Hostel

Updating three times in just as many days? Superstar status is cemented. 

Anyhoo. 

A little over a week ago I moved out of the apartment that I had been living in for the past two months and since having another apartment lined up would have meant not doing things at the very last possible minute, I had to stay in a hostel while my next place, my former host-stay, became available. 

But that is just further evidence that sometimes procrastinating can actually lead you to opportunities you wouldn't have had had you been organized and responsible because my stay at the hostel was awesome. 

First of all, I got to feel like a tourist in a city that I've gotten rather accustomed to. And that's always fun. I've stayed in a bunch of hostels at this point and each one has its one vibe. Some of them have that I'm-going-to-walk-in-on-someone-throwing-up-or-having-sex-on-my-bed kind of vibe and others have the I-want-to-live-here-forever-and-keep-meeting-amazing-people kind of vibe. This one was definitely the latter. 

Apart from an excruciatingly annoying Russian girl who kept complaining that people in Chile didn't speak English to her (natural selection will soon take care of her) I met: 

--Lovely Irish girls who had the same accent as one of my favorite comedians so I kept asking them questions so that they would keep on talking.

--Lovely German girl who spoke Russian and French and who was adorable after some gin.

--Lovely New Mexico girl who was hilarious and talked about her bodily functions in a way that made me care.

--Lovely Puerto Rican lady who complimented me on my Spanish and thus made me love her forever.

--British boys who finally explained the British Parliamentary system in a way that I understood at least for that night, a.k.a. The Night of all That Wine. 

--Lots of others.

Not to be redundant, but it was lovely. 

Also as a sidetone, for those of you who aren't cemented to my twitter page, Chile just won against Bolivia 4-0 and will be going to the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. That's probably a big deal, at least the entire male population of Santiago keeps screaming like it is, so I thought you all would want to know. 

Mi Hermano es Hijo Único

a.k.a. My Brother is an Only Child

I saw this movie recently with a girl that I met at my hostel. It's an Italian movie about two brothers, one of whom belongs to the fascist party and the other to the communist party. It's really, really good and everyone should see it. 

The main reason that I'm writing about it though is while the movie itself is in Italian, a language that I don't come even close to understanding, it had Spanish subtitles. And I understood them. All of them. I can read quickly! And wrap my head around different tenses! And laugh at appropriate moments!

Yep, that's right, I'm a superstar. 

Leave your praises in the comments section please. 

What I miss about America, Part 2

This is a way old unfinished post but I promised myself on twitter to post something tonight and it's really late, so this will have to do. Two posts coming about my recent hostel stay and a movie that I saw so please hound me about that. 

--Real, GOOD coffee. Although I'm not much of a coffee drinker (anymore), the few times that I do go there I'd prefer something besides watered down Nescafé crap. Olga's comment on a previous post reminded me of this because apparently Ireland has amazing coffee. 

--Stores being open 7 days a week with late/never ending hours. Chileans have random holidays all over the place, and fail to inform the gringos. And what with certain products not available in bulk and no 7 11's to be found, this can make a girl pissy. 

--Having access to public libraries, bookstores, and my bookshelf. There's only so many illegal ebooks that I  can download (recently read My Sister's Keeper, don't know why, it was awful), and I can actually feel my English getting worse. And that doesn't help the panic that is slowly brimming up what with having to take the GRE's when I get back.  (Update: GRE's will be taken in the spring, per my mother's useful advice. Yes, I actually wrote that.)

--Free printing

--Multiple places to study, especially late at night. The woman that I lived with planned her various raves to coincide with the night before an essay was due or worse, an economics exam. I have regular, graphic nightmares about these exams, so if soft jazz is blasting into my room and about 9485757 people in the living room are laughing uproariously, I may want to cut someone. 

--Not having to run around to 15 different locations to try and get the readings for your next exam and then not being told that I can't check anything out because apparently my student ID is from 2008 and is expired. 

