well... it's 21 days later. exactly three weeks. wow. first of all let me say that it's kind of a fluke that i am able to actually update now because i was supposed to be giving an English Assessment Test today to some new students but it got canceled. so now i have the whole afternoon free to do whatever i want. what have i chosen to do? why, update my blog, of course! i'll be honest, the further into the past we go, the hazier my memory is but i will do my best. let's get into it, shall we?

approximately 3 weekends ago, a friend of mine from camp named Aaron stayed with me. in exchange for letting him crash at my place, he and his friend Nate paid for various food items which was much appreciated. they were coming from mendoza and on their way to another part of Chile so they stopped by for a few days.

Friday night we all went to Subterraneo, which is a discoteca in Providencia that apparently everyone in pro-diggety has been to but Alice and I. we went with my room mate and the 2 previously mentioned folks. Subterraneo reminded me a lot of clubs in the U.S. because there was a lot of mainstream hip hop and dance played that you'd typically hear in the states. it was kind of lame but at the same time i got to shake my booty to great songs like "SexyBack" and "Kiss" so in the end it was a little refreshing in that sense. it was somewhat of a late night but not too late. overall i'd give Subterraneo a C+.

on the Saturday of that weekend, the same crew minus my room mate went to a flea market in Bio Bio. it happens every weekend and there are TONS of things you can buy ranging from furniture to clothing to video games. that's right. video games. and old school systems too! sega genesis, super nintendo, n64... and i think i also saw a gamecube there. at any rate, while we were there, we ended up playing with some puppies that were being sold literally in a box in the middle of the street. oh and Alice bought a desk. totally productive day.

on that Sunday Alice and I went to the Museo De Arte Procolumbino. it had a lot of pottery and statues and even some mummies. in fact, the mummies in this museum predate egyptian mummies. so WHAT NOW, OTHER MUSEUMS? ahem. at any rate, that was pretty cool. and once again, free :).

by the end of that weekend Aaron and Nate left. it's really interesting to see how people from the United States interact in a Chilean environment. Chileans are really relaxed and quiet. they're funny but they're usually pretty chill. people from the U.S. are kind of... well... not haha. so it was kind of interesting to see that after not seeing it for a few months and i was also surprised by it a little bit. i guess i'm just getting used to being in Chile.

the next weekend i ended up seeing Star Trek with Eric. i liked it a lot. the general thing i've been hearing about this movie is that you will enjoy it even if you've never seen Star Trek before, and that's totally true. still pretty sci fi though. if you're not a fan of the sci fi, then steer clear. but like i said, i really enjoyed it. quite entertaining.

the Sunday of THAT weekend I went to Isla Negra with Alice and 2 people from her program. mainly I went there to see Pablo neruda's third house. i've heard it's supposed to be the best house. it was a cloudy day but hey, that's how Chile rolls in the winter. slightly colder and way more cloudy. i'd take that weather over New England winter weather any day. but any way, PN's house was cool. he collected a lot of different pieces of boats and had a barn for a fake horse. also, it was by the beach. it was way cooler than any of the other houses we'd seen previously of his. unfortunately, Isla Negra doesn't really have much else to offer besides this attraction so we all pretty much vamoosed after seeing it. oh well. now i can say i've done the Pablo Neruda house hat trick. woohooo!

this past weekend was extra long because Chileans had a national holiday last Thursday called "Navy Day". as a result, a lot of people didn't have work on that Friday and what not. Alice and I took this opportunity to visit La Serena. this is a beach town that attracts a lot of tourists and is located about six hours north of Santiago. we ended up bringing our own food because we didn't want to spend too much money there. all we really did while we were there was walk around. we saw a few cool cathedrals and plazas. also, i had a churro for the first time ever while in la Serena. it's kind of like this stick of dough that tastes a little bit like cinnamon and is filled with manjar (which is like a creamier version of caramel). it was delicious to say the least. Also, we ended up going to a Japanese Garden in la Serena. it was kind of cool but you could definitely tell that it was way better looking in the Summer season when everything is in bloom. but still. they had some cool structures and stuff. Near the beach, we saw this gigantic lighthouse that is supposedly iconic in La Serena. we couldn't go inside but it was pretty cool regardless.

