Pieces

Oh boy. I’m finding it difficult to sum up this week. Each time I begin to describe it, I then begin to contradict myself. It was the first week of classes, the first week in my new home, and the first week that I was responsible for getting places on my own. It was exciting, yet uneventful and relaxed. It was slightly stressful, yet not at all difficult. It was a new culture, yet my feelings of uneasiness and intrigue were quite familiar. The only consistency was that my mind, as usual, was filled with ideas, criticisms, comparisons, and general thoughts on my experiences.

On Classes:
I went to five classes this week. I am only going to take three classes (plus an internship teaching English), but it is “shopping period” where students go to several classes before making a final decision. Of the three sociology classes I went to, only one – Sociology of Gender – was interesting enough to face the challenge of a high level seminar in Spanish. After class, I spoke with some of the students who had been in class with me. They expressed mild interest in the North Americans, but were very generous when I needed help finding the “fotocopiadora” where everyone copies their course materials (copyright laws here are pretty lax). Later that week, I went to The Social History of Latin America, which is known to be a class for “gringos.” Unfortunately, it was cancelled. Finally, my ceramics class was hands on, and quite enjoyable. I spent most of the time making clay with four other American students from California. This was not helping me make any Chilean friends, so I went around chatted with some of the art students whose projects were quite impressive.

On Campus:
The Universidad de Chile is a large university that has several campuses all over Santiago. Fortunately, I am taking all of my classes at one campus, which houses the departments of social sciences, visual arts, humanities, journalism, and philosophy. This campus looks like a mix between a public high school, the east village, and Wesleyan University. The students, who mostly still live at home, pack their lunches or eat at the various cafeterias on campus. They sit in their groups of four to 12, converse, eat, drink and study. I felt like the new kid in 12th grade as I walked through the campus sans amigos. Although I have never been the new kid, the feeling of apprehension and a need to fit in and make friends was familiar, perhaps, just from years of being in the social world. Anyway, most of the students rock a trendy/indigenous/rasta/punk look. And the political graffiti on all the buildings adds an appropriate sense of protest to the whole atmosphere. I am comforted by the normality of the mood of resistance, as it is in line with my own politics.

On Homelife:
Things are going well at home. My host mom, Alejandra, is still cooking great meals, and giving me hot water bottles to keep my feet, warm at night. She’s also given me some pointers about surviving in Santiago: make sure that taxi drivers don’t over charge you, and don’t tip them; only use your cell phone in stores, so you don’t get robbed; don’t carry too much money; make Chilean friends so you can have fun Chilean style.

I’ll try to put up some pictures soon. I’m a little sick of the semi-exploitative-touristy-picture thing I’ve been doing all summer, but what are Americans for anyway?

Fun Activity:
Today, two of my Tufts friends and I did some Bikram Yoga, aka Fire Yoga. It was HOT. The room was heated to about 40 degrees centigrade, which was a nice change from the 13 degrees I've been feeling all day. Lots of profuse sweating in the class, but it felt really good.