La Granja Casablanca

Me at the top of Cerro Uritorco, which I climbed with my friend Ruben and inhaled clouds.

Swimmin´hole close to the farm

A fantastic meal made by my friends Juan and Julia (asado from the grill covered in tomato sauce, motzarella cheese, basil from the garden, and tomatoes)

The farm is nestled in between two sets of mountains and is covered in willows, eucaliptus trees(sp?), and beautiful greenery.

More pictures and stories to come!

WWOOFing in Capilla del Monte, Córdoba, Argentina

Hello? Did I accidentally send myself back to Asheville? No, couldn´t be.

I remember having a conversation with Reneé when we were taking a walk one day in Chile and she was like, ¨Do you ever feel like you´ve fallen in love with a place?¨ Well Reneé, I think I do. Coming here feels like I´ve come home.

From what I can tell thus far, Capilla is a small town nestled between two giant mountains and is full of health-loving hippies, backpacking tourists, and generally really friendly people. I really like Capilla. The best way that I can describe it is if you took Asheville, squeezed it down in size, filled it with Argentines, and removed 99% of the tourists/English speakers. It has so many health stores, artisan breasds, cheeses, and jams. Yesterday I was looking to buy coffee and I came across ¨Café de Higo¨-- Fig Coffee. I guess what didn´t really register with me when I bought it was that it was ALL dried fig and no parts coffee. But I like it ok. Other than restarants and tourist shops I haven´t really seen many stores that are exactly alike. It´s not overloaded with pharmacies or panaderías (Viña) nor crowded with people (Mar del Plata). There´s a really safe, relaxed, mountainy feel here that I love (surprise?)

The farm is called La Granja Casablanca (the white house farm) and is in easy walking distance from downtown (several blocks). It´s a campground, hostel, pool, and educational site as well as a farm and a home. Somehow it still manages to feel secluded. Almost like camp. Is this bad that I´m comparing my farmlife to camp, because I keep getting a really strong Rockbrook feeling here. Maybe it´s the fact that I´m sleeping in a bunkbed. The farm is totally green, surrounded by trees and plants with the mountains looming overhead . It´s so beautiful, I can´t believe I ended up here by just selecting one of the closest farms to me.

My job here at Casablanca is to help on the farm with planting, weeding, upkeep etc. I get to use anything out of the garden to spruce up my meals. I only have to work from 8am-1pm daily, at which point I have the rest of the day free to swim in their pool (they have a big community pool that is constantly full of people!), relax, or go exploring! There are lots of trails to hike. Apparently, one hike has like dozens of swimming holes where you can jump in, jump out, drink some mate, and hike on to the next hole. YES PLEASE!

Let me introduce you all to the people in my life (pictures coming later): Sandra and Juan Carlos own the farm and live here with their 3 children (can´t remember their names). Sandra is an Argentine version of Sarah Marion´s mom; tall, thin and tan with dark eyes and short hair. She doesn´t smile much, not to say that she´s not friendly, just that she doesn´t just give her smile away. [She told me that she and her husband gets like 7 or 8 requests from WWOOFers a week requesting to work for them but they are very picky. Apparently they look really hard at what a person writes in their first letter to them to see what it is they want to get out of the experience. I´m only the second WWOOFer they´ve had.] Juan Carlos is lanky, bronzed, tall, very Argentine looking and has seems to always have a cheerful look about him. He was kind enough to invite me into his house this morning to drink yerba mate with him (like strong tea) before work started.

I have met three of the people I will be working with on the farm. The first is Juan Manuel (I think), who is a thin, muscular guy who could be anywhere in age from 19 to 25 and is deaf. He works mostly with the animals . I love watching him because the sign language that they use with him isn´t any traditional language, it´s just hand movements that obviously correspond with whatever they´re talking about. Some do correspond, I recognized the word ¨morning,¨but pretty much watching him converse it like watching an exchange student who knows nothing about a language try to talk navigate themselves around a foreign city, except with less noise. Hugo, a tall middle aged man with gray hair has been assignning me jobs on the farm. He kept telling me not to work so hard today, not realizing that he had assigned a perfectionist to de-weed the tomatoes. Ruben is a broad man with caramel skin and bloodshot eyes. He maintains the upkeep of the grounds (cutting the grass, picking up after the guests from the hostel, etc).

