2 weeks

Some more impressions:

- Lots of street dogs in Chile, however they are all taken care of by the population, they are fed, given medicines and given blankets to wear throughout the winter

- Quite a few homeless people

- Most of the houses in Chile are built for warm weather, so when I'm in my room, I have a hot water bottle on my stomach, I'm under my blankets and have the heater on. 

- Avocados are Very popular!

- Lots of public holidays for all the Virgins in the Catholic religion

This week went pretty quick. Sadly I still didn't have a lot to do at my internship, I'm continually waiting to get given something else to do and usually when I indicate I have done something, it takes another day if not more to get me another task. I thought I would just let it be like that for 2 weeks and after this really point out I want to work hard and therefore would like more on my plate. However it seems that when they give me a task, they expect me to take 2/3 days and instead I take 2/3 hours, so I guess I work at a different speed than what they're used to? 

Furthermore, my colleagues are all really nice and welcoming so that's great! Wednesday we had a public holiday, So I went to hike with some people from my church in The Andes!! It was good, felt great to get off my bum instead of 5 days just working. I might start looking for a gym near to my new apartment from the 1st of August, because YAY I got the room I wanted! So happy! My new roommates also invited me over yesterday to join them with friends to have sushi and a drink etc, and it was great! Looking forward to living with them.
My new address is:
Padre Alonso de Ovalle 868 - Dpto 303B Santiago
Santiago, Chile 8330182

I got told yesterday that on coming Monday and Tuesday they have an ISO certification check with which they will check every employee's line of work and what they think of everything etc and so I got told that I can stay home. I was meant to be going away this weekend with Germaine, but something came up for her so we are moving that to next weekend. Therefore I suddenly had 4 days without plans. Still very strange to not be able to call up friends at that point and start making plans for that weekend. So I thought I should still plan something otherwise those 4 days will drag on, so I'm now in Valparaiso. Not sure yet how long I will stay, Monday some time I think. It's a really interesting city, definitely a cultural highlight of Chile and it's on the coast so that gives some nice views! The city is full of colour and paintings, see below.

So yes still feeling a bit strange in Chile, it definitely isn't my home yet as 'home' requires relationships etc as well. But I know that this will grow and grow so that'll all happen I'm sure:) Not thinking yet YAY Love it! but not thinking I want to go home Now! either... 

Here you can see how bad the smog is in Santiago, and that's even after we had lots of rain 2 days before. This was looking down on Santiago during the hike. 

the hike

The sandwich I've fallen in love with, avocado with cheese

The rest of the photos are taken in Valparaiso

My first week

So now I've been in Santiago for 1 week!
It was a tiring first week, taking in so many new sights, experiences an especially taking in the language.
But I will start off with some descriptions/impressions that will give you guys an image of what it's like:
- People in Santiago are very friendly and polite, open to helping you when practicing your Spanish and also men being polite to women etc.
- People are very affectionate, everywhere you look you see couples kissing, hugging
- Santiago is very clean, many many cleaners and gardeners day in day out
- Santiago has a very large metro system, in which at rush hour, you squash yourself between all the people and when the doors close not one extra person would have fitted, just lovely...
- Santiago feels overall safe, but at night it's not known to be as safe so I have a metro station around the corner which means I don't have to walk very far at night which is nice
- Santiago is in between high mountains and therefore especially in the winter, smog starts to gather throughout the week, in the weekend due to fewer cars it slowly disappears again
- What I absolutely love is that Chilean people are very very proud of their country
- Not many people smoke!

Sunday I ended up mainly cleaning the house as it hadn't been cleaned in quite a while I think, very very dusty, so that made me feel a bit better when that was all a bit cleaner. Monday I decided to go upto Cerro San Cristobal, which is a high mountain in Santiago, which provides you with a really nice view over the entire city which was really pretty! (see below) I got a taxi upto the top with a German girl and we ended up spending the day together and walking down, resulting in muscle ache the next couple of days.
Tuesday I got to start at my placement, and the people are all really friendly and welcoming. My supervisor, is the healthcare manager and speaks good English is which is nice as well, but everyone insists on speaking Spanish to me, which is good but very very tiring as that means concentrating a lot. I definitely don't understand everything they say, however I mostly get the gist of what they are saying, but sometimes not even that. So if something important is being said I usually repeat it in English to make sure what I heard is correct.

