Alrighty guys, here it is! I will be blogging as often as I remember while I'm here--sorry if its not an everyday thing, I can't journal because I forget, so sorry if I forget about the blog, too! Disclaimer: please don't judge my grammar, I'm in a Spanish speaking country and will stop working on my English while I'm here, so no hating on my writing skills :)
So where to start? The title of the blog, "Cachái" is a phrase that every chilean I have come across so far has told me I need to understand. What does it mean? Cachar is a verb that chileans use that comes from the English word "to catch," it means to get it, or to understand. So "cachái" is the chilean accented version of the verb asking, "got it?" So, cachái? Speaking of Spanish, I luckily haven't had too much of a hard time with the language so far (knock on wood). Of course, I've only been here a day and spoken with flight attendants, shop keepers and my host mom. But nevertheless, it's not nearly as overwhelming as I thought it would be... yet. School starts Monday, and I'm sure that that will be a shocker, so we'll see how it goes!
Okay, so details. Flights. The first one was 9 hours and LONG. I couldn't sleep (it was a red-eye) and it was ROUGH. Nevertheless, we had yummy pasta for dinner, I got to watch the Hobbit, I had a ham and cheese sandwich for breakfast, and I made it to Peru safe and sound. The second leg was only 3 and a half hours, and I was out like a light (except for the part where they served the food--another ham and cheese sandwich). I landed in Chile ahead of schedule, easily got my bags through customs and found my way out without a hitch. I took a taxi to a bus terminal in Santiago and from there got on a lovely bus to Viña del Mar, where I met up with my host mom María Verónica (Vero).
Now here comes the fun part: Vero is AMAZING. I love her already, and she's such a sweetheart. Of course, she reminds me of Irena--the similarities are uncanny, you have no idea. She doesn't speak much English, so my Spanish came in handy, and I'm sure she will help it get better as well. As soon as I got home we began chatting over Pisco Sours (delicious, by the way) and eventually got to dinner (yummy meat and potatoes) with a beautiful Chilean wine to go with it. I unpacked and had everything all organized by the end of the night, and I was off to bed before midnight.
So what else? The views from our high rise apartment IN downtown are beautiful, and you can see the ocean from the wall-to-wall windows that line the apartment. Viña itself is bustling with people (more than I expected) and is full of markets, galerías, bakeries and more. I haven't been to the beach yet, but you can bet I'll be there within the week! The weather is gorgeous, "winter" is misleading--sixties and sunny so far, and I'm loving it!
Well, that's all for now, I'm off to make lunch and go get myself a cell phone, shoot me questions, and I'll answer what I can! Miss you all!
