The culmination of my time here.....

So it appears I have not sent a fresh update in over a month. This is exactly how long it took me to put together this next little number. I have been filming my students for the past month, dancing, screaming, playing soccer and running around. They have been so amped about the world cup it seemed like the right activity to do with them and we had an amazing time together. Thanks to my fantastic new camera (it is awesome Dad) I have been able to compile this wonderful montage of my chiquillos. Enjoy!

My 2nd trip to the mines......Thaaaaat's right, I went back for more.

Before I get into the mines, here is a short video I took today of my students pretending to be me. Do I really sound like this?

So, remember how I said I would NEVER go into a mine again? Well, I went back. I was much more confident with this trip though because it was an "open pit" mine, meaning not a shred of it was INSIDE a mountain. My host father works at Minera Escondida and it was a family day so 2 of the daughters and I loaded up very early Saturday morning for the 2 hour trip to the mine. Much like a Chilean classroom or Chilean game show, there was a lot of standing in lines, waiting for instruction, discussion about nothing and more standing around. While the mine itself was very impressive in its massiveness, I was not able to catch it adequately with photos because of the wind and blaring sun. I am also not sure I have captured the absolute massiveness of the trucks they use to carry the material. I got to sit in the cockpit of one and have no idea how you could sit in there for the first time and think, "Sure, I can totally drive this."

Friday night at the party for Ely's 16th birthday.
Not a birthday without a face in the cake, or is it a cake in the face?
At the top of the mine.
I am not sure this illustrates just how big these things are...
This should give you a better idea.

I can see for aisles and aisles.....

Soooooo, you know how I was saying that the giant supermarkets here seem to be stocked with just 4 items? Well, I finally finished my visual expose this afternoon in the HiperLider.
I am not trying to make fun of Chilean ways of life by any means, I love this country; this is just an exploration of the things I find interesting about this country.

Footnote:
I will have you know that I was almost kicked out of the store for taking these pictures. Security was alerted of a suspicious gringa, wandering the aisles and making photographic evidence of this shopping phenomenon. While the events in this story are true, some names have been changed to protect the innocent.

I started in the Double Yogurt Aisle because it was 10am and I hadn't eaten breakfast yet.
The ever popular Vegetable Oil Aisle.
I ran into "Peter" in the Ketchup and Mayonnaise Aisle. It's a little blurry but he had clearly just visited the Vegetable Oil Aisle.
I think I counted 12 bottles in his basket.
A panoramic shot of the Double Pasta Aisle.
The Boxed Milk Aisle was strangely quiet today.
My least favorite, the Canned Tuna Aisle.
For dessert, let's head over to the Canned Peach Aisle!
And last but certainly not least, everyone's favorite, the White Rice Aisle.

Oh, and while we are here, I am going to include a photo of the second play I saw this weekend. While not as amazing as the one I saw a few weeks ago, it was still excellent. Though at first it may sound smug to say I understood the entire thing, I would be remiss in not telling you there was not a single word spoken throughout. Disfruta!
Se llama Atacama.

Is this thing on?

Sooooo, I finally went to the play in the shipping container and it was actually the best play I have ever seen. Here's the deal, Antofagasta has a lot of shipping containers as it is a large port. So this theater company put two containers together, threw in 24 chairs and put on an amazing performance. Having no idea how they could successfully perform in such a small space, I was pleasantly surprised that it was very 3-dimensional. The sound, the set, the actors were absolutely brilliant. It obviously should also not go unnoticed that I understood most of it despite the fact it was all in Spanish. Woohoo!

Poster for the play.
I know it's dark but trying to show the perspective.
The last scene was like a painting.

Reflections.....and smoke.

Soooo I don't have a picture of this story but was reminded of it just recently. While I was violently ill in Argentina, we happened to visit the big cemetery in Buenos Aires which is quite spectacular and very popular. Honni ventured out on her own because some of us were having trouble trolling through the rows of tombs. So she hops back to us at one point with a sinister look on her face (as always) and says she has something to show us. I am not taking the bait on this one because we are in a cemetery and I don't really enjoy stories that start like that in places like this. She keeps on us, that it is strange but she still thinks we will like it. After about 10 minutes of this, we decided to follow her. She turns left down a narrow aisle and from a distance I can sense something is off. As we draw closer I see it, smoke coming from one of the house-like tombs. At this point, my steps grow smaller as I fall to the back of the crowd. I am not interested in being the first one to discover the reason for the smoke. Without understanding, I am suddenly craving a plate piled high with ribs and roasted chicken. We pass by slowly and see that the door is propped open to reveal 4 men, sitting around a tomb, smoking up some hot dogs and carne asada and enjoying a nice little feast. Apparently this is a custom in latin america. Discuss amongst yaselves....

Got no words....

But I do have a couple of pictures....

If you get real close, you can see by the look on the man's face behind him, that this man's songs about his eggrolls can put you in a trance. No joke. It's some sort of magic.
Sort of funny how these pictures came to be but for now, let's just hush and enjoy the view.

Friday and all is right.

Not much to report here. My family is still great. It is still 80 something and sunny every day. I am still going out a lot and exploring the city. It still smells like trash. But I am really enjoying the students. We are having such a good time and so many of them are so enthusiastic that it makes it all worth it. There was a large scale earthquake apparently predicted to happen at 8pm last night here by some ancient prophet which was big news all over town. I was thankful said prophet was totally wrong. Hope all is well stateside and would love to hear from all my gringos!

This picture has absolutely nothing to do with Antofgasta but I realized I hadn't posted it before and love it.