Cooking Again

Because Italo has class every Saturday and I tutor, we usually grab a quick bite to eat on the way to somewhere else and have gotten out of the practice of going to la vega and cooking a big meal. Today, my kiddies were down south with their parents so I got back in the kitchen. I bought some reineta and veggies and grabbed the coconut milk my friend gave me and made Moqueca, a Brazilian fish stew. It was delicious, but the coconut milk makes it a heavy dish that would make my cuñada sick just thinking about how that mixes with the paprika, red pepper, and other spices. It's perfect if you want to lounge around afterwards, but now I need to go out and all I want is a nap!

I finally decided to take a picture, but it's from my computer so it's no masterpiece:

Vamos a Decir que NO!

I don't know how it took me so long to see this video, and the others, but I'm glad I finally did:



This is from the 1988 Chilean National Plebiscite-where the Chilean people voted to end Augusto Pinochet's 16 1/2 year rule. Well, 56% of the Chilean people voted that way. The others were singing a different tune. Literally:



If you type anything about the Chilean Plebiscite on youtube, you'll find plenty of videos from both sides (more from "no") and if you're like me, you'll get lost watching the doctored videos with red images dripping down the screen to reveal burning buses and chaos.

Now, I'm certainly not going to get into a Pinochet discussion per se, but lately I have not been able to avoid this taboo conversation topic as much as I'd like to sometimes.

Because of my job, I teach mainly one type of man (nope, no lady student of mine fits the description) who share many things in common. They are wealthy, Catholic (more precisely Opus Dei), and conservative engineers who studied at either Universidad Los Andes or La Católica. I'm not generalizing here. It's a fact. I have all of their information in my teacher's binder. Here in Chile, these characteristics are pretty much code for "I'm a Pinochetista, or at least my parents were. And I voted for Piñera."* Most anyone in Chile will tell you that they can figure out (and they do try to figure it out) which "side" of the Allende/Pinochet uhh, "issue" a person is on within the first few minutes of meeting them and quite frankly, it's impossible not to. The signs are obvious and it's just something you pick up on here.

When I teach I don't bring up the old Allende/Pinochet** discussion ever for many reasons. Recently, however, my students have wanted to talk about this and everything associated with it when they've never even mentioned it before. Last week, one student laid his opinion out on the table and then went on and on about his feelings on having kept his mouth shut before. It was more like a therapy session on not being able to talk about his beliefs than anything else. Then on Friday, I had a much louder student give me an angry history lecture on the Chilean military (not at all what I learned from 4 years of Latin American Studies and 6 months of Chilean history courses here). Not a huge deal, but it's just so out of the norm that something's got to be going on. I really got the sense that these two students are fed up with being quiet about things and aren't going to stand it much longer. I'm extrapolating A LOT since I only have two examples to go by, but I definitely sense a change in how people who hummed along to the sí song back in 1988 talk about their political beliefs and I wonder if anyone else has had a similar experience.

*Someone pointed out that I'm making a direct comparison between Pinochet and Piñera, politically speaking, which is not what I mean to do, but I guess I need some writing classes to get that point across better :) What I mean to say is that this group of students I'm talking about supported Pinochet and also voted for Piñera. Piñera is not at all like Pinochet and I don't want to make readers think it's like that or that I think that.

**I'm also not saying that Allende was some dream president. AT ALL. I definitely sympathize more with the left in this case, but it would be naive of me to think one's the bad guy and the other's the good guy. And I tend to think every politician has a little (maybe a lot) of bad in him/her anyhow.

Milk Money

First, welcome my mom (and I'm sure my dad, too) to the blog. I have never told anyone at home that I have this, but a few internet savvy people have found it anyway. I guess it's time to come clean to the folks back in VA and admit I'm a blogger:

Hi, my name is Isabel and I have a blog.

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I'm in Starbucks right now. I'm in A Starbucks at least 4 times a week. I sit and use the free internet and drink an OK coffee of the day. I have almost always ordered the coffee of the day because it's quick and it's cheap. They fill it up while I'm paying and I get out of Starbucks within minutes.

