Great news. I had a really good past 3 days.
Let me tell you about it.
On Thursday, I coordinated with one of my friends, Tarek, to meet up in a nearby city called Viña del Mar and then spend the night at his house to watch movies and hang out.
Tarek and his family are all part of my Rotary Club because he went on an exchange last year to Aspen, Colorado. His older sister also went on an exchange in Oregon a few years back as well, but they are both Chilean and obviously speak very good Spanish. I met their parents a few times at the Quillota Rotary meetings and they are both very lovely as well.
Any concerned adults reading this, please know that it was a very safe situation and also that my host family made it very clear that if I felt uncomfortable at any moment, they would move heaven and earth to come get me.
Anyways, back to the fun stuff.
Gonzy, my host brother, took me to the train station in Limache which is about 20 minutes away and got me all situated to take the train to Viña del Mar to meet up with Tarek and his mom. This was my first official time on a train completely by myself, and while I was a little bit nervous, I lived to tell the tale!
Tarek and his mom picked me right up at the train station, and she took my backpack of overnight clothes because she was going to head back to the house, while Tarek and I were going to meet up with his friend Paola aka Puli (pronounced Pow-li).
We finally found her in a Starbucks and we each got a sweet drink to get us through some shopping. Neither of them really had much they were looking for, but I was determined to take this opportunity to get some good Christmas presents for my host brothers because I hadn't gotten anything for them yet.
We picked out some delicious truffles in the Lindt store and then we found this place that sells the same brand of chocolate covered pretzels that they have in Stewart's (you know the ones I'm talking about, in the blue bag) and they were on sale so I snagged a few of those too for my host brothers. My Christmas gifts for my host family include a whole lot of chocolate, but can you ever really go wrong with chocolate?
After that we walked around a bit, and I'd like to say that I felt so comfortable with Tarek and Puli. They both are pretty fluent in English, although we talked in Spanish. It helps me a lot though to converse with people who I can ask questions to in English or who can correct me and then explain it in a way that helps me remember better.
Additionally, they are both 18 like me and the vibes overall were just a little more mature and settled which I appreciated very much.
We ended up going on the Ferris wheel that they have in Viña which was fun, although not worth the $8 it cost but oh well.
After that we stopped at McDonald's because Tarek hadn't eaten lunch yet and I shared some french fries with Puli. Then we started making the trek back to the train to go to Tarek's house, but first we made a pitstop at the grocery store. I had Tarek and Puli pick out a few of their favorite Chilean snacks that we could try later and share during the movie.
Back at Tarek's house, we ate once (pronounced un-say, aka Chilean dinner) with his parents and sister, just hanging out and talking for a bit afterwards which I've come to find is pretty standard in Chile.
After once, we, as in Tarek, Puli, Ami (Tarek's sister), and myself, all changed into pajamas to get ready to watch the movie. Ami had decided that we needed to watch Avatar because a new one is coming out soon. We put out all the snacks in little bowls to share and before we watched the movie we did a taste testing game where I would try the new snack, give it a ranking 1-10, and then everyone else would try it and we would talk about it or share random side stories that correlated with the candy.
It was seriously so fun, I had a blast. Somewhere along the way we decided that we should all have a breakfast for dinner night, but American style with waffles, bacon, pancakes, hash browns, sausage, etc. and I would bring some maple syrup I have tucked away that I have for special occasions. I really hope that happens because it would be so fun. Only time will tell.
After all of those shenanigans, we finally got around to watching the movie and it was really good. I'd only ever seen parts of Avatar before so it was nice to watch the whole thing through. We did watch it in English, I'm a little ashamed to admit, but Ami, Tarek, and Puli all preferred it in English they said so I didn't want to be rude and insist we watch it in Spanish.
I will say, it is a very long movie because we ended up staying awake until approximately 2am by the time it actually finished. In the morning we didn't have anything crazy going on though, so no harm no foul.
I woke up before Tarek and Puli did, mostly because it was a new house and I tend to wake up early in environments that I am unfamiliar with. I just kind of hung out until Puli woke up because she had to go home around 9:30 for a nail appointment.
After that Tarek and Ami got up and we made pancakes and ate those with peanut butter, manjar (Chilean carmely, sweetened condensed milk cream), butter, and jam. This was actually the first time I ate peanut butter in Chile and holy smokes do I miss it. I'm going to have to eat a whole jar when I come home.
Ami and Tarek needed to go to a smaller mall closer to their house in the afternoon to buy a special kind of chocolate for their dad for Christmas, so I tagged along. I made some purchases too, a new book being the most noteworthy. It's one I have read before, but it's in Spanish so I'm hoping that reading it will help me further my skills.
When we got back to the house, the original plan was for me to catch the train again and head back to Quillota, but as it turns out Tarek's dad was heading there around 6pm and could drop me off with my host brother then, so I stayed.
Ami put on Gilmore Girls and we watched a few episodes and chatted which was really fun. It felt good to watch a girly show with another girl. I definitely took having a sister for granted in that sense, because now with three older host brothers I feel like all I watch is dude movies.
Tarek was hanging out with us but also kind of doing his own thing. I can tell he is a bit more introverted and that his social battery might have been running a bit low but I didn't mind. It was nice to just sit with the two of them and not be alone.
When I got back to my host family's house, we ended up having a pretty big dinner that night with the whole family (minus Almendra, for obvious reasons) and stayed up pretty late but it was so fun. The Christmas energy had everyone laughing and speaking over each other. I just sat there and took it in for a moment because it was beautiful. It was one of those moments that I knew I was going to miss, even while I was still living it.
The next day, I took the morning to wrap the Christmas presents I got for my host family and I had exactly enough paper which has got to be a good sign right? After that I went over to the restaurant to eat lunch with Abuela and we ended up coming back to the house because she had some fruit she needed to cook and I decided that I was going to bake Christmas cookies.
The cookies took a while because I'm not used to the ingredients or the kitchen. For those of you thinking, "Anna, the ingredients are all the same" you'd be technically right. But they are not the same type of ingredients that I am very familiar with in my house so I had to improvise a few parts. They turned out good in the end and my host brothers ate most of them by today so I take that as they couldn't have been too terrible.
As for today, I meant to join the zoom call of church at home but at that exact same time Gonzy and Abuela told me they were going to go to Sunday mass. For me, that kind of experience is exactly why I am in Chile. For any readers coming from the Hebron United congregation, I am sorry I missed you but please know it was with good reason.
Once we wrapped up at church, we went to visit Abuela's husband at the cemetery. We brought some flowers and a broom to clean off his gravestone. I could tell that Abuela was really glad we went so that way it was looking really nice for Christmas.
I've just been hanging out at the house now. Trying my hardest to stay true to a list of goals I set for myself at the beginning of my Chilean summer.
Merry Christmas to all <3
Much love always,
Anna
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