The whole week at placement was overall quite boring as I haven't been given my task yet, so time goes slow at work but hopefully I will get it on Monday! Everyone assures me that every placement starts that way and that after 2 weeks you usually have more things to do and my supervisor assures me that I will get tasks as well. He shortly explained to me that I will be doing market research in Spanish, which scared me, but he said that mainy includes looking up numbers and statistics, not writing a full report in Spanish. So we'll see! The company's website is:www.hofmann.cl

Wednesday night at the youth group at church was really nice. There were about 15 people my age until their late 20s who join these wednesday nights regularly and they all have so much bible knowledge which is very motivating, so looking foward to getting to know them! They are a mix of nationalities, Chilean, Finnish, American etc.

Overall how I'm feeling is a bit of a mix, I often have moments throughout my day when for example when messaging with people at home that I have to blink back my tears because it just reminds me of home and how this really isn't my home yet. So that's hard and that in combination of getting very tired listening to all the Spanish can be exhausting. But I have already had many moments where of course I have good chats with people or a good laugh with people and hopefully the feelings of missing home will slowly go more to the background and me enjoying myself here will be more dominant. Germaine, my colleague, is so great to have around and to work with, that helps me a lot! I have started to look for a different room as I don't really feel at home and comfortable in the place I'm currently staying, and visited a room last night where the Finnish girl from church lives, in which I just felt straight away at home, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for that one, but otherwise I'm sure I'll find something else!

This weekend I will be skyping with some people as throughout the week the time difference doesn't let me, which I think is probably for the best as I don't want to just be doing that either, and watching the world cup games in a hostel and meeting with some people for a drink. Ah and what I'm really looking forward to which I will be doing straight after posting this blog is going for a run! Throughout the week I cannot go for a run as before and after work it's dark, so yes looking forward to that.

12 weeks until Philip comes and visits me! Not that I'm counting down or anything haha.....

Arrived safely in Chile

The last few days in Holland were perfect with family, friends and Philip, couldn't have wished for anything better. But then it was time... around 5pm on Friday I left Geldermalsen and went to Schiphol with Carla, Philip and mum and dad. Of course my bag was too heavy, so first had some trouble with that, but was able to move some luggage over so all was okay.

We went to have some dinner and then it was time for the goodbyes... Let's just say some tears were definitely shed and after going through passport control I managed to get myself together and make my way to the gate. The flight took around 13.5 hours to Buenos Aires, then although I would be going back on that plane in the same seat, everyone got off and we waited for an hour and a half until we were led back onto the plane and then had another 2 hours to Santiago. The flight to Buenos Aires literally flew by as I had taken a sleeping pill so I think I slept around 10 hours!
When I arrived in Chile, it all went pretty smoothly and I was picked up by my colleague, Germaine, who I'd been in contact with these last few months and a friend of hers. She drove me to my apartment which is in a really nice location.
The address is: Santo Domingo 550, depto B, Santiago centro. Santiago. Chile
So have a look on google maps;)
I arrived and the apartment is a little bit dirty and smells a little of smoke, because some of my housemates smoke, so we'll see how that goes, but my room is nice enough! The housemates are quite a bit older than in me, in their 30s/40s.
Germaine and her friend went for a lunch somewhere and I packed out my suitcase and had a shower and then it all sinks in a bit. Currently no one here who will give me a loving hug and knows me through and through, so that's strange but due to a beautiful present of Carla I get to look at lovely notes, letters and photos all the time as she put that together for me in a photo album.
In the afternoon I used my best spanish to get myself an adaptor for in Chile, a sim card and some grocery shopping. At 4pm I tried watching the football, but the internet connection was pretty bad, so that was a bit frustrating and then celebrated the win on my own hahaha and then had a nap. Germaine called me around 8pm about going to a birthday party and although my bed was nice and warm and I was still pretty tired, those kind of things I shouldn't say no to if I want to get to meet people.
We went to a rooftop party which had a view over Santiago which was really nice and the people were really lovely and I was just chatting in English and most people my age were able to speak that which is great! People are just genuinely really nice and hospitable so that's perfect:) at 12am we went to a club to another one of her friend's birthday party and dancing is always fun so had a great time!
It's lovely to have Germaine show me around a bit and getting me in touch with people!

This morning I decided to go to an international church. see: http://santiagochurch.org/
Everyone speaks English there and the people there were also very welcoming and on Wednesdays they have a young adult biblestudy which I'll join this Wednesday and see how that is.
I will start working on Tuesday, so I'll be a tourist today and tomorrow and explore the city a bit.
So, so far so good!

Chilean museum of fine arts, in front of my house

The park in front of my house