This is not the case in Chile. Because I ask for a coffee with "one finger of milk" (this is our system so that I don't get a cortado, or half coffee/half milk because my "poquito" is not the same as other peoples' "poquito"), the coffee must go down the line to the espresso bar. Always. Without fail. Inevitably, I wait along with everyone else to get my coffee with milk. This is because there is no milk on the counter with the sugar and the napkins. Once, I went to a Santiago Starbucks and there was milk on the counter, but I haven't seen it since then. I have wondered why they don't put the milk out here and have come up with two possibilities:

1. The milk isn't hot if it's out on the counter. Many Chileans I know love hot milk. They drink it at breakfast and they buy a cortado mostly for the heated milk. When your coffee goes through the espresso line, you get warm to hot milk and sometimes even foam (I love those days) in your coffee. It sorta makes sense that the milk isn't out on the counter if people are going to be asking the employees to heat it up anyway.


2. People will use the free milk too liberally. Again because many Chileans love their milk, maybe Starbucks is worried some will help themselves to glassfulls of it once they've finished their coffee. I'm pretty positive this is at least part of the reason, but you never know. It's just funny to think about because it would never occur to me to refill my cup with milk, but it has always occurred to me to refill my soda at Taco Bell even if you're not supposed to.

The kitchen/bedroom??

It's been a lazy saturday evening after a crazy busy week and I'm topping it all off with a big glass of wine in bed while I stream Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations episodes. I pretty much always watch Anthony Bourdain and drink wine frequently, but I just started to think about how much of the wine I drink in Chile is drunk in bed.

Eating/drinking in bed is one Chilean (or maybe just the Chileans I know?) habit I've adopted. I kinda hate it/kinda love it. Italo and I often eat breakfast in bed on Sunday mornings and since we both work late, we also end up crashing in bed when we get home at night and because I require a glass of red wine after a long day, I end up drinking it in bed because I'm so tired. This may seem symptomatic of alcoholism to some, but I see it as my adaptation of a pretty universal Chilean custom: eating in bed.

I was never, EVER allowed to do this growing up and I had no problem with it. Eating in bed just doesn't feel right. I hate crumbs in the bed and since I'm a messy person, they're inevitable. But when I first got here, my host family would always encourage my breakfast and me to get a room. In fact, we all went our separate ways in the morning to "enjoy" our crappy nescafe "en cama" and then I just sort of picked up the practice and never looked back.

Now, I rarely have time to eat breakfast and I almost never eat lunch at my apartment during the work week, so I've taken to eating my dinner or at least taking my wine to bed with me. Since I'm messy, this also means that halfway through the next day, you're almost sure to find an empty (SOMETIMES half-empty, but not often) wine glass on my nightstand. Some people have a glass of water next to them. Others just a bedside lamp and a magazine. But me? No. No. I have the remnants of my nightcap.

I don't think many other people drink wine in bed, but plenty of Chileans drink tea and eat bread inbed. I still hate that I do this because the thought of crumbs in my sheets drives me crazy, but I haven't been able to fight it, either.There's something so decadently wrong about making your bed your kitchen table, too.It's also completely understandable sometimes. Especially during the winter months where the only semi-warm place is under the covers, it's hard to argue against it.

I've resolved to kick this nasty habit once I have heat and manage to get the tv out of the bedroom and into the tv room where it belongs (another Chilean habit I cannot shake), but in the mean time, salud and goodnight!

All Dried Up

This winter is incredibly dry. Most winters in Santiago are dry, but this one is taking its toll on my body. To start with the ugly, it gives me dandruff. Generally I buy shampoo for oily hair, but that's all changed this winter. Even my face flakes if I don't moisturize it 3 times a day. EW, I know, but I buy special moisturizer that I've never found here so this winter is costing me dolla dolla bills.

