Exploring

Adobe house damaged by quake

Fishermen on Playa Chinchorro (near my school)

Chilean flag

Everything is settling back down and going back to normal in Arica post quakes, although they say a bigger one is expected. Today, tomorrow, or in fifty years. So until it happens, or not, it's business as usual. Damage was minimal but even still schools remained closed until Tuesday, giving ample time for inspection, trauma and students meetings and for me, ample play time. I've been going to the beach, playing with the kiddos and took a couple of day trips. Sunday Vladimir and I joined a tour group to Lake Chungará, the 29th highest lake in the world, at almost 16,000 feet. The lake gives way to three snow capped volcanoes and is surrounded by grazing llamas and birds of prey. Along the way we stopped at the famous candelabra cacti in the Atacama, the worlds driest desert houses cacti that exist by absorbing the morning dew, we had breakfast in small town where we watched a llama chase a cat and drank coca leaf tea, stopped at lookouts for photos, the lake and then a small town on the way back. It was a long day that exposed us to five different zones, beginning at the desert and going up to the mountainous lake. The altitude was higher than I've ever experienced and we found that we got dizzy moving at a normal pace, and forget about squatting down for the perfect shot. And thank goodness for that tea.

Atacama desert, driest in the world

 Candelabra cactus

    

View of Parinacota volcano

Coca leaf tea

Llama chasing a cat

    

Llama friends

    

Lake Chungará

Monday, seeing as there were still no classes, grandma took me to Tacna with her, the Peruvian border town. She needed to order the cloths for the family's cross celebration next month. I went as more of a chaperone and followed her to three cloth stores, one three times. A barber, phone center, malls, bowl shopping, pirated movie shopping, juice shops, pharmacies, the cousin's house, markets for olives and toilet paper sold in Costco sized quantities and the bus station to look for a new maid. Longest day of my life. She was so content to be out and about, being a typical grandmother trying to buy me ice cream and cutting in line because she's older. But nine hours was a bit much for me. I look forward to exploring Peru on my time.

This Tuesday it was back to school, I have now seen half of my students two weeks into my time teaching. Fingers crossed those tectonic plates stay put at least through this week. So I can meet all my students.

Martina practicing English

A little too shaken up

I wanted to take a quick minute to update everyone after last night's earthquake. Everyone here, my family, fellow volunteers, all of Arica and myself is fine. Yesterday night around 8:30 pm there was an earthquake of 8.2 magnitude off the coast of northern Chile. Luckily we were all at home, minus Boris who works in safety and evacuation here in Arica, when a tremor started. I had just gone upstairs and as the tremor escalated ran downstairs, by the time I was halfway down the shaking made it incredibly difficult to make it down. The family was huddled under the doorframe to the dining area, right next to the metal spiral staircase I stood under with grandpa, and in traditional Chilen Catholic fashion saying the Lord's Prayer while we waited for the quake to stop. Then everyone ran for their go bags, something I had not yet prepped but have now, and we evacuated. I live in the middle area of Arica, still classified as tsunami zone, though no tsunami has ever reached this far. Something grandpa pointed out, as he stubbornly told us he would be staying. Boris met us and joined the thousands of people in the street headed to the safety zone. Martina and I sang songs and played games the whole way, which honestly took both of our minds off how scary it really was. We were lucky enough to have family friends who live in the safety zone and so we walked the mile and a half to their house, where Boris left to go back to work, and we huddled around a half functional emergency radio and flashlight in our sleeping bags listening for updates until we all drifted off. The rest of the night was full of aftershocks, according to the news about 90, though for the most part they have been so faint it would be easy to confuse them for a truck driving by. This morning we woke to find that most of Arica was just as it was before the quake, with minimal damage, only buildings made of adobe fell, obviously mud is not earthquake proof. We went back to the house at 9 this morning and were lucky enough to have electricity and internet so I could call home. Then our water was cut for a few hours. And right when Vladimir came to use our internet because his area still had no electricity, it died. But the water came back. Can't win them all.

As I was finishing this entry last night, which means the part above refers to two nights ago, we had another earthquake, 7.6, and evacuated again. This one turned out to be a big aftershock from the previous, and after five hours of evacuation we all returned home. Needless to say things are a bit too shaken up here for anyone's liking and now we are out of school until Monday. It is an unreal experience to come from an area with almost no natural disasters, to one where everyone is constantly prepared for a couple. And though I'm not a fan of either, I think I'd prefer the tsunami. At least those comes with a warning.

