"La Raja"

I would like to write a little about my life here: what its like, where I live…

I live with Eliana in an apartment that is about a twenty minute walk to the center of Providencia. We have a view of the Andes from our living room, which is so amazing to see every day all day. We live right next to the park, Parque Ines de Suarez, which is a pretty big park. Each day I walk down my street fro about twenty minutes and then I end up at the Metro. Once at the metro I meet up with two of my USC friends (metro stop Manuel Montt) and then we continue on together to metro stop La Moneda, which is in downtown Santiago. Its actually pretty easy to do now that I have the hang of it. I have a “trajeta BIP!” which I use to pay for everything. You put money on it and then you just slide it through and enter!

I get to “school” (our “Chile Contemporanea” class with CIEE) around ten. We usually have one or two lectures and then a discussion. Then we watch a Chilean movie and we finish around 6:00. So far we have learned a lot about Allende, Pinochet, Chilean politics, and the Chilean culture.

Eliana makes me a lunch everyday to take to school: usually a sandwich, a juice box, a piece of fruit, and some yogurt. When I return home at night (around 6:00pm) Eliana makes me an “once” or a dinner. “Once” is the same food as breakfast (bread and coffee mainly or sandwhiches) and you can choose to have one or the other or both. Both is always too much for me so I usually choose. And that my friends is my typical day!

PS: “La Raja” is a Chilean word for “very good”