Anyway, I was stationed on the outskirts, far from the population centers but square on the site of this big old pre-March fort. We all were- sent to the margins where fighting was strike-and-fade through the forests and the line between civilians and combatants was drawn with a stick in the dirt and about as permanent. Where it was easy to write off mistakes as mistakes and massacres as blind shots in the dark. Can't trust the Broken Legion around people, not harnessed. We had to participate, in the name of our contracts and our families, but we weren't the ones needed in this war. Not yet.
I can only imagine how the locals saw us. Like the knights of their history, perhaps, eyeless giants clad in black and painted with laughing foreign symbols of teeth, of talons, of blood. An ancestral memory of the armies which swarmed across their frontiers, bearing dragon-banners which metamorphosed over the centuries into dragon-arms, powerful segmented tongues of metal that spit fire and death. A Quilin under harness is war personified, the ultimate sacrifice of self in pursuit of restraint: the terrible force of the Dragon directed and controlled, unleashed only when all other options fail. The very best are our generals, our negotiators, our poets.
A harnessed Quilin of the Broken Legion is a weapon of terror. Nothing less, nothing more. We're the ones who fight too well.
I'm on watch. The forest is dark and quiet, scarred by generations of logging and petty conflict. The animals we haven't shot are keeping their heads down and their mouths shut. The hissing background chatter of status and targeting brushes through my mind as it has for the last three years: -clear clear ready spun at ninety-two percent clear ready-
The dragon-arms swivel this way and that, probing for any foolish Genoans stumbling through the trees who might have an interest in occupying what is theirs. The fort is a historical site, after all. We're here to protect it from the fighting. For their own good.
Radar and heat detection reveals nothing. Only the upper two arms out of six possess this function, along with an array of nonlethal instruments designed to hold, to slow, to incapacitate. It follows a pattern: vigilance and prevention is the height of civilized conflict, so these tools naturally go above the heat rays, the grenade launchers, the antipersonnel shredders, the slashing blades and crushing claws and facemelting acids. The next two tiers, of course, are decisiveness and precision followed by shock and horror, which in turn rotates back to prevention. No one wants to fight a foe armed with so many nasty ways to maim and kill large groups of people.
I've furnished each civilized arm with a pair of bloodshot eyes. The others have teeth. It isn't regulation, but the Broken Legion is entitled its eccentricities.
-ready clear ready noted target target acquired traversing target engage?-
A bat wings its way just above the canopy, utterly absorbed in catching and killing mosquitos for the good of all mankind.
-target- clamors the harness, -target target target-
It zooms and tracks and calculates, bombarding the space behind my eyeballs with projections and trajectories and estimates of power required and power expended.
-engage? engage? target target-
Bats are good luck. In the old days, they were mediators between heaven and earth. I, however, am tired and annoyed and bored out of my mind, and the system seems even more persuasive than usual. It could be a suicide-bat, belly filled with explosive chemicals. Or even a machine cleverly disguised as a bat. Maybe it belongs to one faction or another and is fitted with cameras hoping to steal state secrets. Either way it's not transmitting the "friendly" signal and that means, bat or not, it's an enemy combatant like rebels or squirrels or anything else moving with a pulse that lacks the signal.
I shrug. The cooling vents of dragon-arm number four, already tracking, flare red.
A tiny comet ignites in the distance, and falls.
-target eliminated-
I grin. Just a little. Where else but in malfunction, in procedural error, in a scalpel just off the mark, would society find its killers? We're the ones who went wrong. Skirted too close. Took to it too well. We're the necessary unwanted cousins of the noble warriors, acknowledged as a problem yet never corrected. If anyone needs a city razed without remorse, we're there.
Too bad about the bat, but there are others. Smarter ones who stayed down. Just consider it a service to the species.
C for crazy.
I will never be a poet.
-ready clear ready clear ready spun at ninety two percent-
Watch resumes, and there's no more fire till morning.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Friday, April 22, 2011
And Now For Something Totally New
Not even the Dragon could save us. A presence as constant as death and gossip, a god that insisted it wasn't, the Maker of the Modern World itself--
Taken.
Imprisoned.
Killed, maybe, though most everyone doubts that it can be killed. The Conquerors brought weapons that can punch holes through poor beleaguered Earth's crust, but the Dragon's made of... well, something it's never been able to really explain and we've never managed to produce. Probably won't ever manage.
Either way, I don't think it's dead. Just silent. And it hasn't been silent for over fifteen hundred years, ever since it arrived, crash, right in the middle of the Eastern Gulf and washed up on the Mayan coast. Ever since it set up camp at Siaan K'aan and transformed a dozen squabbling kingdoms of stone-carvers and jungle farmers into the first industrial civilization the world had ever seen. Ever since it set off on the Long March, all through the Old World and then across the Western Ocean to China, who gave it the name "Celestial Dragon" instead of "Quetzal Serpent."
And it's been the Dragon ever since. (The Crosslands call it the Walking Wyrm, granted, but that's a local thing and they've always been a bit backwards.) Over a thousand cultures and a thousand years it held the world together. And now it's gone.
We fought like jaguars, of course. But even a jaguar can't do much against twenty tons of metal hurled at half the speed of light.
I like to think we would have won if we hadn't been at war already.
My apartment: a form-stamped box of a place on the two hundred and thirty-fourth floor of Cloudrise Arcology. I've got approximately a million neighbors within a mile of my front door and I can walk the floor circuit in just under eight hours. Pretty spacious compared to the barracks and heaven knows I need my space.
Still wish they'd left enough for my door plate, though. "Auma Madlangbay" it says, no room for the "an" on the end so I've had to write it in with a marker (and then of course it doesn't match the rest of the calligraphy). Doesn't do much to reassure visitors when you can't even get your door plate fixed.
It isn't that I haven't tried. I have. Reparations paperwork just isn't the easiest when people like to pretend you don't exist. And now that I've been offered for service at Seventh House Station....
Well.
My name, as I've said, is Auma Madlangbayan, with that "an" on the end. Twenty-eight years old. Born on one of the unlucky days, but that's just a superstition, really, and has nothing to do with my present situation (and they aren't unlucky to -everyone-, just the people who matter). Card-carrying citizen of the Five Great Northern Nations of Old Haida, which everyone just calls the Five Nations for convenience's sake. Second-generation immigrant (father's from Tui Kaloa and mother's from Independent Damascus), first-generation veteran. No one in the Five Nations trusts a new family until they've given up at least one kid to the levies. Being female, I was disposable.
They didn't say that, of course.
Either way, off I went to the staging college, did well in the examinations, volunteered for the Quilin Division of Special Forces because they said it was a quick ticket to promotion and anyway the process was reversible and perfectly safe and ended up in C Division of the so-called Broken Legion instead. C for crazy, right? Anyway, we did the Crosslander peacekeeping thing as best we could until -they- showed up, and then we did our best against -them-, which I'm sure -they- thought was amusing. Not much of the old C Division left these days. Not much of any military left these days.
So now I'm here, and the Conquerors are expecting me at Seventh House Station. Something about a "variety of phenotypes." Got to study us in "all our forms," the better to decide what we're good for. We're not the first species to get this treatment. We're just the first to lose half a continent before anyone said hello.
And then they snared the Dragon.
This is my apartment, room 689 Northwest on the two hundred and thirty-fourth floor of Cloudrise Arcology. The doorframe is too low. The keypad is too small. I'm the black-haired giant shuffling down the hallway in weighted boots, hunched for lack of space and lack of balance and lack of two hundred pounds of hardware drilled into my spine. Seven years harnessed and you forget how to walk without it. Half my back and sternum is nothing but mount and interface points. Of course they wouldn't let me keep the guns. Aside from that, I've got it all: eyes like a jaguar, scales like a snake, voice like (so I'm told by my long-haired thrash artist brother) a dying seagull on steroids. The finest military-grade gengineering. Low-light vision. Bullet-resistant. Bones like steel columns. Totally reversible, if the Five Nations still had the capacity or the will to do it. Maybe someday.
In the meantime, I don't exist except as an interesting variant phenotype. I'd go to a support group but most of us Quilin didn't survive Conquest and we were an irritable bunch anyway. I've taken to insisting that eyes the same sickly green associated with vats of acid or radioactive sludge are the latest trend. Odder things have caught on.
I leave in nine days.
I still have to go to work.
This is the uniform of Maziar's Best Curries: whichever pants, shirt, and belted skirt you prefer, so long as they're black, the red restaurant sash and shoulder badge, and this silly sort of starched hat with points on either side and a golden disc in the middle. Technically speaking I ought to be wearing a headscarf, too, looped around to cover my face, but my mother isn't here to badger me and last time I tried to maintain family tradition I got scarf in the curry. As for the hat.... I'm not putting on the hat until I get there.
"Hey! Hey, Madlangbay!"
I continue my slow forward lurch, hat tucked like a dead pigeon under my arm. "Bayan, Sofi."
"Psssh." The other woman's voice lilts in early-morning mockery. "Didn't think you could sneak off without me, did you?"
"The least you could do is allow me my fleeting moments of hope."
"Psssh." Sofi ducks under my elbow and punches me in the side before skipping ahead and flashing me a perfectly symmetrical grin, teeth white against bright blue skin. Her eyes glitter with the mad abandon of one who is a morning person only through copious chemical support. Her sash is crooked. "Hope for what? That you'd beat me to the tables if you start a half-hour early? No go, Gimpy. You knew the risks when you signed up for my shift."
"And here I thought making curry was the least dangerous of my life choices."
She shakes her head vehemently. "Nuh-huh. That stuff -burns-. Especially when some supremely honored customer spills it on your leg."
I shrug. "Guess I wouldn't know."
"Not in the kitchens, you wouldn't."
"And we certainly don't let any supremely honored customers into the kitchens," I agree, ducking through the entrance to the elevator gardens. "Might see how food is made, or who makes it, and then..."
My boots crunch on the cobbles.
Sofi flinches. "Yeah. Well."
I glance down at her. "That wasn't—"
"I know-ohhey! Off for breakfast, are we? Maziar's is running a tea special- two for two and a bowl for good measure!"
The couple just up the path pauses at Sofi's frantic waving. Newlyweds, by the look of it, both draped in at least a dozen layers of richly beaded and embroidered silks. Exhausted, but then five days of family-hosted celebration can take their toll.
"Green-black-red-specialty!" patters Sofi. Her skin glows electric under the garden sunlights. "Momentous occasions merit extra shots!"
I hold up a hand in half-greeting, trying to look friendly. Can't put both palms together while carrying the hat.
The man's gaze slides from Sofi to me and then back to Sofi. The woman refuses to look at me at all. They confer a moment, voices obscured by wind and water and general garden acoustics. The place handles tens of millions of people a day and spirals almost the full height of Cloudrise; if it wasn't designed to muffle sound from level to level and path to path no one'd be able to hear a thing. Edgetrains glide along the rim but we're going far enough to need an actual elevator, the shafts of which run through the center, hidden inside a walled circular waterfall meant to evoke one of the old ceremonial cenotes. The nearest is ten minutes away if we walk fast. We being me: Sofi could probably make it in five.
"Extra shots?" finally asks the man.
"Extra as they come," replies Sofi. A few other people strolling past slow to observe the spectacle: a group of businessmen, a teacher, a four-man detachment of Arcology Security, a thrasher and his stage assemblers. An iguana-walker skirts around us with her charges firmly in tow. One of the lizards hisses at me.
"Be seeing you in the roaster, tough guy," I mutter.
The man blinks.
The iguana-walker gives me an apologetic look and tugs the lizard away.
"Well...." says the man.
The woman tucks an errand strand of hair back beneath her husband's headdress. "Oh, Cocijo, you haven't slept in days. And if they're willing to make a deal...?"
He sighs, eyes heavy. "All right. So long as it's quick. Got one more blessing to attend."
"Quick as they come!" grins Sofi. She jerks her head at me, at the couple, and at three or four other people who seem interested, and sets off down the path, brisk blue dynamite. I wait to take the rear (as I'd end up doing anyway), and follow. And hope I don't step on someone's iguana.
The couple's names are Cocijo Ehuan and Itzel Can-Ehuan. They're just now concluding the final stages of their wedding, and arrived at Cloudrise from Siaan K'aan City two days ago at the behest of their aunts and uncles and cousins who live here. They'll be leaving tomorrow.
They've never been to Maziar's. They've also never seen a Quilin. Minor civilian splices, sure, but like I said: most of the military types were wiped out and not many people like to keep the "massive serpent-warrior" look past their term of service. Mostly because things just aren't built to accommodate someone who runs over eight feet tall and weighs a quarter-ton. Also: drug expenses, in the name of not accidentally liquefying half of your own organs. Food expenses don't help, either. Expenses in general aren't helpful.
Anyway, the Ehuans have had curry before, but not Maziar's curry. They're lucky the owner got out of India before it started raining relativistic hard-titanium telephone poles. And now Heaven, as he likes to say, is only an edgetrain or an elevator away.
We take the elevator. Waiting for the edgetrain to spiral down forty stories would take far too long. While in line, we also toss a coin down the outside shaft.
"Good luck for the newlyweds," I explain to the confused-looking thrasher, who's come along with the rest of his group. A jaunty collection of shoulder badges declares that he's visited all nine continents and won a local basketweaving contest.
"Yah, yah," he says. About three dozen piercings in his ears jingle as he looks up at me. "Very good."
I eye the nearest bunch of Security. It had been my job to stand around casually and block their view of proceedings. "You're not really allowed to, but people do it anyway."
Jingle. "Very good."
"Family down on their luck even threw a baby down there once."
Jingle. "Very good."
I raise an eyebrow. The thrasher smiles blankly, revealing a set of sharpened teeth.
On the ride down I manage to deduce that he and his group are from the Ngoya Confederacy and that they somehow lost their translator somewhere but they´re pretty sure they'll do okay and find him eventually because this has happened twice before in other places and no one died and only one person lost their ID. And besides, the Dragon provides. Even now.
The name of the group: Keening Fury Eruption. I make a note to ask my brother about them next time we talk. And we -will- talk before I leave.
Nine days. The first is already turning.
A giant wooden whale greets us at our destination. Maziar's Best Curries: Dining 34 Southwest, Floor 196, Orca Crescent. The statue's carved in the national style, rounded squares inside rounded squares, hints of other animals and maybe even people suggested by each line. Bold reds, blacks, blues. Maybe if the real animals looked like that there'd be more of them (or, alternatively, less; wearing a live painted whale would be difficult.)
"And here we are!" announces Sofi, leading her pack of pilgrims past the bagged soybean and tamale hawkers towards a doorway that resembles a pair of crossed scimitars. The staccato sizzle of an electric zither choir spills into the concourse, mixed with an assortment of drums and a heavily synthesized female voice singing either too fast for me to understand or in a language I don't know. Possibly both. Maziar's really been pushing the "ethnic" angle lately. "Best curry this side of a crater, though don't tell management I told you that."
I wince. For someone who's blue because one grandparent or another decided to grant their children skin the color of God, she can show a startling lack of respect for the sudden demise of her native land. Then again, she's never been there and at this point probably never will.
Oblivious, she continues, "Step right in, find a seat, and I'll have the special out in just a few moments!" And then she vanishes.
The Ehuans glance at me. Most of the rest of the early customers also glance at me.
"Very good?" asks the thrasher.
I produce my only slightly squashed hat and perch it atop my head. "Yeah. Go on, sit down. She'll be with you in a bit."
After making sure band and bonded migrate towards the nearest pair of tables, both of which have non-stolen seat cushions and have been cleaned recently, I flee past paintings of many-headed snakes and blue-skinned gods in search of Maziar. The music shifts to something that sounds like an orchestra of tuned blenders.
Most of the kitchen staff has already arrived for the day shift. Riyyah, Li, Kim, Mountainbook.... the last looks up from his meat molding as I clomp into view.
"Well," he drawls, "I see you almost made it this time."
"Waylaid by customers," I explain. "Blame Sofi."
He dumps a batch of venison cubes into a bowl. There's machines to handle meat molding, but at Maziar's every cut, fillet, and steak is hand-formed. Gives it that authentic "just off a dead animal" feel without actually needing the animal. "If I could catch her, I would. Blazed through here like a rabid bat and just about killed poor Li here with a pot of boiling water."
I shrug. "Impromptu wedding special. Got a pair outside, four days in."
He chuckles. "Best regards to the ragged."
"Yeah." I squeeze past the curing vats, gagging only momentarily at the smell. "You seen Maziar?"
"Check the freezers," suggests Kim. His knives flash and the squash before him collapses into a lacy pile of paper-thin slices. Chok-chok-chok-chok-chok. "Something about a supplier delay or a misplaced order. Thinks we won't have enough slugs to last the month."
"Slugs?"
"Slugs."
"That drink must have been a hit."
Chok-chok-chok-chok. "You have no idea."
I make for the freezers. About half our produce is local, but any restaurant worth its place on the concourse knows to keep enough extra on hand to keep business running for at least three months of famine. Just in case. The lack of slugs in this instance is an isolated failure, one that Maziar will spend no time in fixing.
The freezer doors are uncomfortably low, the better to reduce lost cold when someone has to open them. The view through their round windows is one of precariously balanced packages, crowded shelves, and frost. I rap on the "Kitchen Staff Only" sign. "Mr. Maziar?"
No response.
"Mr. Maziar? I have to talk to you."
Still no response.
"It's about wor-"
An elephant head appears in the left window. It's wearing a quilted cap. "Madlangbayan. Heard you in the kitchens. Come in, come in."
"I think it'd be better if-"
"No, no, come in here. I need you to move boxes."
The head vanishes.
I mutter a curse against heat efficiency and somehow manage to finangle myself through the doors. The space beyond is too low for me to stand up straight even if I wanted to, and I swear I can feel my hair freezing to the ceiling. The squat, fan-eared form of Maziar has retreated to one of the far corners, inventory clipboard in hand and stylus in trunk.
"Did you know," he says as I creep over corn barrels and between hanging bags of tarantulas towards him, "that the Conquerors sank our supply ship?"
