introducing the SSLC

SSLC is WorldTeach Chile's official semi-annual newsletter and our group this year is the first one to produce it.  Lauren, Allison, and I are the editor's for this year and we couldn't be more proud to release it to the world.  I did most of the design work and was actually working on it while I was on vacation last weekend in San Pedro de Atacama in order to make the release date of July 1st, 2010, but it's full of stories, poems, quotes, and photos contributed by everyone in our program and gives a good insight into the lives of 13 volunteer teachers in Chile.

So, make it a light read on the beach, in the morning, or while you're bored at work and trust me, you won't be disappointed.

Chile Sslc July 2010

la roja, you did us proud

Sadly for me, all the teams I have personal associations with have been eliminated, with the US, Chile, and Japan sent packing early.  With Chile's 0-3 loss to Brazil on Monday, so ends their run in the 2010 World Cup South Africa.  We watched the game in a tiny, mud-walled restaurant with no roof in the middle of the northern desert pueblo of San Pedro de Atacama amongst eager and hopeful fans.  No one expected them to beat Switzerland, let alone advance past the first round.  And losing in the second round to the favorite to win the entire tournament ain't so bad either.  Apparently, Chile's national team isn't supposed to be very good, but you wouldn't know it being here and watching the games with the locals.  The Chileans cheered their homegrown on as if each game was the Final, celebrated each goal as if each was the winning penalty kick, danced in the streets afterwards as if Chile won it all, and cheered on the team as if they actually had a chance against powerhouse Brazil.
All I can say is that I feel so lucky to have been here and apart of it all.  Fuerza Chile!

chile and my students go wild

World Cup crazed Chile winning over the heavily favored Switzerland 1-0 on Monday brought about as much mayhem as it sounds.  I watched at school with my students and since the government mandated that they all be able to watch, everyone was in the lunch room where there is a flat screen TV and also that day, a projector set up.  After the game, the kids ran around the school, jumped on chairs, and yelled "Chi chi chi!  Le le le! Viva Chile!" and "Ole ole ole ole Chile Chile!" until the teachers rounded them back up for class.  Outside the school, everyone got in their cars, bikes, buses and drove around the streets of the country beeping their horns and waving the flag for the rest of the day.  In Santiago, mobs rushed the streets and created a bouncing sea of the Chile red, white, and blue.  Should Chile win against powerhouse Spain on Friday, watch out.

The day's festivities at Colegio Fernando Durán Villarreal...

My students go mad after the Chile goal...

Chi chi chi!  Le le le!  Vi-va Chile!

father's day in chile (and a late posting of pics from mother's day)

For Mother's Day and Father's Day, my host family travels all of 10 minutes on foot to another part of our neighborhood of El Sol to have a big almuerzo with Norman's parents, his sister's family, and his brother's family who live in three separate houses all on the same property.  Since lunch is normally THE meal of the day anyway and since these are two special family days in Chile, the meals were pretty elaborate and definitely delicious.

Día del Papá (Father's Day, June 20, 2010)

Uncle Alfredo Jr. and Gramps Alfredo Sr.

Mariscos over the open fire

Buffet style at the counter

Family around the table

Cousin, Santi, and brother, Amaury

Sister, Ayun

Día de la Mamá (Mother's Day, May 9, 2010)

Ayun, Amaury, and relatives of all sorts

Raw oysters and sea urchin

Family around the table

Meat fresh from the clay oven

Host sibs and I

Santi and the clay oven

Amaury and Santi in the kitchen

sopaipillas for any kind of weather

I went to visit my co-teacher's, Angela's, home on Saturday for lunch and to make sopaipillas from scratch.  She lives in a small, quiet suburban town named Placilla about twenty minutes outside of Valpo if you're driving towards Santiago.  A sopaipilla is a tasty, round, and flat piece of fried dough made with flour, oil, and varying ingredients depending on where you are.  In Chile, they are made with pumpkin and, being just the base of the snack, they can be eaten plain or accompanied by numerous flavors, sweet and savory.  Traditionally, they are made and eaten when it rains.  Saturday was perfect and clear, but we made them anyway for the sake of my Chilean traditional food-making education and believe me, there is nothing like a  fried sopaipilla straight from the pan.

