After our WorldTeach group split up to our new homes, we each wrote an update to everyone about our placements, families, towns, and schools. This is the email I sent:
Hola! to my wonderful posse,
I am writing from my lovely little house (yay wifi!) in the suburbia of Valpo. I have an awesome family that seems to be pretty influential in this town (the mayor is a close friend who gets drunk and crashes on their couch at their weekly Sunday asados):
-my dad, Norman, works for the Mineduc and also was a former prisoner of Pinochet
-my mom, Charo, is the sweetest woman, a great cook, and her last name is Allende...(relation maybe!?) Neither parent speaks a lick of English save for "beautiful" and "Oh my God!"
-my 17 year old brother, Amaury, has the intelligence and wisdom of someone way beyond his years, speaks really in-depth English, and is a talented musician
-my 12 year old sister, Ayun, also speaks some English and is just adorable
-our german shepard named Laica who is a very "special" dog. Just now I called out at her from my window and watched her get really excited, run in circles, and then proceed to lay down and gnaw on a piece of her own stale poo. Yes, "special."
We live in a little 1-story house about a 10-min walk from the centro of town and also near a metro stop on the Valparaiso line (I think it's 20 min from here to Vina and 30 min to Valpo?) The house reminds
me of Pablo Neruda's in that the rooms are each at different weird levels even though it essentially is just one floor. Some walls are painted in different bright colors, some have murals on them of Valpo that the family painted together and the house is covered in cool paintings, tapestries, and objects from all over the world. It doesn't hurt the Neruda association that they have pictures of him all over the place. The best part is the backyard which is full of fruit/nut trees, has a grape terrace, garden, hammock, BBQ pit and is surrounded by tall walls covered in ivy. I've happily discovered the wifi reaches the hammock. They whole place is decorated with what other people would deem trash but they have turned into works of art.
Quilpué itself is just kind of a big sprawl of homes and I've been warned to stay out of some areas. The centro is a small commercial area but the streets are small, the buildings are short, and there are lots of mom and pop shops and bakeries. The whole town is surrounded by hills. Just over the ones my house faces is Vina.
My school is about a 20-min walk from my house, shorter by bike which I'll have after Amaury fixes his up for me. It's grades 1-8 and I'll be seeing them all. My co-teacher and principal both speak some English, enough to communicate fine and I've met most of the kids already. Some are really sweet, some are terrors naturally, but all
of them are adorable. I'm mostly shocked by the lack of classroom management here and how it's just accepted as "Es lo que hay." My schedule after this week of observation will be M, T, W 8am-3pm and W, Th, F 8am-3pm on alternating weeks. Yes, this means every other weekend for me will be 6-day weekends so get ready to show me around your towns!
The only problem is that I currently don't have my own classroom. I've been pushing for one this week and will be more firm at the end of it before I actually start teaching. The only prospect is the stage in the courtyard that can close up and is only used a few times a month. Everything else with the school is great, it has projectors and boards in every room and has wifi on the whole property for free. It's a public school but I've been told that the kids who go there are really under-privileged with tough social backgrounds and so they get a lot of donations and funding from the government. But you wouldn't be able to tell this from their energy and enthusiasm.
Anyway, sorry my little update has turned into a 10-page paper. I loved reading about all your places and I will definitely be seeing you all soon! (The ones on the beach probably sooner :)
Muchos besitos,
Tang
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