A protruding shelf attacks my hip. "Ch-! No, sir."
"Now can you imagine why they'd do that? I certainly can't." He taps a finger against a box marked with Crosslander script. "We've only got nine of these left. I need them moved to immediate storage and then some way of stretching them out for another two months invented. Might have to mix in... additives." His eyes, still brown and human in his wrinkled face, roll in exaggerated despair. "Can you imagine?"
"Staff'll make it happen, sir."
He stiffens. "Staff? Not 'we'? You're not leaving, are you?"
The metal sunk into my flesh burns with cold. "Er, well...."
"Is it Newar? I told you that woman's no good. Just wants you so she can brag about how generous she is, letting you work for full wages. And in the open, too! She might say she has very good lawyers, but you're still under contract and you and me both know that the government would come down on you like lightning. I've done the very best anyone can, and you know I would offer you full employment if I could. Haven't you heard about Lieutenant Xac?"
"Yes, sir. But it isn't-"
"Repossessed and sent to clear minefields in West Zamibia!"
I bend down, eye to eye, holding onto a shelf for balance. Maziar takes a step backwards despite himself. "They're sending me to Seventh House Station."
He stares. The capped stump of his right tusk, ritually broken, glitters with frost. "They bloody didn't."
"They bloody did." One more sacrifice thrown down the steps, hoping to appease the new gods. And I've got no choice in the matter so long as that service contract hangs over my head. So long as I've got serpent-scales. "I'm leaving in as many days as we've got boxes. I'll move them for you, but tomorrow I'll have to call in my resignation."
He shakes his head, slow with disbelief. "Space. Sending my best packer to space...."
"It's only a few thousand miles." I point at the ceiling. "Just up, is all."
"Dragon protect you," he mutters. "You'll be on Its home ballcourt, at least." He reaches out to grasp my shoulder and gives it a shake. "Introduce those Conquering bastards to my curry, you hear? Maybe then they'll stop sinking ships. Stop...." His trunk wobbles. Attempts to tie itself in a knot. "Stop," he concludes.
I nod. Mr. Maziar hasn't always had a trunk. Grief makes people do funny things.
"Good girl," he says. He looks down at his clipboard. "I expect those boxes in immediate storage by the end of the shift."
"Yes, sir."
"And if you would move out of my way..."
I shift around enough to let him past, slipping sideways between the spider-bags. His cap bobs up and down in the silence, threaded through three months of emergency supplies, and then he tugs open a door and is gone. The seals re-engage- sss-chunk- and all that's left is me and the Crosslander script and the slugs. If I wasn't clearly the superior creature by right of size and brainpower, I'd almost find myself empathizing with the slimy things. Tossed in a box and sent off into the unknown.
They, at least, get to go together.
Five years ago. We'd been sent overseas to Genoa, where the Five Nations and an assortment of allies was hoping to swing a local civil war in their favor. Officially, we were peacekeepers. Stand around, look intimidating, keep major trade centers more or less intact and the trains running, offer protection to any civilian who asked. Not that many did- the locals consider snakes evil creatures and most didn't know that the mythological Quilin, despite its intimidating appearance, is a creature so gentle it can walk on grass without bending a single stalk.
Well, and kill evil-doers with fire and lightning, but that's only if you really piss it off.
Taken.
Imprisoned.
Killed, maybe, though most everyone doubts that it can be killed. The Conquerors brought weapons that can punch holes through poor beleaguered Earth's crust, but the Dragon's made of... well, something it's never been able to really explain and we've never managed to produce. Probably won't ever manage.
Either way, I don't think it's dead. Just silent. And it hasn't been silent for over fifteen hundred years, ever since it arrived, crash, right in the middle of the Eastern Gulf and washed up on the Mayan coast. Ever since it set up camp at Siaan K'aan and transformed a dozen squabbling kingdoms of stone-carvers and jungle farmers into the first industrial civilization the world had ever seen. Ever since it set off on the Long March, all through the Old World and then across the Western Ocean to China, who gave it the name "Celestial Dragon" instead of "Quetzal Serpent."
And it's been the Dragon ever since. (The Crosslands call it the Walking Wyrm, granted, but that's a local thing and they've always been a bit backwards.) Over a thousand cultures and a thousand years it held the world together. And now it's gone.
We fought like jaguars, of course. But even a jaguar can't do much against twenty tons of metal hurled at half the speed of light.
I like to think we would have won if we hadn't been at war already.
My apartment: a form-stamped box of a place on the two hundred and thirty-fourth floor of Cloudrise Arcology. I've got approximately a million neighbors within a mile of my front door and I can walk the floor circuit in just under eight hours. Pretty spacious compared to the barracks and heaven knows I need my space.
Still wish they'd left enough for my door plate, though. "Auma Madlangbay" it says, no room for the "an" on the end so I've had to write it in with a marker (and then of course it doesn't match the rest of the calligraphy). Doesn't do much to reassure visitors when you can't even get your door plate fixed.
It isn't that I haven't tried. I have. Reparations paperwork just isn't the easiest when people like to pretend you don't exist. And now that I've been offered for service at Seventh House Station....
Well.
My name, as I've said, is Auma Madlangbayan, with that "an" on the end. Twenty-eight years old. Born on one of the unlucky days, but that's just a superstition, really, and has nothing to do with my present situation (and they aren't unlucky to -everyone-, just the people who matter). Card-carrying citizen of the Five Great Northern Nations of Old Haida, which everyone just calls the Five Nations for convenience's sake. Second-generation immigrant (father's from Tui Kaloa and mother's from Independent Damascus), first-generation veteran. No one in the Five Nations trusts a new family until they've given up at least one kid to the levies. Being female, I was disposable.
They didn't say that, of course.
Either way, off I went to the staging college, did well in the examinations, volunteered for the Quilin Division of Special Forces because they said it was a quick ticket to promotion and anyway the process was reversible and perfectly safe and ended up in C Division of the so-called Broken Legion instead. C for crazy, right? Anyway, we did the Crosslander peacekeeping thing as best we could until -they- showed up, and then we did our best against -them-, which I'm sure -they- thought was amusing. Not much of the old C Division left these days. Not much of any military left these days.
So now I'm here, and the Conquerors are expecting me at Seventh House Station. Something about a "variety of phenotypes." Got to study us in "all our forms," the better to decide what we're good for. We're not the first species to get this treatment. We're just the first to lose half a continent before anyone said hello.
And then they snared the Dragon.
This is my apartment, room 689 Northwest on the two hundred and thirty-fourth floor of Cloudrise Arcology. The doorframe is too low. The keypad is too small. I'm the black-haired giant shuffling down the hallway in weighted boots, hunched for lack of space and lack of balance and lack of two hundred pounds of hardware drilled into my spine. Seven years harnessed and you forget how to walk without it. Half my back and sternum is nothing but mount and interface points. Of course they wouldn't let me keep the guns. Aside from that, I've got it all: eyes like a jaguar, scales like a snake, voice like (so I'm told by my long-haired thrash artist brother) a dying seagull on steroids. The finest military-grade gengineering. Low-light vision. Bullet-resistant. Bones like steel columns. Totally reversible, if the Five Nations still had the capacity or the will to do it. Maybe someday.
In the meantime, I don't exist except as an interesting variant phenotype. I'd go to a support group but most of us Quilin didn't survive Conquest and we were an irritable bunch anyway. I've taken to insisting that eyes the same sickly green associated with vats of acid or radioactive sludge are the latest trend. Odder things have caught on.
I leave in nine days.
I still have to go to work.
This is the uniform of Maziar's Best Curries: whichever pants, shirt, and belted skirt you prefer, so long as they're black, the red restaurant sash and shoulder badge, and this silly sort of starched hat with points on either side and a golden disc in the middle. Technically speaking I ought to be wearing a headscarf, too, looped around to cover my face, but my mother isn't here to badger me and last time I tried to maintain family tradition I got scarf in the curry. As for the hat.... I'm not putting on the hat until I get there.
"Hey! Hey, Madlangbay!"
I continue my slow forward lurch, hat tucked like a dead pigeon under my arm. "Bayan, Sofi."
"Psssh." The other woman's voice lilts in early-morning mockery. "Didn't think you could sneak off without me, did you?"
"The least you could do is allow me my fleeting moments of hope."
"Psssh." Sofi ducks under my elbow and punches me in the side before skipping ahead and flashing me a perfectly symmetrical grin, teeth white against bright blue skin. Her eyes glitter with the mad abandon of one who is a morning person only through copious chemical support. Her sash is crooked. "Hope for what? That you'd beat me to the tables if you start a half-hour early? No go, Gimpy. You knew the risks when you signed up for my shift."
"And here I thought making curry was the least dangerous of my life choices."
She shakes her head vehemently. "Nuh-huh. That stuff -burns-. Especially when some supremely honored customer spills it on your leg."
I shrug. "Guess I wouldn't know."
"Not in the kitchens, you wouldn't."
"And we certainly don't let any supremely honored customers into the kitchens," I agree, ducking through the entrance to the elevator gardens. "Might see how food is made, or who makes it, and then..."
My boots crunch on the cobbles.
Sofi flinches. "Yeah. Well."
I glance down at her. "That wasn't—"
"I know-ohhey! Off for breakfast, are we? Maziar's is running a tea special- two for two and a bowl for good measure!"
The couple just up the path pauses at Sofi's frantic waving. Newlyweds, by the look of it, both draped in at least a dozen layers of richly beaded and embroidered silks. Exhausted, but then five days of family-hosted celebration can take their toll.
"Green-black-red-specialty!" patters Sofi. Her skin glows electric under the garden sunlights. "Momentous occasions merit extra shots!"
I hold up a hand in half-greeting, trying to look friendly. Can't put both palms together while carrying the hat.
The man's gaze slides from Sofi to me and then back to Sofi. The woman refuses to look at me at all. They confer a moment, voices obscured by wind and water and general garden acoustics. The place handles tens of millions of people a day and spirals almost the full height of Cloudrise; if it wasn't designed to muffle sound from level to level and path to path no one'd be able to hear a thing. Edgetrains glide along the rim but we're going far enough to need an actual elevator, the shafts of which run through the center, hidden inside a walled circular waterfall meant to evoke one of the old ceremonial cenotes. The nearest is ten minutes away if we walk fast. We being me: Sofi could probably make it in five.
"Extra shots?" finally asks the man.
"Extra as they come," replies Sofi. A few other people strolling past slow to observe the spectacle: a group of businessmen, a teacher, a four-man detachment of Arcology Security, a thrasher and his stage assemblers. An iguana-walker skirts around us with her charges firmly in tow. One of the lizards hisses at me.
"Be seeing you in the roaster, tough guy," I mutter.
The man blinks.
The iguana-walker gives me an apologetic look and tugs the lizard away.
"Well...." says the man.
The woman tucks an errand strand of hair back beneath her husband's headdress. "Oh, Cocijo, you haven't slept in days. And if they're willing to make a deal...?"
He sighs, eyes heavy. "All right. So long as it's quick. Got one more blessing to attend."
"Quick as they come!" grins Sofi. She jerks her head at me, at the couple, and at three or four other people who seem interested, and sets off down the path, brisk blue dynamite. I wait to take the rear (as I'd end up doing anyway), and follow. And hope I don't step on someone's iguana.
The couple's names are Cocijo Ehuan and Itzel Can-Ehuan. They're just now concluding the final stages of their wedding, and arrived at Cloudrise from Siaan K'aan City two days ago at the behest of their aunts and uncles and cousins who live here. They'll be leaving tomorrow.
They've never been to Maziar's. They've also never seen a Quilin. Minor civilian splices, sure, but like I said: most of the military types were wiped out and not many people like to keep the "massive serpent-warrior" look past their term of service. Mostly because things just aren't built to accommodate someone who runs over eight feet tall and weighs a quarter-ton. Also: drug expenses, in the name of not accidentally liquefying half of your own organs. Food expenses don't help, either. Expenses in general aren't helpful.
Anyway, the Ehuans have had curry before, but not Maziar's curry. They're lucky the owner got out of India before it started raining relativistic hard-titanium telephone poles. And now Heaven, as he likes to say, is only an edgetrain or an elevator away.
We take the elevator. Waiting for the edgetrain to spiral down forty stories would take far too long. While in line, we also toss a coin down the outside shaft.
"Good luck for the newlyweds," I explain to the confused-looking thrasher, who's come along with the rest of his group. A jaunty collection of shoulder badges declares that he's visited all nine continents and won a local basketweaving contest.
"Yah, yah," he says. About three dozen piercings in his ears jingle as he looks up at me. "Very good."
I eye the nearest bunch of Security. It had been my job to stand around casually and block their view of proceedings. "You're not really allowed to, but people do it anyway."
Jingle. "Very good."
"Family down on their luck even threw a baby down there once."
Jingle. "Very good."
I raise an eyebrow. The thrasher smiles blankly, revealing a set of sharpened teeth.
On the ride down I manage to deduce that he and his group are from the Ngoya Confederacy and that they somehow lost their translator somewhere but they´re pretty sure they'll do okay and find him eventually because this has happened twice before in other places and no one died and only one person lost their ID. And besides, the Dragon provides. Even now.
The name of the group: Keening Fury Eruption. I make a note to ask my brother about them next time we talk. And we -will- talk before I leave.
Nine days. The first is already turning.
A giant wooden whale greets us at our destination. Maziar's Best Curries: Dining 34 Southwest, Floor 196, Orca Crescent. The statue's carved in the national style, rounded squares inside rounded squares, hints of other animals and maybe even people suggested by each line. Bold reds, blacks, blues. Maybe if the real animals looked like that there'd be more of them (or, alternatively, less; wearing a live painted whale would be difficult.)
"And here we are!" announces Sofi, leading her pack of pilgrims past the bagged soybean and tamale hawkers towards a doorway that resembles a pair of crossed scimitars. The staccato sizzle of an electric zither choir spills into the concourse, mixed with an assortment of drums and a heavily synthesized female voice singing either too fast for me to understand or in a language I don't know. Possibly both. Maziar's really been pushing the "ethnic" angle lately. "Best curry this side of a crater, though don't tell management I told you that."
I wince. For someone who's blue because one grandparent or another decided to grant their children skin the color of God, she can show a startling lack of respect for the sudden demise of her native land. Then again, she's never been there and at this point probably never will.
Oblivious, she continues, "Step right in, find a seat, and I'll have the special out in just a few moments!" And then she vanishes.
The Ehuans glance at me. Most of the rest of the early customers also glance at me.
"Very good?" asks the thrasher.
I produce my only slightly squashed hat and perch it atop my head. "Yeah. Go on, sit down. She'll be with you in a bit."
After making sure band and bonded migrate towards the nearest pair of tables, both of which have non-stolen seat cushions and have been cleaned recently, I flee past paintings of many-headed snakes and blue-skinned gods in search of Maziar. The music shifts to something that sounds like an orchestra of tuned blenders.
Most of the kitchen staff has already arrived for the day shift. Riyyah, Li, Kim, Mountainbook.... the last looks up from his meat molding as I clomp into view.
"Well," he drawls, "I see you almost made it this time."
"Waylaid by customers," I explain. "Blame Sofi."
He dumps a batch of venison cubes into a bowl. There's machines to handle meat molding, but at Maziar's every cut, fillet, and steak is hand-formed. Gives it that authentic "just off a dead animal" feel without actually needing the animal. "If I could catch her, I would. Blazed through here like a rabid bat and just about killed poor Li here with a pot of boiling water."
I shrug. "Impromptu wedding special. Got a pair outside, four days in."
He chuckles. "Best regards to the ragged."
"Yeah." I squeeze past the curing vats, gagging only momentarily at the smell. "You seen Maziar?"
"Check the freezers," suggests Kim. His knives flash and the squash before him collapses into a lacy pile of paper-thin slices. Chok-chok-chok-chok-chok. "Something about a supplier delay or a misplaced order. Thinks we won't have enough slugs to last the month."
"Slugs?"
"Slugs."
"That drink must have been a hit."
Chok-chok-chok-chok. "You have no idea."
I make for the freezers. About half our produce is local, but any restaurant worth its place on the concourse knows to keep enough extra on hand to keep business running for at least three months of famine. Just in case. The lack of slugs in this instance is an isolated failure, one that Maziar will spend no time in fixing.
The freezer doors are uncomfortably low, the better to reduce lost cold when someone has to open them. The view through their round windows is one of precariously balanced packages, crowded shelves, and frost. I rap on the "Kitchen Staff Only" sign. "Mr. Maziar?"
No response.
"Mr. Maziar? I have to talk to you."
Still no response.
"It's about wor-"
An elephant head appears in the left window. It's wearing a quilted cap. "Madlangbayan. Heard you in the kitchens. Come in, come in."
"I think it'd be better if-"
"No, no, come in here. I need you to move boxes."
The head vanishes.
I mutter a curse against heat efficiency and somehow manage to finangle myself through the doors. The space beyond is too low for me to stand up straight even if I wanted to, and I swear I can feel my hair freezing to the ceiling. The squat, fan-eared form of Maziar has retreated to one of the far corners, inventory clipboard in hand and stylus in trunk.
"Did you know," he says as I creep over corn barrels and between hanging bags of tarantulas towards him, "that the Conquerors sank our supply ship?"
A protruding shelf attacks my hip. "Ch-! No, sir."
"Now can you imagine why they'd do that? I certainly can't." He taps a finger against a box marked with Crosslander script. "We've only got nine of these left. I need them moved to immediate storage and then some way of stretching them out for another two months invented. Might have to mix in... additives." His eyes, still brown and human in his wrinkled face, roll in exaggerated despair. "Can you imagine?"
"Staff'll make it happen, sir."
He stiffens. "Staff? Not 'we'? You're not leaving, are you?"
The metal sunk into my flesh burns with cold. "Er, well...."
"Is it Newar? I told you that woman's no good. Just wants you so she can brag about how generous she is, letting you work for full wages. And in the open, too! She might say she has very good lawyers, but you're still under contract and you and me both know that the government would come down on you like lightning. I've done the very best anyone can, and you know I would offer you full employment if I could. Haven't you heard about Lieutenant Xac?"
