Updates Coming

So it's time for finals and my economics paper on lack of financial derivates is due on Tuesday. I've got lots to tell about Buenos Aires (everyone reading this should visit this city), as well as tales of my daily life and my trip to La Serena. I'm coming home soon!

Becoming Mostly Sunny After Morning clouds. Mid 60s. Southwest Wind Around 10 MPH.

It's autumn here. The leaves are changing colors. It is colder outside every day. It hasn't started raining yet, but it will soon. I traded my spring of uneventful weather reports for another fall.

(Radio DJ: It's 7:50 AM; that's 10 minutes till the top of the hour here in the Bay Area. We've got traffic and weather for you every morning on the 10's, so here's Chip, our drive-time commute expert. What's going on, Chip? Chip: Slow and go on the 101, Paul. We've got a mattress in lanes near Foster City. Watch out for brake lights. Announcer: Thanks Chip. Now to Nancy, our weather forecaster. Nancy: Thanks Paul. It looks like another day of clear, sunny skies with temperatures hovering around 80 degrees. We expect the same tomorrow, the next day, the day after that, and pretty much every day from then on until October 1^st. Back to you, Paul.)

I really don't mind the fall, though. It reminds me of home. I must stay, I really miss weather. At Stanford, it's either raining or it's clear and cold in the winter. I miss the dense fog, downpours, drizzles, frost, and the cold, clear days of the Washington invierno. That's real weather.

Normally, the Santiago acts like somebody getting up in the morning to go to a job that they're not wild about. Santiago hears the alarm clock go off in the morning, decides to hit the snooze button for another 10 minutes of dozing instead of taking a shower, and then rolls out of bed at the last possible moment. It throws on some generically bad-looking clothing and checks to make sure that its hair doesn't say too strongly "I'd rather be sleeping." It grabs a portable yogurt and then hurries out the door only to sit in traffic and stress about whether or not it's going to make it to work on time. Upon arriving at work, it sees the line of customers going out the door and thinks, "Great, another day of this." This is the side of the city I often see. It's smoggy, stray dogs run around everywhere, and I always have to worry about people stealing items from my backpack on crowded buses.

Tonight, however, I saw a different side. Santiago was dressed up classily for a nice dinner. It was clear, slightly chilly, the leaves were of all different colors, and there was a pink sunset painted on the bottom of the clouds above the high-rises. It was gorgeous. I am actually excited for the rain, when it comes. I think it will be very comforting.

I feel as if the mild persistent congestion that I have is a result of the pollution; when I traveled to Pucón, I found that I could breathe freely. In a slightly exaggerated course of action, this morning a student emailed the group here saying that he had purchased 3 air masks (the kind you see on the news whenever infectious diseases like SARS break out around the globe) and only needed one, so could offer two to the first people who wanted them. It actually is fairly stark sometimes:

I've actually been somewhat lacking in my sight-seeing within Santiago. I've traveled to various places within the country, but I have not yet visited the head governmental building (La Moneda), the primary cathedral (La Catedral), or the central square (La Plaza de Armas). I did go and visit the Cerro San Cristobal on Saturday, however. The Cerro is one of two or three hills in the middle of the city. Of all strange places to put a zoo, this smoggy hillside does not seem like it would be at the top of the list; the guidebook here said it was quite poor, however, so I avoided it and continued walking. The climb itself was a gradual walk up the road to the top. At the apex was a statute of the Virgin Mary decorated in the traditional Catholic manner: with radio towers surrounding it. In a pragmatic sense, I understand the decision to put the towers there, but in a symbolic sense, what is this saying? 'Citizens of Santiago, the Virgin Mary is watching you through the trials and tribulations of your day and is never far; neither is the crystal-clear service of Entel, Claro, and Movistar. Contracts start at 15000 pesos per month.'

