LOS BRASILEÑOS GANAN

Chile´s national soccer team suffered a very disappointing 5-0 butt-kicking from Brasil today. The game was really anticipated and everyone went in with high expectations. Oh how humbling it is to play Brasil. My brother, Nico, and I watched the game together at home. Chile really needed to win to help qualify for the 2006 World Cup in Germany. Things aren´t looking very good at the moment.

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The day was better overall, though. After the game, I joined my father Tallu on visits to both sets of grandparents elsewhere in Santiago. First, we met up with mom at her parents´place. As usual, I was fed. I think everyone can start placing bets on how much weight I´ll put on down here! They also showed me around and grandpa told me some stories about when he was in the marines and about how their piano (which is almost 200 years old!!!) was impossible to fix because no pianos are made like it anymore. So I played a few really out of tune songs and we passed the time quite easily.

Then it was over to Tallu´s family. Tallu´s mom is Russian and he was born in Europe. They came over to Chile when he was 2 following problems with WWII. Again, it was good to meet everyone, but I was getting pretty tired by the time we left.

Other than that I read a unch today. Now I´m working on The Mermaid and the Drunks, which is excellent thus far. It´s set in Chile, and I love that I know the vast majority of references thus far because everything has taken place in Santiago thus far.

Here´s a little about Santiago. It´s built along Rio Mapocho and the Andes feel like they´re about to fall on me from the east. They are so close, and so beautiful. The Spanish conquistador Pedro de Valdivia pretty much conquered Chile and got Santiago started. History has a funny way of blurring things - now streets named after Spaniards and Natives who fought each other are simply a block apart!

The city is fantastic. It´s incredibly modern, has a superb public transportation system (even if I did have my watch stolen because I fell sleep), and still maintains many aspects of what one would consider Latin American flair: street vendors, native clothing alongside european styles, a great city square - La Plaza de Armas.

I´ve taken advantage of my free afternoons thus far to simply get lost while walking. There are tons of great places to discover, and my teaches recommend little-known gems during every class. Last class my Spanish track teacher, Marcella, suggested a tiny merengue dive, which I might try after some more dance lessons.

And to classes. Everything I am taking is taught in Spanish, or Castellano. I have a Spanish track class that meets Monday-Thursday and is wonderful. It´s tons of practical knowledge about the city, country, language and its many eccentricities, and so fourth. It´s been a really helpful class.

I also have a International Political Economy class, which has been incredibly interesting. The class is pretty much based on oil and how it was shaped international economies and in turn politics in the last 60 years. Every similar class I have had has always looked at major world events such as wars, but this takes another step and looks at why the wars happened due to oil. This one meets twice a week and will require quite a bit of work.

The final class is a Latin American literature survey course. I don´t have the correct book yet because the fotocopiadora screwed up. It´s interesting, regular text books aren´t used here. You simply copy books. I take a book in, give it to the person behind the desk, and come back for the copied version the next day. It makes things much cheaper overall. Regardless, I think that this will also be a great class.

The program has a lot of day trips scheduled for Fridays. This week we head to Isla Negra. The nice thing is that we then have the option of staying at the location for the weekend and simply making our way back on our own. It offers much more of an opportunity to really discover areas.