So last Saturday my ND program took a trip to Pomaire, a small town about an hour outside of Santiago known for all the people who work with clay. First thing in the morning, we visited a house and met the family who lived there. They would serve as our tour guides and hosts for the day. We had an excellent breakfast at their house, complete with bread, jam, cheese, and an assortment of pastries. The house in and of itself was incredible. It was set back towards a hill, down a long dirt driveway, and had been made by the family themselves. After breakfast we set out for our tour.
Our first stop was the workshop for a couple of potters. But unlike most other shops, these guys worked the whole process. The greda, or clay, is brought in by the truckload, looking like nothing more than really rough, dry, and brown dirt. The clay used to all come from Pomaire, but after years of harvesting it, it now comes from the surrounding 50-100 kms. The next step in the process is to soak the dirt for a couple of days and send it through a ramshackle grinder, breaking up all the rocks and large pieces. The now moist clay is then formed into quesos, or cheeses, because they look like giant wheels of cheese, about 30 kg each (trust me, they were every bit that heavy!). After being cleaned for small twigs by hand, they were ready to be worked. I was the first to step up to the plate from our group and try my hands at the clay wheel, trying to make a simple bowl. It could have gone better, to say the least! It's real hard to find the right balance between molding the clay too hard and not hard enough. Eventually, with considerable help, I managed to create a semi-acceptable bowl. I wish I could have had more time with the wheel, but my friends were waiting. It was also quite humorous to see the shelf-fulls of much more intricate bowls made by the potter in a single day, while seeing how much effort and time mine took.
Our next stop took us to another artisan, one who specialized in making piggy-banks. Our whole group spread out along the table and followed his lead, forming our clay into chanchitos, or little pigs. I was real proud of how mine turned out until it started to dry and I realized that I hadn't scored the clay for the snout well enough. You can see the crack starting to form in the above picture. My piggy is now in two parts, the main body and the snout. Oooops! I guess it's a learning experience. And nothing a little super glue can't fix.
We returned for lunch, were we were served the largest empanadas I've ever seen. I happily ate mine then helped out a friend, with half of hers. We were then served salad, vegetables, and cazuela, a delicious soup I've eaten quite regularly here with beef or chicken, rice, corn, squash, potato, and always a healthy portion of aji, or chili pepper (personal preference). On a side note, I'm kinda disappointed they don't call chili chili in Chile (follow?). On a second side note, Chileans have a sweet word, cachai, they use all the time to ask "Do you understand?" or "Do you follow?," perfectly applicable in the earlier sentence. Back on topic, this was a HUGE lunch, and I almost didn't want to get up from the table. In the end I did, as we made it into town to buy some pretty awesome and cheap clay cups and mugs, seen above. Some might say the large one had the intention of being used as a beer stein...
On another note, I recently went golfing with my tandem partner David (he helps me with Spanish, I help him with English). We played the Mapocho course, out by the airport. Real fun time. At over 6900 yards (for some reason they measure golf courses in yards here while everything else is metric) it was far and away the longest course I've ever played. I also had the unique experience of being dive-bombed by birds on the first two holes. I hooked a drive into the long grass and must have disturbed their nest. As I went to find my ball, birds flew directly at me, squawking away like crazy. Through the use of my golf bag and clubs as shelter and protection, I avoided any injury, but I'm convinced they would have actually hit me if not for my efforts to repel them. David told me that I was being ridiculous, and that that's happened to him tons of time with no injury, but it still scared the crap out of me. I calmed down for the rest of the round and ended up playing pretty well. I was real happy to get out golfing because it's not a very popular/accessible activity for most Chileans. It's considered a very cuico, or snooty high society, pass time. $20 for 18 holes might not sound like a lot to us (in fact it's quite cheap considering the quality of the course), but to many Chileans this is out or reach. I'm hoping to get out again with David and his girlfriend's dad. Chao
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