The hill actually did give a new perspective on the city. One could see the nice areas, the slums, and halfway perceive office buildings through the smog. It offered a nice sunset:

A friend of mine here grew up near Long Beach, CA. Upon climbing the hill, she remarked, "Wow, look at all the fog over the city." After a second, it dawned on her: she had been under the mistaken impression for the previous 20 years of her life that the grey haze that settles over parts of Los Angeles was composed of simple water droplets. She realized that the phenomenon occurring in both Santiago and Los Angeles was not fog but rather smog and then had a laugh at herself. Not being from LA but being cognizant of the air-quality issues there, I thought it was funny that she had been so oblivious.

The next day, Sunday, was Mother's Day. It was sad to be out of the country on Mother's Day, but I did call my mom and chat with her for a bit. There was a small lunch in my host family here, which I attended. The first hour and a half was fun, but the last hour and a half of not really understanding all that well what was being discussed and trying to plan out materials for my apartment in Zurich became tiresome.

Movies here actually maintain the same schedule as the US. A week and a half ago, I saw Spiderman 3 subtitled in Spanish. For those expecting an action movie involving a comic book character fighting bad guys, also expect a song and dance number in the style of jazz courtesy of Toby Maguire. After discussing the movie with friends, the scene was unanimously the most strange that we had see in quite some time. I am extremely excited to see Pirates of the Caribbean 3 next week.



The next day was a friend's birthday, so 12 or so students went out to a restaurant and then to a club. We dined at the Mexican restaurant Como Agua Para Chocolate (Like Water for Chocolate) in honor of the day, Cinco de Mayo. The food was amazing – lamb shanks served with a sugar and cilantro sauce. More distinct than the specific flavors of the food was the fact the food had flavor at all. Some people do not like curry in their food, finding it too spicy. Some people do not care for sushi, finding it too strange a texture. I'm not big on cauliflower, personally. Chileans, well, Chileans aren't big on flavor in their food (yes, this is the third time I have mentioned the poor quality of the fare here). Most dishes consist of some blandly cooked meat with some sort of bland vegetable. Empandas, a Chilean favorite, exemplify this. Empanadas are a cross between a taco and a potsticker. Think food inside of a rich, oily bread. The famous empanda de pino is this bread filled with beef, onion, hardboiled egg, and an olive. Barring the olive, it all just tastes like 'food.' There's no bell pepper, no herbs, no marinade, no sauce. Just 'food.' My friend Nikk was once discussing Russian food with me and mentioned that all Russian dishes contain beef, potato, or vodka. It is similar here – they all consist of beef, chicken, or potato.

And palta. Oh, palta. Palta is the word here for avocado. I used to love avocado. Avocado is great in my mom's salads. Guacamole with tortilla chips is quite delicious. Once in a while, I will even eat a bit raw. But here, everything is stuffed with avocado, then smeared with it, then served with avocado on the side, just for good measure. Palta smothers the sandwiches. It falls out of the sides of the terrible burgers. I went to a Japanese restaurant to get away from the bland food and inundation of palta only to find my sushi rolls covered in the green fruit. The Chileans have gone way, way overboard with the avocado.

This made the Mexican food at Como Agua Para Chocolate all the more delectable. In my lamb, there was simultaneously flavor and no palta. After the restaurant, all the students went to a bar to drink cheap beer before going to the expensive club. We were not particularly rowdy. Perhaps at times we were a little loud. After consuming the cheap cerveza, we decided to move on to the club, El Subterráneo. Coincidentally, as we left, the people in the bar decided to announce their pleasure with the service of the establishment by applauding. Strangely, the people in the street continued this show of appreciation of the waiters as we walked down the street. Yes, the students and I were actually applauded out of a bar. In our defense, we really weren't that loud. The people on the street could not have heard us. They were just giving some gringos a hard time.

Being gringos here is a big deal. At 5' 11", I am taller and bigger than many of the people in Santiago. I also have lighter skin than many of the people and just generally stand out. Most of the students in the program have the same issue. Some do the utmost to try and avoid it, to act and speak in a certain manner and avoid certain situations. I think this is wise to a certain extent. But no matter how much I change my behavior or the size of the group I'm in or any of the other factors, I'm still a gringo. I still stand out. To some extent one has to own one's gringo-ness.

Speaking of the local appearance, I guess hygiene is not en vogue amongst the youth. The popular style seems to be to dip one's hair in lard and then let it sit for a few days. All the male youth sport greasy mullets. The women also sport similar styles, although they wash their hair more frequently. I saw someone yesterday who looked as if the deceased guinea pig Teddy of my friend Marc Rollins had nested on this person's head and was taking a nap. I don't get it.

In order to try and do some authentic things in the city, many of the students went to see a soccer game. The best team here is Colo-Colo and we saw them play Mexico. The game itself was not too crazy, as Mexico did not have to win but rather just not lose by an enormous margin to advance in the tournament. It was definitely a good time, though. On the way back, the rowdy fans that I had heard about appeared. I was on the metro home when ten boys who were approximately fourteen boarded the subway car. They proceeded to jump up and down while singing loudly and punctuating their words with blows to the walls of the car in efforts to drum. This is where I worry about my future abilities as a parent. I had no sympathies when the police started threatening these punk-ass kids with their sticks as they impeded the safety and progress of the metro. When two of them were taken away, I was pleased. The whole thing was ridiculous and showcased unacceptable behavior. Hopefully my kids will not board subways after the games of their favorite sports team and disturb the peace.

The game itself was last Tuesday, right in the middle of midterms. For many of us, the tests were a rude reminder that we're technically here to study, not just to enjoy ourselves and speak Spanish. I thankfully only had one midterm. Perhaps not coincidentally, a wave of disease has swept the students this week.

Unfortunately, reliable internet can be hard to come by here. Thus, when there is work to be done, the students often go to the easiest place that is open late with internet. This happens to be good old Starbucks (their internet is free). The top floor of the Starbucks here is flush with gringos, primarily Americans, who all buy their lattes and cakes and chat with each other in English. It's our own little embassy, a place for foreign affairs, a common ground. Our center closes at 7:30 PM on weekdays, meaning many students walk to Starbucks in order to get another two hours of computer and internet time. Unfortunately, the internet cuts out inexplicably at times, which results in many prematurely terminated Skype phone calls. On the weekends, it is really the best place to study. So as much as I wish I could say that I spend my time in cultural Chilean cafes where I can interact with Chileans, I can't; I spend my evenings at the Bux with the gringos.

As one spends time at Starbucks, the baristas there begin to recognize the client. Several baristas now know 'Max.' A few even attempt to guess my drink. One knows me as the guy who asks the baristas to fix the internet because it is not working. One in particular has begun speaking with me. I've been through this in the States and so was not surprised. I was surprised when he asked me to a club with a friend of his. I ended up going to his apartment with two friends of mine and then to a small club where a friend of his was playing a DJ set. Afterwards, I chatted with Ricardo and the DJ until 5 in the morning and then headed home. The next day, he asked if I wanted to join him at his parents place in the countryside Saturday night. At that point, it started to get strange. I didn't get the impression that he was hitting on me, so I was perplexed as to his motives. Are people here just friendlier? I still don't have a great answer to this. I think he maybe wants to help out a gringo and also is a bit lonely, as many of his friends have passed away or left the country. More unusual still is that I did not learn his name (Ricardo) until the following Monday. We'll see if Ricardo wants to hang out more in the future.

After staying up until 5 AM, I had to be at the Stanford center at 10:15 AM to go wine tasting. We were all treated to a short trip to a winery name Cosiño Macul in the south part of the city. It was quite beautiful. I thought their merlot was especially good. We received a tour and souvenir wine glass, as well. The tour painted an interesting picture of both wine production in Chile and the evolution of the business over the years. The tour guide had jokes, too. She had us try their gris, which does not appear to be related to the pinot gris. Essentially, the winery takes some type of red grape and presses and ferments it to some extent in the style of a white, giving the wine an amber color. It was interesting. In the middle of her schpiel on the wine, she commented that they refer to it as their "Michael Jackson" varietal due to its composition of different types of grapes/methods. This received a mixture of laughs and groans.

Strangely, MJ has been popping up in my travels here. In the middle of a bus ride in northern Chile, the tour guide put a video on of Michael Jackson in concert for our viewing pleasure. All the students sang along to "Billie Jean" and "Beat It" but then promptly fell asleep. There was then the Jacko reference at the winery. Today, a barista referred to a mocha made with both regular and white chocolate (a drink I have heard called a 'Zebra') as a 'Michael Jackson.' I have no idea if he is still quite popular here or is simply an object of ridicule.

Finally, I will commence to travel again on Thursday. Many students are heading to Buenos Aires for the weekend. I saw on the news today that there was a massive riot outside the major subway station in the city and that the building was set on fire. I guess this is their version of applause. I need to get in the habit of buying airline tickets without the assistance of my mother, however. I am so used to listing myself on flights through her employee passes. Unfortunately, these will expire when I am 23, meaning I will be thrust back in to the real world. I had to buy real tickets to Buenos Aires, but put if off for some time, thinking that I would just get to it later. I broke the two week barrier, however, and saw my potential fares shoot up. I then decided to risk it and hit up the few-days-before prices of Expedia.com. Thankfully, I netted a fare of $200 round trip, which is good but not great for this region. It was a learning experience for when I travel to Machu Picchu.

Mother’s Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms reading this blog. You do so much for your sons and daughters. I want to give special thanks to my mother, an amazing woman who made it part of her life's work to raise me as a good person, teach me about life, and shower me with love. I am searching for words to fully express my appreciation for everything that you have done for me, mom. I am not sure that they exist, but I will keep looking. You are an incredible mother and I love you so much.

Size Comparison

Chile is a really long country. It's the longest north-south country in the world. Below is a comparison with California to visually relate the nation's dimensions. Also, on the right side of the screen I have put a map of places that I have visited within Chile.

Dreaming of Lions

I just finished Ernest Hemmingway's The Old Man and the Sea on the bus ride home this evening. It wasn't until the end of the book that I realized that the name of the main character, the old man of the title, is Santiago. It was a nice coincidence. Perhaps it is representative of the city, a city that has hooked modernization and is following it far out to sea despite the trials that doing so brings.


The novella (only 127 pages) itself is a wonderful work. It won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. I recommend it to everyone, especially those who love to be out on the water or who love to fish. It is the story of an old fisherman in Havana who, after 85 days without catching a fish, hooks an enormous marlin and fights with every ounce of his being to catch it. It is the story of a man and the boy who loves him, a story of persistence, a story of courage in the face of loss. At one level, it is simply the romantic tale of a man and his duel with the fish. But it has so many other levels. I would love to look at the role of suffering in the work.

The old man suffers so greatly in his trials. His hands are cut badly by rope; he does not sleep for three days; he suffers from dehydration and malnutrition; his back bears the pain and the pull of the fish for the entire journey.

He was stiff and sore now and his wounds and all of the strained parts of his body hurt with the cold of the night.

He earns his fish. At the end, when the man returns to Havana, the boy who loves him (Manolin) finds him asleep.

The boy saw that the old man was breathing and then he saw the old man's hands and he started to cry. He went out very quickly to go to bring some coffee and all the way down the road he was crying.

Hemmingway even seems to compare his battle to crucifixion, casting him in a Christ-like light.

"Ay," he said aloud. There is no translation for this word and perhaps it is just a noise such as a man might make, involuntarily, feeling the nail go through his hands and into the wood.

It reminds of the I Have a Dream speech of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In the expository writing class of my sophomore year, the class read this speech. The instructor, Dr. Joyce Moser, mentioned that King is just now being looked at as a theologian. There are ideas in his writings that are easy to pass by in lieu of the stronger messages of racial equality.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

"Unearned suffering is redemptive." What an interesting idea. Was Santiago's suffering unearned? In some ways, no, it was not. To say it was unearned would be to diminish his accomplishment. He gave everything of himself towards the goal of catching this fish, and consciously so. But does a poor, old fisherman such as Santiago deserve such suffering? No, he does not.

Sometimes I wish I was an English major. I would love to analyze the role of suffering in the novella more deeply.

In unrelated thoughts, the burgers here are terrible. Terrible. Even McDonald's, the global standard of fast food, seems lacking from its usual reliability. Burger King is my relief; their Whoppers are delicious and taste like a real hamburger with better ingredients.

I've also heard that the Ruby Tuesday's here puts on a good show. I am excited to find out.

“Keep the point of your ice axe directed away from you at all times while sliding. We don’t want you to end up with the tip in your stomach.”

So, I climbed a volcano yesterday. It's great to be able to say that. "What'd you do yesterday, Max?" "Oh, you know, climbed an Andean volcano in Chile. Good times." I can feel it in my thighs and shoulders today, a persistent reminder of scaling the 9,340 foot Villarrica.

I'm in Pucón, a mountain town in the manner of Aspen or Jackson Hole. Everything is made of wood, there are a lot of hostels, and eXtreme sports companies for tourists are everywhere. The weather here is deliciously familiar. It feels like a chilly 50˚F outside. There has been a confused overcast hanging above me all day. The sky is grey but the sun is attempting to shine through. A mist floated amidst the town in the morning and I could see my breath. The air feels distinctly alpine. There are trees and green grass everywhere. Woods and fields fill the surrounding lands. It could be Snohomish on a cold day in winter. I imagine that this location is at a roughly similar latitude to Washington. It certainly feels like it.

Breaking the backdrop of the quiet alpine town are the sounds of construction: hammers, nails, and saws. There is an incredible amount of development going on here. I remember walking through the streets on the first day thinking, "Wow, this would be an amazing place to buy something rentable. A condo, perhaps." It could be rented out during the year, used for vacations, and sold in a few years. This property is only going up in value. Judging by the skeletons of the soon-to-be hotels and apartment buildings, however, other people seem to share my view. Pucón really is a lovely place.

Actually getting here to enjoy one's vacation home would be quite the trip, however. My fellow students and I boarded an 11 PM bus on Thursday night, slept, and departed the bus at 9 AM the next morning. 10 hours is quite the journey (assuming the bus was doing 60 MPH, that's 600 miles away from the capital). The lights were dimmed; everyone tilted their seats back; and we all woke up in the morning to an oatmeal cookie and a strange (but not terrible) cup of instant coffee. 10 hours goes by quickly when you're simply getting your night's rest.

Two groups of Stanford students came to Pucón. I was in a group with 9 other people. After arrival, we had to decide how to allocate our time. Each person asked themselves, "Do I go river rafting? Horseback riding? Mountain bike riding? Do I scale the volcano? How about the thermal baths?" I decided to go horseback riding Friday and do the volcano and the thermal baths on Saturday. Most people (including myself) figured that they would be too tired by Sunday to do anything too wild. Also, as much as we try to forget it, we all have homework to do. I found a nice café with internet to pass the time and write on my day of rest.

On a side note, technology boggles my mind sometimes. The student sitting across from me used her computer to make a video call to her boyfriend back on campus. Essentially, she was talking into a small amalgamation of plastic and metal in the middle of nowhere in a 3^rd world country in South America and her boyfriend was interacting with her and responding through a similar hunk of plastic and metal thousands of miles away. I love modern technology but I find it particularly astounding when it has novel and tangible effects on the lives of everyday people. This isn't a new smoke effect in a video game or a better DVD. This is technology bringing people together across the world. Just a few days ago, I used the same service (without video) to send my voice from a Starbucks in Santiago into my computer, through the internet, and across the world to the cellular phone of my friend Nikk. He happened to be in class, but stepped out to chat with me as if I was just calling him from a few miles away. Really cool stuff.

Horseback riding was quite something. I can't really remember spending any time on any sort of equine since when I was approximately 5. This involved my best friend Marc Rollins and me going to a pony camp for a few weeks. Apparently, after coming home from the first day, my parents asked me how it went I responded with a "not good," and when my parents asked why, I responded that my pony was "rough." Thankfully, my horse wasn't particularly rough this time. I would instead call him "independently minded." By "independently minded," I mean "out of control." I'd like to take credit and say that I masterfully directed Sam (my horse's name), but he really just did what he wanted while I hung on for dear life. The beginning of the ride was quite nice. We walked into a hilly area with incredible views of the valley.

A bit later, we disembarked and hiked down to a waterfall, Salto del Claro. It was amazingly beautiful. The structure in stone we found was a vertical cylinder seemingly carved out of the higher ground above us. From the top of the cylinder, the waterfall fell down to the pool into below. The water, the moss, and all the surrounding vegetation were incredibly gorgeous.

On the way back, Sam seemed to be in a hurry. Perhaps he needed to use the restroom back at the barn. Fittingly, Sam and Max are the two main characters of a comic book series that was made into a famous computer game, Sam & Max Hit the Road. I would say that my horse and I definitely hit the road. After descending the hills onto more open (but unpaved) roads, Sam decided he wanted to gallop. And Sam certainly was not asking for my permission. I was riding alongside a friend of mine named Alif when Sam started to gallop. Alif's horse, apparently not wanting to be left out of the fun, also began to gallop. The two horses seemed to essentially egg each other on. I bounced up and down in the saddle while holding the reigns and enjoying the experience. After a few minutes, however, I decided it was time to stop and began to pull on the reigns. This had the same effect as putting a stop sign in front of an out-of-control semi truck. Sam only stopped when we came to a corner. Once we rounded said corner, it was back to galloping, again without my consent. My persistent yells of "Sam...Saaaaaam…SAM!" had no effect. He knew where he was going and we stopped shortly before arriving back at the pasture. Despite my inability to steer my horse, it was a great time, especially the galloping.

The next, day we woke up at 6 AM in order to start putting on our hiking gear at 7. On the way up to the base of the climb, I chatted briefly with the group of students in our van from Notre Dame University. We played the "Do you know this person?" game. She asked me if I knew her sister, who was a grad student in the political science department at Stanford. I said no. She then asked me if I knew her ex-boyfriend, Dan Zeehandelaar. I laughed and told her that I had some bad news. I met Dan this year through some friends of mine. He lived in the house next door to mine. The thing about Dan is that he's gay. She started laughing when I told her, as she already knew but wanted to see my reaction. Small world.

We rode half an hour to get to a ski lift at the base of Villarrica, which we took up instead of trudging though the bald ski slope of dirt and rock. From there, we hiked up through 3 successive sections of the volcano: the first, less steep part where I thought to myself "Hah, this is so easy"; the second, steeper part, where I remembered a bit of my humility; and the third, quite steep part up the last part of the volcano, where I thought to myself "oh God, I'm wearing jeans that have become damp and heavy and are now sticking to my legs underneath my latex pants. How am I ever going to get up this?" Thankfully, I did make it up, where I enjoyed my peanut butter, honey, and banana sandwiches with a bottle of Gatorade. Meals at hiking destinations always taste like the best food ever. And I got to see the magma inside the volcano, which was really cool. The views from the mountain were jaw-droppingly gorgeous.

The way down was soooo much faster. After nicely descending the first two regions, we all got to the most legendary point of the climb: sliding down the mountain. There were grooves carved into certain areas where one could buckle on their plastic chaps and shoot down the hill while sitting down. It was great fun and a great way to end a hard day. We slid all the way to the ski lift, which was disappointingly closed. Essentially, in the morning I forked up 5,000 pesos (approximately $10) to get a one way ticket over a dirt field. While this was appreciated, it would have been great if the $10 got me both ways. Oh well. After a 25 minute trot down the ski slope, we all threw ourselves into the vans to rest and get off of our feet after the long day

We ended the day by going to some thermal baths nearby. They were pretty incredible. We lounged in one of several large, heated pools next to a roaring river while sipping wine and enjoying each other's company. As my friend Carolyn jokingly described it, we were in a bad teenage horror porn movie. We were a bunch of American college students in a 3^rd world country in our bathing suits drinking together at night with the moon out and steam everywhere. After a nice, relaxing time, we headed back and I promptly went to bed.

