Mi horario loco
The past few days have been fairly hectic--I had an oral presentation due for my COPA Spanish class on Thursday, classes started at my other university on Wednesday and Thursday, I had my very first physical therapy session today, and it's been absolutely gorgeous, meaning that I never wanted to be inside where it remains completamente helada (freezing)--especially since I managed to melt my outlet on Wednesday night while trying to finish my powerpoint presentation.
I got up super early Wednesday morning and headed to my first class at the Universidad de Valparaíso (monográfico de américa y chile--apparently focusing on geography, but not really sure), which has its history and philosophy building all of four blocks from my house. My compulsive earliness is getting fairly annoying, especially given the high percentage of professorial no-shows in this country. So there I was, standing awkwardly in the history building courtyard, watching as abrigados Chileans wandered in and began to cluster into little circular groups, many laughing at Chile's new no smoking in public places law which had just gone into effect. It seemed odd to me that several people couldn't understand me when I asked them what I thought to be a simple question of which class they were taking in an attempt to track down my classroom. I finally figured out that people here don't think in terms of classes as much as they do in terms of years. At one point, students started magically deciding to file in various directions, and I hitched myself onto the end of one of the lines and luckily ended up in the right place. About a half-hour after class was supposed to start, the prof still hadn't shown up, but something fantastic had happened in the mean time--real live Chileans had struck up multiple conversations with me. I even made jokes and people understood them and laughed. I was the only gringa anywhere on the premisice, and I felt myself desperately trying to stifle my ridiculous gringa grin, at least until it could break loose a little more discretely. So I learned several names--and even remember a few--but was really depressed to find out that the schedule had changed without my knowing it, so instead of having two classes with the same group of kids, now I can only have one. And so the search for a fixed class schedule continues....
After that, I tried to head over to the sociology building to catch a class that I was also interested in, but of course that schedule had changed as well, so instead I returned home and worked on my oral presentation. My poetry class later that day actually happened, though I thought it was fairly odd to sit there for and hour and a half listening to a profesor interpret a poem for me. The whole lack of discourse thing is hard to get used to, but it was interesting if nothing else. Afterward, I headed back to the history building at UV and spoke with un montón of people--professors, administrators, secretaries, students--who were all very patient and answered my questions. I've decided I really like this university--all the students showed up in punk clothing, about half of them wearing the black All-Stars I left at home. One of the girls I met while waiting for our prof told me that, in relation to la Católica, UV is really revolutionary and less formal. The lack of professors seemed to back up her claim. But everyone's also so much more welcoming and community-like than at la Católica--even when an extranjera confuses a professor for someone else and looks a little foolish and lost.
That night my toasty-warm room suddenly went cold as I realized that odd smell--which was kind of reminiscent of melting rubber--wasn't coming from the kitchen where my host mom is intent on frying everything under the fridge, but was actually the result of my beloved estufa rendering my surge protector useless and my outlet permanently seared to the plug. And now I can't watch tv.
Thursday I headed to my sociology class I tried to go to the day before, and found myself surrounded by many dozen chileans (and I think two french students) in a small room with a professor who came up with the bright idea of calling on random people and asking them to tell him what they knew about Latin America. The title of the course is the social and political history of Latin America, so this seemed like a reasonable, if ridiculously vague and unfair, question. Turns out, not many people know very much about Latin America. I found it very odd as student after student announced that they couldn't even attempt to answer the question. One who did answer it gave a very Euro-centric response about how it's a region that shares a common history, common culture, common language, etc. The professor looked concerned and went on a tangent about the complete lack of research coming out of the region--and especially Chile--on estudios latinoamericanos. I sat there, playing with the idea of what it meant to be sitting in a room full of Latin American students who knew nothing about the region, knowing that I am a Latin American Studies major trained to distinguish between looking at a place as a whole and recognizing the individuality of every country and culture. I also prayed (successfully) that he wouldn't call on me. It also turns out that map quizzes are not just confined to my sixth grade social studies class, which is cool cause I've always liked them.
My oral presentation later that day went fairly well, despite the fact that the story I was assigned is now the most hated story to ever have been read by COPA students. I even managed to come up with some pretty intriguing--though probably silly--themes about the presence of unnatural couples in the story. Afterward I went to the extranjero dance class, where I looked on glumly as everyone else fumbled trying to hop along to the cuenca steps. But later we did merengue, and I was at least able to keep up. Our best laid plans to go to Huevo, a heavily-frequented Valpo club, slowly died that night as Amanda, Graciela and I were treated to her mom's hot wine mixed with orange juice, cinnamon, and sugar in her estufa-laden apartment. We had a great time, though, looking over their pictures from Atacama and chatting the night away over bread.
Today I went back to my influencia anglosajona class today, which I still haven't made a final decision about. It's pretty sweet having the professor talk about me to the entire class all the time, but I'm not sure I really want a Friday class, especially if the powerpoint presentations are going to consist mostly of very dead white men juxtaposed with Hollywood's mass-produced renditions of their lives (think: Henry VIII, William Wallace, oh, and the tokenly female Queen Elizabeth). I also never realized how confusing it would be to try to take history notes when all the names have changed. It took me several seconds to realize who Anna Bolena was, for example.
My much-awaited physical therapy fax finally arrived yesterday, and Vivi drove me to my very first appointment this afternoon. It was all very exciting--there was ultrasound and one of those football player bath thingies that I got to put my foot in and move it around in the warm circulating water, and there were even fun exercises involving paper and slippery wooden things. The less fun part was at the end when my therapist thought it would be another three months before I could hike or play sports. I really didn't think this was going to take so long, and I'm having trouble dealing with the thought of spending a semester in Chile and never being able to hike in the Andes or travel to all the places of been dying to see. My love for shopping carts is being tested. But things are good--if slightly chilly indoors--I'm hoping to see some beaches this weekend.
