First Days

Bienvenidos a mi Blog.

I arrived in Santiago airport yesterday (Sunday) morning after flying all night from Dallas. 15 other Notre Dame students accompanied me on this flight and we met up with four students from Marquette at the Santiago airport as well as our host for the Linares section of our trip, Cecilia Espinoza. She is a wonderful Chilean woman who currently lives in New York but has worked with the Maryknoll Lay Missioners for many years. The flight was uneventful bus the view during the decent into Santiago was incredible. The Andes mountains stretch on forever. However my travelling wasn't over as I immediately jumped on a four hour bus that took me South to the town of Linares. The bus ride was pretty calm as most people got at least some sleep after a full day of travel beforehand. It took forever to get out of what I can only imagine was still Santiago. The city sprawls out for miles and miles. Once we got outside of the urban area, the landscape changed drastically. Everything is green (which came as a surprise because it is currently the middle of winter here in Chile) and mountains dominate the horizon at all times. We passed through plenty of sizeable cities as well as long stretches of rural areas. The vast majority of fields were planted with grape vines for the vineyards. They were of course not currently bearing fruit because of the season but were still impressive. As an aside, the vineyards in Chile are located in the central part of the country as the north is very dry and the south is rougher terrain.

Eventually we arrived at Linares. We are staying at a retreat center that has a connection to the diocese of Linares. It's called Chacahuin and is a very pleasant place. A husband (Juanito) and wife (Jessica) operate the place and provide us with three hot meals a day. Linares is located about an hour and a half east of Constitucion, a coastal town that was one of the main casualties of the recent earthquake and resulting tsunami. On a more pleasant note, we did arrive in Linares (much to my joy) just in time to catch the second half of the World Cup Final and see Spain rightfully win their first World Cup (success!). I also landed a free beer out of the game as I made a bet with my good friend and roommate Shu, but that's of no interest to any of you, right? After the game we settled into our space and headed to mass at the Cathedral of Linares. It's a beautiful old building that thankfully withstood the recent earthquake but not without damage. They are currently in the process of trying to raise 200,000,000 Chilean pesos (about $400,000) to pay for the repairs. We listened to a very traditional mass that included the renewal of wedding vows of a couple on their 25th anniversary. We returned to Chacahuin, ate a late dinner and spent the night catching up with eachother, family, and playing a game of Mafia (a great group card game), in Spanish of course. We then huddled into our sleeping bags for a somewhat chilly night of sleep. Thank goodness for mummy bags!

Today we woke up and after breakfast went to a nearby school. The school, Nuestra Senora del Rosario, included the equivalent of high school, middle school and some elementary school kids. The students were overjoyed to see us and even treated us like celebrities, asking for our autographs and the lot, even as we insisted that we were not famous. We shared conversations about sports, music, lifestyles, girls and anything else that happened to be of interest. Several students also demonstrated the cueca, the national dance of Chile, in a very well-prepared presentation.

We left the school after a very enjoyable and informative morning and walked around Linares. It is a very calm city of about 70,000 with a nice warm feel to it (not literally of course, as it is winter). Later today we also purchased cell phones. After the earthquake, Notre Dame now requires that we buy them for emergency use, and gives us an additional $50 of stipend. Surprisingly that money went quite far as I bought a prepaid phone with about 150 minutes for only 9,900 pesos, or about $20.

Lastly, I should fill you in on the weather, as I am living in the opposite season from all of you. It is currently winter here in Chile. July is the rainy month (Can you really call it winter if it's raining and not snowing?), and August is the coldest month. After that they tell me that springtime is beautiful and the summer is amazing. We'll wait and see. As for winter, it's been about 45*-50* here, warmer in the sun and colder at night. There was excitement this morning when it actually got cold enough to leave frost on the grass! Even though I will never come to admit that this weather is cold (Minnesota would probably disown me), Chile is unique in that there is no central heating in all but the ritziest of places. That means that you never really escape the "cold." As a result, we are all wearing many layers and are often seen in jackets, hats and gloves, even inside. It has also been a damp cold which has brought about some shivering (but it's still not cold, I'm staying stubborn).

Oh, and I've adopted the nickname of Pato here in Chile. It's a nickname for Patricio, the Spanish version of Patrick, but also literally means duck. Not half bad I guess. At least it brings about a few laughs and rolls off the tongue nicely.

That's all for now, I'll keep you posted as we continue to explore central rural Chile in the coming weeks. Hasta luego.