Day 5: Bosques del Mauco

May 10, 2012

Hola amigos! Welcome back to Viña del Mar, Chile. Today we got up pretty early again to go to another culture lecture with Jose Luiz, our instructor at the Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria. This lecture also focused on culture, but this time we talked about differences in doing business in Chile, Chilean ads and how they represent the culture, and Chilean music. Seeing the ads were really cool, and Chilean music and dancing is really interesting as well. After the lecture and a lunch of fish and rice in the university's cafeteria, we headed off to our second company visit at Bosques del Marco, a mushroom farming company that we reached after a picteresque 30 minute drive along the beach out of Viña del Mar. Bosques del Marco was some experience. Walking through the the different areas of the factory, we were flooded with one of the worst smells I have ever encountered, as the fertilizer for the shrooms was a mixture of chicken droppings and ammonia that had a scent which flooded my nostrils and nearly made me vomit. The smell followed us throughout the factory, but it was actually really cool inside, the way they grow the mushrooms in crates in giant stacks of 12, and then pick them by hand and package them fresh. Despite the smell, I am glad we got to see it. After grabbing a quick bite for dinner, we had our last dance class, this one being reggaeton for the second time. We reviewed the steps we learned from the first class and picked up some new ones; reggaeton is a lot of fun and a great cardio workout! It was sad to say goodbye to our instructor, David, as he was a lot of fun as an instructor. After the class, Constanza, one of the Chilean students, interviewed me in Spanish about organic restaurants for a project she was doing, it was a neat experience. And that brings us to now, blogging in the hotel, looking forward to going out to the discotheque later tonight when the Chilean students come pick us up!

 The worst smelling fertilizer in history

SHROOMS!

Fun fact of the day: Today is Chilean Mother's Day!

Hasta mañana,
Christian

Day 4: LAN Airlines

May 9, 2012

Hola Amigos! Today was a very interesting day. The day started off with a bus ride to Universidad Tecnica Federica Santa Maria, where we had a lecture from Jose Luiz, a  cool Chilean professor. His lecture to us was all about Chilean culture, and it was much more interesting than our previous lectures at the university. We went over several interesting aspects of life here in Chile, such as the education strike, Chilean art and literature, and earthquakes and their affect on Chile. After our lecture, we went to lunch in the Chilean cafeteria, but it wasn't very good, at least for me, as the empanadas they gave us were mainly filled with onions. After lunch, we left for a one and a half hour trip to visit LAN Airlines at the Chilean airport. We had a really cool Q and A with an engineer at LAN, and learned a lot about the company. After our tour of LAN and the hour and a half ride back to Viña del Mar, we had our second salsa lesson with our dance instructor, Davíd. Davíd really knew his salsa, as after only two days of classes, he had us moving and salsaing like seasoned professionals. It was a good time, and I feel like I could even teach a salsa lesson now that I've had it taught to me! After that, we split up into small groups for dinner, and then headed back to the hotel.

Planes at LAN Airlines

Fact of the Day: Since LAN Airlines merged with TAM Airlines in 2011, it has had no competition in South American airspace.

Hasta mañana,
Christian

Day 3: Santiago

May 8, 2012

Yet another amazing day has passed by here in Chile, it feels like we have already been here for weeks, has it really only been 3 days? We have done so much in there three days, as our days begin early in the morning and end so late at night. Today was no different, as we began our day with breakfast at 7:30 and an hour and a half bus ride to the capital city of Santiago followed. Our first stop in Santiago was the Santiago Stock Exchange, where we watched a video about the exchange, were given a presentation on the exchange, and then got to actually tour the trading floor. One thing that I found really interesting about the exchange is that nearly all of the trading is done online now, so the trading floor is virtually empty in recent years, used mainly as a museum and attraction for tourists and field trips. After leaving the stock exchange we began our grand tour of Santiago, and there were some very cool sights to see. We visited the Cathedral of Santiago, the oldest and largest church in Chile, and it was beautiful. I was awed the first time I was in Saint Paul's Cathedral in Pittsburgh, but the Cathedral of Santiago outshines it several times over. We also walked by La Moneda, the house where the Chilean presidents conduct affairs, and then took an incline up a gigantic hill near the edge of the city to look down and try to see as much of the city as possible. It was an interesting view. As far as the eye could see, was city. Santiago, with its 5 million inhabitants, stretches over an enormous amount of land, and because of the combination of that and the smog, we could not see the end of the city. In addition to touring Santiago, we had lunch there at Augusto's Fish Market, which was a giant restaurant seated inside a building that looked kinda like an old train station. My Chilean Sea Bass was quite good, but the salmon that other people got was out of this world. After the traffic-filled ride back to Valparaiso, we had our first reggaeton class, which is more upbeat dancing than salsa, basically the Chilean's party music. In our practice, we danced to fun songs like Danza Kuduro by Don Omar, and it was a great workout as well! The night ended with a nice group dinner, and now here I am late night blogging in the hotel.

Fact of the Day: Unlike American public restrooms, which always must be free for public use, Chilean public bathrooms cost 300 pesos to use!

