Algunas Fotitos

one of me and Diego at a wedding in Santiago back in February, and one of just Diego ;) gotta show him off :P i'll post some more pictures later, but for now i'm off to bed!

The Return of My Sense of Humor

...or maybe it never actually left. Several posts ago, I wrote about how frustrating it was (is) to try to maintain your sense of humor in another language. It's a kind of "lost in translation" deal a lot of times. Well, buenas noticias... maybe I'm not as "un-funny" as I once thought. At least according to Diego - who, I admit, is probably biased. But still, it made me feel better when in a conversation recently, he told me that his friends did think I was funny. Now, maybe what they really find funny is this gringa trying to speak Spanish and throw some Chilean slang in the mix, but I'd like to think they find my sense of humor funny as well.

Here's another thing: I remember in the beginning of January (I think this is when it was), when I first started watching Club de la Comedia with Diego and his family/friends. If you haven't seen that show, there's a cast of 6 Chileans who do a mix of stand-up routines and regular skits. When I first started watching, I didn't understand a whole lot of it. So, if you want the definition of awkward - that would be me trying to watch that show with a group of Chilean friends and not understanding hardly anything. So naturally, everyone else is cracking up and I have this half-smile plastered to my face the entire time, hanging on every word, desperately trying to seize upon some joke that I might understand - all so that I could laugh too, and be in on the joke! So needless to say, it was really frustrating at the beginning. But I kept watching, and by the time I left Santiago in March, I found that I understood a great deal of the show. And it cracked me up whenever I would laugh at one of the jokes, and D's mom would look at me in surprise and say, "You understood that?!"... yes, I finally did!

My favorite sketches were always "El Cliente Siempre Tiene La Razón" (The customer is always right) and El Encuestador (a guy showing up at people's houses to conduct a survey). Whenever I'm missing Chile a whole lot (which is basically all the time!), I watch some of the sketches online (www.chilevision.cl) and it always makes me laugh. ;)

A Little of This, A Little of That

Well, I've been inspired by fellow bloggers to spruce up my own a little bit. I wanted to get a picture of Santiago on here, but I just hadn't taken the time to until now. Heck, I haven't even posted since what... the 13th? Anyway, the picture is one that a friend took of the Plaza de Armas when we were in Santiago in August 2006, which is the first time I ever went to Chile. It's kind of bugging me that the picture isn't really centered on the darker blue background, but I guess I can live with it for now. :) I'm also playing around with different color schemes, so we'll see what comes of that. I'll probably write another post later tonight about the amazing bastion of inefficiency that is the company I work for (FYI, a good part of this long weekend will be spent looking for another job). But for now, I'm taking advantage of the chocolate truffle pie my mom made this weekend! ;)

I Need A Job

Basically, this post is gonna be pretty short since it's 12:10 and I'm dog-tired. I've mentioned in previous posts that I'm thinking of moving back to Santiago in a few months. Right now I'm looking at moving back probably at the beginning of August, so this means I need a job! I'd be cool with anything pretty much, so I guess I'm hoping some of you girls I've talked to might have some leads/ideas for me, or anyone else who might come across this blog randomly. Please help! It's kind of stressing me out right now, and it's definitely stressing D out, and that's not good! Any ideas or contacts you have would be appreciated, thanks a bunch! :)

A Tale of Six Flaites

Today's conversation with D starts out with him telling me, "oye, algo malo me pasó anoche..." Cue freakout mode. Not really, but I did think, uh oh... hope it wasn't something TOO bad. Last night, D was supposed to go to a friend's house for an asado. As it turns out, it ended up just being a bunch of guys playing Playstation. Typical. :P Anyway, D lives in Ñuñoa, near the Estadio Nacional, and his friend lives close to the metro station El Parrón, which is basically at one end of the yellow line. Now, I'm not sure exactly where this happened, but at some point when he was on the micro, D was suddenly surrounded by six flaites (not-so-savory characters), all threatening him. Using some common sense, D didn't try to resist or fight them at all (you don't have to be a mathematician to realize that 6-on-1 isn't very good odds). Thankfully, they didn't hurt him at all... but they did take all the money he had on him. Not very much, but still. It's the principle of the thing. A lot of emotions ran through me when I heard what had happened, among them fear and extreme anger. Also relief, that D wasn't hurt at all. But seriously, this just pissed me off. I realize there are criminals and jerks everywhere in the world, but good grief... 6 on 1? This is one of those times when it's REALLY hard to be in the States, away from D. I usually try not to worry too much, and he usually doesn't take the micro late at night by himself, but hearing this story just rattled me. I guess you just never know what can happen.