Second comes the gross. I got my first nosebleed in about uhhhhh 15 years yesterday. I was talking on gchat with my sister and thinking, wow one of my nostrils is bigger than the other and then I realized it wasn't bigger, it was just dripping blood and looked bigger in my computer's camera. My dad's side of the family is known for nosebleeds in winter time, but it's never happened to me. Santiago winter has changed that. I am now my father's daughter. I can feel the sting each time I breathe deeply through my nose.

Third comes the OLD. My hands are absolutely, positively 40 years older than I am. They are so wrinkly I can't look at them without freaking myself out. If anyone's seen the movie The Others, remember when you think you'll find a little girl playing under a veil, but rather you see an old lady's hand sticks out from underneath it?? Sorry if I ruined that surprise but my face is the little girl and my hands are the old, wrinkly lady. I'm resorting to sleeping with Vasoline smeared hands in cotton gloves.

I never thought I'd say this, but I think I miss (SOME OF) the humidity of Northern Virginia. At least my hair, skin and nose are normal there. Now, I have to worry about things I thought I'd get to put off for almost another 10 years. Thanks, Chile, thanks.

Cat Castration

I'm sure someone has already posted about this, but it cracks me up/infuriates me how so many Chileans view fixing your male cat (and dog) as cruel and unnecessary.

This morning I had an early private class and then I went to return my friend's cat carrier that I had borrowed last week to take McNulty to get the big snip. I brought the empty carrier to my student's apartment and naturally, he was curious about it. When I told him what I used it for he said, "PLEASE tell me it was a gata and not a gato!!". The look on his face when I told him McNulty is indeed a gatO was that of excruciating pain. He just couldn't understand why on earth I would do such a thing to an animal I supposedly love, especially since he's not the one who would make the mistake of getting pregnant. This CRACKED ME UP and made me want to give him a little refresher course on the birds and the bees. Hello! It takes two to tango.

This student is otherwise very intelligent, but he just can't grasp why it's necessary to both spay female cats AND neuter male cats. To him, it's not my problem if McNulty sleeps around the town because we won't have any of his illegitimate kittens to deal with. When I brought up the fact that other people would have to deal with them he said, "wow, that's very considerate of you to fix him for other people." And then he went back to the fact that it was painful to even think about what I had done when in reality, it is much more invasive and painful for female cats than it is for male cats to get fixed.

Now, I don't want to single just this one student out because I've heard it from so many people, which explains why so many Chileans prefer male pets to female pets; because then they don't have to "worry" about anything. This is one of those cultural differences that I can laugh at, but when I really start to think about what's behind that thinking it's upsetting.

I won't get into that (in this post, at least), but come on Chileans. Take animal balls for what they are! In fact, take all balls for what they are: 50% responsible for offspring.

These boots really are made for walking

So maybe I've lived in Chile too long to know any better, but I've had a lot of luck shopping the past week...so much so that I'd say I really like the clothes that are out right now. In fact, I LOVE what I bought. Granted, one thing was a ridiculously cheap dress originally from J. Crew but my other purchase was a pair of Chilean boots I just adore. I might even go as far as to say that Chile has a better boot selection than the US. WOW, yup. I said it.

I think I can rationalize this by saying that I prefer one Chilean style (the shorter, wide boots with no heels). The U.S. is teeming with sexy, tall boots that I'll never even try on. Why? Because I cannot wear them and if "what not to Wear" and my mother have taught me anything, it's that good fit always trumps what's fashionable. I'm too short and my calves are too big for anything tall to go on them so I adore the tiny Chilean boots that don't come up far enough to turn my ankles into those dreaded cankles. What I also love about my recent purchases is that both were very reasonably priced which is a rarity when shopping in Chile.

What's going on here? Are things "en oferta" actually going to be a deal? Are we going to see a Target and an H&M pop up so we can look both stylish and afford our apartments? Is Chile finally realizing its clothes are ridiculously overpriced??

HAH, NO! I know it was just luck. I don't think Chile's quite there yet on the affordable, well-made, fashionable clothing. But I'm happy with my two good deals.

Here's a picture of my beloved footwear (I originally took that picture to show my mom/get her approval which is why you can see newly-mohawked Italo in the background):