Hasta mañana,
Christian

 The trading floor of the Santiago Stock Exchange

 Inside of the Cathedral of Santiago

The view of Santiago from the highest point in the city

Day 2: Life in Chile

May 7, 2012

Today was our first full day in Chile, and it really is an amazing change in culture and I am so glad to be here! We started the day with breakfast at the hotel, which consisted mainly of bread, jam, a little meat and cheese, yogurt, and juice, after a nice run along the beach. We were lucky, the day started off warm enough that we could run in shorts, and the weather only got nicer from there. We left to catch the public bus to go to the Universidad Tecnica Federica Santa Maria at like 8:30, and that was an interesting experience, as the bus probably went about 30 km over the speed limit and it flew around the curves! Once at the university, Javier and another Chilean student, Camilo, gave us a tour of the university. It is actually pretty similar to an American university, except without dorms, and the soccer field being the main sports arena instead of the football field. Then we had a lengthy but informative lecture on South American economies by one of the university's professors. Following the lecture was lunch in the university cafeteria, which is very different from US cafeterias, as there is only one plate to get (today it was blood sausage), and the seating area of the cafeteria was completely packed! After our time at the university, we were taken on a tour of Viña del Mar and Valparaiso, the two connected cities in which we are living and spending most of our time. The cities are both centered around a giant cove of the Pacific Ocean, and are surrounded by hills, and the layout of the cities is the biggest buildings are near the coast, and then the cities just sprawl up the hills. This may be the largest amount of land I have ever seen taken up by one metropolitan area, as even at the tops of the hills, you cant possibly see the entire city! The streets in the city are crazy as well, winding up and down hills, full of perilous turns and flying motorists. After touring, we finally got to get empanadas for dinner, and they were as delicious as I had hoped! Dinner was followed up by our first salsa class, which was actually a lot of fun, and I will comment on that more in Wednesday's blog after our second class, so hopefully by that point I will be more proficient and can comment on my progress. Lastly, after salsa, we were taken to a karaoke bar by the Chilean students, and had an enjoyable end to a full day. 

Fun fact of the day: Chilean karaoke bars have as many American songs as they have Spanish songs

Hasta Mañana,

Christian

La Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria

 Valparaiso, Chile

Mike dancing the salsa with our dance instructor, David

Day 1: We Made It!

May 6, 2012

We are finally in Viña Del Mar, Chile! It is wonderful to be here and finally see what its like to be immersed in a Hispanic culture. We boarded the plane from Miami about a half hour later than expected, in fact we were the last people to board, but still managed to get off just about on time. The flight went smoothly, mostly sleeping and listening to music, they had "We Bought a Zoo" playing on the TV but I determined sleep was much higher on my priority list. The flight lasted roughly 8.5 hours and at around 7:35 Eastern time (which is the same time as here in Chile currently due to Daylight Savings Time) we landed in Santiago! We had an interesting time getting through customs, as we had to pay an entrance fee to get in to Chile from the US. Our wonderful trip advisor Sarah had the fees prepared for us to pay, but the customs officers wouldn't take a lot of the bills because they were "too wrinkled!" So that was a hassle, but we eventually made it. After taking our first Chilean pesos out of the ATM and meeting our first Chilean student, Javier, we boarded the bus to take us to Viña Del Mar. It was a hour and a half bus ride and we saw some cool sights along the way. We then checked into our hotel, had some fun trying to get the key to work (never thought bending a key would fix it!), and went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant. Food was good and huge portions, we had variety ranging from steak and eggs to blood sausage to fajitas. After that was the highlight of the day, we went to a Chilean soccer game! The game was crazy, fans were chanting and screaming the whole time, cards were being thrown out left and right, and the home team of "Everton de Viña del Mar" came back from a 2-0 defecit vs San Marco while playing down two players to win 3-2 late in the second half. I've never seen police with riot shields used to escort a referee out of a stadium before! Also learned that Chileans don't boo when they are angry at sporting events, they whistle instead (I'm personally not a fan, doesn't give off the same angry vibe that a good boo does!). Let's just say there was a LOT of whistling during that game! It was so much fun, and I got an Everton flag as a souvenir! So now we are back at the hotel, we plan to go out to grab dinner soon, and then chill here until bed. Early day tomorrow, as we are up at 7:30 to go to our first Chilean lecture!
Hasta mañana,
Christian

Day 1/2: Almost There!

May 5, 2012

This is my second trip blog entry and sadly we still are not in Chile! We had this morning to hang out and get prepared to go, a couple of us grabbed Dunkin Donuts for breakfast and then we met at the bus stop at 1250. We all managed to pile onto the 28X airport flyer, that was a fun ride as we took up basically the whole bus! But we made it to the airport, and at 500, headed off to Miami, and made it safe and sound, although it may have been the tiniest tightest plane I've ever been on. We all grabbed dinner at TGI Friday's in the Miami airport (which is a very poorly laid out airport if anyone was wondering), but it was a cool meal as one of the chefs came out to talk to us and he was a world traveler, having been in over 40 different countries! So now here I am, waiting to board in Miami, soo excited to finally get to Chile! Unfortunately there is no internet here so this will be posted tomorrow as I am only doing this in Word.

Next stop: Chile!

Day 0: Group Bonding

Friday May 4, 2012

This is my first actual trip blog. Our trip begins tomorrow, as today we had to check in to Tower B to stay the night here at Pitt before leaving tomorrow. I checked in at around 2:00 brought my stuff up to my room and just hung around with the other guys for a while. We had our meeting for all the groups where we had to put on skits about what not to do in our countries. They were quite funny, especially the German group with the repetitive WWII references. After that, we went to dinner as a group, and had the rest of the night free to just hang out with all of our group mates. It was a fun night, as I really didn't know anyone in the group very well until last night, and we finally got to hang out and get to know each other. I am really excited to finally leave tomorrow, I can't wait to actually get to Chile!