"Yes, sir. But it isn't-"
"Repossessed and sent to clear minefields in West Zamibia!"
I bend down, eye to eye, holding onto a shelf for balance. Maziar takes a step backwards despite himself. "They're sending me to Seventh House Station."
He stares. The capped stump of his right tusk, ritually broken, glitters with frost. "They bloody didn't."
"They bloody did." One more sacrifice thrown down the steps, hoping to appease the new gods. And I've got no choice in the matter so long as that service contract hangs over my head. So long as I've got serpent-scales. "I'm leaving in as many days as we've got boxes. I'll move them for you, but tomorrow I'll have to call in my resignation."
He shakes his head, slow with disbelief. "Space. Sending my best packer to space...."
"It's only a few thousand miles." I point at the ceiling. "Just up, is all."
"Dragon protect you," he mutters. "You'll be on Its home ballcourt, at least." He reaches out to grasp my shoulder and gives it a shake. "Introduce those Conquering bastards to my curry, you hear? Maybe then they'll stop sinking ships. Stop...." His trunk wobbles. Attempts to tie itself in a knot. "Stop," he concludes.
I nod. Mr. Maziar hasn't always had a trunk. Grief makes people do funny things.
"Good girl," he says. He looks down at his clipboard. "I expect those boxes in immediate storage by the end of the shift."
"Yes, sir."
"And if you would move out of my way..."
I shift around enough to let him past, slipping sideways between the spider-bags. His cap bobs up and down in the silence, threaded through three months of emergency supplies, and then he tugs open a door and is gone. The seals re-engage- sss-chunk- and all that's left is me and the Crosslander script and the slugs. If I wasn't clearly the superior creature by right of size and brainpower, I'd almost find myself empathizing with the slimy things. Tossed in a box and sent off into the unknown.
They, at least, get to go together.
Five years ago. We'd been sent overseas to Genoa, where the Five Nations and an assortment of allies was hoping to swing a local civil war in their favor. Officially, we were peacekeepers. Stand around, look intimidating, keep major trade centers more or less intact and the trains running, offer protection to any civilian who asked. Not that many did- the locals consider snakes evil creatures and most didn't know that the mythological Quilin, despite its intimidating appearance, is a creature so gentle it can walk on grass without bending a single stalk.
Well, and kill evil-doers with fire and lightning, but that's only if you really piss it off.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Random After-Class Angry Thoughts
If you don't have a hyphen, you're not special.
If you don't have a hyphen, you have no culture to call your own.
If you don't have a hyphen, you can't claim pride of your ancestry, because your ancestors were conquerors and murderers and slave-drivers and to hold them up as an example would offend those who have hyphens.
I would like to have a hyphen, but I will never get one.
My friends have them:
Korean hyphen--
Chinese hyphen--
African hyphen--
Mexican hyphen--
--American
But I am only American and that's all I'll ever be. There is no option for European-American, only White, and everyone knows they were the bad guys of history. If I were, perhaps, not pale and grey-eyed, I could claim some other label-- maybe even that small part of my heritage that crossed the Bering Strait when it was above water-- but I am pale and grey-eyed and almost blonde and therefore I am White.
My brothers, at least, have dark hair. Their eyes-- because they are lucky-- are brown. They're “ethnic.” I am nothing.
I could claim cowboys and apple pie as my own, I suppose, but the majority of cowboys were Brown or Black and anyway they killed Indians, and I've never made an apple pie. Apple pies are good, though. Unlike cowboys. Who anyway were copies of the vaqueros south of the border, who in turn came with cows from Spain... but that was so long ago it doesn't matter.
Centuries have a tendency to erase distinctions.
Centuries ago, not many but enough, my ancestors came to this land in a boat from who knows where and gave up their names, their foods, their languages for.... something. Something which we are informed does not exist for White America, though we should respect this something that belongs to other people like the Chinese-- they certainly have it. We gave it away before we knew it was valuable.
And now we are told to respect this thing that others have, this culture. They don't deserve to be judged by our standards, as whatever we have is flawed and theirs is a noble people in slow recovery from our depredations: we have no right to place ourselves on the same level. Our parents slaughtered Native children and owned Black slaves and excluded hopeful immigrant Chinese and detained Japanese in internment camps in the desert; they are blameless.
The Irish might have suffered, once, but now they are simply White and just as guilty as the rest.
We read now of the Chicano movement, the crisis of cultures in collision: I look upon this with jaded grey eyes. Do they realize that in time the distinction of their hyphen will fade away and they will become homogenized, assimilated, lost as my ancestors were lost? In the end, to be the same is the same as being nothing. This is all to which we are told to aspire.
In time, the whole world will be hyphen-less. Perhaps then the sins of my forefathers will be forgiven.
If you don't have a hyphen, you have no culture to call your own.
If you don't have a hyphen, you can't claim pride of your ancestry, because your ancestors were conquerors and murderers and slave-drivers and to hold them up as an example would offend those who have hyphens.
I would like to have a hyphen, but I will never get one.
My friends have them:
Korean hyphen--
Chinese hyphen--
African hyphen--
Mexican hyphen--
--American
But I am only American and that's all I'll ever be. There is no option for European-American, only White, and everyone knows they were the bad guys of history. If I were, perhaps, not pale and grey-eyed, I could claim some other label-- maybe even that small part of my heritage that crossed the Bering Strait when it was above water-- but I am pale and grey-eyed and almost blonde and therefore I am White.
My brothers, at least, have dark hair. Their eyes-- because they are lucky-- are brown. They're “ethnic.” I am nothing.
I could claim cowboys and apple pie as my own, I suppose, but the majority of cowboys were Brown or Black and anyway they killed Indians, and I've never made an apple pie. Apple pies are good, though. Unlike cowboys. Who anyway were copies of the vaqueros south of the border, who in turn came with cows from Spain... but that was so long ago it doesn't matter.
Centuries have a tendency to erase distinctions.
Centuries ago, not many but enough, my ancestors came to this land in a boat from who knows where and gave up their names, their foods, their languages for.... something. Something which we are informed does not exist for White America, though we should respect this something that belongs to other people like the Chinese-- they certainly have it. We gave it away before we knew it was valuable.
And now we are told to respect this thing that others have, this culture. They don't deserve to be judged by our standards, as whatever we have is flawed and theirs is a noble people in slow recovery from our depredations: we have no right to place ourselves on the same level. Our parents slaughtered Native children and owned Black slaves and excluded hopeful immigrant Chinese and detained Japanese in internment camps in the desert; they are blameless.
The Irish might have suffered, once, but now they are simply White and just as guilty as the rest.
We read now of the Chicano movement, the crisis of cultures in collision: I look upon this with jaded grey eyes. Do they realize that in time the distinction of their hyphen will fade away and they will become homogenized, assimilated, lost as my ancestors were lost? In the end, to be the same is the same as being nothing. This is all to which we are told to aspire.
In time, the whole world will be hyphen-less. Perhaps then the sins of my forefathers will be forgiven.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Update, belated
Sorry about that-- ended up sleeping more than I really ought to, and spend a few hours fighting my way through the first pages of "Historias de la Penumbra y lo Invisible" by Arthur Conan Doyle, a neat little tome I picked up from the used-book shop next to the house. Three spaced notebook pages of words I didn't recognize for two pages worth of writing. The whole book will be quite the task.
This week was my first week of classes. How'd it go? Not bad, all things considered. My first class ever in Chile, Antropología Generál, was canceled and I spent half an hour sitting in the appointed classroom in the History Castle with six fellow US citizens and a pair of Mexicans before realizing this fact. The following class, however, was not canceled and I managed to take a few Spanish notes on the vertical geography of Chile as concerning early peoples of the area (in sum, Chile is really narrow and really vertical, with completely different vegetation and climate only a few thousand meters of elevation apart).
My first class concerning the Spanish language: I arrived an hour late. The time change had thrown me off-- I was firmly convinced I was on time and wondered why the class was so short before the gal from Germany sitting next to me informed me of my error.
My next class concerning the Spanish language, the next day: I arrived an hour early. Sat through the class before it, after enduring a rebuke by the teacher for being late again (but for a different class, see), and exited just in time to see my actual classmates walk through the door.
My third and final class of the week concerning the Spanish language: I arrived ten minutes late in the right class. Now all I need is a faster micro (bus). Or to leave earlier.
I will not be taking the Physics and Humor class because it is in Valparaíso at 8:15 in the morning and I can´t wake up in time to get there, much less stay awake for the full two-hour duration. As promising as it looked (and still looks), the time requirements simply aren´t kind to my sensibilities and scholastic capacity. Not sure about the architectural workshop, as well, as it starts at roughly 8:00 pm some distance away in Viña, which strikes me as rather perilous an hour to be out and about by myself.
My Language, Cognition, and Society class started off on a fine footing-- the teacher gave everyone a basic evaluative science test (logic problems involving different-sized cups and weights and tokens in a bag, that sort of thing, in which I discovered to my embarrassment I´ve forgotten how to multiply fractions-- yes, laugh, I don´t multiply fractions in everyday life), which, being an extranjero, I didn´t have to undergo. There´s only two of us foreigners in the class. I asked to take the test while the other girl split, which I think reflects rather well upon my studiousness and willingness to learn. I was the second-to-last person finished, of course, because I had to look up words in the dictionary, but I think it went well.
Afterwards a group of kids from the class invited me to a get-together of sorts in Valparaíso, apparently not an unusual occurrence-- the class structure here is more regular than in the US, and people in the same disciplines all get to know one another very well by the end because they all take the exact same classes in the exact same order.
Unfortunately I had a previous engagement. Next time....
This previous engagement was with a gal from ISA, someone who´s been here for about five months and knows people. Shaina (for that´s her name) is part of a non-denominational church group composed mainly of college students which congregates at the very same red edifice I can see from my front door. She´d invited me and about four others to come along for a gathering thing on Friday night.
She didn´t tell me, of course, that this gathering was an hour-long homily framed on either side by a half-hour of rock-band worship music. This came as a bit of a shock. In retrospect I probably should have anticipated it (this being a CHURCH GROUP and all) but I was thinking it wasn´t an organized thing, maybe just some wandering about town with people from the group and maybe cookies, I didn´t know.
In sum: the music was good (all in Spanish, of course) but the hour-long unanticipated lecture on salvation was a let-down and the downright rapturous attitude of some of the people there during the singing was a bit frightening.
So was the mosh pit, actually.
Call me staid and traditionalist, but I´m of the opinion that a person should keep their blissful ecstasy to themselves. It´s like they´re deliberately trying to call attention to how faithful they are, how worshipful and utterly convinced and joyous, and if it´s real, okay, I´m sorry, but at the same time you´d think it would be possible to be in rapture without throwing your arms up and crying and mouthing tongues.
Maybe it comes from being Catholic-- the unrelenting general Protestant emphasis on Jesus and happiness and bliss can get a bit grating. If all the world is love, people, why was Chile flattened by a terremoto a few weeks ago? Sing, dance, fine, that´s cool-- I´m all for that-- but if I wanted a life lecture from some gal in a T-shirt with the aid of Powerpoint I´d attend one of those Think Positive seminars. If there´s going to be a mosh pit, I´d like some warning. And aside from the big wooden cross on the wall (lit by a red spotlight at appointed times during the songs, themselves accompanied by video of dolphins and rainforests and clouds and such), you´d hardly be able to tell the place was a church at all. And... well, there´s spotlights and a mosh pit.
The local Catholic church is roughly a hundred years old. It´s got an adobe-plastered steeple, the exterior of which is slightly cracked from the terremoto, narrow stained-glass windows, and a spiky black iron fence around it.
The name: Nuestra Señora de los Dolores. This translates roughly to Our Lady of Suffering.
I think that about sums up the difference in attitude.
Craig, being Craig, would probably say that this approach is more "metal." In that vein, I have this observation to give: there exists a micro driver in this city who has three big black stickers above his dashboard and they are, in order, a skull, a ninja, and the thorn-crowned head of Jesus Christ.
Religion aside, this coming week will be my first full week of (hopefully) non-canceled classes. I have to find the FIN building in Valpo and sit through almost six hours straight of class on Monday, which will be interesting. I need to swipe some music in Spanish from the cabinet outside my door so I can listen to it while trying to read my book in Spanish. I need to get my camera looked at, because it can't seem to focus anymore and any picture it takes is almost inevitably blurry and indistinguishable (which is why I don't have any pictures at the moment). I need to take a shower. I need to drag María-José to the Fonk Museum in the next few days so I can have a look at that Easter Island moai, and I need to find that sushi shop.
I did pick up a laptop cooling fan for a cool 8600 pesos (about 18 bucks), and it does its job well in the heat.
The last student arrived today, one Diego from the north, and now all I have to do is wait for Roberto and Nicolás to return from wherever it is they´ve gone to get a group photo of the the six of us.
I also have to eat this banana on my desk.
This week was my first week of classes. How'd it go? Not bad, all things considered. My first class ever in Chile, Antropología Generál, was canceled and I spent half an hour sitting in the appointed classroom in the History Castle with six fellow US citizens and a pair of Mexicans before realizing this fact. The following class, however, was not canceled and I managed to take a few Spanish notes on the vertical geography of Chile as concerning early peoples of the area (in sum, Chile is really narrow and really vertical, with completely different vegetation and climate only a few thousand meters of elevation apart).
My first class concerning the Spanish language: I arrived an hour late. The time change had thrown me off-- I was firmly convinced I was on time and wondered why the class was so short before the gal from Germany sitting next to me informed me of my error.
My next class concerning the Spanish language, the next day: I arrived an hour early. Sat through the class before it, after enduring a rebuke by the teacher for being late again (but for a different class, see), and exited just in time to see my actual classmates walk through the door.
My third and final class of the week concerning the Spanish language: I arrived ten minutes late in the right class. Now all I need is a faster micro (bus). Or to leave earlier.
I will not be taking the Physics and Humor class because it is in Valparaíso at 8:15 in the morning and I can´t wake up in time to get there, much less stay awake for the full two-hour duration. As promising as it looked (and still looks), the time requirements simply aren´t kind to my sensibilities and scholastic capacity. Not sure about the architectural workshop, as well, as it starts at roughly 8:00 pm some distance away in Viña, which strikes me as rather perilous an hour to be out and about by myself.
My Language, Cognition, and Society class started off on a fine footing-- the teacher gave everyone a basic evaluative science test (logic problems involving different-sized cups and weights and tokens in a bag, that sort of thing, in which I discovered to my embarrassment I´ve forgotten how to multiply fractions-- yes, laugh, I don´t multiply fractions in everyday life), which, being an extranjero, I didn´t have to undergo. There´s only two of us foreigners in the class. I asked to take the test while the other girl split, which I think reflects rather well upon my studiousness and willingness to learn. I was the second-to-last person finished, of course, because I had to look up words in the dictionary, but I think it went well.
Afterwards a group of kids from the class invited me to a get-together of sorts in Valparaíso, apparently not an unusual occurrence-- the class structure here is more regular than in the US, and people in the same disciplines all get to know one another very well by the end because they all take the exact same classes in the exact same order.
Unfortunately I had a previous engagement. Next time....
This previous engagement was with a gal from ISA, someone who´s been here for about five months and knows people. Shaina (for that´s her name) is part of a non-denominational church group composed mainly of college students which congregates at the very same red edifice I can see from my front door. She´d invited me and about four others to come along for a gathering thing on Friday night.
She didn´t tell me, of course, that this gathering was an hour-long homily framed on either side by a half-hour of rock-band worship music. This came as a bit of a shock. In retrospect I probably should have anticipated it (this being a CHURCH GROUP and all) but I was thinking it wasn´t an organized thing, maybe just some wandering about town with people from the group and maybe cookies, I didn´t know.
In sum: the music was good (all in Spanish, of course) but the hour-long unanticipated lecture on salvation was a let-down and the downright rapturous attitude of some of the people there during the singing was a bit frightening.
So was the mosh pit, actually.
Call me staid and traditionalist, but I´m of the opinion that a person should keep their blissful ecstasy to themselves. It´s like they´re deliberately trying to call attention to how faithful they are, how worshipful and utterly convinced and joyous, and if it´s real, okay, I´m sorry, but at the same time you´d think it would be possible to be in rapture without throwing your arms up and crying and mouthing tongues.
Maybe it comes from being Catholic-- the unrelenting general Protestant emphasis on Jesus and happiness and bliss can get a bit grating. If all the world is love, people, why was Chile flattened by a terremoto a few weeks ago? Sing, dance, fine, that´s cool-- I´m all for that-- but if I wanted a life lecture from some gal in a T-shirt with the aid of Powerpoint I´d attend one of those Think Positive seminars. If there´s going to be a mosh pit, I´d like some warning. And aside from the big wooden cross on the wall (lit by a red spotlight at appointed times during the songs, themselves accompanied by video of dolphins and rainforests and clouds and such), you´d hardly be able to tell the place was a church at all. And... well, there´s spotlights and a mosh pit.
The local Catholic church is roughly a hundred years old. It´s got an adobe-plastered steeple, the exterior of which is slightly cracked from the terremoto, narrow stained-glass windows, and a spiky black iron fence around it.
The name: Nuestra Señora de los Dolores. This translates roughly to Our Lady of Suffering.
I think that about sums up the difference in attitude.
Craig, being Craig, would probably say that this approach is more "metal." In that vein, I have this observation to give: there exists a micro driver in this city who has three big black stickers above his dashboard and they are, in order, a skull, a ninja, and the thorn-crowned head of Jesus Christ.
Religion aside, this coming week will be my first full week of (hopefully) non-canceled classes. I have to find the FIN building in Valpo and sit through almost six hours straight of class on Monday, which will be interesting. I need to swipe some music in Spanish from the cabinet outside my door so I can listen to it while trying to read my book in Spanish. I need to get my camera looked at, because it can't seem to focus anymore and any picture it takes is almost inevitably blurry and indistinguishable (which is why I don't have any pictures at the moment). I need to take a shower. I need to drag María-José to the Fonk Museum in the next few days so I can have a look at that Easter Island moai, and I need to find that sushi shop.