Laguna La Luz near Angela's house

Sopaipillas
1. Boil pumpkin until soft and peel is easily removed

2. Mash pumpkin and add to bowl of flour, salt, oil, and water used in boiling pumpkin

3.  Knead everything together until unsticky and can be rolled out flat

4. Cut out circles of dough and deep fry them until golden

5.  Eat plain, with sugar or pebre, a salsa with cilantro, chili peppers, tomatos, and onions!

where are all the children?

Yup, you guessed it.  It rained today.

In my first class of the day, 5th graders, fourteen of thirty-seven showed up.  My co-teacher was running an hour late so I just took all fourteen and taught them like a normal lesson.

In my next two classes of first graders and then second graders...

ONE student out of about thirty in each class showed up (the other people in the pictures are all teachers).  I doubt there is any kind of attendance penalty at my school.

So instead of teaching for these two classes, I got to watch the USA vs. Slovenia soccer game.  We should have won 3-2 but instead, just tied 2-2 because of a disallowed goal I'm still confused about.

chile really likes its fútbol

Chile beat Honduras 1-0 today in their first match of the 2010 World Cup--and you would have known this even if you hadn't watched it.  After the stoppage time ran out and Chile claimed victory, possibly every Chilean in the country piled into their or their friends' cars, rolled down all the windows, blew plastic trumpets, and beeped their horns incessantly while dressed in colors of "La Roja," faces painted in the Chile red, white, and blue, and waving giant flags out the windows.  Those without cars paraded through the streets banging on anything that would make noise and yelling in unison, "Chi-chi-chi!  Le-le-le!  Vi-va Chi-le!"  Lost your eyesight for four seconds when your face paint smeared into your eye and missed Chile's goal?  No problem!  Every channel on TV replayed it and you could literally watch it over and over every five minutes.  All this went on ALL DAY.  The celebrations died down by the evening in Quilpué, but the stragglers certainly made themselves heard.  Talk about passion.  Here in Chile, the people celebrate anything that has to do with fútbol.  It doesn't even need to be a World Cup win for them to glue themselves to the television for 90+ minutes, although the glitz, glam, national pride, and pure love of the game factors do magnify these matches to a level that has everything in the country coming to a complete halt during this time frame.  Did I mention the game today started at 7:30AM and everyone from children to adults were excused from school and work until it was over at 10 o'clock?  At a school in Santiago, the students actually watched the game AT school and then afterwards, piled out and stormed the streets in celebration with no intention of returning the rest of the day.
In Chile, fútbol transcends responsibility, education, and the bare necessities of life.
In Chile, fútbol is life.

Some of my students after the Chile win.

A little Waka Waka of course!

Me joining in the Waka Waka

a little taste of home

Culture shock is funny little thing, full of funny little nuances.  Not everyone follows the same progression of emotions and not everyone experiences them at the same intensity or for the same amount of time.  But unless you have no soul, everyone experiences them at some point when thrown into a new culture.  The four stages go as follows:

1.  Euphoria and wonder accompany you to the new place.  Everything is different and exotic and you can't get enough of the constant stimulation of new experiences.  There's always so much to do and seemingly not enough time to do it all.  The language is intriguing and you want to learn more of it.

2.  After the euphoria passes, anger takes over.  Instead of noticing everything that's different from what you're used to, you notice things that are not the same.  Those may sound alike but the feelings associated with the latter lead to homesickness and resentment.  Trivial things trigger negative overreactions and the inability to communicate exactly what you want is beyond frustrating.

3.  If staying for a longer period of time, the feeling of being stuck embodies the depression stage.  You feel the hopelessness of knowing you won't be returning to the familiar for awhile and just dwell on the security and reliability of the environment you left behind.  You think nothing will be able to make you happy  for an extended period of time unless you go back home.  You just don't want to be here anymore.

4.  And finally, when things that were once foreign to you are becoming familiar, you cross over into acceptance.  This can happen gradually or suddenly but the best analogy I've seen equates it getting into a warm bath after a rough day.  You don't have to love it all, but you realize that things are the way they are, and sometimes, they even become endearing the more this place and culture become your home away from home.

Having moved to a few places abroad, I can personally vouch that this progression is more or less accurate.  Though each location and experience yielded their own different progressions, as a whole, culture shock at some point always showed its faces.  One thing I have made sure to keep in mind is that it is absolutely necessary to be flexible, be liquid.  This mantra has made adjusting to new countries a thousand times easier than had I gone to them rigid with expectations that I would be living the same way as I did at home.  If I were a liquid, I'd be mango juice.