on that Saturday, Alice and I decided we would go on one of the excursions that our hostel offered. it was a van ride to an observatory in Vicuna. the actual van ride was about 50 miles per hour uphill through a mountain that had extremely curvy dirt roads. it was incredibly unpleasant. the observatory itself though was awesome. our guide had a laser pointer that points for like 3 miles or something and he kept pointing to constellations in the sky with it. there were soooo many stars. you could actually see the milky way. we saw Saturn, too. it's a view of the sky that i hadn't seen since coming here as a result of being in the city, so that was cool. then we had an equally, if not more excruciating, van ride back to our hostel. lots of curves and bumps. i legit thought i was going to throw up. i haven't felt that way in a while. despite that van ride though, the actual observatory was pretty cool.

we continued the Sunday Museo ritual that weekend in La Serena at their own Precolumbino museo. this one could NOT hold a candle to the one in Santiago. sure it had all the same stuff: mummies, statues, pottery and weapons. but it had way less of it. we did the entire museo in about 10 minutes. it was kind of lame. the one cool thing they had there though was one of those gigantic head statue things from Easter Island. other than that it was meh-tastic.

this past Monday, Alice and i went to another market called La Vega. this one mainly had food such as fruits, vegetables, cereal, meats, dog/cat food etc... for INCREDIBLY cheap. i bought a kilo of apples, a red pepper, a green pepper and a quarter kilo of black olives for about 1,500 pesos which is about 3 U.S. dollars. score. oh and yeah i like green and red peppers now. who would have ever thought? but yeah. totally buying all fruit and veggies there from now on.

yesterday was my birthday. i had a class and my student took me out to lunch. i had a completo italiano (standard hot dog for Chile). it was delicious. after that, i came home and opened 2 packages i received from my mom, dad, sister and aunts. i got quite an awesome array of things, including:

-a banner that says "happy 21st birthday" even though i'm 26.
-a birthday card with a 10 second sped up version of "happy birthday" in Polish sung by my mom, dad and sister. so awesome.
-a cook book with 365 easy recipies.
-A CRIBBAGE BOARD!!!
-a gigantic bag of Doritos
-a huge thing of the little coffee dunker cookie things from Trader Joe's
-a t-shirt
-2 mix cds from my aunts
-and more.

it was really awesome getting all of those things on my birthday. after that i decided that i immediately wanted to go to Alice's and open her gift to me. and guess what it was...


A SUPER NINTENDO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

that's right. Alice was a ninja and secretly went back to Bio Bio one weekend to buy me a Super Nintendo, 2 controllers, and Donkey Kong Country. apparently she also sat with the woman for a while to get a combination of all cords and controllers so the whole thing would actually work. the funny thing is that i was kind of secretly hoping that she would get me this for my birthday (even though i never said i wanted that specific thing) and she ended up doing it. i was smiling for a long time after i opened that present. it was great. i am so going back to Bio Bio probably this weekend to pick up some games for it. i am stoked.

after that, i began my birthday evening. Alice and I went to Tiramisu in Las Condes for an absolutely delicious pizza dinner. we had a pretty standard pizza with mozerella, fresh tomatoes, garlic oil and basil. it was totally delicious. after Tiramisu we went back to my apartment and fired up the SNES (of course) to play some Donkey Kong Country. everything works fine. once Alessandro and Ari got home, we all went back to Las Condes to go cosmic bowling. but unfortunately on Tuesdays the bowling alley closes for a tournament. sooooo we didn't end up going cosmic bowling. i was pretty dissappointed but whatever. i think there is talk of having bowling happen this coming weekend or something. also, i was promised a return trip to Club Miel (the best discoteca i've been to so far) so as long as one or both of those things happen with some peeps, i'd be cool with it. after getting rejected from bowling we talked about going to a few places afterward but ultimately ended up back at the apartment. Ari joined Alice and I for some cribbage which was awesome to play for the first time in a few months. All in all, i had a pretty awesome birthday that will be even more awesome if bowling and clubbing happen soon.

May was a short month. this combined with the fact that i've had like 6 cancelled classes in May means i will be getting a smaller check. boo. but on the upside, i got some money for my birthday that i think will be sufficient enough to allow me to travel to Buenos Aires in 2 months. so THAT'S pretty awesome. all i need is for someone to go with me since Alice will be busy chilling with her parents and traveling around during her month long break she gets from her job. another upside is that i picked up another class which brings my total to 4. i also opened up three of my mornings. hopefully i will be making more money soon. we shall see.

that's all from South America for now. phew. sorry for the hiatus. i'll try to update this thing more regularly. although because of money, i'm not traveling anywhere for the month of June so it may not be as exciting. but i'll try to make it exciting. until next time, hasta!