I did pick up a laptop cooling fan for a cool 8600 pesos (about 18 bucks), and it does its job well in the heat.
The last student arrived today, one Diego from the north, and now all I have to do is wait for Roberto and Nicolás to return from wherever it is they´ve gone to get a group photo of the the six of us.
I also have to eat this banana on my desk.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Remember Me?
I suppose I should apologize for the lack of updates over the past week. Except that I've been told to limit my contact with English in favor of full Spanish immersion, and writing a long letter in English every night is something like self-sabotage.
So I won't be updating every day. The letters will now be weekly. This is just a heads-up-- I just got back home, it's past midnight, and I woke up this morning at eight to take a bus to my Language, Cognition, and Society class (which, by the way, is full of friendly people who tried to invite me to a get-together after class and were disappointed to learn I had a previous obligation).
Tomorrow I have nothing to do until eight pm and therefore I will write the real update sometime in the morning.
Again, my apologies, but this is one of those recommended study-abroad things for learning languages: don't use your own if you can avoid it.
So I won't be updating every day. The letters will now be weekly. This is just a heads-up-- I just got back home, it's past midnight, and I woke up this morning at eight to take a bus to my Language, Cognition, and Society class (which, by the way, is full of friendly people who tried to invite me to a get-together after class and were disappointed to learn I had a previous obligation).
Tomorrow I have nothing to do until eight pm and therefore I will write the real update sometime in the morning.
Again, my apologies, but this is one of those recommended study-abroad things for learning languages: don't use your own if you can avoid it.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
As for today
Pretty much the only event of note was a power outage for about thirty minutes during dinner... almost an hour in our case. Depended on location-- the outage knocked out most of the country. What caused it, I don't know, but apparently Chile's powergrid is interconnected as the food web.
We ate homemade pizza by candlelight and discussed the absence of Cristobal, who was out shopping at the mall at the time (he lived to return home safely, in the dark, thinking it was another tsunami warning or a quake he somehow hadn't felt).
I want a camera that can take pictures at night without flash. What I did manage to capture is... interesting, but not exactly easy to identify. Mostly cars (lights of cars) and what buildings that had generators.
Flickr pictures updated with pictures of the university, class registration, and tonight's outage. Any pictures of a church chapel are also part of the university (it's a Catholic university, you've gotta have a Catholic church inside somewhere).
For questions answered, email me.
Classes (and more happenings) tomorrow~
We ate homemade pizza by candlelight and discussed the absence of Cristobal, who was out shopping at the mall at the time (he lived to return home safely, in the dark, thinking it was another tsunami warning or a quake he somehow hadn't felt).
I want a camera that can take pictures at night without flash. What I did manage to capture is... interesting, but not exactly easy to identify. Mostly cars (lights of cars) and what buildings that had generators.
Flickr pictures updated with pictures of the university, class registration, and tonight's outage. Any pictures of a church chapel are also part of the university (it's a Catholic university, you've gotta have a Catholic church inside somewhere).
For questions answered, email me.
Classes (and more happenings) tomorrow~
As for yesterday...
I spent my time recovering.
Which meant sleeping, mostly.
Nothing to see here, folks, move along....
Which meant sleeping, mostly.
Nothing to see here, folks, move along....
Friday, March 12, 2010
I knew this day would come
Figured after three weeks of repeated disaster I was long-due for something like this. I mean, earthquakes and tsunamis are special events: the sort of events that you can look back upon and tell your kids you survived with pride in your eyes and faint trauma scars across the back of your mind, the kind that makes you assume any unanticipated motion (truck on the road, someone shaking the bed, the background operation of your own body) is another quake on its way. Not everyone gets to live through that.
I was very special.
This day actually starts last night. This will not be an entirely normal update because it was not an entirely normal night, and it cascaded into a morning that deceived in its cheeriness and general good will towards mankind.
You won't be finding these disasters on the news. They are entirely mundane.
I present to you my masterwork from last night, written in the bathroom (of which I am now more than a passing acquaintance) under the influence of frustration, fear, and exhaustion. The time was 5:20 am. The following words are unedited.
"Can't sleep. When I sleep I'm defenseless. When I sleep they come for me, and they come for me even as I try. They're everywhere-- everywhere flitting shapes bloodsuckers buzzing wings in my ears-- I can't escape. I'm in the bathroom door shut window shut watching... they'll get me here, too, eventually.
They only come for me. Twenty bites in two days, all along one arm. Elbow. Wrist. Fingers. Forehead neck shoulders they're eating me alive and I can't do anything about it I'm slathered in chemicals and hiding beneath sheets and still they come they come they come
I startle at the least motion. Least sound. Hypersensitive waiting for the whine in my right ear-- always my right ear.
No internet. I wanted to talk to someone. Look into purchasing a mosquito net burning candles something anything but there's no internet and everyone's asleep.
Somewhere along the way I took a wrong turn: this isn't Chile, this is Hell.
Silly, sure. Overreacting, sure. Cowering in the bathroom writing for lack of contact at 5 am.
But there aren't any in here. I think. Yet.
Letting insects dictate my life. Sleep. Don't sleep. Where, when, how-- open to the air or hiding beneath cloying sheets hoping this time it will work. They've driven me out of my room out of my bed fleeing with my pillow like a child crying.
Silly.
Stupid.
But I can't sleep. I can't do it. I can't I can't I can't.
Why must the internet fail at night when I need it most, not for something meandering and useless but for survival. Every night it goes down. This night.
I look over my shoulders, waiting. Wonder if the prickling of my legs is cold or them and don't want to check.
It's fine, they said. Just mosquitoes. No fleas in this house, just mosquitoes. Here: buy some of this repellant. It's good. It'll work.
It didn't.
It's toxic and I ate some of it during dinner, smeared on my fingers left over, and it doesn't work.
Bites on my hands, my fingers, my neck, my shoulders my forearms and elbows... I covered them with chemicals and yet suffer check my skin for more pulpy patches of dark red surrounded by rings of itchy pink.
Only annoying, right? Just itchy. No diseases, no West Nile or malaria.
But they're everywhere. And they're eating me. And I can't sleep.
In the morning I play it down-- yeah, I'm from a state with no mosquitoes, this is all new to me, it itches but its not that bad....
Night is a siege.
Stupid, stupid. What else to do? There are machines that spray Raid into the rooms while you sleep, making them slower and easier to kill, but do I want to breathe poison for a year in exchange for slower terrors?
Net. I want a net. I want veils of shrouding white around my bed, a wall, a fortress to match my paranoia, a Lace Curtain through which none shall pass. Good God, do I want a net. I am a silly weak foreigner in a foreign land and people might laugh-- look at the gringa, can't handle a few bugs-- but I would be safe.
I would be able to sleep. Five days I haven't slept. Not really. Make do with four-hour naps during the day when they aren't awake and hungry and buzzing. Five hours, maybe, if I'm lucky.
Letting bugs scare me away from what is mine but here I am with my pillow in the bathroom typing.
I want to go home.
Earthquake, tsunami, abject poverty, entirely too much bread... this I can handle. I can ignore tremors in the night, picture frames shaking, CD cases clattering in their cabinet. Disaster is a way of life. It happens.
Despair is a keening in your ear and the knowledge that they're waiting.
There are no mosquitoes at home.
Lucky, they said.
Yes.
Very.
Why did I leave?"
The next morning (this morning) I informed Myriam of my plight over breakfast. Rather more calmly, I might add, having had time to compose myself after fleeing weeping to the water closet three hours before.
Results: my room now smells faintly of Raid and I nearly fumigated myself trying to drop my bag off inside after signing up for classes at the college. Also, there are now two thin poles duct-taped to the back of the headboard, over which is laid a great deal of white filmy fabric. My fortress raised at last. Hallelujah.
After my time at the college signing up for classes, I returned to discover a new fellow in the house, a fellow whose name I sadly cannot remember at the moment for lack of much contact. He's tall enough, we joked over dinner, to paint the roof with his hair and thin as an anemic coyote. Bearded. Seems nice, but like I said I didn't see much of him: he immediately retired to his room to unpack and afterwards fled to the college to choose his own classes before the weekend rush.
By this point I wasn't feeling well-- tired, stomachache, and I spent most of the day asleep. Brief dinner (tea and nothing else for me) at nine, and then more attempted sleep. What was curious about this attempt was that the upset in my midregions induced a very specific and peculiar hallucination whenever I closed my eyes: some sort of religious ceremony, presided over by people in cloaks, involving cups and and a big table and a lady beside me who'd pat my shoulder every so often and inform me that whatever it was they were doing was extremely significant and I should pay attention.
I wondered if pain-induced fever dreams was how religion came to be.
Then I returned to the bathroom and threw up.
I'm feeling marginally better now.
On a positive note, I do have my classes:
1. Español Comunicacional y Cultura Chilena (6 créditos)
2. Fisica y Humor (2 créditos)
3. Arte y Sociedad en Chile Prehispánicos (3 créditos)
4. Introducción a Geografía (4 créditos)
5. Taller de America: Espacio Urbano (2 créditos)
6. Lenguaje, Cognición, y Sociedad (3 créditos)
7. El Universo (2 créditos)
8. Antropología General (3 créditos)
For my esteemed readers who do not know Spanish, these translate as:
1. Communicational Spanish and Chilean Culture
2. Physics and Humor
3. Art and Society in Prehispanic Chile
4. Introduction to Geography
5. Workshop of America: Urban Space
6. Language, Cognition, and Society
7. The Universe
8. General Anthropology
All will be going to U of I as Spanish credit, regardless of actual topic-- and 400-level Spanish credit in all cases but two, at that. Figured I'd just take whatever looked interesting and pick and choose the classes that I end up liking the most.
School starts Monday.
A sidenote:
While boarding the bus back home from the University, the driver asked me if I was French. I suspect it was the orange headscarf that threw him off-track (orange headscarves are not part of the stereotypical "American" ensemble) and suggested as much to Maria-José. She told me, quite definitively, he probably made the mistake because bus drivers are not very high-class people.
Hmmm...
I was very special.
This day actually starts last night. This will not be an entirely normal update because it was not an entirely normal night, and it cascaded into a morning that deceived in its cheeriness and general good will towards mankind.
You won't be finding these disasters on the news. They are entirely mundane.
I present to you my masterwork from last night, written in the bathroom (of which I am now more than a passing acquaintance) under the influence of frustration, fear, and exhaustion. The time was 5:20 am. The following words are unedited.
"Can't sleep. When I sleep I'm defenseless. When I sleep they come for me, and they come for me even as I try. They're everywhere-- everywhere flitting shapes bloodsuckers buzzing wings in my ears-- I can't escape. I'm in the bathroom door shut window shut watching... they'll get me here, too, eventually.
They only come for me. Twenty bites in two days, all along one arm. Elbow. Wrist. Fingers. Forehead neck shoulders they're eating me alive and I can't do anything about it I'm slathered in chemicals and hiding beneath sheets and still they come they come they come
I startle at the least motion. Least sound. Hypersensitive waiting for the whine in my right ear-- always my right ear.
No internet. I wanted to talk to someone. Look into purchasing a mosquito net burning candles something anything but there's no internet and everyone's asleep.
Somewhere along the way I took a wrong turn: this isn't Chile, this is Hell.
Silly, sure. Overreacting, sure. Cowering in the bathroom writing for lack of contact at 5 am.
But there aren't any in here. I think. Yet.
Letting insects dictate my life. Sleep. Don't sleep. Where, when, how-- open to the air or hiding beneath cloying sheets hoping this time it will work. They've driven me out of my room out of my bed fleeing with my pillow like a child crying.
Silly.
Stupid.
But I can't sleep. I can't do it. I can't I can't I can't.
Why must the internet fail at night when I need it most, not for something meandering and useless but for survival. Every night it goes down. This night.
I look over my shoulders, waiting. Wonder if the prickling of my legs is cold or them and don't want to check.
It's fine, they said. Just mosquitoes. No fleas in this house, just mosquitoes. Here: buy some of this repellant. It's good. It'll work.
It didn't.
It's toxic and I ate some of it during dinner, smeared on my fingers left over, and it doesn't work.
Bites on my hands, my fingers, my neck, my shoulders my forearms and elbows... I covered them with chemicals and yet suffer check my skin for more pulpy patches of dark red surrounded by rings of itchy pink.
Only annoying, right? Just itchy. No diseases, no West Nile or malaria.
But they're everywhere. And they're eating me. And I can't sleep.
In the morning I play it down-- yeah, I'm from a state with no mosquitoes, this is all new to me, it itches but its not that bad....
Night is a siege.
Stupid, stupid. What else to do? There are machines that spray Raid into the rooms while you sleep, making them slower and easier to kill, but do I want to breathe poison for a year in exchange for slower terrors?
Net. I want a net. I want veils of shrouding white around my bed, a wall, a fortress to match my paranoia, a Lace Curtain through which none shall pass. Good God, do I want a net. I am a silly weak foreigner in a foreign land and people might laugh-- look at the gringa, can't handle a few bugs-- but I would be safe.
I would be able to sleep. Five days I haven't slept. Not really. Make do with four-hour naps during the day when they aren't awake and hungry and buzzing. Five hours, maybe, if I'm lucky.
Letting bugs scare me away from what is mine but here I am with my pillow in the bathroom typing.
I want to go home.
Earthquake, tsunami, abject poverty, entirely too much bread... this I can handle. I can ignore tremors in the night, picture frames shaking, CD cases clattering in their cabinet. Disaster is a way of life. It happens.
Despair is a keening in your ear and the knowledge that they're waiting.
There are no mosquitoes at home.
Lucky, they said.
Yes.
Very.
Why did I leave?"
The next morning (this morning) I informed Myriam of my plight over breakfast. Rather more calmly, I might add, having had time to compose myself after fleeing weeping to the water closet three hours before.
Results: my room now smells faintly of Raid and I nearly fumigated myself trying to drop my bag off inside after signing up for classes at the college. Also, there are now two thin poles duct-taped to the back of the headboard, over which is laid a great deal of white filmy fabric. My fortress raised at last. Hallelujah.
After my time at the college signing up for classes, I returned to discover a new fellow in the house, a fellow whose name I sadly cannot remember at the moment for lack of much contact. He's tall enough, we joked over dinner, to paint the roof with his hair and thin as an anemic coyote. Bearded. Seems nice, but like I said I didn't see much of him: he immediately retired to his room to unpack and afterwards fled to the college to choose his own classes before the weekend rush.
By this point I wasn't feeling well-- tired, stomachache, and I spent most of the day asleep. Brief dinner (tea and nothing else for me) at nine, and then more attempted sleep. What was curious about this attempt was that the upset in my midregions induced a very specific and peculiar hallucination whenever I closed my eyes: some sort of religious ceremony, presided over by people in cloaks, involving cups and and a big table and a lady beside me who'd pat my shoulder every so often and inform me that whatever it was they were doing was extremely significant and I should pay attention.
I wondered if pain-induced fever dreams was how religion came to be.
Then I returned to the bathroom and threw up.
I'm feeling marginally better now.
On a positive note, I do have my classes:
1. Español Comunicacional y Cultura Chilena (6 créditos)
2. Fisica y Humor (2 créditos)
3. Arte y Sociedad en Chile Prehispánicos (3 créditos)
4. Introducción a Geografía (4 créditos)
5. Taller de America: Espacio Urbano (2 créditos)
6. Lenguaje, Cognición, y Sociedad (3 créditos)
7. El Universo (2 créditos)
8. Antropología General (3 créditos)
For my esteemed readers who do not know Spanish, these translate as:
1. Communicational Spanish and Chilean Culture
2. Physics and Humor
3. Art and Society in Prehispanic Chile
4. Introduction to Geography
5. Workshop of America: Urban Space
6. Language, Cognition, and Society
7. The Universe
8. General Anthropology
All will be going to U of I as Spanish credit, regardless of actual topic-- and 400-level Spanish credit in all cases but two, at that. Figured I'd just take whatever looked interesting and pick and choose the classes that I end up liking the most.
School starts Monday.
A sidenote:
While boarding the bus back home from the University, the driver asked me if I was French. I suspect it was the orange headscarf that threw him off-track (orange headscarves are not part of the stereotypical "American" ensemble) and suggested as much to Maria-José. She told me, quite definitively, he probably made the mistake because bus drivers are not very high-class people.
Hmmm...
Thursday, March 11, 2010
I would like to report to all of you once again...
...that I am not dead. Despite the country´s many and varied attempts to make that so. Chile, Chile... what did I ever do to you?
To tell the truth, I didn´t even know about the tsunami warning until almost an hour after the fact. I was at the university, filling out paperwork for my student ID card and the like, and there was a fairly strong temblor while we were in the courtyard but no one thought anything of it. Later I met up with Ragini, one of the ISA gals, so she could come to my house and use the shower (her house still has no water) and we took a bus back to Viña. There was one section of road that seemed even bumpier than usual, but again, we thought nothing of it. We got off the bus, began walking up all the hills to her house to fetch her toiletries (and her house is very much on top of those hills, quite some distance), and commented a few times on how many people were standing around in the streets. Why? We speculated. The temblors, maybe. Or maybe everyone was gathering to see the new president, who was inaugurated today in Valparaíso.
Eh.
We got ice cream.
When we finally arrived at her house and informed her host family of our plan, they put us under house arrest. No, no, they said, you can´t go to Arlegui-- that´s at sea level, and everyone´s been evacuated at least ten meters above that, into the hills. Maremoto warning, you know. Tsunami.
Great, I thought. Now the ocean as well as the land is out to get me. There is nowhere on Earth I can hide now, save for maybe the sky, and unfortunately a private jet runs a bit more on the costly side than I can handle. Also: it would have to land sometime, at which point a wave of either rock or water would do its best to demolish it and me both.
