Travel and Teaching

Well I don't know about you guys but I have had quite a busy week.

I should probably start with last weekend when we went to Valdivia with some friends. The first day we actually went to a little village just outside of Valdivia called Niebla. It's by the coast and is just a really pretty little place. The ocean was really calm there and there wasn't a lot of wind... pretty much the opposite of Puerto Saavedra, which I have found out has the windiest shores of Chile. We walked along the beach for ages and ended up reaching the next village 20 kms away. It was really sunny and really nice. We found some blackberries to help us with the walk back.

On the second day we went into Valdivia and walked around the botanical garden. Found lots of stray dogs that followed us around all day. They were close friends by the end. We went to the Fluvial Market which is set up next to the river. It has vegetables on one side of the market and fish on the other. Sea lions swim up from the sea to eat the discarded fish parts. They're huge! Not nearly as pretty as the seals we saw in Valparaiso. We didn't really do too much more in Valdivia. We did run into two girls that we met in Puerto Iguazu in Argentina! The world is small.

we found llamas

Our weeks been pretty busy as Ingrid has been off work all week because she's ill. So we arrived on Monday with no idea that we were going to have to take all the lessons ourselves. Ingrid had left us a note with what to do with the classes but other than that we were left on our own. This was interesting. We're in a strange position at the school. We're not teachers but we're also not proper assistants. The kids sort of give us respect but are also a bit more relaxed (naughty). So we end up kind of being teachers and kind of being friends. Some of the classes were really good and listened to us and did the work (of course not all the kids do, but then they don't usually). Some of the classes were horrible. We've employed lots of songs to entertain the children. We know all the words to them all because we've heard them all so many times. Tuesday is our worst day of the week because all the classes are with older children. And the bad ones. The older kids don't listen as much and behave worse. So we left school very wearily on Tuesday, after hearing that there was a substitute English teacher starting the next day.

The new teacher is very friendly and a good teacher. She's nice because she lets us be a bit more involved in the class. It was a bit weird telling her how things went in the school and what we were doing with the kids. But the week did get a little easier with her around. Still we were very happy when the weekend arrived. I did enjoy getting that teacher experience. It's something we don't really have any more because we're not teaching in Vega Larga any more.

Yesterday we did some mega shopping and then went to capoeira. There's a new instructor who's really good and takes us through all the music and movements. He's also doing a good job of recruiting new people because the class was about twice as big as usual. It was a really good class yesterday.

Off for lunch now. Have to try and eat and breathe at the same time as I have a cold.

It's Still Sunny!

Wow this week has felt pretty hectic!

On Saturday we met up with the vols in CholChol in Temuco. We went to a cafe and had cake to celebrate Aminas birthday. As a birthday present they gave Amina something a little different.
Meet Vincent Maloy/Sheldon/Poseidon/ Abdula/Moquito.

Yep. We have a turtle. He's really cute and small. He's in a nice big box with water and rocks etc. Amina got a water heater so he swims around very happily. Only had one escape attempt but he was found quickly enough hiding under some books. Argh he's so cute.

On Sunday we went out picking blackberries and made great smoothies. Mmm rica. 

All week we've gone to escuela 6 seeing as we still haven't heard anything about going to Vega Larga. Lots of noise. The classes are all so noisy. I remember primary school being quite quiet. We were never allowed to talk as loudly as the kids do here. We were given many adorable cheek kisses from the kids. It's even cuter when the little boys do it cause you know they won't do it when they get older.

This afternoon we went out for tea with Ingrid and a couple of students. Very tasty. Had giant sandwiches and talked the whole time in Spanish which is enjoyable now that we can. I think the summer has made us better at socialising. Things seem a bit easier with the teachers as well. Although this doesn't help us remember their names. There's one we just know as "smiley guy".

Off to Valdivia tomorrow. The weather's supposed to be quite nice this weekend.

Thoughts

Being back in Lautaro is strange.

Number one, not travelling and having time to think, made me realise that I'd overlooked the fact that I've been here for over six months. That's half my time gone. Time passes so quickly. Of course I've missed home, and at times it felt like the year was going so slowly, but being on this side of summer makes it all seem so short. I can't believe there's less than six months less. I worked it out today that we only have 22 weeks left. I've been here 30 weeks! It still feels like there is so much more to do.

