Niebla Pictures

I finally got internet hooked up in my house, so I now I dont have to go to internet cafes all the time. Also, I can call people on skype and upload pictures. Here are a couple from from the beach, Niebla, and the old Spanish ruins there. I will post more as I take them, i've been waiting for a sunny day to take more pictures of downtown Valdiva. That will be next. 

Everything's all good here. One of my students won the regional championship for public speaking (in English) so me, him and the other English teacher won a trip to Antofogasta in northern Chile in August. I practiced with him a lot and he nailed it at the competition and won, it's very exciting and rewarding as a teacher. I've been ahving fun here. Valdivia is a really, beuatiful and fun city to live in. Tomorrow i will be 23 and I'm having a asado (bbq) tonight with the other volunteers in Valdivia and host families and teachers and such, should be fun. 

Of course, I heard about Michael Jackson's death. He was and is very popular in Chile and a lot of the tv stations have been showing his videos. Its weird to think he is gone, and experiencing that news from a different country has been interesting. It seems that whether you are a big fan or not, and despite his personal issues, his songs were something that everyone worldwide, despite their different cultures could share and enjoy together. It's strange (and beautiful, in a way) how sad events like this can bring the world closer together.

5 Days Passed in Valdivia

So I am starting to get settled in a bit here in Valdivia. It´s very pretty here, but cold. It reminds a lot of the Pacific Northwest like Seattle so I like it a lot. There are rivers, trees, the pacific ocean all abound and I am not far from lakes, mountains, volcanoes I will soon explore. Valdivia is a really nice city as well.
The school I am teaching at is a big private, Catholic high school. It´s really nice though and they keep the kids in line really well. I have been teamed with a Chilean English and she is really nice and easy to work with. The only thing is, she just started last year and before that there was no english teacher. So all the kids, from all the grades are at the same level of english, which is not very much. I have my work cut out for a me bit, but it should be fun. The school is a 45 minute commute from Valdivia each way though. No es bueno.
I am living with another teacher from the school and her aunt. They are both extremely nice and really good cooks. It´s been really good to speak spanish with them and practice in that way. I am my own room which is really comfortable.
I went to beach yesterday and it was amazing, but it looks exactly like San Simeon so it made me miss home a bit. After that, I met with some other gringo friends who are also living in Valdivia and it was pretty refreshing to be able to speak english at a normal speed and vocabulary for awhile. There are 4 other volunteers in Valdivia and 3 more in the region, and we all get a long well and should be able to help each other out with teaching ideas and such.
So far, I haven´t found anywhere with wi-fi to use my laptop so pictures and skyping will have to wait but I have internet at school and a cafe by my house, so email me: klcoons@gmail.com and i will tell you more about Chile. adios

Week in Santiago, onto Valdivia

I have not updated the blog this week because I have been very busy and the internet at the hostel I've been staying at has not worked super well, but it's been quite a week. I arrived on last Saturday and was able to explore the city quite a bit. Santiago is not a very beautiful city, it's big, busy and industrial but there are some very great parts and some very pretty old buildings worked in. There is a big catholic church in the middle of town and the architecture and paintings both in and outside of it are unbelievable. It was built in the year 1551 and it is absolutely breathtaking. Unfortunately pictures are not allowed on this inside so you'll have to visit there yourself (or google it). I also was able to visit La Moneda, which is their version of the whitehouse, and some great parks. I also went to Santa Lucia which is a big fort where the city was founded and from the top of a whole lot of stairs you can see the whole city.The city is just busy, busy with people everywhere, and cars and smog, but it feels very modern and safe.  In Chile there are stray dogs everywhere, some of them very beautiful expensive breeds even. I haven't been petting them but I have wanted to because they are all really calm and mellow. 

During the week I was mostly busy with training stuff and spanish classes, which ended up being very helpful. The people who run this program are extremely nice and welcoming, which really makes a big difference in adjusting. I've also made a lot of good friends. There are 6 of us going to Valdivia and we've become a pretty tight group. Most everyone is here is American and close to my age, with a couple of exceptions.

 Spanish has been hard for me, there are some very very good speakers here in this program and some others at my level or lower, but I can already feel I am improving and remembering vocabulary from my classes. I can order food, get directions and other basic stuff so I"m doing okay. 

On Thursday, I went  with some friends to an America-themed sports bar in Santiago to watch the Lakers game on a big projector screen and to my surprise it was full of fellow Americans as well as Chileans. Lakers dominated, and it was a really fun night, cheering along from another side of the world. After a bit I started slightly lying and saying I was from L.A., close enough, right?

On friday after we wrapped up training the program threw a giant barbeque/party and it was a lot of fun. On Saturday, most everyone slept in a bit and then a lot of people left. Us Valdivia peeps aren't leaving until today though, so we stuck around and hung out in Santiago.

Then today, we went to Valparaiso which is an hour from Santiago, on the coast. It is a very beautiful city. It reminded me a lot of San Francisco because you can smell the ocean throughout the city and there are giant hills everywhere with houses on them. Also while there, we visited the house that Pablo Neruda used to live in while he was alive. Pablo Neruda is a Chilean poet whose work I really like, definitely check out his stuff if you haven't. His house was pretty neat. After that, we ate a great lunch and came back to Santiago. My bus to Valdivia is leaving in an hour or so. It's a charter bus going 10 hours through the night. 

internet is sloooooow so Im saving a bunch of pictures for later, but here's a taste: