Aaaaaachew!

Despite being more than just a little sniffly, I braved the sunshine last week and signed up to el gymo. When they told me to come in for an "evaluación", I feared the worst. And guess what? I was right to. After waiting around for like half an hour, a smug fitness freak called Fernando called me into a cramped office. He weighed me, and then proceeded to get out a small, pinching contraption to measure my body fat percentage - uh oh. The humiliation didn't end there: after a 10-minute warm-up on the cross-trainer, he took me on a circuit of the weights machines where I used muscles I didn't even know existed. Ohhh, the pain. I might just skip the next one...

In other news, on Friday I went to a proper aufentic Chilean concert that was held in the open air at the Universidad de Chile's engineering campus. It was basically a massive street party full of drunkards and tropical muzak. After a few beers, I attempted to dance latino-style i.e. actually move my hips in a slightly rhythmic way. The results were less than pretty, but I sure had fun trying.

On Sunday, a group including meself, my American ex-flatmate Julie, her Swedish friend, plus three chileans and two other brits (oh how very international) went off to a stunning canyon a few hours from the city called Cajon del Maipo. Although some of us hadn't exactly come prepared for the conditions - normal trainers + a scrambly start x a fair bit of snow = duuuh - it was definitely worth it; the views were increíble and we even got a peek at a real-life glacier. The insanely bumpy bus ride there and back was quite the thrill ride - at a certain point it felt like we were going to bounce right off the hill. As I always say, tis all part of the Sarrrf American experience innit.

...Of soaps, stalkers and strange hostels...

Lola is a new "teleserie" that began a few weeks ago and it has a fantastically barmy central gimmick: the titular character is actually a man who has been transformed into a woman by a weird old witch after he seriously pissed off a one night stand by promising her the world and then failing to return any of her calls. If that sounds convoluted, fear ye not - it's just the tip of a very farcical iceberg. The soaps here might not be quite as trashy as those from Mexico/Brasil, but they are just as dramatic; each climactic moment is preceeded by a "duh-duh-duh-duh-duh!" sequence of stabbing strings. What can I say, I'm hooked.

Back in the real world, I have followed through with me plan to increase my presence at uni, and rewards have been reaped. I now assist with a couple more classes in which the teachers are actually glad to have me as a native-speaker-resource, I've hung out with the students more and my first office hour was a success! On the other hand, I do seem to have gained a semi-stalker girl: the first years warned me she was a "gringo-eater" and a few times now she's appeared out of nowhere and started blatantly flirting with yours truly... uh oh.

Yesterday, my flatmate Julie and I decided to head off to Valparaiso, a bohemian and colourfully chaotic coastal city a couple of hours from Santiago. We enjoyed an unexpectedly fancy lunch with beautifully presented tapas on arriving there, and proceeded to wander around and explore the characteristic hills filled with zig-zagging streets and mucho graffiti art; this included riding on the famous wooden lifts, creaky contraptions that don't feel entirely safe, but have contributed to the city being named a UNESCO World Heritage site as they are apparently in danger of disappearing - I wonder why that might be?!

I was originally planning to stay the night, but felt the beginnings of a cold coming on and so decided to make it a day trip instead. Fate, however, had other things in mind; after hanging out in a dimly-lit bar for a while where the music policy seemed to consist solely of cheesy 80s ballads, we headed to the bus station only to be informed that the last bus for the capital had left half an hour earlier - demonios! We ended up being lead to a hostel by a woman we encountered there, who promised us a cheap room with a private bathroom. What we got was bug-ridden bed sheets and mysterious voices/noises throughout the night! Ah well, at least none of us got bitten...

¿Me estas huevoneando?

There is nothing quite like the taste of freshly-brewed Chilean bureaucracy. I have paid two visits to the central police station, three to my local civil registry, waited in queues for hours... and I still don't have my ID card. The British Council told me that the phrase "patience is a virtue" would be the understatement of the century out here, but ay caramba - this is just taking the piss. Even yesterday, when I went to change my flight, I had to wait around for an hour as apparently there were problems with "el sistema" and my card. Oh, and did I forget to mention that my university might not be able to pay me? D'oh!

Aside from that, I seem to have oodles of free time. My timetable consists of barely more than 10 hours per week, all from Monday to Wednesday. Yes, that means I have four-day weekends. Also, some of the teachers I've been assigned to appear less than overjoyed to have a native speaker assisting them - several times I've been told that I'm not "needed". So, I've decided to pester other teachers and have my very own office hours so that any students needing help can find me easily. That, and join a gym/sit in on english lit & spanish classes/do some voluntary work/save the children/rainforest. Not necessarily in that order.

Last weekend, I was invited to a Chilean "carrete" (a word that can mean many things - party/shindig/outing, in this case it was a flatwarming). This involved yum food, mucho banter with plenty of slang or "chilenismos" thrown in - half the time I didn't know exactly what I was laughing at but hey, it was hilarious! - and an extremely tuneful (ahem) karaoke session. We sang our hearts out to the Beatles, Aerosmith and some mega-popular Argentinian rock band called Soda Stereo, who I slurred along to despite not having a clue how the song went. A place on Latin American Idol surely beckons...