On Monday we entered into the maze of confusion that is the local government once again. We weren't picked up by the director to go to Vega Larga, so we thought we'd check that we were still going there. It turns out that with a change of alcalde there were a lot of other changes. They don't seem to share information very well because we had to explain again who we were and what we'd been doing in Lautaro for the last six months. A lady used us as an excuse to blow off some steam and ranted on about how unfair the sharing of resources is. So as usual we left with less information than we entered with. Ran into Ingrid on the way home though and she said just to go to Escuela 6 so that's what we did. Being back at the school is great. The kids are so cute and were really happy to see us (though we weren't quite as happy to see the huge class of 6th graders that just wouldn't stop talking). Trying to think of ways to do more. I would like to be able to do more teaching and less... sitting watching the children work. Did have a very good first lesson with the second graders. They're so well behaved at that age. Still listen to you and give you respect. Give them about a year and they won't listen to a word you say.

All the Kinders that we were teaching last year have moved up to primero, which means they've been set loose in the playground. We were swamped the other day by a mass of children running at us to give us kisses, when we stepped outside at break time.

The bad thing about being back at school is that our friends aren't working there any more. So we're back to how is was in the beginning, wandering the halls or being in the staff room instead of being with our friends in the computer room.

I suppose a bit of news I have is that I received an unconditional entry place to Edinburgh uni. Pretty pleased because it's for the uni and degree that were pretty much my top choice. So I'm pretty happy. Tried to explain it to Ruty but I don't think she gets how difficult it is to get into some unis. Then she asked why I couldn't just stay at home and relax instead of living in halls. I swear, all Chileans ever want us to do is relax.

We met up with some friends yesterday for the first time since coming back to Lautaro. Really nice to see them again. I got all envious about one of them being able to play the guitar really well. We sat in the park and made up songs while eating chocolate. I think Amina was a bit surprised by the amount of people that remembered her birthday. She got loads of emails and presents and was able to chill in the sun so I think she was happy.

Us with our friends in the park

A little video from the Iguazu Falls. Pretty sure this is from when we were walking the upper trail along the top of the waterfalls.

There and Back Again

Well all good things must come to an end. I'm sitting here in Lautaro, enjoying not having to carry a bag around and not feeling guilty for relaxing and not going out to see something. It was a pretty amazing couple of months. Don't regret a single place we went (except maybe spending that night in Potosi).

We ended our holiday in Bariloche. It's next to the cordillera so we had great mountain views. There are lots of big lakes and the Nahuel Hapui lake is the biggest one. We arrived at 11 in the morning. You can tell that you're getting used to day long bus journeys when a conversation goes like this:
Amina: "Oh great, we're nearly there!"
Beth: "What are you talking about? We have 5 hours left."
Amina: "Yeah that's what I mean!"

We found our hostel which was actually one of the best hostels we'd been to. Apart for being clean and having comfortable beds, there was a free box of food. It had food that other travellers had left and meant that we never had to buy pasta or rice once while we were there.
We spent the first day chilling by the lake and wandering around town. Oh, we even tried one of the ice creams. They're amazing. To be honest I would tell people to go to Bariloche, just to try the ice cream. Oh I'm still such a child at heart.

Day two found us heading out to the chocolate museum. Bariloche is pretty well known for having lots of chocolate shops. Mmm the museum was great. We got free samples of chocolate and hot chocolate. Got to see them making the chocolate and then we saw some big chocolate-made statues of animals that were supposed to represent the culture of chocolate. What I wanted to know was, why was there penguins?

These are made of chocolate!

In the afternoon we met up with a Lautaro friend who had come to Bariloche at the same time as us. It was really nice to see him again. Just hung out at the beach again.

Day three we went out on a bike ride. Rented some mountain bikes and hit the "short circuit". Ended up taking us most of the day. At the start there were some cars on the roads but after a while it was really quiet and we were able to zoom down the hills without fear of being hit by cars. Passed some really beautiful scenery. Passed the most expensive hotel in Argentina which would set you back £1300 a night. Really enjoyed the bike ride though we all had very sore bums afterwards! And I did fall into a bush at one point :/ Basically I got startled when a car beeped it's horn at me and stumbled. Anyway enough of that.

The bus journey back to Lautaro was only 9 hours long. Nothing. We had a two hour changeover in Osorno. It's weird to be back in Chile because everything is familiar but still different from the way things are at home. In Argentina the people are also quite European with different hair colours and eye colours. Being back in Chile I feel very conspicuous again. Arrived home to a warm hug from Ruty. So nice to see her again. Had a big long chat before heading upstairs to unpack. I love having all my clothes in drawers again. And having other clothes to wear. It's great.