--Not having to pay a $5 fee every time I take out cash, especially what with the paranoia that comes with carrying lots of cash around. 

--Being able to put on a seatbelt when I am in the back of a car. I only ride in cars here when I need to take a taxi, but these are usually driven by kamikaze drivers who don't feel like it's their civic duty to avoid pedestrians or dogs. Sometimes it's almost worth walking alone at night to avoid the terror. Almost.

Hellllllo, future home.

(source)

I'll see you soon. Just don't rain on me. 

Marijuana

This isn't some insightful post about drugs in Chile because how would I even know about stuff like that? But a friend of mine has to write a 10-page essay and in solidarity I'm helping her gather some data. 

The questionnaire takes literally 30 seconds and if you fill it out it boosts your karma. And who doesn't love karma? 

GO HERE

Thanks!

Empanadas and dogs

In the spirit of avoiding writing my essay and studying for my exams,  I'm gonna post something. Anything. We'll see what happens.

--I woke up at the ungodly hour of 8:30 this morning and so decided to reward myself my actually eating breakfast. Since I usually fail to keep the fridge and cupboards stocked beyond a few days of eating, I had to go to the local supermarket (I use that term lightly. They don't sell alcohol or liquid soap or tweezers) to pick up tomatoes (man am I going to miss how cheap these things are). While there I decided to be lazy and just buy empanadas, which are sold frozen but which heat up really fast in this thing they have here called an oven, which I've discovered works even better than a microwave, albeit slower. I had about 3,000 pesos worth of stuff and paid with a 10,000 peso note because that is what the ATM gives me, so shoot me. The cashier starts grumbling about it though, and starts talking with the woman waiting behind me about "these extranjeras who flash their money around". Or something along those lines. I got the gist. 

HOW RUDE! (Anyone remember the show Full House? Man, good times) Granted, I've seen this cashier before and she's convinced I don't speak any Spanish at all. The last time I was buying empanadas (which are frozen solid, might I remind you) she started talking really fast about something which sounded like "do you know that you have to cook these before you eat them" and I figured I wasn't understanding her because well, DUH. But a guy standing next to me translated it into English and she WAS in fact concerned that as the obvious gringa that I am, I would just clamp down on the frozen food and sort of salivate over it until it thawed out. Maybe I'm just really misinterpreting the situation but I've looked at it from all angles and that seems to be it. Any thoughts?

--There is a dog outside my window. Well, there's hundreds of dogs, if any country needs Bob Barker's campaign of "get your pets spayed and neutered" it's Chile. But there is this one dog in particular that waits until I'm ready to fall asleep and then starts whining and barking really loudly at equal intervals so after a while you start feeling like you're going insane. And then you start imagining all the things that you could do to that dog like ripping off its tail or slitting its throat and watching the blood gush out. And I LOVE dogs, I really do. I often have to physically restrain myself from petting some of the ones on the street, but this one dog I absolutely despise. And of course imagining all these cruel things you would do to the dog means that when you finally do fall asleep your dreams are really disturbing. 

--Where are all these umbrella vendors that are supposed to be a dime a dozen on the street right now? And why is one umbrella masculine and two umbrellas feminine? 

--Funny/sad story about umbrellas. I was trying to explain to the woman I live with that I need to buy an umbrella. So I said "necesito comprar un parapluie". She looked at me like I was crazy, but I'm used to that. Apparently paragua is the Spanish word for umbrella whereas parapluie is the French. Figures.

--We're supposed to be getting wi-fi in the apartment tonight. I say "supposed to" because my hopes have been lifted and shattered over this wi-fi for about two weeks now. 

--I can't find my cell phone charger. (Update: found it. Yes, my life is riveting)

--I really, really don't want to do any work right now.  

Reply

Email I received in response to a post on craigslist, searching for a room to rent:

hi im italian from californian living alone in santiago. i am very open minded practice tanatra and have swinger friends woudl that be a probelm with you?? [sic]