As for homesickness, it's always there, but depending on the emotional roller coaster that is experiencing a new place, it varies in strength.  I have been asked whether it gets easier each time I move to a new place, and honestly, I think the answer is no.  Each place is different and each culture is initially unfamiliar.  I still left my home behind and still missed out on life moving on without me there.  But it does make it a little easier knowing that Stage 4 eventually comes, and the hopelessness from Stage 3 is lessened because of that.
My state of mind is incredibly important in coping, and when I catch myself wandering into anger, sadness, or longing, I try to center myself again by reminding myself that this was my choice, I came for certain reasons, and that I am in a remarkable and privileged position--able to live and work in a different country, learn another culture and language, become apart of a welcoming family and community, and still have my wonderful real family and life back home to support me.  It's easy to forget these and to start taking everything for granted, and it's when this happens that you get lost in the downs because you're glazing over the ups.

That being said, here in Chile, I've been feeling a little more homesick than normal recently due to summer starting in Massachusetts, my family going to the Cape, an unfortunate case of fleas lovingly spread to me by my affectionate students, and missing seeing Kevin speak at his high school graduation last week.  So I've been helping this with a few remedies for when I'm craving a little something more familiar, things I would do at home, including but not limited to talking to folks from home, watching The Office and Glee, keeping up with my sports news, taking rides on the bike, and planning my winter break (in July) travel.

But my favorite is eating food I love that I don't usually get around here.  Go figure.

Nesquik

Peanut butter and anything.  PB is super expensive here, about $6 for a tiny jar so it's not too common in the Chilean diet.  My mom sent me a care package with a giant jar of Skippy.  Creamy, of course.  :)

Chinese food--kind of goes along with home-cooked meals.  This wonderful goodness and my one biggest food longing here, I have to cook myself since the Chinese restaurants have adapted to the Chilean palete of salt, salt, and salt.  I made this chow mein and garlic spinach lunch for my host family one Sunday, but I have to admit, it was mostly for me.

Thanks mom!!!

waka waka ¡eh! ¡eh! ¡esto es áfrica!

La Copa Mundial Sudafrica 2010 has begun!  The Cup, arguably the most important tournament in the world, is the one time every four years that every country stops for the love of one thing:  soccer.  We all know not too many people in the US would say that soccer is their sport of choice to watch, but I think most can agree that when an international event with the magnitude of the World Cup takes place, there is certainly a buzz of electricity in the air.  Now take that buzz and multiply it into a lightning storm during the Kansas tornado season and you've got the electricity in the air here in Chile.  As someone who loves sports in general and actually enjoys watching soccer games, I can't explain how happy I am to be in a country that really cares about the sport (fútbol as they say here) and how exciting it will be to watch games with the passionate locals.  You can't go anywhere without seeing an ad, hearing the Shakira song or someone yelling, "Chi! Chi! Chi! Le! Le! Le! Viva Chile!!!"  I don't watch much TV but from what I've heard and have seen, pretty much every commercial and show has some kind of soccer related theme.  My students are running around the school with their 2010 Official Chile World Cup Sticker Books, and if there is one thing that keeps them semi-tame, it's crowding around the book and discussing each player's stats and how many goals "Chupete" will score.

Fellow volunteer, Annamarie from South Africa, and I were grabbing empanadas after Bikram yoga in Viña last night and the man at the cash register asked where we were from.  When she replied, his eyes looked like they were going to pop out of their sockets and with a huge smile, he yelled, "Sudafrica??  Sudafrica!  Johannesburgo es una ciudad hermosa!  Te gusta fútbol??" so that everyone in the shop turned and looked at us.  She's going to be pretty popular this month.

Chile will be playing their first game next Wednesday, June 16, against Honduras that will take place in the morning in Chilean time (also happens to be the same as East Coast time since Daylight Savings for those of you who didn't know).  And so the entire country will be at a standstill during the match.  No, I'm not kidding.  The government sent a memo to all the schools mandating that the students MUST be able to watch when Chile plays.  So next Wednesday and every game after, they aren't required to be in school until 10AM after the match ends and those who have to come on time will be able to watch on the TV in the lunchroom.  Many businesses are doing the same.  I, myself, will be cheering for Chile as well as the US, of course, and am super emocionada (excited) to watch the USA-England game on Saturday!