Us at the Argentina/Chile boarder

It's been a long road but it's great to be back. Starting school/work again on Monday or Tuesday.

Oh and in case you didn't know, I've re-uploaded the blogs from Machu Picchu and the Timeless one, with pictures included.

Timeless

Well now that me and Amina have both lost our phones we are timeless. We wander around doing things only to suddenly find out that it's half past 5. And to be honest travelling feels a bit like that. Things feel like they're going slowly but all of a sudden you realise that the time has flown by. We have less than a week left before we return to Lautaro. Even though I'm really excited to go back and see Ruty again, it will be a bit of a bummer not to be travelling anymore. It's been so much fun! We've met so many friendly, interesting people and seen so many amazing places. I've not had a single bad day, even when I was ill.

I'm really enjoying it now when people ask me if I can speak Spanish and I can say 'yes'. It feels so good. Like all that hard work is worth it. I mean I have to add that I'm not fluent but I really can have a conversation with someone so much easier than before. And talking to people that speak Spanish and they say that I can speak really well. If I try to protest they insist. Who am I to argue with them?

Salta

We took two buses to Salta, in the North of Argentina. The second one was so nice. We were upgraded to a cama seat which was sooo nice. I should explain that in, well all the countries we've been to, they have semi-cama, cama, or cama suite seats. Usually we go for semi-cama because it's the cheapest. The cama seat was so much bigger and comfier. It was great.

Argentina is quite like Europe. Very green and open. The roads are smooth which is great after the journey from Tupiza. The houses are really pretty and don't seem like they're about to fall down.

Salta is a really pretty place. We were there for only one day. We stepped off the bus at the station and were hit by a wall of heat. It was so hot! So different to Uyuni. A really nice guy helped us find a hostel and book bus tickets. The hostel was alright. We were just really happy to arrive after the long journey. Although it was a bit horrible when I was about to take a shower and there was a huge cockroach in the shower. And then we were in the kitchen and we saw a group of ants transporting some food thing up the wall. The next day we explored a little of Salta. It's such a nice place. Really pretty. We had to take the bus at 2 so we returned to our hostel and made a huge lunch of pasta.

The highlight of the bus journey was the amazing lightening storm we drove through at night. For about 2 hours there was just constant lightening flashes and forks. But it wasn't raining at all. And we only heard one rumble of thunder. It was amazing. I always thought I'd be scared in a big lightening storm but I wasn't. It was thrilling.

Puerto Iguazu

Puerto Iguazu was even hotter than Salta and really humid. We tried to walk to find our hostel but the map we'd been given was rubbish so we got a bit lost. Ended up taking a taxi and it was practically right next to the bus station. Nice place with a pool which was so refreshing. We relaxed for a bit and then we booked a boat tour for the next day.

Took a bus the next morning to the Nacional Park where the Iguazu Falls are. It was so exciting. We went first to the Garganta del Diablo (Devils throat), where there is one huge waterfall and lots of little ones all falling at the same point. You can see right down to the bottom - or you could if they didn't throw up so much mist. We got really wet standing there.

La garganta del diablo

In the park there were so many butterflies. You'd see one and then all of a sudden there would be a big swarm that would all swarm at you at once. Big yellow ones, blue and red ones, little white ones, grey ones, blue ones... every colour you could imagine. At one point I became butterfly women when they all decided to sit on me at once.

Next we walked to upper trail where we could see some waterfalls from above. I should explain that there are around 150 waterfalls over quite a large space. We could only see some of them up close. It was really cool to see the water falling. It looked a bit like glass. We stayed pretty wet all day getting up close to the falls. We saw lots of coatis walking around the park.

After lunch (we had to try and stop the coatis stealing and eating our food) we went on a boat ride. Now when I say boat ride, I mean immense speed boat ride. It was so much fun. We drove up the river for a while, speeding up over all the rapids, and tilting to very dangerous angles. Then we saw the waterfalls which looked pretty incredible from that viewpoint. We stopped to take photos and then stow away our shoes. Then we drove really, really close to the waterfalls. We were absolutely soaking! The water was so strong. We weren't under the fall, but the mist was so strong it was moving my contact lenses that were in my eyes! I couldn't see. But it was so much fun. Amina told me she broke down, lost all faith in humanity and started praying to Allah. I was just enjoying myself. It was great.

We arrived back on dry land (well, wet land) and walked to lower trail, where we saw some waterfalls from below. Got really wet again but by this point it didn't really matter. As it was getting later some more animals started to come out. We saw a big family of toucans in a tree and flying over the falls. It was amazing. All day we'd heard some sort of insect buzzing away in the bushes and there were these funny little birds that liked to make a lot of noise. Had such an amazing time at the falls. I would tell anyone to go.