Sounds.
Birds. There is an Argentinian bird that sounds just like a squeeky toy. When they´re all riled up it´s like a pack of dogs have just been set loose in Pet´s Mart.
Spanish. For once, it´s all I hear. It´s all I speak. It´s really hard for my mind sometimes to be constantly swtiching back and forth from Spanish to English. Speaking Spanish is a relief, really.
Children. This farm constantly had happy children playing volleyball, swimming in the pool, hanging out on the playground (or today, as an educational lesson groups of children were escorted around the farm and the animals´pen.)
The Turkey. he doesn´t make that much noise really, but when he does, you know it´s him. It´s amazing how when a turkey speaks, it seems to be in questions. ¨Gobble-gobble?¨

Sights and Smells
The sky stays bright blue and full of big puffy clouds tha may all of a sudden turn gray and sprinkle you with the lightests most refreshing rain that disappears quickly. Speaking of rain, Capilla doesn´t have enough. Córdoba is in a huge drought. The two big rivers on either side of Capilla are totally dry. Dry Creek, you might even say (Newbie group, anyone?)
What I smell as I write this is cut grass (Bandit´d love it), warm earth and a serious lack of pollution. When you´re weeding tomato and basil plants that are as seriously overgrown as the ones I weeded today (word for weeds: Lluyo), you know you´ve found the plant before you see it from that dynamic duo of scent: tomate y albahaca.

FYI: Argentine word for pool: pileta
Favorite current word in Spanish: ¨Crocante¨(crunchy)

That´s me for now. I´m super happy, healthy, and already way comfortable with where I am, who I´m with, and what´s in store for me. It´s happened again, I´ve found myself in one of those places that I was meant to be in.

Pictures will follow eventually. Good thoughts, good thoughts.

Sentiments on Christmas from this past September

Christmas is nearing fast and it doesn't feel like it at all. It' s hot and there is a serious lack in the amount of Santa Clauses I'm used to seeing. I've gotten news that Asheville/Winston-Salem has just gotten the most snow in years and I spend my days in swim suits and shorts rather than sledding down the snow hill. This Christmas is clearly going to be different. I know that sometimes I act impervious to homesickness (I don't feel homesick right now, I have too much going on, plus Mom's here with me.) Note: I'm perfectly happy right now and I'm really enjoying my time with Coty's family. But I just wanted to include a page from my journal from earlier this semester to let at least Haley and Dad know that I'm going to really miss their company over these holidays.

"9/24/09

I'm supposed to be studying but I can't get the idea that I'm going to miss Christmas off my mind. It's making me cry just thinking about it. I'm going to miss the piney aroma and the happy glow of our Christmas tree. I'm going to miss Mom's search for the perfect candle to make the house smell warm and spicy. I'm going to miss the Christmas carols playing through the house as we scurry around getting ready for a party. I'm going to miss Dad getting dressed up as Santa and coming home with sorties about how the children responded to him. I'm going to miss fighting over who gets to eat the last of Becky West's Christmas toffee. I'm going to miss Bandit and Tollie hating their reindeer antlers. I'm going to miss getting up Christmas morning and crowding into Mom and Dad's bed to open stockings and eat biscotti cookies. I'm going to miss how Haley gets me a The Farside (an old comic strip by Gary Larson) calender every year, and every year I get excited because I love The Farside.  I'm going to miss getting presents labeled as "From Santy Clause," wrapped in our same wrapping paper. I'm going to miss hearing "Thank you sweet pea!" or "Sweet bear!!" from my Daddy. I'll miss getting together with the Reisters and Grandma to eat an early dinner. I'll miss the children performing a Christmas ceremony at PUCC and remember how it felt like the big performance of my life back when I used to be involved. I'll miss going to the Warrick's house for Christmas Eve-Eve and being shocked at how big Carter has gotten. I'll miss snuggling with little Pearl for hours reading a book. I'll miss being covered in cat hair. I'll miss Dad's wild hairs about doing things in the Christmas spirit, like baking a LOT of cookies to give to people and then having us eat them all. I really hope I can supplement al that I'll miss with something."

And off we go.