One of my 5th graders asked me who I was cheering for in the tournament.  I told him US and Chile and so he drew this for me before the end of class. :-)

Get into the World Cup spirit!

"Waving Flag" - The official FIFA World Cup Anthem


"Waka Waka" - Another song and dance of the tournament by Shakira (Spanish version)

Nike "Write the Future" Commercial

skipping school for...what?

In my couple months of teaching here, I've learned that there are a few unconventional-to-our-standards reasons for students not to go to school.  Sometimes because they just want to sleep.  Sometimes, other activities just sound more fun.  For example, on Monday, my host sister, Ayun, and host mom Charo both didn't go to school or work.  I came home from school and found them just hanging out in the house.  Obviously my first question was if they were sick though they both seemed perfectly healthy.  Turns out they were in perfect health and they had skipped out on daily obligations because they were going shopping at the mall in Viña del Mar.  Right.
But the most interesting reason had to do with weather.  And no, not snow or storms.  My host brother, Amaury, had told me awhile back that when it rains in Quilpué, all the kids stay home from school.  Coming from a place where parents only let their kids stay home if deathly ill or there is a 5-foot layer of snow on the ground, this of course, blew my mind.  He said that they just don't know how to deal with being wet.  To their credit, there are no heaters in the schools and so if they are soaking wet in the winter, there's a pretty good chance of a cold epidemic.  Still, I was curious to see if he was exaggerating or if this was actually true.
Seeing rain when I wake up in the morning usually puts an immediate damper on my mood if I know I have to go out in it.  However, I was interested in seeing how many kids would show up to school with it.  It has hardly rained in Quilpué thus far and never while I was teaching so imagine my excitement when I woke up last Friday and saw that there was a good steady drizzle going with heavier rain to come in the afternoon.  It was probably the first and only time I was excited to go to work in the rain.
When I arrived, I could already tell that the courtyard where all the kids are usually running and screaming before the bell was quieter than normal.  During the first block, one of my 2nd grade classes, I taught 8 kids out of a normal 30.  Only half of my 5th grade class showed up to school and about 13 of my normal 25 1st graders.  Also, my co-teacher changed her lesson plan for the day so that it now focused on rainy days, but we spent most of the time running to the window every time there was a sudden downpour anyway.
So it's true.  When it rains in Quilpué, the kids stay home from school.  I would love to see what would happen if it ever snowed.

Half of a usually full 5th grade class

Muy pocos chiquititos

20 years and still going strong

It's kind of funny and also a little wrong that esposas, the word for wives, also means handcuffs in Spanish.

Charo and Norman had a 20th wedding anniversary asado thrown for them by a group of their close friends.  Our backyard was all set up with flowers, white table cloths, candles, and of course, a massive buffet of grilled meat and sides.  The party started at 6:30pm meaning the guests arrived at a very Chilean time of  7:30 or later.  Next-day reflection counted about 53 total attendees at the asado.  The two never had a formal wedding and reception and had tied the knot at the city municipal building with a government official present for the certificate signing.  And so this was their chance to celebrate the way they would have had there been a party that night twenty years ago.

The novia and novio

Backyard asado patio

Meat on the grill

Choripan of course!

The novia, meaning bride-to-be and as Charo was calling herself all night, wore a white dress and carried around a bouquet of flowers while Norman, the novio, pranced around the backyard socializing with their friends.  Almost every person brought a gift along with a bottle of wine and so the drinks were plenty.  After the big meal, the two read aloud a conversation consisting of love letters they had sent to each other during their courtship, or something to that extent from what I could understand in my limited Spanish.  That, or they were their wedding vows.  Either way, it was thoroughly romantic and all the listening crowd could do was sigh, smile, and clap.

Next, my host brother, Amaury and his friend, Cristobal, played a song on the guitar and charango respectively while host cousin, Santi, did a dramatic reading that I unfortunately couldn't understand but I assumed had something to do with love and devotion.  The entire extended family is extremely artistically talented, made up of painters, needlecrafters, musicians, and actors.  After their performance, it was time for the removal of the garter from the bride's leg.  Yes, you read that correctly.  Norman pulled the garter off of Charo's leg and proceeded to put it on his head and dance around with his signature grin of mischief.  The whole thing finished up with the bouquet and garter throwing and ensuing wrestling match for the flowers.  Then, as Chilean parties go, the dancing and music extended into the wee hours of the morning until everyone left exhausted but happy.

More Anniversary Asado Pics