Our last morning in Iguazu we walked to 'las tres fronteras', the point where Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina meet. Technically this is a river. So to really be there, we took a boat ride. This one much calmer than the day before. It was lovely to sail on the calm water and wave hello to Brazil. Amina was especially happy. I'm sure I've mentioned before how much she wishes she was Brazillian. Caught a great cama bus to Buenos Aires. We were constantly being given cakes and sweets and drinks. Dinner was great and the films were actually in English (with Spanish subtitles so I was still learning).

I swear Amina was happier than she looks in this photo

Buenos Aires

Arrived in Buenos Aires and took a really expensive taxi to our hostel (it's ok, Amina paid ;) ). Dumped all our bags, we seem to have collected quite an amount of stuff over our travels. We hit the city to see what was what. walked up the main road and saw the congress building. It's big. Then we walked down the main road and saw the main plaza and the casa rosada which is a really important building. It's where the President works and where all sorts of important meetings are held. We even went to a little museum about the plaza and some other thing that we couldn't quite work out what it was.

Congress

Plaza de Mayo and la casa rosada

Returned to the hostel to check-in and then it was back out to the city. We bought some food for a picnic and walked down to a big natural reserve park. We were walking for ages along this narrow path, trying to find some grass to have a picnic. We knew there was a lake there so we thought it might be nice to eat next to it. Arrived at a grassy area and saw this HUGE expanse of water in front of us. We both just thought "WOW that is a MASSIVE lake!" We were really confused. . . Then we realised that it was the Atlantic Ocean and the world started to make sense again.

I waved to you all across the Ocean

A park in the middle of the city

Had a really nice lunch looking at the birds and the "leaf insects" (ants carrying leaves, Amina refused to believe this until I showed her the ants). Spent about an hour walking out of the park because we got a bit lost. It was a really big park.

Day two in Buenos Aires we went out with two girls for the day. Marie (who we met in Iguazu. She's French) and Paulina (Mexican). We were going to go to a famous graveyard but we were on the bus and thought, why not go to the zoo? So we went to the zoo. It was really big and had loads of animals. A couple of vicuña which look much nicer out in the wild. There were lots of little animals wandering free in the zoo. The looked like a mix between rabbits, dogs and deer. Afterwards we had lunch in the Botanical Gardens nearby. There is so much to do in Buenos Aires.

We went out for dinner to a nice restaurant where we could sit outside. We had to be a table service charge (paying for the napkins etc, we thought about taking them seeing as we'd paid). Then the waiter told us that tips weren't included. Pshh we didn't want to tip him after that.

Day three in Buenos Aires, me and Amina spent the morning trying to find a museum by the bay. walked around a lot and found out it was shut. So we went to a shopping centre that's inside a big old building. Really pretty with loads of paintings on the ceiling. I tried the Argentinina ice cream, because someone had told me that it was amazing. It was pretty incredible.

Afterwards, we met up with Marie and Paulina in a really famous BA cafe called cafeteria Tortini. It's been running for over 150 years, and you can just feel the history it there. The waiters were wearing black and it was just so nice inside. And it wasn't hideously expensive like we'd thought it would be. It was pretty much the same as everywhere else we'd been.

Pointy bridge

A shopping centre with painted ceilings

Ice cream :)

Marie, Amina, me and Paulina

In the afternoon Amina, Marie and I went to la casa rosada, and walked all around it. Saw the Presidents office. It's quite cool because it's not a museum. The place is still used for all sorts of things. And it's really pretty. BA seems really European, especially in comparison to Puerto Iguazu where it seemed very much like we were in the jungle (which we were). BA is called the Paris of South America. It's really nice. There's so many pretty buildings and loads of parks and plazas to walk around. There's so much we haven't done because we haven't had the time.

This evening we went to a tango show at la cafeteria Tortini. It was so, so amazing. The dancing was incredible, the music was outstanding and the effects were really good. The timing and choreography that must have gone into it. There was a little mock cafe Tortini with the waiter singing and joking around. There would be little dances of tango that showed how cafe life was back when it was a new little cafe. Then the dances got longer and more amazing. A guy came on and started spinning some balls on a string while dancing. He was dancing so fast. It doesn't sound that amazing but it really was. It was incredible. I'm so happy we went to one. I would tell anyone to go and see one.