Photos

At the top of Cerro San Cristobal, Santiago

Marketplace and statue in Santiago

Peru\Chile border (see the hill of Arica in the background)

 View from Arican airport

 Humitas (Chilean tamales) my favorite food so far

 Matías, Martina and me

 Playa Chinchorro, a few blocks from school

Martina in Lluta

 Starting the BBQ (we wrapped newspaper around a wine bottle, stacked the coals and then removed the bottle before lighting) Grandpa fanning it to get it going

All the meats

Boris is to my right, his friends and Vladimir

 View of Lluta from the family's cross

 Decorating the cross (and removing the empty beer bottles)

 Claudia, me and Vladimir

Track our earthquakes and tremors here: Arica Quakes

Shake it up

As many already know I am down in Chile for the next few months volunteer English teaching (for those who weren't aware, now you are 😉). I was accepted into the program English Opens Doors, a collaborative effort put forth by the Chilean Ministry of Education and the United Nations Development Program. With this program English speakers are partnered with Chilean English teachers and work in the classroom in the about the same capacity as I did in Spain. We are each assigned a school, courses and a host family. The program in general is much more involved than the previous one I did. We arrived in Santiago and spent a week doing a crash course training. This involved TEFL training, classroom management and Chilean culture. My particular session of volunteers is comprised of 21 volunteers from all over the world, and who were sent all over Chile. I was assigned to Arica, Chile's northernmost city and the last stop before Peru, with two other volunteers (Selene from South Korea and Vladimir from Bulgaria). I am working at Colegio San Marcos with 6-11 graders. The program involves teaching, helping with debate teams and starting an English club. My first week at the school involved observing classes and decorating the English classroom. I am looking forward to actually teaching and getting involved with the students this next week.

My host family is absolutely incredible. I live with a small village of Chileans in one house. There's Claudia, the mom who teaches fourth grade at the same school, Boris, the dad, Matias, who's 9, Martina, 6, the uncle Toño and Camilla his daughter, 11, and grandma and grandpa. Plus me. That makes 9. From the minute they met me at the airport in Arica they have made it very clear that I am another member of the family and have been showing me their love with copious amounts of food. I'm one week in and had to loosen my belt. They've taken me around the city, to markets and this weekend to Lluta for my first Chilean BBQ. Lluta is one of two valleys at the beginning of the world's driest desert, and the grandparents have a small home there. Vladimir joined us along with two other families for a day of beer, BBQ and all things Chilean. Along the way we passed by geoglyphs, a place site I'm hoping to return to to see up close, the kiddos chattered and climbed all over their new "gringo siblings" and Boris popped the top on another beer. With his seatbelt. Once in Lluta we went for a walk with the kids, armed with rocks to scare off stray dogs, and got a step by step lesson in Chilean BBQ. The BBQ was loaded with chorizo, hot dogs, chicken and slabs of beef. I got an egg and potatoes. After lunch Vladimir and I were invited to hike up the hill behind the house to the family cross. This is a tradition that is traced back to Pre-Colombian  times when the natives had hills that honored their families and once a year host a festival to celebrate their family and Pachamama, Mother Earth. When the Spanish came they brought with them the catholic religion and the natives in the region adopted the crosses as part of this tradition. Claudia's family cross has stood atop this hill for an estimated 200 years, and they insist that just as much importance is given to the hill itself as to the cross. This is honored by offering the first sip of every drink to the Pachamama (which to Vladimir and me at first looked like everyone was dumping their beer on the ground for no apparent reason before drinking). The hike up was steep, sandy and a bit slippery. The grandfather had me carry the rusty hatchet up, something I gladly did after reminding myself I am up to date on my tetanus shots. Upon arriving at the cross the family crossed themselves, then opened a beer,  shared some with Pachamama and placed a new tile on the cross base. We took photos and enjoyed the view while the family explained the importance of the family cross and the festival in May, a day when they supposedly go up and down this hill six times to bring up all the supplies, which we have been invited to. It was incredible to be allowed to be apart of something so sacred to the family and look forward to May when we can do it again.

I should also add the Chile is a hot spot for earthquakes and tremors, two things I never thought I'd differentiate between. 7 and up on the Richter scale is an earthquake, everything below is just a tremor. As part of orientation as well as part of the "welcome to your new Chilean family" we were all prepped on earthquake and tsunami safety. In Santiago we felt the aftershock of a tremor in the north, and since arriving in Arica I have felt at least five tremors. And have been crossing my fingers to not experience an earthquake. I'm not quite ready to shake things up that much. Sorry this entry isn't well organized, I am having technical difficulties.