10 Weeks

So it has already been two and a half months. Funny how fast the time is going. Everyone in the U.S is probably preparing for the major holidays of the year and bundling up because the temperature, I'm guessing, is dropping rapidly. Here everyone is putting away the winter clothing and preparing for summer. Christmas in EXTREME heat is what I am preparing for. That will defiantly be a change for the wonderful New England Christmas weather. School is pretty hectic because I have exactly 21 days left until summer. All of the people in "cuatro medio" aka seniors are preparing for the PSU - a test similar to the SAT except their life kind of depends on it...The rest of the school is preparing for typical end of the year things, last tests before finals and so forth. Once we get out of school, I have a 4 month summer to look forward to. In that time I am going to Patagonia, on a 20 day scout trip which will consist of bonding activities and community service, and then switching families.

26th of November -Thanksgiving (not celebrated here)

27th of November - LAST DAY OF SCHOOL

13th-19th of December - Patagonia Trip

25th of December - Christmas

27th of December - Switch Families

Public Transportation part 2

Public transportation is the most popular way of commuting for everyone in Santiago. At night around 1130,I think the metro stops working...personally I think that is a really bad decision on the city's part because the public buses are unreliable. You could be waiting for a bus for an hour or two or just not know which buses are running at night. Taxis are still running but it makes transportation from different parts of the city very difficult. I've learned from personal experience. :)

Halloween in Chile

Halloween is somewhat of a new concept here in Chile and has only been around for about 15-20 years...which is why not everyone here gets as pumped up as people in the US. When my friends said that not many people get dress up, I was expecting actually no one and when I left my house in the evening, Iwas quite surprised to see a few kids walking up and down the street asking for candy. Unlike us, mischief night is also celebrated the same night as halloween but all they do here is throw eggs i think because i didn't see any houses tee-peed...In supermarkets and grocery stores they are not banning selling eggs to children at night either because when i stopped by a store, i saw 4 little boys about 12 buying a two cases of about 24 eggs.

As for halloween parties...most of those I heard of were being organized by exchange students, but as for the night, it was basically a regular Saturday and people could dress up if they wanted too...festivities that we have in the US were definitely missed but no big deal, there are costume parties all the time here and costumes aren't as easy to find.