viernes, 18 de julio de 2008

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.