I got up super early Wednesday morning and headed to my first class at the Universidad de Valparaíso (monográfico de américa y chile--apparently focusing on geography, but not really sure), which has its history and philosophy building all of four blocks from my house. My compulsive earliness is getting fairly annoying, especially given the high percentage of professorial no-shows in this country. So there I was, standing awkwardly in the history building courtyard, watching as abrigados Chileans wandered in and began to cluster into little circular groups, many laughing at Chile's new no smoking in public places law which had just gone into effect. It seemed odd to me that several people couldn't understand me when I asked them what I thought to be a simple question of which class they were taking in an attempt to track down my classroom. I finally figured out that people here don't think in terms of classes as much as they do in terms of years. At one point, students started magically deciding to file in various directions, and I hitched myself onto the end of one of the lines and luckily ended up in the right place. About a half-hour after class was supposed to start, the prof still hadn't shown up, but something fantastic had happened in the mean time--real live Chileans had struck up multiple conversations with me. I even made jokes and people understood them and laughed. I was the only gringa anywhere on the premisice, and I felt myself desperately trying to stifle my ridiculous gringa grin, at least until it could break loose a little more discretely. So I learned several names--and even remember a few--but was really depressed to find out that the schedule had changed without my knowing it, so instead of having two classes with the same group of kids, now I can only have one. And so the search for a fixed class schedule continues....
After that, I tried to head over to the sociology building to catch a class that I was also interested in, but of course that schedule had changed as well, so instead I returned home and worked on my oral presentation. My poetry class later that day actually happened, though I thought it was fairly odd to sit there for and hour and a half listening to a profesor interpret a poem for me. The whole lack of discourse thing is hard to get used to, but it was interesting if nothing else. Afterward, I headed back to the history building at UV and spoke with un montón of people--professors, administrators, secretaries, students--who were all very patient and answered my questions. I've decided I really like this university--all the students showed up in punk clothing, about half of them wearing the black All-Stars I left at home. One of the girls I met while waiting for our prof told me that, in relation to la Católica, UV is really revolutionary and less formal. The lack of professors seemed to back up her claim. But everyone's also so much more welcoming and community-like than at la Católica--even when an extranjera confuses a professor for someone else and looks a little foolish and lost.
That night my toasty-warm room suddenly went cold as I realized that odd smell--which was kind of reminiscent of melting rubber--wasn't coming from the kitchen where my host mom is intent on frying everything under the fridge, but was actually the result of my beloved estufa rendering my surge protector useless and my outlet permanently seared to the plug. And now I can't watch tv.
Thursday I headed to my sociology class I tried to go to the day before, and found myself surrounded by many dozen chileans (and I think two french students) in a small room with a professor who came up with the bright idea of calling on random people and asking them to tell him what they knew about Latin America. The title of the course is the social and political history of Latin America, so this seemed like a reasonable, if ridiculously vague and unfair, question. Turns out, not many people know very much about Latin America. I found it very odd as student after student announced that they couldn't even attempt to answer the question. One who did answer it gave a very Euro-centric response about how it's a region that shares a common history, common culture, common language, etc. The professor looked concerned and went on a tangent about the complete lack of research coming out of the region--and especially Chile--on estudios latinoamericanos. I sat there, playing with the idea of what it meant to be sitting in a room full of Latin American students who knew nothing about the region, knowing that I am a Latin American Studies major trained to distinguish between looking at a place as a whole and recognizing the individuality of every country and culture. I also prayed (successfully) that he wouldn't call on me. It also turns out that map quizzes are not just confined to my sixth grade social studies class, which is cool cause I've always liked them.
My oral presentation later that day went fairly well, despite the fact that the story I was assigned is now the most hated story to ever have been read by COPA students. I even managed to come up with some pretty intriguing--though probably silly--themes about the presence of unnatural couples in the story. Afterward I went to the extranjero dance class, where I looked on glumly as everyone else fumbled trying to hop along to the cuenca steps. But later we did merengue, and I was at least able to keep up. Our best laid plans to go to Huevo, a heavily-frequented Valpo club, slowly died that night as Amanda, Graciela and I were treated to her mom's hot wine mixed with orange juice, cinnamon, and sugar in her estufa-laden apartment. We had a great time, though, looking over their pictures from Atacama and chatting the night away over bread.
Today I went back to my influencia anglosajona class today, which I still haven't made a final decision about. It's pretty sweet having the professor talk about me to the entire class all the time, but I'm not sure I really want a Friday class, especially if the powerpoint presentations are going to consist mostly of very dead white men juxtaposed with Hollywood's mass-produced renditions of their lives (think: Henry VIII, William Wallace, oh, and the tokenly female Queen Elizabeth). I also never realized how confusing it would be to try to take history notes when all the names have changed. It took me several seconds to realize who Anna Bolena was, for example.
My much-awaited physical therapy fax finally arrived yesterday, and Vivi drove me to my very first appointment this afternoon. It was all very exciting--there was ultrasound and one of those football player bath thingies that I got to put my foot in and move it around in the warm circulating water, and there were even fun exercises involving paper and slippery wooden things. The less fun part was at the end when my therapist thought it would be another three months before I could hike or play sports. I really didn't think this was going to take so long, and I'm having trouble dealing with the thought of spending a semester in Chile and never being able to hike in the Andes or travel to all the places of been dying to see. My love for shopping carts is being tested. But things are good--if slightly chilly indoors--I'm hoping to see some beaches this weekend.
posted by Emily Schulman | 7:12 PM
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