So I hung around Ragini´s house for three hours. Called Myriam, discovered that they were waiting it out on the next hill over (fortunately for a country with such a long tsunami-prone coastline, Chile has a LOT of steep hills), and that I couldn´t go back to the house even if I wanted to, because the police had cordoned everything off. That, and the evacuation of Congress, had been the first official act of Piñera, Chile´s new president. I like to call this the "OH GOD GET EVERYONE TO HIGHER GROUND NOW" declaration, and it's a heck of a way to enter office. There were signs along the route to Valpo this morning-- "Bienvenido Presidente Piñera"-- and at this point I expect the reverse side will be changed to "And Sorry About That, But We Really Hope You'll Come Back Soon (maybe when the ground stops shaking?)".
There wasn't a tsunami. I am in my house, and there are no fish flopping about on the patio. This is a relief. Despite the fact that a good fish would be most welcome right now (cubes and tuna just aren't cutting it).
In other less disastrous news:
There are several hundred extranjeros studying at PUCV, most of them from the US but a decent number from Europe and Central/South America. Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Canada, Mexico, Columbia, Argentina, and so forth. As well as one rather confused-looking fellow from Japan. In the welcome speech, the word "terremoto" was mentioned at least twenty-six times. And also the university buildings are secure, in case you were wondering. Because we were. Most assuredly.
As part of the welcoming ceremonies, everyone was treated to a show demonstrating some folk tunes and dances of various parts of Chile (North, Center, South). While the crowd was initially not terribly enthusiastic-- it was quite early in the morning, still, for people who'd grown accustomed to waking at 11 or later, and standing around in a courtyard filled with cigarette smoke for an extended period wasn't helping-- this attitude changed after the dancers started swiping people from the front ranks.
Let's just say that my one-semester dance class came in handy.
I've chosen my classes. The schedule is daunting. Most of my destinations are in Valpo, which will mean extremely intimate acquaintance with the bus system in short order. Also, all of the times and locations for classes are in code. CC 0-15 at 7-8, for instance, means the class is in la Casa Central on the first floor, room 15, from 14:00 to 16:45, and yes all time is written out military-fashion and classes run two hours long at the very least.
I sign up tomorrow at 9:00 sharp.
Actually, speaking of which, it's past midnight and I almost slept through my appointment this morning. Best be off.
Here's hoping for lack of a tsunami alarm in the night~
To tell the truth, I didn´t even know about the tsunami warning until almost an hour after the fact. I was at the university, filling out paperwork for my student ID card and the like, and there was a fairly strong temblor while we were in the courtyard but no one thought anything of it. Later I met up with Ragini, one of the ISA gals, so she could come to my house and use the shower (her house still has no water) and we took a bus back to Viña. There was one section of road that seemed even bumpier than usual, but again, we thought nothing of it. We got off the bus, began walking up all the hills to her house to fetch her toiletries (and her house is very much on top of those hills, quite some distance), and commented a few times on how many people were standing around in the streets. Why? We speculated. The temblors, maybe. Or maybe everyone was gathering to see the new president, who was inaugurated today in Valparaíso.
Eh.
We got ice cream.
When we finally arrived at her house and informed her host family of our plan, they put us under house arrest. No, no, they said, you can´t go to Arlegui-- that´s at sea level, and everyone´s been evacuated at least ten meters above that, into the hills. Maremoto warning, you know. Tsunami.
Great, I thought. Now the ocean as well as the land is out to get me. There is nowhere on Earth I can hide now, save for maybe the sky, and unfortunately a private jet runs a bit more on the costly side than I can handle. Also: it would have to land sometime, at which point a wave of either rock or water would do its best to demolish it and me both.
So I hung around Ragini´s house for three hours. Called Myriam, discovered that they were waiting it out on the next hill over (fortunately for a country with such a long tsunami-prone coastline, Chile has a LOT of steep hills), and that I couldn´t go back to the house even if I wanted to, because the police had cordoned everything off. That, and the evacuation of Congress, had been the first official act of Piñera, Chile´s new president. I like to call this the "OH GOD GET EVERYONE TO HIGHER GROUND NOW" declaration, and it's a heck of a way to enter office. There were signs along the route to Valpo this morning-- "Bienvenido Presidente Piñera"-- and at this point I expect the reverse side will be changed to "And Sorry About That, But We Really Hope You'll Come Back Soon (maybe when the ground stops shaking?)".
There wasn't a tsunami. I am in my house, and there are no fish flopping about on the patio. This is a relief. Despite the fact that a good fish would be most welcome right now (cubes and tuna just aren't cutting it).
In other less disastrous news:
There are several hundred extranjeros studying at PUCV, most of them from the US but a decent number from Europe and Central/South America. Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Canada, Mexico, Columbia, Argentina, and so forth. As well as one rather confused-looking fellow from Japan. In the welcome speech, the word "terremoto" was mentioned at least twenty-six times. And also the university buildings are secure, in case you were wondering. Because we were. Most assuredly.
As part of the welcoming ceremonies, everyone was treated to a show demonstrating some folk tunes and dances of various parts of Chile (North, Center, South). While the crowd was initially not terribly enthusiastic-- it was quite early in the morning, still, for people who'd grown accustomed to waking at 11 or later, and standing around in a courtyard filled with cigarette smoke for an extended period wasn't helping-- this attitude changed after the dancers started swiping people from the front ranks.
Let's just say that my one-semester dance class came in handy.
I've chosen my classes. The schedule is daunting. Most of my destinations are in Valpo, which will mean extremely intimate acquaintance with the bus system in short order. Also, all of the times and locations for classes are in code. CC 0-15 at 7-8, for instance, means the class is in la Casa Central on the first floor, room 15, from 14:00 to 16:45, and yes all time is written out military-fashion and classes run two hours long at the very least.
I sign up tomorrow at 9:00 sharp.
Actually, speaking of which, it's past midnight and I almost slept through my appointment this morning. Best be off.
Here's hoping for lack of a tsunami alarm in the night~
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
New gal
She arrived late yesterday from Iquique, a city in the north of Chile. She´s pale, a bit on the heavy side. Wears a striped shirt. Smokes, one or two cigarettes a day. She´s quick to smile, quicker to laugh, and listens to punk rock. Her name is Maria-José, and she´s the second student after myself to arrive in the house.
After waking this morning to discover both forearms and my head covered in bugbites, I spent a few minutes in my room moaning, complaining, trying not to itch, and contemplating tears.
I like cold. I like snow. I hate bugs. Why, I wanted to know, why had I chosen to study in a warm country?
Because there are no cold countries that speak Spanish.
Why did I have to choose a language spoken only in tropical and semi-tropical parts of the world? Where it´s warm? Where there are BUGS??
*sigh*
I finally dragged myself out to breakfast after putting on a long-sleeved shirt and a bandanna to hide the bites on my forehead. Maria-José was there, calmly buttering her toast. Hóla, she says. Hóla, I say. I try not to look too uncomfortable and fail, as she asks what´s wrong. Bugs. I show her the bites. She commiserates and agrees that, since she needs to go out and buy toothpaste anyway, the two of us can go look for a pharmacy that sells OFF, an insect repellent cream.
So we go. This is my first time out in the city with someone who does not know where we are, but we manage: she deciphers some of the more confusing conversations and signage while I map our way around the neighborhood, with which I´m a few days more familiar. The house really is right in the middle of downtown-- less than ten minute´s walk to the central square, of which I have pictures from a later outing that day with Cristobal in tow (he wanted to buy formal pants and a shirt and ended up buying neither, but I picked up some sweet sunglasses from a street stand). We went to the supermercado and a number of farmacias, as they´re called, found the cream, and then decided to look for the local PUCV building (the History Institute, for history majors).
It´s a castle. On a hill. With turrets.
Regrettably, I left my camera´s memory card in the computer.... but don´t worry! I will take a history class this semester specifically so I can walk by that row of old mansions and up three flights of winding stairs to a castle. I will take pictures then.
Other highlights of the day:
I watched Myriam light a candle, and asked if the house had a smoke detector (I hadn´t spotted one in the house yet; in fact, anywhere in Chile). It doesn't. Most places don't-- you have to be either a skyscraper or some rich person's mansion to warrant a smoke detector. It was slightly awkward confessing that my house in the States has three.
A gringo, in Chile, is specifically a person from the US-- not any foreigner as I had been told. Something to do with the Mexican War. So, while the pair of ladies from France who came to dinner today were foreigners, they were not gringas.
I am the only gringa in the house.
I try not to be too offended, but it was a bit of a set-back to learn that people from my country are singled out more than from anywhere else. I mean, heck, I'm supposed to be an ambassador for my nation here and all, and I immediately get stuck with a special nickname given to us and us only? What did I ever do to deserve this, aside from being born in a certain place?
I catch myself wishing I was from somewhere else on occasion, just to reduce the level of special attention I keep getting. I order an avocado in Spanish, I don't want the fruit-seller to try and negotiate in English. I may be a gringa, but I'm speaking Spanish, dammit! I have a horrible accent and hilarious grammar, but I am making an effort to appreciate you and your language and your country!
I try to be calm about this for the most part, or laugh it off. It's better to laugh it off. Never mind that every so often I feel like a tourist from the future where machines wash dishes and warn of fires and people wear seatbelts and aren't bitten to death by bugs.
Good God, the bugs. I'm whining, I know, but I'm really not happy about this aspect of the country.
Oh-- there were people from France at the dinner table today. Friends of Myriam. Conversation was conducted in a mishmash of Chilean and French-accented Spanish, French, and mine and Cristobal's occasional comments in English-accented Spanish, Spanish-accented English, or American English. I didn't really talk much because it was difficult to keep up and it was even more bizarre being from the US with people from Europe at the table. Talking about free schooling and healthcare, or the lack of, wouldn't you know.
Hi. I'm from the US. I have three smoke detectors in my house and have to pay for college and all my medical expenses not covered by company insurance. I'm from a nation simultaneously so far advanced and so far behind that no one is quite sure what to make of me, but no one dares to speak up because, if slighted, we might invade them.
I didn't talk much.
I miss peanut butter.
Pictures from now on will be uploaded to that flickr account-- here's the link again, for anyone who might have misplaced it somehow: http://www.flickr.com/photos/48182168@N05/
Today's installment features the central plaza of Viña del Mar. The gal in stripes is Maria-José. Dude with the cyborg headpiece is Cristobal. I'm in green. The big black statue guy is Sr. Vergaras, who is credited for founding the city. The church is not in the plaza, but it's nearby. There were two guys playing some sort of amazingly long game of checkers-- I went to the plaza twice, separated by at least three hours, and they were there both times. Multiple games, perhaps. Different guys? Dunno. The board remains.
Always, the board remains.
After waking this morning to discover both forearms and my head covered in bugbites, I spent a few minutes in my room moaning, complaining, trying not to itch, and contemplating tears.
I like cold. I like snow. I hate bugs. Why, I wanted to know, why had I chosen to study in a warm country?
Because there are no cold countries that speak Spanish.
Why did I have to choose a language spoken only in tropical and semi-tropical parts of the world? Where it´s warm? Where there are BUGS??
*sigh*
I finally dragged myself out to breakfast after putting on a long-sleeved shirt and a bandanna to hide the bites on my forehead. Maria-José was there, calmly buttering her toast. Hóla, she says. Hóla, I say. I try not to look too uncomfortable and fail, as she asks what´s wrong. Bugs. I show her the bites. She commiserates and agrees that, since she needs to go out and buy toothpaste anyway, the two of us can go look for a pharmacy that sells OFF, an insect repellent cream.
So we go. This is my first time out in the city with someone who does not know where we are, but we manage: she deciphers some of the more confusing conversations and signage while I map our way around the neighborhood, with which I´m a few days more familiar. The house really is right in the middle of downtown-- less than ten minute´s walk to the central square, of which I have pictures from a later outing that day with Cristobal in tow (he wanted to buy formal pants and a shirt and ended up buying neither, but I picked up some sweet sunglasses from a street stand). We went to the supermercado and a number of farmacias, as they´re called, found the cream, and then decided to look for the local PUCV building (the History Institute, for history majors).
It´s a castle. On a hill. With turrets.
Regrettably, I left my camera´s memory card in the computer.... but don´t worry! I will take a history class this semester specifically so I can walk by that row of old mansions and up three flights of winding stairs to a castle. I will take pictures then.
Other highlights of the day:
I watched Myriam light a candle, and asked if the house had a smoke detector (I hadn´t spotted one in the house yet; in fact, anywhere in Chile). It doesn't. Most places don't-- you have to be either a skyscraper or some rich person's mansion to warrant a smoke detector. It was slightly awkward confessing that my house in the States has three.
A gringo, in Chile, is specifically a person from the US-- not any foreigner as I had been told. Something to do with the Mexican War. So, while the pair of ladies from France who came to dinner today were foreigners, they were not gringas.
I am the only gringa in the house.
I try not to be too offended, but it was a bit of a set-back to learn that people from my country are singled out more than from anywhere else. I mean, heck, I'm supposed to be an ambassador for my nation here and all, and I immediately get stuck with a special nickname given to us and us only? What did I ever do to deserve this, aside from being born in a certain place?
I catch myself wishing I was from somewhere else on occasion, just to reduce the level of special attention I keep getting. I order an avocado in Spanish, I don't want the fruit-seller to try and negotiate in English. I may be a gringa, but I'm speaking Spanish, dammit! I have a horrible accent and hilarious grammar, but I am making an effort to appreciate you and your language and your country!
I try to be calm about this for the most part, or laugh it off. It's better to laugh it off. Never mind that every so often I feel like a tourist from the future where machines wash dishes and warn of fires and people wear seatbelts and aren't bitten to death by bugs.
Good God, the bugs. I'm whining, I know, but I'm really not happy about this aspect of the country.
Oh-- there were people from France at the dinner table today. Friends of Myriam. Conversation was conducted in a mishmash of Chilean and French-accented Spanish, French, and mine and Cristobal's occasional comments in English-accented Spanish, Spanish-accented English, or American English. I didn't really talk much because it was difficult to keep up and it was even more bizarre being from the US with people from Europe at the table. Talking about free schooling and healthcare, or the lack of, wouldn't you know.
Hi. I'm from the US. I have three smoke detectors in my house and have to pay for college and all my medical expenses not covered by company insurance. I'm from a nation simultaneously so far advanced and so far behind that no one is quite sure what to make of me, but no one dares to speak up because, if slighted, we might invade them.
I didn't talk much.
I miss peanut butter.
Pictures from now on will be uploaded to that flickr account-- here's the link again, for anyone who might have misplaced it somehow: http://www.flickr.com/photos/48182168@N05/
Today's installment features the central plaza of Viña del Mar. The gal in stripes is Maria-José. Dude with the cyborg headpiece is Cristobal. I'm in green. The big black statue guy is Sr. Vergaras, who is credited for founding the city. The church is not in the plaza, but it's nearby. There were two guys playing some sort of amazingly long game of checkers-- I went to the plaza twice, separated by at least three hours, and they were there both times. Multiple games, perhaps. Different guys? Dunno. The board remains.
Always, the board remains.
About those updates
Jesus Christ, I need to keep up with these things. I take too long to write. I also take too many pictures. More than a HUNDRED pictures to sort through for you, after just two days of failure-to-update. Granted, those two days were spent touring around and doing tourist-y things, which naturally accumulates more photos, but even so. I might have to just start selecting a picture of the day or two to send off, because this is getting insane.
No! I am creating a Flickr account. Uploading pictures, of which I have taken 337 since my arrival in this country.
Some of them require a bit of explanation, and if anyone has questions, you can email me and ask. For now, my brain is pretty well fried from a long walk around Valpo in the heat and dust and bugs.
I have decided I hate bugs. When winter comes and they all die, I will laugh. Long and hard. People will look at me even funnier than they do already, but I will enjoy myself. You'll see.
A few observations:
1. People will board buses to sell stuff. Jump on, hawk wares, jump off at the next stop.
2. Valpo is dirty. After I returned from my walk, my arms were grey from all the dust and dirt blowing through the air.
3. When talking to a gal named "Paloma," keep in mind that "paloma" in this context means "dove," and not "pigeon."
4. To cross the street, you walk up to the curb, look both ways, and run for it as soon as there's a gap in traffic. This holds even if there's three lanes filled with cars speeding by like blurry ribbons of DEATH
5. Each micro (bus) is different and charming in its own unique rattling butt-jouncing I'm-going-to-fall-apart-any-second-now-but-hey-Jesus-saves-and-the-radio-is-kept-at-decent-volume-by-law sort of way.
About the eagle thing: there were two layers of wire around the big eagle enclosure. This poor dumb bird had gotten itself stuck between the two. We, with the help of some hefty sticks, managed after about an hour to pry apart the wire and prod the eagle through the resulting opening and back into the enclosure proper.
Upon reflection, I suspect poking an eagle with a stick repeatedly is not something I'd be able to get away with in the States.
One high point: I can now successfully navigate the bus system. At least to and from the university (I made it there and back without getting run over, lost, accosted by gypsies, or kidnapped by drug cartels).
Okay. Here is my photostream. I am UnoSombrero. Enjoy.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/48182168@N05/
No! I am creating a Flickr account. Uploading pictures, of which I have taken 337 since my arrival in this country.
Some of them require a bit of explanation, and if anyone has questions, you can email me and ask. For now, my brain is pretty well fried from a long walk around Valpo in the heat and dust and bugs.
I have decided I hate bugs. When winter comes and they all die, I will laugh. Long and hard. People will look at me even funnier than they do already, but I will enjoy myself. You'll see.
A few observations:
1. People will board buses to sell stuff. Jump on, hawk wares, jump off at the next stop.
2. Valpo is dirty. After I returned from my walk, my arms were grey from all the dust and dirt blowing through the air.
3. When talking to a gal named "Paloma," keep in mind that "paloma" in this context means "dove," and not "pigeon."
4. To cross the street, you walk up to the curb, look both ways, and run for it as soon as there's a gap in traffic. This holds even if there's three lanes filled with cars speeding by like blurry ribbons of DEATH
5. Each micro (bus) is different and charming in its own unique rattling butt-jouncing I'm-going-to-fall-apart-any-second-now-but-hey-Jesus-saves-and-the-radio-is-kept-at-decent-volume-by-law sort of way.