Maureen, Colomba (dog), Me, kitten, Ian, kitten, Juanita, Yoly

This is my last day in Chile, though it doesn't feel like it. Nothing feels final ever, you know? Let's hope it never is. I've been awash with feelings of sadness and excitement, but I feel like the only way for me to get through this goodbye is just to keep following my feet. Last night we had a despedida for me (a goodbye party) and I had to keep myself from crying the entire night. Not because it was sentimental in anyway, considering the conversations we have can last for hours while discussing merely where the best bakeries in Valparaiso are in relation to the main plaza. But I think that all of my emotions stemmed from the fact that I was sitting there in the room with all of the Chileans that make me look back on my time here and think, they are my Chile. They are the reason that this trip has been full of love, support and laughter. They are my family here, and this is our last meal together. 

Yesterday before the despedida I went to meet Marisol, a Chilean woman who studied abroad with Jan Morris (a teacher at the Downtown Elementary School) back in 1973 (right before the Golpe de Estado in Chile). We talked all about Jan and her family, how many times Marisol came to visit and what it's like to be a foreign exchange student. Those of us who are fortunate enough to have a supportive and loving host family (or really, just fortunate enough to study abroad) are really lucky to be able to take a glance at how another culture lives and also, how our own cultures live. Her stories about Atlanta, Georgia and Winston-Salem made me pine for home a little bit. She said she's been back to visit Jan's family at least 7 times. Que suerte! It's great to find a family connection  that remains just as strong across country borders. 

Today is going to be hard, tomorrow will be harder. Today I'm going to wander around Valparaiso one last time with some friends, finish packing, and then go out with friends for our last night together. The plan is to not sleep so that I can sleep on the 24 hours of bus ride that I have in front of me. One hard thing is knowing that all of my friends are going home to spend Christmas with their families while I'm continuing on. I'll be meeting up with Mom in Buenos Aires, Argentina two days from now, but knowing that Haley and Dad are home without us for the first Christmas in 20 years makes me so sad. 

Here's the plan, Stan: 8am Sunday board a bus for Mendoza, Argentina. Around 12pm Monday arrive in Buenos Aires, meet up with Mom in our hostel! Spend a week touring around Buenos Aires, and then head on to Mar del Plata to spend Christmas with the Navesi family. Then, a few days after New Years I'll be heading to Cordoba, Argentina to WWOOF on an organic farm that I've found! [Here's their website, take a look! www.lagranjadecapilla.com.ar]

 I'll stay there until mid-February and then I'm meeting up with Adrienne (close friend from UNCA) in BsAs and we're going to Uruguay! Woo! Then I'll come back and teach English in Buenos Aires!

It's crazy that a third of my trip is now over. I'm so sad to leave Chile, but I have Argentina ahead of me. Bring on the next seven months! Happy Holidays everyone!

To the South of South America!

I went with three other friends (Lindsey, Lindsey, and Renee) to tour around the south of Chile. We didn’t head into Patagonia (although some of our friends went there instead and had a blast backpacking in Torres de Paine) but we had a few good adventures of our own.

The south of Chile is especially known for how green and lush it is (la naturaleza) and the European influence on the bigger cities (German influence especially.) We headed first to Valdivia, which is flooding with German influence, and has it’s own brewery which is famous throughout Chile, called Kuntsmann (I’m not a beer connoisseur, but it was good!) We ate beer ice cream and had a good time in the museum impersonating the most bizarre German mannequins I’ve ever seen. 

Slogan of the day: Das gute Bier!

(Mapuche medicine woman and man)

Also in Valdivia, we went to a Mapuche cultural festival (the Mapuches are the indigenous people of Chile who are still fighting to keep their culture alive) and saw some beautiful artwork done of current Mapuche tribe leaders. 

Finally, we went to el Castillo de San Sebastián de la Cruz Fort, which wasn’t much to look at at all, until we realized that there was a man who was willing to take pictures of us in old-fashioned costumes and print out pictures for 3 mil (like 6 bucks). This was most definitely worth the visit.

The Lindseys (left)

Me and Renee, battling (below).

Next we went to Puerto Montt, a port city before the start of Patagonia, and one of the most dangerous cities in Chile. We mostly wanted to go to Puerto Montt so that we could visit Petrohue, a beautiful city with waterfalls and El Lago de todos los santos (All Saints Lake), but we had more cut out for us. 

The day after seeing the water falls of Petrohue and the lake (BEAUTIFUL, by the way. We drank out of the lake), we were stopped on the street by a man who told us that he needed gringas (blonde, German-looking tourists) for a movie he was working on. 

[Side note: It’s funny, I’ve never associated myself with Germans, but people ALWAYS think I’m German! And really, I’m a good percentage Dutch… but definitely 100% United Statesian, whatever that means. So now, when they ask me if I’m German, I think to myself, “Well yeah, I kind of am.”] 

