wee!

5/4:

The University is beautiful. There is an awesome view of the water! The first lecturer was great. He talked a little about the history of Chile and played music (that they play in the clubs!!!) and showed videos of Chilean dances. The professor also told us we would play a soccer game agaisnt them on Friday... that should be interesting. We got lunch at the cafeteria at Santa Maria... which is nothing like Market Central at school. Later we went on a tour of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar. There were many places I saw that I'd like to go back. We rode something similar to the incline and they had tons of sweet handmade fanny packs that my mom would love!! We also almost got hit by a bus... I guess we are too used to walking in Oakland where drivers are aware of the fact that we think we own the streets.

After the tour we had a salsa lesson. I clearly had no experience. I got coupled with a Chilean named Willy; he was super nice and he helped me a ton, haha. After, we went out to our first club and tasted the typical Chilean drink. The girls also sang Spice Up Your Life!! That was hilarious. Luckily the bar wasn't too full.

5/5

Today was a long day. We had several lectures on Chilean business. One of the lectureres, Leslie was actually an alumni from Pitt and she went on the Plus-3 Chile program in 2004. Now she works in Chile to help businesses in Pennsylvania expand to Chile. It's crazy where life can take you. We had another salsa class after the lectures with a different girl. This time it was just us. She didn't know much English, but she did very well. She also did know the very useful phrase, "The man is the boss!"

After the day at the University we were totally ready for some food so we went to a place down the street from the hotel and then Doreen Megan and I went to get gelato.

5/6

Today we had our first company visit to Codelco. Codelco is a gigantic copper plant in Chile. It was cool to see because copper is Chile's number one export by far. It turned out that in order to go inside and see everything we needed steel toe boats which we definitely didn't have. Therefore, we took the tour from our bus. The tour guide couldn't speak English so Arturo translated for us. He gave us a lot of great information about the copper making process. His name was also Jose Segura (segura is safe in Spanish), which was funny because he was the one telling us about all the safety precautions.

After the company visit, we went to Santa Maria for our 2 last lectures with Memo. His lectures are so interesting because he shows us so much we can relate to. Directly after the lectures we went back to the hotel to get picked up by the Chileans taking us to the Everton futbol game!! It was so cool to see how enthusiastic they all are. They ended up tieing 1-1, but it was such an experience. Me and Megan split Chilean churros! Yum! And then after that I had my first empanada. Yum again! This time we had abit of an obstacle trying to figure out how to order it to-go, but the bartender seemed to figure it out very quickly. I have found that if I don't know certain words or phrases that pointing and hand gestures are always a safe bet.

5/7
Indomita was my company visit. It is a winery in Chile. It was so beautiful and it was cool to see the process. They grow their grapes in the Casablanca Valley, and while we were there there were workers outside handpicking the best grapes to be made into wine. Apparently until 2006 they didn't ship to the United States, but now they do so I totally plan on getting my family some of their wine. We did a wine tasting as well. It was funny how she taught us the etiquette of wine tasting like you are supposed to sniff the wine softly and swirl it around before drinking. I have pictures of those that I have not uploaded yet.

Next we went to another "authentic Chilean restaurant" where the waiters were dressed up as cowboys. The floor was just dirt, and it was decorated super cute! Also, I'm definitley having trouble getting used to the fact that the toilet paper here is usually kept outside of the stalls, haha. Then we drove straight to the Santiago airport to do a company visit with Lan Airlines which is a huge company! We mostly just got a lecture and got to see some of the planes they had. I got a nice nap on the hour and a half bus ride home!

The wireless in the hotel still isn't up, but there is wireless at the local McDonald's classy McCafe. The man told us we had to buy something so we could sit here so we all shuffled to the counter and bought something so we could e-mail and write our blogs!