About the eagle thing: there were two layers of wire around the big eagle enclosure. This poor dumb bird had gotten itself stuck between the two. We, with the help of some hefty sticks, managed after about an hour to pry apart the wire and prod the eagle through the resulting opening and back into the enclosure proper.
Upon reflection, I suspect poking an eagle with a stick repeatedly is not something I'd be able to get away with in the States.
One high point: I can now successfully navigate the bus system. At least to and from the university (I made it there and back without getting run over, lost, accosted by gypsies, or kidnapped by drug cartels).
Okay. Here is my photostream. I am UnoSombrero. Enjoy.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/48182168@N05/
Uh...
This would be another day of not doing terribly much. Tomorrow another student, Nicolas, will be showing up, so maybe tomorrow will be more interesting. Today... well... uh...
I took a shower! In our shower, I mean. Now that the water's back. It's a little stand-up number, with walls made of doors (e.g. there are two walls which are not house walls, and these swing on hinges), and a spout-on-a-string that you have to hold because there's no place to hook it. Means that whenever you need two hands for something, you have to either let the shower head hang spraying water or turn the water off and let it hang. A bit awkward, but we're supposed to be conserving water anyway-- turning it off when you don't need it to rinse stuff is a good plan, I suppose.
I forgot that water heating in Chile isn't automatic: you have to turn on this thing called a califont, which is basically a heater started with a lighter (one of the ISA kids said that the one in his family's house is stubborn-- he has to get a lighter, light a piece of toilet paper on fire, and then shove the burning paper into the mechanism to get it to start). As a consequence, I got to shower with cold water until about thirty seconds before I was finished. This was when Myriam realized that someone was in the shower and turned in the califont.
Warm water, let me tell you, is awesome. I love warm water. I could take a bath in the stuff.
I got to use my pretty new green towel, and then hung it up to dry in my closet. No sun today, and no driers either. You make do.
What else for today...
Ah.
I was all inspired by a conversation with a friend and the general lack of breakfast cereal in this country to draw a picture, which can be found here:
http://unosombrero.deviantart.com/art/Unstoppable-156422659
If there is breakfast cereal in Chile, I have yet to see it eaten as such.
I also met and got to talk with this neat old lady named Laura, who is apparently a friend of the family and showed up sometime around five or six to chat with Myriam. Myriam wasn't home, so she hung around and talked with me and Cristobal about learning the British version of English and not being able to understand Americans, about male-female relations as regarding who serves who, about where you stab yourself when using insulin, about why there's so much bread in Chile, and about the meaning of life in general. She wore a long scarf, a red coat, had milk-white hair, and brought along a bag of peaches ("duraznos") and a colored-pencil drawing of what looked like a psychedelic desert sunrise as a gift. Anyone bearing gifts is welcome in my book.
She ended up sticking around until eight, sitting down to drink tea and talk some more once Myriam got back. I had some tea, too, and between the two of us (me and Laura) we ate an entire bag of tea crackers with this awesome caramel-ish spread called "manjar."
Fun times.
I would like to point out at this point that milk here tastes just like half-and-half. I love half-and-half. It's like me and this country were made for each other. With the notable exception of the fish cubes from last night.
I never thought I'd be able to say I've eaten fish cubes. I mean...
No. I didn't even know fish cubes, as an actual food, existed. Or could ever exist.
I'm not complaining, don't get me wrong! It's just...
Fish cubes.
*glances over shoulder*
It's a good thing I have access to a secret code called English. Otherwise I'd probably be in trouble.
It is a nifty feeling, knowing that your native language is more or less totally incomprehensible to everyone around you. Scared Cristobal on the way back from the mall yesterday by dropping an English "positive" while he and his amiga were exchanging a chain of "seguros" (which, as a question, means something like "you sure?").
C: Seguro?
A: Seguro?
C: Seguro?
Me: POSITIVE
C: D8
Makes me feel special. :D
I took a shower! In our shower, I mean. Now that the water's back. It's a little stand-up number, with walls made of doors (e.g. there are two walls which are not house walls, and these swing on hinges), and a spout-on-a-string that you have to hold because there's no place to hook it. Means that whenever you need two hands for something, you have to either let the shower head hang spraying water or turn the water off and let it hang. A bit awkward, but we're supposed to be conserving water anyway-- turning it off when you don't need it to rinse stuff is a good plan, I suppose.
I forgot that water heating in Chile isn't automatic: you have to turn on this thing called a califont, which is basically a heater started with a lighter (one of the ISA kids said that the one in his family's house is stubborn-- he has to get a lighter, light a piece of toilet paper on fire, and then shove the burning paper into the mechanism to get it to start). As a consequence, I got to shower with cold water until about thirty seconds before I was finished. This was when Myriam realized that someone was in the shower and turned in the califont.
Warm water, let me tell you, is awesome. I love warm water. I could take a bath in the stuff.
I got to use my pretty new green towel, and then hung it up to dry in my closet. No sun today, and no driers either. You make do.
What else for today...
Ah.
I was all inspired by a conversation with a friend and the general lack of breakfast cereal in this country to draw a picture, which can be found here:
http://unosombrero.deviantart.com/art/Unstoppable-156422659
If there is breakfast cereal in Chile, I have yet to see it eaten as such.
I also met and got to talk with this neat old lady named Laura, who is apparently a friend of the family and showed up sometime around five or six to chat with Myriam. Myriam wasn't home, so she hung around and talked with me and Cristobal about learning the British version of English and not being able to understand Americans, about male-female relations as regarding who serves who, about where you stab yourself when using insulin, about why there's so much bread in Chile, and about the meaning of life in general. She wore a long scarf, a red coat, had milk-white hair, and brought along a bag of peaches ("duraznos") and a colored-pencil drawing of what looked like a psychedelic desert sunrise as a gift. Anyone bearing gifts is welcome in my book.
She ended up sticking around until eight, sitting down to drink tea and talk some more once Myriam got back. I had some tea, too, and between the two of us (me and Laura) we ate an entire bag of tea crackers with this awesome caramel-ish spread called "manjar."
Fun times.
I would like to point out at this point that milk here tastes just like half-and-half. I love half-and-half. It's like me and this country were made for each other. With the notable exception of the fish cubes from last night.
I never thought I'd be able to say I've eaten fish cubes. I mean...
No. I didn't even know fish cubes, as an actual food, existed. Or could ever exist.
I'm not complaining, don't get me wrong! It's just...
Fish cubes.
*glances over shoulder*
It's a good thing I have access to a secret code called English. Otherwise I'd probably be in trouble.
It is a nifty feeling, knowing that your native language is more or less totally incomprehensible to everyone around you. Scared Cristobal on the way back from the mall yesterday by dropping an English "positive" while he and his amiga were exchanging a chain of "seguros" (which, as a question, means something like "you sure?").
C: Seguro?
A: Seguro?
C: Seguro?
Me: POSITIVE
C: D8
Makes me feel special. :D
Two days' worth of stuff
To be honest, more like one days' worth: today was pretty darn slow. No update yesterday because the Internet decided to fail me at a most inopportune moment. I must learn to type faster. Also: I did something weird to my arm, so this update will be a bit shorter than usual. (Too much typing X))
Yesterday I went to the clinic and to the mall. The clinic with Myriam and the mall with Cristobal. Two very different experiences.
The clinic is a little state-owned deal that functions as a sort of mini-hospital: if you have a cold, just don't feel good, or need medicine or nutritional supplements of any sort (prescription), you come here. We went to pick up medication and supplements for Myriam's mom, and talked most of the way there and most of the way back about the differences between state-run and private health companies and the way things function in both Chile and the States. She concluded that having no state health care option is silly and that it's a good thing Obama's pushing that health care bill. When we got back to the house I showed both her and Jaime my Group Health card and they thought it was interesting-- as was my Social Security card and my school ID, which is how I learned there's no such thing as school mascots in Chile.
I tried to explain the Richland Bombers and all present agreed that having a nuclear bomb and the attendant cloud as your mascot is pretty terrible, regardless of whether or not you're used to mascots at all. They figured animals made more sense. And Vandals? Why have as a mascot a barbarian tribe that brought down the Roman Empire, if you're an institution of learning?
The mall. BIG mall. Three stories, escalators everywhere, full of US companies. I was there to buy a towel; Cristobal ended up buying shoes and a pair of headphones. Cristobal is a big spender. We met a friend of his at the mall (whose name I can't remember, though I should-- she was pretty cool and will be going to the Catolica) who described him as 'flaco,' which I take it is slang for 'dork.' The three of us hung out at the food court (which was a pretty sorry food court, by my high standards: the little Chinese stand was manned entirely by Chileans and sold basically wontons and rice) for quite some time, never buying food and talking about Chilean slang and Bush and cell phones and actors and what a doofus Cristobal is (that was just me and the girl, after he went off and got himself lost while we went and got some ice cream. It was good ice cream).
This is how you learn Spanish, I figure. Hang out with people and talk. And don't worry about making mistakes, because mistakes are hilarious and it's good to be the comedian of the group, right?
I, Paige Orwin, am a funny foreigner.
I did pick up my towel eventually (it's green) and walked back to the house after dropping the girl off at a bus for Valparaiso (there are no bus stations, you just wait until you see a bus driving by with a sign that says your desired destination hanging in the window among the ten or so other signs and then wave frantically until it pulls over). Ate food, talked a lot after dinner-- because after dinner you always talk for an hour or two-- and went to sleep after trying to write an email and watching in dismay as the Internet went off and shot itself.
Today: pretty much nothing. I stuck around the house, listened to music, doodled randomly, talked a bit with Cristobal, and spent dinner trying to keep up with a two-hour conversation about movies and geometry and surnames. Apparently everyone in Chile is named Maria-Fernandez. Or Juan.
Will do more tomorrow!
Yesterday I went to the clinic and to the mall. The clinic with Myriam and the mall with Cristobal. Two very different experiences.
The clinic is a little state-owned deal that functions as a sort of mini-hospital: if you have a cold, just don't feel good, or need medicine or nutritional supplements of any sort (prescription), you come here. We went to pick up medication and supplements for Myriam's mom, and talked most of the way there and most of the way back about the differences between state-run and private health companies and the way things function in both Chile and the States. She concluded that having no state health care option is silly and that it's a good thing Obama's pushing that health care bill. When we got back to the house I showed both her and Jaime my Group Health card and they thought it was interesting-- as was my Social Security card and my school ID, which is how I learned there's no such thing as school mascots in Chile.
I tried to explain the Richland Bombers and all present agreed that having a nuclear bomb and the attendant cloud as your mascot is pretty terrible, regardless of whether or not you're used to mascots at all. They figured animals made more sense. And Vandals? Why have as a mascot a barbarian tribe that brought down the Roman Empire, if you're an institution of learning?
The mall. BIG mall. Three stories, escalators everywhere, full of US companies. I was there to buy a towel; Cristobal ended up buying shoes and a pair of headphones. Cristobal is a big spender. We met a friend of his at the mall (whose name I can't remember, though I should-- she was pretty cool and will be going to the Catolica) who described him as 'flaco,' which I take it is slang for 'dork.' The three of us hung out at the food court (which was a pretty sorry food court, by my high standards: the little Chinese stand was manned entirely by Chileans and sold basically wontons and rice) for quite some time, never buying food and talking about Chilean slang and Bush and cell phones and actors and what a doofus Cristobal is (that was just me and the girl, after he went off and got himself lost while we went and got some ice cream. It was good ice cream).
This is how you learn Spanish, I figure. Hang out with people and talk. And don't worry about making mistakes, because mistakes are hilarious and it's good to be the comedian of the group, right?
I, Paige Orwin, am a funny foreigner.
I did pick up my towel eventually (it's green) and walked back to the house after dropping the girl off at a bus for Valparaiso (there are no bus stations, you just wait until you see a bus driving by with a sign that says your desired destination hanging in the window among the ten or so other signs and then wave frantically until it pulls over). Ate food, talked a lot after dinner-- because after dinner you always talk for an hour or two-- and went to sleep after trying to write an email and watching in dismay as the Internet went off and shot itself.
Today: pretty much nothing. I stuck around the house, listened to music, doodled randomly, talked a bit with Cristobal, and spent dinner trying to keep up with a two-hour conversation about movies and geometry and surnames. Apparently everyone in Chile is named Maria-Fernandez. Or Juan.
Will do more tomorrow!
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Stupid temblors!
I would like to say this right now: I am massively, incredibly tired of the buildings I'm currently in shivering like a dog just out of water. That's four more shocks today, and any number of little ones I'm not going to bother to count. It's like someone is following me around with a forklift, picking up the house or store or boardwalk by its foundations, and doing wheelies. All day. Every day.
Nature: I appreciate your attempt at a funny joke, but it's only funny the first time!
Much to my chagrin, I somehow ended up sleeping most of the day. It started with me sleeping in until 12. I woke up just in time for lunch. To my surprise, there were two more people in the house: a niece and a nephew of my host folks. Over to visit, apparently.
We ate bread, cheese, and fruit juice, then walked to the beach (all seven of us). It´s not terribly far from here, but it took us some time to get there because we walked all through the city, too, along the way, and looked at various buildings that had been damaged by the quake (and speaking of quakes, hello tremor). One skyscraper was leaning sideways, with all its balconies askew, and an old house was missing large portions of the roof above its door and the walls were cracked. I'm learning the words surrounding "terremoto" very quickly: things like "grieta" and "disastre" and "damnificado," meaning "crack," "disaster," and "condemned," respectively. Any time anyone drops something or something falls over after being bumped, we say "terremoto." Earthquake, it's all your fault.
There's been two more "temblors" offshore of Valpo-- one a 5.6 and the other a 5.5.
The beach was... well, an actual beach. The kind you see in films. All sand and boardwalks and people lounging under umbrellas and massive waves. It stretches for miles and miles (along all of Chile, as a matter of fact) and we must have walked two or three miles of it. Myriam was planning for us to walk back, too, but we took a bus instead after receiving word of new quakes and a possible "maremoto," or tsunami. Three dogs followed us almost all the way, hoping for a handout-- I wanted to feed them because they looked so sad, but I suspected such an act would have been met with disapproval. There's millions of dogs, after all; no need to help them breed, I suppose.
They still looked sad and I felt bad :(
Didn't wear enough sunscreen, either. They say Chile ranks a 12 on the 12-point "Sun Power" scale, and they weren't kidding. Both my arms are red, and so is my nose and forehead.
Must remember to wear more sunscreen. And my hat, no matter how doofy it might look to the locals.
After the beach and after we returned to the house, unfortunately, I went straight back to sleep. I don't know why. I just felt really tired. When I woke up after about an hour, there were two more people in the house and I told Myriam that I didn't know why I was so tired: she blamed it on being in a different time zone, having to keep up with a new language, and the stress caused by being in an earthquake and subsequent aftershocks.
Stupid terremoto!
The new folks were the mother of the two cousins and the neighbor woman whose shower we'd borrowed two days earlier. They set about making dinner while I wandered upstairs and watched YouTube videos of the quake with Ramiro (host parents' kid, the guy whose name starts with an R) and the cousins. I was rather useful, all things considered, since I could point out videos described in English about the quake that we might have missed otherwise.
...Another tremor. Seriously, now.
Dinner was bread and mashed-up avocado and milk and cheese. I'm starting to detect a pattern here. And also my grapes, which I bought, and which we've just about finished off between me and Cristobal. Did my best to follow the conversation (plenty of time to do so, since every meal takes an hour or two due to rampant and rapid blabbing between all concerned) and afterwards said my goodbyes to the cousins, mom, and neighbor before hanging out in Cristobal's room for a while exchanging musical preferences.
Checked my email, found multiple Do Not Travel warnings from the US State Department and ISA. More shocks. Myriam appeared and told us that the safest place in the house is right in the middle, away from all the windows. I personally prefer my doorframe, myself. Laptop started to run down, went to my room, and now.... I write.
Nature: I appreciate your attempt at a funny joke, but it's only funny the first time!
Much to my chagrin, I somehow ended up sleeping most of the day. It started with me sleeping in until 12. I woke up just in time for lunch. To my surprise, there were two more people in the house: a niece and a nephew of my host folks. Over to visit, apparently.
We ate bread, cheese, and fruit juice, then walked to the beach (all seven of us). It´s not terribly far from here, but it took us some time to get there because we walked all through the city, too, along the way, and looked at various buildings that had been damaged by the quake (and speaking of quakes, hello tremor). One skyscraper was leaning sideways, with all its balconies askew, and an old house was missing large portions of the roof above its door and the walls were cracked. I'm learning the words surrounding "terremoto" very quickly: things like "grieta" and "disastre" and "damnificado," meaning "crack," "disaster," and "condemned," respectively. Any time anyone drops something or something falls over after being bumped, we say "terremoto." Earthquake, it's all your fault.
There's been two more "temblors" offshore of Valpo-- one a 5.6 and the other a 5.5.
The beach was... well, an actual beach. The kind you see in films. All sand and boardwalks and people lounging under umbrellas and massive waves. It stretches for miles and miles (along all of Chile, as a matter of fact) and we must have walked two or three miles of it. Myriam was planning for us to walk back, too, but we took a bus instead after receiving word of new quakes and a possible "maremoto," or tsunami. Three dogs followed us almost all the way, hoping for a handout-- I wanted to feed them because they looked so sad, but I suspected such an act would have been met with disapproval. There's millions of dogs, after all; no need to help them breed, I suppose.
They still looked sad and I felt bad :(
Didn't wear enough sunscreen, either. They say Chile ranks a 12 on the 12-point "Sun Power" scale, and they weren't kidding. Both my arms are red, and so is my nose and forehead.
Must remember to wear more sunscreen. And my hat, no matter how doofy it might look to the locals.
