There is lots to update you on but it also occurred to me that I have hardly spoken about the all the delicious foods I have been eating since I arrived here (practically a month ago??!?!?)...so I am going to share, get ready to drool.
First, possibly the most popular chilean food (besides meat) are empanadas, there is no way to explain an empanada to someone and do it justice...the taste of it is like a party in your mouth...a really good party with lots of people and dancing. Empanadas are either baked or fried (both are delicious) and could have just about anything in them, the most popular in Chile are Pino (some sort of mixture of meat and onions, this is the chilean empanada), cheese, mushrooms and cheese, and just plain meat. And if the empanada wasn't good enough it is like a little surprise every time you eat one because they shove a little green olive in each one and you always know it is coming but you never now when :)!
Next, MEAT, if you are a vegitarian and are visiting this country or living in the this country I feel so bad for you because the meat here is INCREDIBLE, it's another party in your mouth for sure. I have tried all kinds and most of the time I am not even sure what type I am eating but it all just tastes so good. In fact I had my first or second piece of chicken since I have been here because all the meat they serve here is red! And this weekend for the first time in my life I ate raw meat, now I am not just saying I tried it, or it was a small bite, no, I mean I had a whole bowl of red meat. It is a very common meal here and the name is slipping my mind but it is doused in lemons and onions and the lemons are supposed to make the raw meat safe to eat (i don't get it but maybe someone who is science savvy can help me out). When I ate it all I could really taste were the lemons so I tried to pretend I was just eating cooked meat, I think that I have been told my whole life that eating raw meat was bad so it was hard to overcome my fear. A while back I also tried something even more interesting. Again, I wasn't quite sure what I was eating but my mom's boyfriend assured me it was tasty, I should have said no because of the look on my moms face but I thought I had nothing to lose. Afterwards I found out that I had just eaten horse...now I clearly have no problem eating certain animals but horses is where I draw the line. Although it tasted yummy (sort of like beef jerky) I told my moms boyfriend that one taste of it was good enough for me.
FISH! Fish is also all over the place here and I LOVE IT! This weekend I had raw fish with onions and lemon (the same as the meat dish above but with fish instead). That was delicious and I had less of a problem eating a bowl of raw fish because I love sushi so much. I had less of a problem until we found a little red worm floating around in the leftovers. We tried to kill the worm with different types of alcohol, because if it died from a certain type we all said we would take a swig of that alcohol to ensure that the worm wasn't alive inside our stomachs. It didn't die until we cut it in half. No problems with my stomach yet (keep your fingers crossed please)
Bread, the amount of bread that is eaten here is redic, I guess it is no more than what I remember in Spain, but it is just so much. They eat bread for breakfast and bread for dinner. In Chile most families eat a small breakfast and a small dinner which they call once, that usually consists of bread and avocado, and then they eat a fairly large lunch. Thank goodness my mom and boyfriend eat a big dinner because I love food to much to just have bread for dinner.
Fruits and vegetables: I know I told many of you who are reading that I would be unable to eat most fruits and veggies, but I was wrong, it turns out the water here in Santiago is much better than the rest of Chile and other places in South America so we can eat all the fruits and vegetables we want. I have been eating tons of bananas and apples because they are so cheap and SO much avocado. Fresh salads consists of cut up iceberg lettuce with lemon and oil, although they are somewhat tasty I am missing the delicious salads I am so accustomed to at home.
Obviously I am eating lots more types of food than listed above but those are some of the favorites.
Since this weekend was Independence weekend and I was at the beach with my family we had many bbq's (or asado). My mom and her boyfriend rented a house about 5 minutes from the beach and about an hour and a half away from Santiago in the town where I had orientation back in August. It was nice to revisit the same place and feel like something was familiar. We spent lots of time relaxing in the house and lots of time walking along the beach. Unfortunately it was too cold to even touch the water but I founds lots of beautiful seashells that I had never seen before (i found purple ones!).
This week will be a busy one, with seminars and visiting the schools that we will spend about 7 sessions with. I am very excited to spend some consistent time in a classroom and get to some students as well as the teacher. This weekend I will be heading to Valparaiso with the program to explore! I am so excited! Here are a few pictures and I swear this is the week I will get more pictures up on snapfish ( I think there are about 500 more to put up, get excited!).
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