Today, I have been editing my pictures from the weekend and writing. The best of the pictures are up on my photo website, http://picasaweb.google.com/bulletrounds/. Up with them are my pictures from last weekend in La Serena, which I have not yet written about. Tonight is another long bus ride home. We should get to Santiago at around 7 AM, which will I'm sure be unfortunately terrible. There's a high probability I will take the metro across town and go back to bed. It will be good to be back in the city, though.

I've had some time to deliberate on my choice of classes this weekend. I'm not sure at all that I want to take one of my classes, Modernization and its Discontents: Chilean Politics at the Turn of the Century. On the plus side, I want to like the material, it's 5 credits towards my credit aggregate, and it's taught by a former Minister of National Affairs and Minister of Transportation of Chile. On the downside, I cannot understand a word the man is saying, I don't actually like the material (at least enough to study it somewhat rigorously), and the work itself will impinge on my time in Chile. I'm fairly certain I will drop the class. The only thing holding me back is my degree: if I have 225 credits or more upon graduation, I receive a dual degree, or a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics. If I do not have 225 credits, I receive a double major, or a Bachelor of Arts and Science in Economics and Mathematics. While the distinction is fairly trivial, it would be nice to have the dual degree. To get it, I need as many credits as possible. I'm just not sure it's worth the extra effort while here in Chile. I have 4 hours to the deadline to decide if it is.

Photos

I have posted some of the photos of my journey here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/bulletrounds

Journey from Stanford to Santiago

So it was a long week. There was a lot of living in airplanes and airports involved. It is illustrated here:

I left Stanford on March 24th to stay in Mukilteo for a few days after feverishly packing up my life. It was then on to Boston through Chicago for three days to visit Lauren and Peggy. Sunday morning, April 1st (the day that I was supposed to arrive in Santiago), I left Boston for Atlanta again through Chicago. Upon arriving in Atlanta at around 4:45 PM local time, I discovered that cross-airline employee passes (ID-90's) are only valid on Delta for dependants under 21. Since I turned 21 on January 24th of this year, I was in Atlanta without any method to get on the Delta flight to Santiago that evening. The flights to Washington, DC, were all full, so with the help of my father I found a Holiday Inn, spent the night, and headed back to the Atlanta airport the next morning to fly to Washington/Dulles. I arrived there at around 10:30 AM to wait for the red-eye from Dulles to Buenos Aires, Argentina. 11 hours later, at 9:30 PM, I sat up against the bulkhead in business class as the airplane lifted off for its long journey south. I landed in Buenos Aires sometime in the morning there (9:30?) and waited until 2:30 for my flight from Buenos Aires to Santiago. I finally arrived in Santiago at 4:30 PM on April 3rd, 56 hours after leaving Boston.

The ticket agent in Buenos Aires had attempted to communicate something about the weight of my bags to me which I had barely understood. She told me my bags were in aggregate 6 kilograms too heavy, but then proceeded to stamp both and put them on the conveyor belt behind her. Not wanting to look a gift horse in the mouth, I did not question her until I arrived in Santiago without one of my bags. I did what I could at the baggage area and moved on.
Upon leaving the security perimeter, the taxistas waiting for tired Americans/foreigners all pounced. They know that you're exhausted, they know you don't speak Spanish all that well, and they know that you don't have a great feel for the local currency. Most were easily dismissed with a "No Gracias," but one, Francisco, was persistent. He wanted it. He would not let me go. As he knew, I was exhausted, wasn't in great command of my Español, and didn't do the conversion of the Chilean Peso to the US Dollar easily. As I was beat after over 2 days of flying and was without a bag, I didn't really care at that point and accepted his badgering to the tune of $60. It should have been more like $30. But oh well, right? At the time, I was too tired to fight.

Later that night, my bag finally arrived. I and all my possessions had finally arrived in South America to begin their 10 weeks here.