After the beach and after we returned to the house, unfortunately, I went straight back to sleep. I don't know why. I just felt really tired. When I woke up after about an hour, there were two more people in the house and I told Myriam that I didn't know why I was so tired: she blamed it on being in a different time zone, having to keep up with a new language, and the stress caused by being in an earthquake and subsequent aftershocks.
Stupid terremoto!
The new folks were the mother of the two cousins and the neighbor woman whose shower we'd borrowed two days earlier. They set about making dinner while I wandered upstairs and watched YouTube videos of the quake with Ramiro (host parents' kid, the guy whose name starts with an R) and the cousins. I was rather useful, all things considered, since I could point out videos described in English about the quake that we might have missed otherwise.
...Another tremor. Seriously, now.
Dinner was bread and mashed-up avocado and milk and cheese. I'm starting to detect a pattern here. And also my grapes, which I bought, and which we've just about finished off between me and Cristobal. Did my best to follow the conversation (plenty of time to do so, since every meal takes an hour or two due to rampant and rapid blabbing between all concerned) and afterwards said my goodbyes to the cousins, mom, and neighbor before hanging out in Cristobal's room for a while exchanging musical preferences.
Checked my email, found multiple Do Not Travel warnings from the US State Department and ISA. More shocks. Myriam appeared and told us that the safest place in the house is right in the middle, away from all the windows. I personally prefer my doorframe, myself. Laptop started to run down, went to my room, and now.... I write.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Tired and also in Chile
Today was the day I was tested for my Spanish language proficiency. The verdict: I suck at writing it, but I seem to be doing well in the speaking department. I've been placed at a high level for my Spanish class, and can take any other classes I want.
Good news.
On to the interesting stuff: in order to take this test, I had to take a bus to Valparaiso and to the Casa Central of the university, the main building. It's this massive grey stone structure, almost gothic, sitting right next to a major roadway and rows of open markets. There's a security guard at the entrance. Inside, to my surprise, it is open to the sky: two plazas connected by a roofed cafeteria, with three levels of walkways circling above. The classrooms radiate off this central point, both above and below, and the one I saw was a basic lecture set-up with rows of chairs on terraces and the teacher's desk to the front and side. The predominant color is grey, though the study abroad office was decorated with posters and flags and maps.
Jaime (host "dad," though I'm not to call him that), as it turns out, is a philosophy professor at this very same university.
Most of the time in Valpo was spent waiting in the ISA office, which is about two blocks from the university. From the outside it looks like your typical semi-run-down Chilean building, painted pale yellow stucco, with a massive iron gate. No signage. You'd never know there was forty Americans hanging out and eating yogurt on beanbag chairs inside. Security is ridiculous: there's the gate, and an electric lock, and two additional normal locks on the door inside. You have to push a button and disarm the alarms or something to get out, and it buzzes. One of the lights was broken from the quake but everything else seemed fine.
I ended up waiting there for more than three hours to take my test, because the oral portion had to be done in shifts.
While waiting, myself, Chicago (Madeline's nickname) and Eliot (a dude in the program that I don't think I've mentioned yet) went out to see the markets. I thought they'd be like Pike's Place-- lots of stalls, lots of raw fish, lots of people jostling and yelling. And so they were... multiplied by about twenty thousand and located under a sun that tries its best to kill you dead the moment you step into its rays. There were buildings as part of the markets, but just as many "stalls" inside as outside, and the stench was incredible: chopped-up fruit, gutted fish, the tang from odd sliced vegetables, organic residue everywhere discarded and decaying... Parts of the street were paved with corn husks and fish blood and I spotted a dude carrying half a cow on his back.
I honestly don't know if I like the markets in Valpo at this point. No one, however, came up to me and tried practicing their English on the gringa for once, so I suppose everyone being so busy hacking off fish heads has its high points.
After returning to Viña, I went shopping with Myriam. An arresting part of shopping in Chile: you talk to the shopkeepers. And not just perfunctory greetings, either: you inquire about their kids and about how they fared in the quake and how business has been and did that shipment ever come in and this looks like really good bread, yeah, just baked today? While there wasn't an open market like in Valpo, Viña is plenty busy and there were fruit stands littering the streets along with the usual million-and-a-half feral dogs and packs of giggling children with ice cream bars. I picked up a kilo of grapes for about a buck.
Two words concerning Chile: panaderia and farmacia. One is a store that sells bread. The other is a store that sells medicine.
There must be forty of each within four blocks of the house. All different names, and all different set-ups, but all selling variants of bread and medicine. Every street. Next to each other. Across from each other. Perched on the corners. Panaderias and farmacias are the Starbucks of Chile.
I did get to eat my grapes for "once," which is pronounced like "own-say" and operates like a sort of pre-dinner teatime, if I haven't explained that already. People drink tea here. They also hang their clothes out to dry in the air and wash their plates by hand.
.....
I feel like I'm from Coruscant or Trantor or some other crazy city-planet-- always explaining that people in the US don't wash plates by hand because there's machines to do that for us and that there aren't any open-air markets because all our food comes to giant grocery chains from across the ocean and that our grapes are twice the size and don't have any seeds because they've been engineered to be that way....
I made the mistake of asking Cristobal, who plans to join the Chilean Navy, what kind of ship he wants to serve on. He seemed confused and replied "a warship." I asked what kind of warship, and then tried to describe aircraft carriers and submarines, in addition to the usual surface boats.
Chile doesn't have aircraft carriers or nuclear submarines. Which, on second thought, I really should have known, considering the cost of operating the things, but living in an area where you can drive past an aircraft carrier in dock seems to skew perspective.
I also seem to have acquired my first flea bite and it's all swollen because we Americans can't handle assault by fleas, apparently.
I really need to find that sushi stand.
Good news.
On to the interesting stuff: in order to take this test, I had to take a bus to Valparaiso and to the Casa Central of the university, the main building. It's this massive grey stone structure, almost gothic, sitting right next to a major roadway and rows of open markets. There's a security guard at the entrance. Inside, to my surprise, it is open to the sky: two plazas connected by a roofed cafeteria, with three levels of walkways circling above. The classrooms radiate off this central point, both above and below, and the one I saw was a basic lecture set-up with rows of chairs on terraces and the teacher's desk to the front and side. The predominant color is grey, though the study abroad office was decorated with posters and flags and maps.
Jaime (host "dad," though I'm not to call him that), as it turns out, is a philosophy professor at this very same university.
Most of the time in Valpo was spent waiting in the ISA office, which is about two blocks from the university. From the outside it looks like your typical semi-run-down Chilean building, painted pale yellow stucco, with a massive iron gate. No signage. You'd never know there was forty Americans hanging out and eating yogurt on beanbag chairs inside. Security is ridiculous: there's the gate, and an electric lock, and two additional normal locks on the door inside. You have to push a button and disarm the alarms or something to get out, and it buzzes. One of the lights was broken from the quake but everything else seemed fine.
I ended up waiting there for more than three hours to take my test, because the oral portion had to be done in shifts.
While waiting, myself, Chicago (Madeline's nickname) and Eliot (a dude in the program that I don't think I've mentioned yet) went out to see the markets. I thought they'd be like Pike's Place-- lots of stalls, lots of raw fish, lots of people jostling and yelling. And so they were... multiplied by about twenty thousand and located under a sun that tries its best to kill you dead the moment you step into its rays. There were buildings as part of the markets, but just as many "stalls" inside as outside, and the stench was incredible: chopped-up fruit, gutted fish, the tang from odd sliced vegetables, organic residue everywhere discarded and decaying... Parts of the street were paved with corn husks and fish blood and I spotted a dude carrying half a cow on his back.
I honestly don't know if I like the markets in Valpo at this point. No one, however, came up to me and tried practicing their English on the gringa for once, so I suppose everyone being so busy hacking off fish heads has its high points.
After returning to Viña, I went shopping with Myriam. An arresting part of shopping in Chile: you talk to the shopkeepers. And not just perfunctory greetings, either: you inquire about their kids and about how they fared in the quake and how business has been and did that shipment ever come in and this looks like really good bread, yeah, just baked today? While there wasn't an open market like in Valpo, Viña is plenty busy and there were fruit stands littering the streets along with the usual million-and-a-half feral dogs and packs of giggling children with ice cream bars. I picked up a kilo of grapes for about a buck.
Two words concerning Chile: panaderia and farmacia. One is a store that sells bread. The other is a store that sells medicine.
There must be forty of each within four blocks of the house. All different names, and all different set-ups, but all selling variants of bread and medicine. Every street. Next to each other. Across from each other. Perched on the corners. Panaderias and farmacias are the Starbucks of Chile.
I did get to eat my grapes for "once," which is pronounced like "own-say" and operates like a sort of pre-dinner teatime, if I haven't explained that already. People drink tea here. They also hang their clothes out to dry in the air and wash their plates by hand.
.....
I feel like I'm from Coruscant or Trantor or some other crazy city-planet-- always explaining that people in the US don't wash plates by hand because there's machines to do that for us and that there aren't any open-air markets because all our food comes to giant grocery chains from across the ocean and that our grapes are twice the size and don't have any seeds because they've been engineered to be that way....
I made the mistake of asking Cristobal, who plans to join the Chilean Navy, what kind of ship he wants to serve on. He seemed confused and replied "a warship." I asked what kind of warship, and then tried to describe aircraft carriers and submarines, in addition to the usual surface boats.
Chile doesn't have aircraft carriers or nuclear submarines. Which, on second thought, I really should have known, considering the cost of operating the things, but living in an area where you can drive past an aircraft carrier in dock seems to skew perspective.
I also seem to have acquired my first flea bite and it's all swollen because we Americans can't handle assault by fleas, apparently.
I really need to find that sushi stand.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Here and Moved In
What a day.
Slept in until almost ten, since hey, we were at a resort and that's what you do at resorts. There were two highlights to the morning:
1. Madeline (aka "Chicago," for her home city) getting herself trapped in the bathroom and panicking before she realized she had simply locked the door.
2. A small Chilean child drinking her Earl Grey with five spoons of sugar and threatening to kill me if I told her mother.
I've decided that small children speaking Spanish is adorable. Just because they're small children, I suppose, with the added attraction in that they're actually speaking, at such a young age, this crazy language that I only know about from junior high and/or high school. You don't really consider other languages to be quite equal to your own until you hear little kids speak it and realize "hey, this is for real."
This particular kid was quite chatty.
We left the hotel at 1:30 (Chilean version of 12:00), and drove for about an hour on the bus before reaching Viña del Mar.
And what a city!
I don´t know what I was expecting, but it wasn´t this. My first view of it was hundreds of bright houses perched atop a dozen different hills, with modern skyscrapers, construction cranes, and huge billboards in the background. The bus stopped in front of a white mansion with pillars and surrounding gardens (also surrounded by caution tape, due to quake damage), and we all unloaded our luggage and stood around for a while to wait for our host families. Viña is much cleaner than Santiago-- you can actually breathe the air without wanting to scour your lungs with steel wool-- and I can see why they call it the Garden City. There´s the usual poor areas, sure, but even those are full of flowers and greenery and clever little windchime things made out of wood and bits of glass.
Totally off-topic yet pertinent: these aftershocks are getting annoying. That´s the third one today.
Anyway, eventually the ISA folks hooked me up with Myriam, the gal who runs my pensión with her husband Jeime. She was there with two boys, Cristobal, from northern Chile, and a fellow whose name starts with an R (Ricardo? Reduardo? Will make certain in the morning...), who is her son. All of them immediately started yakking away in Spanish, asking me where I´m from and what I think of the city and where I was during the terremoto, etc. etc. as we walk down the street towards the house.
The house is not what I expected at all. I thought it would be your normal two-story downtown townhouse-type thing. Maybe with a little garden or something.
Nope.
It´s perched on the third floor of a labyrinthine complex of stores and apartments, and is reached by walking down an alley in the middle of downtown, unlocking a high iron gate, and walking up three flights of rickety stairs after passing through another gate beneath a huge palm tree. It´s small, but it´s evident that they take very good care of it, and there´s a view across a sort of river to the city from the dining room (my room looks at the buildings beside, including the laundry hanging on lines between windows). There´s no water at the moment, given that parts of the city still need repair, so after I unpacked all of my stuff Myriam took all of us to a friend´s house for showers.
We took a taxi. A colectivo, rather, which is basically a taxi that is cheaper and carries groups. The streets are narrow and winding and in places almost vertical, and there were no seatbelts. Which was terrifying, I won´t lie, but no one died on the way there and for the most part speeds remain below 20 or 30 mph. Which... isn´t very reassuring, I´ll grant, and I´ll probably take buses or the metro more often, but I was told that that´s how it´s done in Chile as far as colectivos are concerned.
The friend was a quirky old woman in a massive apartment complex which had suffered minor cosmetic quake damage. We were over to run up her water bill and mess up her bathroom, but she acted like it was a birthday party and chatted it up and offered tea and cookies (at least they looked kind of like cookies-- huge, double-layered cookies coated with solid caramel) and turkey on bread while one by one five people used her shower.
(Seriously now, tremors, stop it-- I´m not kidding)
I could follow the conversation at the table, more or less (mostly less) and managed to get in a few comments of my own, but mostly just sat back and listened. Everyone here so far has been amazingly kind and curious, wanting to know all about Washington and what I think about Chile and whether or not I like the Backstreet Boys and why the Golden Gate is called the Golden Gate when it isn´t a gate, it´s a bridge...
After showers and once (Chilean teatime), which took more than three hours, we returned to the house via colectivo and I took the opportunity to set up wireless. Called Dad, arranged a brief videochat between him and my host family, and then sat down to write this.
Slept in until almost ten, since hey, we were at a resort and that's what you do at resorts. There were two highlights to the morning:
1. Madeline (aka "Chicago," for her home city) getting herself trapped in the bathroom and panicking before she realized she had simply locked the door.
2. A small Chilean child drinking her Earl Grey with five spoons of sugar and threatening to kill me if I told her mother.
I've decided that small children speaking Spanish is adorable. Just because they're small children, I suppose, with the added attraction in that they're actually speaking, at such a young age, this crazy language that I only know about from junior high and/or high school. You don't really consider other languages to be quite equal to your own until you hear little kids speak it and realize "hey, this is for real."
This particular kid was quite chatty.
We left the hotel at 1:30 (Chilean version of 12:00), and drove for about an hour on the bus before reaching Viña del Mar.
And what a city!
I don´t know what I was expecting, but it wasn´t this. My first view of it was hundreds of bright houses perched atop a dozen different hills, with modern skyscrapers, construction cranes, and huge billboards in the background. The bus stopped in front of a white mansion with pillars and surrounding gardens (also surrounded by caution tape, due to quake damage), and we all unloaded our luggage and stood around for a while to wait for our host families. Viña is much cleaner than Santiago-- you can actually breathe the air without wanting to scour your lungs with steel wool-- and I can see why they call it the Garden City. There´s the usual poor areas, sure, but even those are full of flowers and greenery and clever little windchime things made out of wood and bits of glass.
Totally off-topic yet pertinent: these aftershocks are getting annoying. That´s the third one today.
Anyway, eventually the ISA folks hooked me up with Myriam, the gal who runs my pensión with her husband Jeime. She was there with two boys, Cristobal, from northern Chile, and a fellow whose name starts with an R (Ricardo? Reduardo? Will make certain in the morning...), who is her son. All of them immediately started yakking away in Spanish, asking me where I´m from and what I think of the city and where I was during the terremoto, etc. etc. as we walk down the street towards the house.
The house is not what I expected at all. I thought it would be your normal two-story downtown townhouse-type thing. Maybe with a little garden or something.
Nope.
It´s perched on the third floor of a labyrinthine complex of stores and apartments, and is reached by walking down an alley in the middle of downtown, unlocking a high iron gate, and walking up three flights of rickety stairs after passing through another gate beneath a huge palm tree. It´s small, but it´s evident that they take very good care of it, and there´s a view across a sort of river to the city from the dining room (my room looks at the buildings beside, including the laundry hanging on lines between windows). There´s no water at the moment, given that parts of the city still need repair, so after I unpacked all of my stuff Myriam took all of us to a friend´s house for showers.
We took a taxi. A colectivo, rather, which is basically a taxi that is cheaper and carries groups. The streets are narrow and winding and in places almost vertical, and there were no seatbelts. Which was terrifying, I won´t lie, but no one died on the way there and for the most part speeds remain below 20 or 30 mph. Which... isn´t very reassuring, I´ll grant, and I´ll probably take buses or the metro more often, but I was told that that´s how it´s done in Chile as far as colectivos are concerned.
The friend was a quirky old woman in a massive apartment complex which had suffered minor cosmetic quake damage. We were over to run up her water bill and mess up her bathroom, but she acted like it was a birthday party and chatted it up and offered tea and cookies (at least they looked kind of like cookies-- huge, double-layered cookies coated with solid caramel) and turkey on bread while one by one five people used her shower.
(Seriously now, tremors, stop it-- I´m not kidding)
I could follow the conversation at the table, more or less (mostly less) and managed to get in a few comments of my own, but mostly just sat back and listened. Everyone here so far has been amazingly kind and curious, wanting to know all about Washington and what I think about Chile and whether or not I like the Backstreet Boys and why the Golden Gate is called the Golden Gate when it isn´t a gate, it´s a bridge...
After showers and once (Chilean teatime), which took more than three hours, we returned to the house via colectivo and I took the opportunity to set up wireless. Called Dad, arranged a brief videochat between him and my host family, and then sat down to write this.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Trying Stuff Is a Good Idea
Because something crazy might just happen.
Sent in an account of the quake to MSN, after seeing a banner asking for "Your Experience."
Four hours later:
http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2010/02/27/2214336.aspx
I told them that I'll be in Valpo/Vina for nine months and can report, and received this:
"That is great. I’ll pass your contact info on to folks here. NBC’s sending a team and we always appreciate reports from the field."
:D :D :D
Sent in an account of the quake to MSN, after seeing a banner asking for "Your Experience."
