otras cosas..

I have now been in Concepcion for about ten days, yet I’m still living under the wing of Antonio and Paula. I found myself a place to live (pension) but I cannot move in until March 1. I think it will be a nice place to live. I’m joined by 11 other “pensionistas” and a maid. I have my own upstairs room, which is quite private, and there are 5 bathrooms to share. This is a pension completa, so included in the monthly cost is three meals daily, internet, cable, water, lights, laundry once a week, and of course the room. The pension is 3 blocks from the U in a nice neighborhood situated at the bottom of the forested hills. The neighborhood itself has a lot of trees and foliage as well.

I’m anxious to move in there and out of Paula and Antonio’s house. Although it is very nice staying here, and I eat great, I’m ready to move into my own space and get settled. My pension is only blocks from this house, so maintaining regular contact with the couple will surely happen.

Speaking of food…. I have now eaten carne crudo two times. The second time was at P&A’s house. It was basically ground beef that had not been cooked. We spread it on bread and put other sauces on it. Again, I was hesitant, but, I survived and it was tasty. Another notable meal was a BBQ we had a few days ago. We had chicken, pork, sausage and a sausage I can’t recall the name of made from cow blood. All of this food was served to share as finger food as it came off the grill. We ate the cow blood thing last, and that was interesting. Lets just say the next morning I didn’t feel amazing.

This weekend we went to Talcuhuano, a port town about 15 miles away. There we bought fresh mariscos. I must admit, I had never tried raw seafood in such a setting. Again, I survived.

Other things I have done in the past week have included a lot of walking around the city shopping for little personal items (cell phone, soap, towel & ect), walking the university, and visiting P&A’s workout club. It is situated on Laguna Chica on the other side of the River Bio Bio. It has a couple outdoor pools and a large dock with diving boards and slides & ect on the laguna. We went there to go swimming, which was great. It is summer here and I have been itching to get wet.

On Saturday night, P&A and I and a friend of Paula’s, also named Paula, went out to a bar. It was very nice and modern. When I saw modern, I mean modern for USA standards.. Very nice and sheik, something you find in the city. Anyway, this leads me into another kind of quirky thing about Chile; how you pay for things. When you walk in the door of this place, you have to give your name and cell phone number. They then give you a little card, like a credit card. You then use this card for the remainder of the evening to pay for everything, and then when you leave, you go to the cashier and she scans your card and prints your bill. There is no money exchanged with the waiters or bartenders. This is kind of neat, but dangerous too. I don’t think all of the bars are like that here, but the cell phone store is similar.

Once you decided on the plan you want & ect with the customer service person, you then go to the cashier cage, pay, then go to another cage and pick up your phone, then go back to the customer service person to have them set it up & ect. The meat market store was the same as well. You pick out all the meat you want as in the US, and then the person gives you a little ticket. You then take the ticket to the cashier, pay, they give you another ticket, and then you go back to the meat counter and they give you your meat. I think I have a few more examples, but you get the point.

Since we are on the topic of Chilean customs, I must share one that I really like. Every greeting and goodbye between men and women, and women and women is accompanied by a kiss to the right cheek. Men usually just shake hands, unless they are family or very close friends, and then a hug is exchanged and sometimes the kiss. This interchange establishes respect and peace and affection that seem to keep most interactions peaceful and happy. There is also notable affection between parents and children, and all of the children I have interacted with are very well behaved. I have yet to encounter the common whining, annoying little bastards that run rampant in the USA. I’m not sure if there is a correlation here, but it is notable.

Again, I regret not posting photos, but blogspot is giving me fits…. I will use another site to host my images and post the link on here when I add to it.

Hope all is well in your world
Besitos