Coca-Cola

I've now been in Santiago, Chile for two weeks (almost). It's quite something to live in a 3^rd world country (albeit a fairly developed one). Have you ever seen the movie Lost in Translation? At one level, it's about the disorientation that Bill Murray's character feels when traveling to Tokyo. He sees a society that has adopted Western culture without necessarily knowing why. The movie portrays Tokyo as un poco soulless, and perhaps unjustly so. I can see the same thing here – everyone wants to be Western but they don't know why. Also, the food is terrible. Not poorly cooked, just extremely bland. It's strange to me that a country that provides food to nations of the Northern Hemisphere during the winter months has such flavorless food itself.

Perhaps I should not have opened with the things that are negative about Chile. It's amazing in many ways. I'm seeing a side of life that is really incredible here – I'm witnessing a nation develop from the vantage point of the center of it. The nightlife is fun. I'm meeting new students at the Stanford program, which is excellent. My host mother is incredibly sweet. I'm also realizing that my studies in economics and business have made me a touch more conservative than my peers. The countryside here is beautiful. I've been out to the coast these past two weekends, and it's truly amazing. The place I went to on Friday, Isla Negra, reminded me so distinctly of the Washington coast (with slightly different sand). Once I stepped off of the pavement of the street onto the dirt path leading down to the site that I was visiting, I had the strongest sense of déjà vu. The pine trees and the ground and the air near the ocean put me squarely in the middle of a park in Washington. As I approached the beach, my sense of home only increased. The granite rocks, the kelp, the salt, the tide pools, it all SCREAMED Washington to me. It was a good feeling. I wouldn't say that it made me homesick, for I didn't have a desire to travel home immediately. I did have a desire to plan a barbeque for when I return in June. And I did, however, worry about my future.

This summer, I will be in Zurich. It will mark the first year in which I will not spend a significant amount of my time living in my house in Mukilteo. It portends the future, for my career path traverses the distant streets of New York City. My anxiety stems from the connection that I feel to Western Washington – the sprawl, the green, the weather, the Puget Sound and the ocean, the rain. The adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine that form my DNA double-helixes encode not only my thin, brown hair and broad shoulders, they also express the rainstorms and seaweed-encrusted rocky beaches and immense expanses of salt water and encircling verdance of my home. I will come back. I do not know how at this point, but I will come back. I feel the pull even from here.

In other thoughts, Paris is often described as the city of love or romance. Supposedly there are couples everywhere and their love and affection is endearing in some fashion. I have not found that to be the case here. Upon arrival, my friends and I noticed how many couples there were everywhere we went. Couples can be found on the subway, in restaurants, on the streets, and on the beaches. The obnoxious part is that at any given time, two-thirds of said couples in your presence feel the need to visually and audibly demonstrate their tongues' needs to reconnect with one another. Get a god damn room! Seriously. It stems from the living accommodations of people between their adolescence and marriage here. At home, teenagers feel the need to relieve themselves of their parents' abode sometime between the ages of 18 and 22. They get jobs, they get degrees, they earn money, and they move out. Most want the independence and the privacy. Here, people apparently do not move out until they get married. This means all the young couples need to find a place to canoodle and feel that doing so within the vicinity of their parents is not kosher. Thus, they take their canoodling out on the streets. I encounter it in the seats next to me on the airplane from Buenos Aires to Santiago, on the bench outside the convenience store, and at the table behind me at Starbucks (loudly and with great span of time, in the latter case). Granted, most of the reason why this occurs is because wages for young people, especially those without degrees, are quite poor ($1-$2 an hour, although this $1-$2 can purchase slightly more than it can back home), and thus they live at home. It just seems like this is not a satisfactory solution – soundproof the rooms or find empty parking lots or something. Being a city of romance is not all that it is cracked up to be.

Finally, I am reading fiction for the first time in a while. Number9Dream by David Mitchell. Nikk got it for me as a gift because we both enjoyed another work of Mitchell's, Cloud Atlas. I get on the bus here, start reading, and 10 minutes later realize that I am in danger of missing my stop because I am so engrossed in the book that I have forgotten about the world around me. The nonfiction that constitutes my studies and academic interests, however interesting I may find it, is still not nearly as involving as a good novel. It's good to be back.