Four hours later:
http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2010/02/27/2214336.aspx
I told them that I'll be in Valpo/Vina for nine months and can report, and received this:
"That is great. I’ll pass your contact info on to folks here. NBC’s sending a team and we always appreciate reports from the field."
:D :D :D
When Disaster Strikes...
...go to a resort!
We are currently in Olmue, in a resort packed with rich Chileans. Leather seats, tiled floors, open bars (that we aren't allowed to use, boo hoo), eight swimming pools, palm trees, flowers, the lot-- all surrounded by a twelve-foot hedge so we don't notice the abject poverty on all sides.
Bizarre.
We're in an area not hit hard by the quake, although the roof of one of the rooms is looking a bit buckled, and we're to remain here until tomorrow. There is quite a bit of quake damage in Valparaiso, with a few host families out of a house and a number of buildings fallen down, but there was no tsunami and the buses, taxis, water, and electricity all work and are running.
Chile is very well-prepared for earthquakes, in general. There are very strict regulations regarding building, and most of what fell down are older structures. An earthquake isn't a real earthquake (terremoto) unless it breaks 8-- anything below that is a 'temblor,' or tremor, and they happen all the time.
So... right now I'm in the lobby of this resort. I'm planning to go to lunch at the buffet, and then... I don't know, lounge around and watch birds or something. We had an aftershock this morning, but all it did was shake the beds. I was too tired to care and the picture frames weren't banging around, so I just went back to sleep.
My camera has dead batteries, and I don't know if I can buy any here. There's no real store, and the wireless is jumpy, so communication will be infrequent until tomorrow at least.
I'll send pictures of the quake, such as it was, a bit later. Computer's almost dead.
I love you all and I thank you for your comments and concern and everything you've said. That said, I'm not running away from here, and not just because the airports are shot and the road to the south is cut in five places.
:D
We are currently in Olmue, in a resort packed with rich Chileans. Leather seats, tiled floors, open bars (that we aren't allowed to use, boo hoo), eight swimming pools, palm trees, flowers, the lot-- all surrounded by a twelve-foot hedge so we don't notice the abject poverty on all sides.
Bizarre.
We're in an area not hit hard by the quake, although the roof of one of the rooms is looking a bit buckled, and we're to remain here until tomorrow. There is quite a bit of quake damage in Valparaiso, with a few host families out of a house and a number of buildings fallen down, but there was no tsunami and the buses, taxis, water, and electricity all work and are running.
Chile is very well-prepared for earthquakes, in general. There are very strict regulations regarding building, and most of what fell down are older structures. An earthquake isn't a real earthquake (terremoto) unless it breaks 8-- anything below that is a 'temblor,' or tremor, and they happen all the time.
So... right now I'm in the lobby of this resort. I'm planning to go to lunch at the buffet, and then... I don't know, lounge around and watch birds or something. We had an aftershock this morning, but all it did was shake the beds. I was too tired to care and the picture frames weren't banging around, so I just went back to sleep.
My camera has dead batteries, and I don't know if I can buy any here. There's no real store, and the wireless is jumpy, so communication will be infrequent until tomorrow at least.
I'll send pictures of the quake, such as it was, a bit later. Computer's almost dead.
I love you all and I thank you for your comments and concern and everything you've said. That said, I'm not running away from here, and not just because the airports are shot and the road to the south is cut in five places.
:D
Super Special Earthquake Update
I am okay!
We are all okay, in fact, and thought the city sustained some substantial damage, no one at the hotel was hurt. Supposedly small tremors-- temblors-- are common in Chile and might happen once or twice a day, but this was a true earthquake-- terremoto-- and it was quite exciting.
Unlike most, I was awake at the time and not out clubbing. In bed, trying to sleep... and then stuff starts shaking. My roommate thought I was attacking her before she woke up fully, and by the time she did I was standing in the doorway, bracing myself as picture frames slapped against the walls and something heavy crashed in the bedroom. She joined me a few seconds later, and we held onto each other's arms and the doorframe as the building bucked and rattled like it had grown legs and was trying to hop away. All the lights were out, and the other two in the room appeared in their own doorway not long after us.
We waited it out.
Afterwards we inspected the room, discovered that the TV had fallen off its stand, all the picture frames were crooked, and there were cracks in the wall plaster outside, with shards of it all over the floors. We didn't know whether to leave the building or stay put, so we elected to stay in the building-- outside glass or brick or something could have fallen on us and the building seemed to have ridden out the worst.
The room has a balcony-- we went to it and watched people congregate in the streets as sirens wailed past the buildings. There were very few lights. Few enough to see the stars-- in downtown Santiago, city of a million midnight clubs.
After a while one of the ISA people appeared at the door and told us that we had to meet in the lobby, outside, to see what would happen. No one seemed to know exactly what to do. I threw together my clothes, grabbed my camera, computer, and first aid kit, and jogged down nine flights of stairs with the rest of my room.
Most of the others were gathered outside on the street below. The street lights were off, and dozens of Chileans were standing around, looking a bit shellshocked. A car on the side of the road had put on its emergency flashers, and that was the only local illumination beyond the hotel's emergency lights (powered by a generator that also generated choking fumes). At least six cars rocketed out of the underground parking garage destined for places unknown.
When people returned from clubbing, they had stories to tell. There wasn' t much damage in our area, but they brought reports of broken glass littering the streets, people fleeing to the doors and screaming, and an old church steeple that had come apart and fallen into the street.
"That can't be right, it couldn't have done that."
"You doubt me? I just saw a church slide to pieces before my very eyes! The whole steeple!"
Later that church appeared on the news, minus a steeple.
We stayed outside for about an hour, playing games with the rubble and offering one another bags of Cheerios or blankets, and then were told to go back inside and sleep. Orientation the next morning canceled. Breakfast at 9:30.
We went back and slept-- but the ground still shook every hour or so. Bed rocking. Lights flickering. Something rattling in the closet.
The epicenter of the earthquake was south, an 8.8 on the Richter scale.
Here it measured about a 7.3. Biggest quake in fifteen years.
We're evacuating to a city about an hour east of Valparaiso-- not going to the coast for fear of tsunami.
Bus coming soon.
And hey, don't worry-- we're all okay, and the ISA people are on top of things. Great first introduction to Chile!
We are all okay, in fact, and thought the city sustained some substantial damage, no one at the hotel was hurt. Supposedly small tremors-- temblors-- are common in Chile and might happen once or twice a day, but this was a true earthquake-- terremoto-- and it was quite exciting.
Unlike most, I was awake at the time and not out clubbing. In bed, trying to sleep... and then stuff starts shaking. My roommate thought I was attacking her before she woke up fully, and by the time she did I was standing in the doorway, bracing myself as picture frames slapped against the walls and something heavy crashed in the bedroom. She joined me a few seconds later, and we held onto each other's arms and the doorframe as the building bucked and rattled like it had grown legs and was trying to hop away. All the lights were out, and the other two in the room appeared in their own doorway not long after us.
We waited it out.
Afterwards we inspected the room, discovered that the TV had fallen off its stand, all the picture frames were crooked, and there were cracks in the wall plaster outside, with shards of it all over the floors. We didn't know whether to leave the building or stay put, so we elected to stay in the building-- outside glass or brick or something could have fallen on us and the building seemed to have ridden out the worst.
The room has a balcony-- we went to it and watched people congregate in the streets as sirens wailed past the buildings. There were very few lights. Few enough to see the stars-- in downtown Santiago, city of a million midnight clubs.
After a while one of the ISA people appeared at the door and told us that we had to meet in the lobby, outside, to see what would happen. No one seemed to know exactly what to do. I threw together my clothes, grabbed my camera, computer, and first aid kit, and jogged down nine flights of stairs with the rest of my room.
Most of the others were gathered outside on the street below. The street lights were off, and dozens of Chileans were standing around, looking a bit shellshocked. A car on the side of the road had put on its emergency flashers, and that was the only local illumination beyond the hotel's emergency lights (powered by a generator that also generated choking fumes). At least six cars rocketed out of the underground parking garage destined for places unknown.
When people returned from clubbing, they had stories to tell. There wasn' t much damage in our area, but they brought reports of broken glass littering the streets, people fleeing to the doors and screaming, and an old church steeple that had come apart and fallen into the street.
"That can't be right, it couldn't have done that."
"You doubt me? I just saw a church slide to pieces before my very eyes! The whole steeple!"
Later that church appeared on the news, minus a steeple.
We stayed outside for about an hour, playing games with the rubble and offering one another bags of Cheerios or blankets, and then were told to go back inside and sleep. Orientation the next morning canceled. Breakfast at 9:30.
We went back and slept-- but the ground still shook every hour or so. Bed rocking. Lights flickering. Something rattling in the closet.
The epicenter of the earthquake was south, an 8.8 on the Richter scale.
Here it measured about a 7.3. Biggest quake in fifteen years.
We're evacuating to a city about an hour east of Valparaiso-- not going to the coast for fear of tsunami.
Bus coming soon.
And hey, don't worry-- we're all okay, and the ISA people are on top of things. Great first introduction to Chile!
La Vida es Tan Rapido
Up at 7:30, before anyone else. I'm just awesome (and also I figured out how to set my alarm clock).
Took a shower last night, so I wasn't getting up early for hygienic purposes. Actually, speaking of last night, I should probably fill that in-- went to the building beside ours and played cards on the 10th floor balcony in a T-shirt at night for a bit (with wind, was cold), then returned to the room for a shower. Bathroom is somewhat rickety, and the water kept shifting between freezing and boiling, and the lights flickered out once or twice, but I did get a shower and I went to bed around 1 am local time.
So, anyway: today.
Woke up, got dressed and ready, took pictures of the sun rising over the buildings and more of the surroundings, then went to breakfast on the top floor of the hotel. Very sunny day. Breakfast was toast, yogurt, fruit, tea, and milk that tasted more like half-and-half. As I will discover in a supermercado later, milk comes in boxes, and mayonnaise comes in bags. "Pringles" are "Pringoooools."
At 9:45 (meals take a long time here-- two hours set aside for lunch on the itinerary, every day) we went to the orientation session, where we were informed about all the hazards of being gringos in Chile and of being in Chile in general. Mostly: pay attention to the location of your valuables at all times, keep an eye out for people following you or bumping into you, don't get drunk, don't start fights, and if you have to speak English do so quietly and don't count money in the streets. American tourists make for easy targets.
Luckily, I don't drink-- which is more than 50% of the horror stories mentioned avoided. The ISA staff seems to assume that everyone is planning to go to bars and get smashed. Given that there are millions of bars here and the entire city turns out to party at midnight, I suppose it's a reasonable presumption, but I don't think I'll be going to any shifty joints to dance the night away and get pills slipped into my drinks.
When we headed out to visit the Palacio de Moneda, I brought only a few bills and my camera. If I was to be mugged, I would lose twenty dollars at the most, and I kept good hold on the camera (people will just swipe it, apparently).
Palacio de Moneda: basically the White House for Chile. It's right in the middle of downtown Santiago, surrounded by a square of grass and water, and the smog around it is almost thick enough to chew. Uniformed guards at every doorway ("Como las personas en una banda... una banda que... que... caminar?" I tried to explain in my broken Spanish, "just like a player in a marching band, except with tall shiny boots and authority.") Inside was quite official and with dozens of displays, including several commemorating Presidente Allende, who was killed when the building was bombed in 1973. White columns, oil paintings, chandeliers donated from France, one of which seemed to still have the barcode attached until we figured it must have been a cataloging tag (or a barcode, this is another country, I don't know).
Afterwards we walked to la Plaza de Armas, which is... a huge plaza filled with people selling stuff and people yelling and people hustling around in big groups talking very very fast. The streets in Santiago are packed-- packed, as in wall to wall, building to building, so tight that even the cars have to creep through in places like rocks against water. Other places, of course, they rocket past like guided missiles and God help anyone who gets in their way.
There were shoe-shine stands, dudes on six-foot stilts carrying blue signs, a pack of guys who whistled at us as we passed by (ah, chicas bonitas!), a fellow all in gold who masqueraded as a statue, a rolling information stand, little old ladies selling rosaries, a pair of men giving an impassioned speech to an enormous ring of people, beggars with no legs or humped backs, magazine stands selling Spanish versions of Cosmo, Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, people carrying makeshift jewelry stands from corner to corner...
It's quite the country.
I must say, the people in the ISA program have been extraordinarily kind and outgoing and willing to put up with anyone, even me-- if I see anyone from the program I'm free to wander around with them, drifting back and forth between groups as the mood strikes. There's no cliques or barriers or anything of the sort. We foreigners are a unified force.
That said, we foreigners spend our time in the streets talking in a bizarre mishmash of two languages, hacking together sentences like "I don't no sé dónde está una tienda con converters, but pienso que we can find it." It's good practice, and great fun-- any opportunity to speak Spanish without feeling too stupid is a blessing, and we're encouraged to do the best we can with what we know, even if what we know is nothing (as is the case for a few of us). It's still very difficult to understand the native Chileans-- they drop the 's' off words and don't enunciate 'd' and use a lot of slang and speak very quickly-- but we've been reassured that once we catch on, we'll be able to understand any Spanish, anywhere. With the possible exception of the Dominican Republic.
Dinner was pasta, made using ingredients from the local supermercado, food enough for eleven including appetizers and wine for about 10 dollars. I did not partake of the wine. Or the pasta, either (had ground beef in it), but I ate the little tomato-bread things and that was sufficient. Food comes in huge portions here.
Now... I am here, in the room, with my roommates who are speaking with friends and family. There was a card game going on when I first came in, but most people are going to bed now (it's past 1 am).
Another long day ahead!
Took a shower last night, so I wasn't getting up early for hygienic purposes. Actually, speaking of last night, I should probably fill that in-- went to the building beside ours and played cards on the 10th floor balcony in a T-shirt at night for a bit (with wind, was cold), then returned to the room for a shower. Bathroom is somewhat rickety, and the water kept shifting between freezing and boiling, and the lights flickered out once or twice, but I did get a shower and I went to bed around 1 am local time.
So, anyway: today.
Woke up, got dressed and ready, took pictures of the sun rising over the buildings and more of the surroundings, then went to breakfast on the top floor of the hotel. Very sunny day. Breakfast was toast, yogurt, fruit, tea, and milk that tasted more like half-and-half. As I will discover in a supermercado later, milk comes in boxes, and mayonnaise comes in bags. "Pringles" are "Pringoooools."
At 9:45 (meals take a long time here-- two hours set aside for lunch on the itinerary, every day) we went to the orientation session, where we were informed about all the hazards of being gringos in Chile and of being in Chile in general. Mostly: pay attention to the location of your valuables at all times, keep an eye out for people following you or bumping into you, don't get drunk, don't start fights, and if you have to speak English do so quietly and don't count money in the streets. American tourists make for easy targets.
Luckily, I don't drink-- which is more than 50% of the horror stories mentioned avoided. The ISA staff seems to assume that everyone is planning to go to bars and get smashed. Given that there are millions of bars here and the entire city turns out to party at midnight, I suppose it's a reasonable presumption, but I don't think I'll be going to any shifty joints to dance the night away and get pills slipped into my drinks.
When we headed out to visit the Palacio de Moneda, I brought only a few bills and my camera. If I was to be mugged, I would lose twenty dollars at the most, and I kept good hold on the camera (people will just swipe it, apparently).
Palacio de Moneda: basically the White House for Chile. It's right in the middle of downtown Santiago, surrounded by a square of grass and water, and the smog around it is almost thick enough to chew. Uniformed guards at every doorway ("Como las personas en una banda... una banda que... que... caminar?" I tried to explain in my broken Spanish, "just like a player in a marching band, except with tall shiny boots and authority.") Inside was quite official and with dozens of displays, including several commemorating Presidente Allende, who was killed when the building was bombed in 1973. White columns, oil paintings, chandeliers donated from France, one of which seemed to still have the barcode attached until we figured it must have been a cataloging tag (or a barcode, this is another country, I don't know).
Afterwards we walked to la Plaza de Armas, which is... a huge plaza filled with people selling stuff and people yelling and people hustling around in big groups talking very very fast. The streets in Santiago are packed-- packed, as in wall to wall, building to building, so tight that even the cars have to creep through in places like rocks against water. Other places, of course, they rocket past like guided missiles and God help anyone who gets in their way.
There were shoe-shine stands, dudes on six-foot stilts carrying blue signs, a pack of guys who whistled at us as we passed by (ah, chicas bonitas!), a fellow all in gold who masqueraded as a statue, a rolling information stand, little old ladies selling rosaries, a pair of men giving an impassioned speech to an enormous ring of people, beggars with no legs or humped backs, magazine stands selling Spanish versions of Cosmo, Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, people carrying makeshift jewelry stands from corner to corner...
It's quite the country.
I must say, the people in the ISA program have been extraordinarily kind and outgoing and willing to put up with anyone, even me-- if I see anyone from the program I'm free to wander around with them, drifting back and forth between groups as the mood strikes. There's no cliques or barriers or anything of the sort. We foreigners are a unified force.
That said, we foreigners spend our time in the streets talking in a bizarre mishmash of two languages, hacking together sentences like "I don't no sé dónde está una tienda con converters, but pienso que we can find it." It's good practice, and great fun-- any opportunity to speak Spanish without feeling too stupid is a blessing, and we're encouraged to do the best we can with what we know, even if what we know is nothing (as is the case for a few of us). It's still very difficult to understand the native Chileans-- they drop the 's' off words and don't enunciate 'd' and use a lot of slang and speak very quickly-- but we've been reassured that once we catch on, we'll be able to understand any Spanish, anywhere. With the possible exception of the Dominican Republic.
Dinner was pasta, made using ingredients from the local supermercado, food enough for eleven including appetizers and wine for about 10 dollars. I did not partake of the wine. Or the pasta, either (had ground beef in it), but I ate the little tomato-bread things and that was sufficient. Food comes in huge portions here.
Now... I am here, in the room, with my roommates who are speaking with friends and family. There was a card game going on when I first came in, but most people are going to bed now (it's past 1 am).
Another long day ahead!
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