So anyway, we were a little bit hesitant about this man wanting 3 blonde-haired blue-eyed gringas for his "movie," but we gave him our number and he'd call us the next day. Of course, in our minds we're inventing all of these stories about how we'd arrive the next day and they'd take us into a room and kill us, or have us do unflattering things in front of a camera. But he called us the next morning and asked us to meet him in an outside touristy fish market called Angelmo. It was an absolutely ugly day, very cold, rainy, windy. 

We got to Angelmo and wandered around the fish market trying to figure out where the film was taking place until finally we realized that we were on the set. The director took Lindsey (the most blonde-haired and blue-eyed of the three of us) and immediately put her in as an extra in the movie. Meanwhile, the other Lindsey and I asked around about the film and found out that it's tentatively being called "Patagonia," or "Como una estrella en el cielo," and it's being done in German. We watched Lindsey (gringa tourist extra) follow around the actress and politely turn down the street venders, as her part entails. Lindsey and I watched her proudly like show biz moms. Finally, it was our turns to be on screen. The director put us in our positions and told us that when the actress shows up at the bottom of the stairs we were to walk across the set. The first time we didn't understand our cue and Lindsey walked right in front of the actress, cutting off her lines. Hah! We knew that something had to be lost in translation because the German director would approach us, gabbering in German and waving her arms. Then, her Chilean translator would step in and repeat everything in Spanish, which we would then translate into English in our own heads. 

(Below: Our big scene! Famous German actress on the left.)

We thought that our time spent on this movie would be like one, two hours tops, but at 3pm we left Angelmo in route to a restaurant to continue filming. Now, my hair was in braids when we were at the fish market so I was severely unaware of how greasy it was. We were instructed to take our hair down and to change clothes for the restaurant scene, obviously, since that would be strange that the same 3 gringas from before just happened to be in a trendy restaurant scenes later. Talk about self-conscious. We tried to steam some of the grease out with a straightener, but that didn't help much. The Lindseys hadn't brought any other clothes apart from t-shirts, so of course they had to have a costume change. 

A woman took them into the bathroom and put this terrible lacy, ugly bit of shirt on Lindsey P (the girl who looks like she's wearing a table cloth) and said, "There, that's better." Oh my gosh how we laughed. On the set we were supposed to be pretending to talk and eat salad while the actors were doing their thing (you know, like acting...) but they sat me and Lindsey together and we had the hardest time keeping a straight face and it wasn't like there were lots of extras in the restaurant. There were like, 10 of us, total. I don't think they included us in the scene. This is why actors don't act with their best friends. In the end, we got paid 5 mil (10 bucks)each (two free dinners! Woo!) (Me and Lindsey with our "chilean family")

We left Puerto Montt and spent a few days in Puerto Varas and Frutillar. Both were beautiful but extremely touristy. Frutillar is especially known for its German influence and architecture. We ate apple strudel. Das gute strudel!

Next we headed up to Pucón, a city in central Chile that was not on our itinerary but we decided that we could squeeze it in, and boy are we glad we did. 

Very close to Pucón is Huerquehue National Park, with some of the most beautiful lakes I've ever seen. We hiked for about 7 hours and just basked in the natural glory of clear waters, blue skies, and the smoking Villarrica volcano.

Left: Cascada Nido de Aguila

Right:

Villarrica volcano with Tinquilco Lake

Me in front of Lago Toro

The Three Pigs at Huerquehue Park

And then we went home.

Some more pictures.

Me with Pablo Neruda, my love (lying beside his grave.)

Pig and I at Isla Negra (Lindsey 1)

Other pig and I at an asado (barbecue)... (Lindsey 2)

We five girls have stuck together all throughout our Chilean Culture and Ortofonia classes! Yeah Grupo 3-B!

(Abby, Lindsey2, Lindsey1, Me, Renee.)

Algunas fotos recientes

Me at Laguna Verde

Las tres chanchitas for Halloween (The Lindseys and Me)

Camouflage 

Me and Maureen (host sister)

Yoly and Maureen

Maureen's birthday party

Everyone but Yoly knew this was coming. She was in good humor about it afterward, which impressed me.

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I have a mass of emotions, feelings, and stories that are anxious to bust out of my heart and gush from my fingertips. It'll come soon enough.