…I found it in the rarest of places. I responded to this guy Tony’s post on craigslist in Santiago looking for people to play American football on the weekends. I responded telling him that I would like to play and left him my number. Tony calls me ten minutes later and he asks me what I’m doing here and I tell him that I’m looking for work teaching English. He tells me “I know this lady, she’ll get you a job, no problem, call her now”. He gives me the number for this lady Elba, I had two interviews with her and I have now taught three classes so far. I have classes Monday, Wednesday and Friday with an accountant named Rodrigo from 7:30 a.m to 9:00 a.m. Presently, Wednesdays I am teaching two hour and a half classes at Audi in Las Condes which is the richest part of the city. After my classes I told one of the bosses that my rate is a new car every three months…he laughed at me and sent me out of his office. I’m still looking for more work. This Monday I’ll be working 8 hours in an office Translating documents from English to Spanish. This is only a one time job, though. These people only have a set amount of material they need translated right now. I have second interview on Tuesday with the Burford institute in Providencia. The woman Katie told me they are now in need of more teachers. Burford is more attractive than other options not because of the pay, but they told me they can help me secure a work visa here in Chile in order for me to be here legally which is of paramount importance.Ideally, I’m looking to be an entrepreneur here. I’m going to hand out flyers in the malls, post flyers in the universities, and post my services online. I can charge double what I am making if I do private classes. I’ve done the math…If I can teach roughly 15 hours a week privately, I will make enough to enjoy myself and here to send money back home to pay off my loans, not bad!! Less hours, better lifestyle and I’m not saying “Thank you for calling Mercer, you’ve reached Daniel Callahan, how can I help you?” I think I’m going to lose my lunch. Ideally, I will only work for Burford so I can get a visa and I will do private classes, but in the meantime I will be doing work for Elba so I have some sort of cash-flow. My roommate, Cristian, is helping me to put my flyers together and Yenny told me she’s going to tell her friends about me and is going to post flyers in her university for me, things are coming together.
Side-note: there is always some type of Jenffifer in my life, always has been. I seem to get along with Jenns and Jennys and now Yennifer, I’m probably going to end up marrying a Jennifer.

Right now I need to find books that I can base my lessons on and that I can give to the students. This is only a small problem and I’m sure I’ll have it resolved in the next few days if I ask around. That’s all for now, I'm off to the beach shortly, emails are always welcome!