Yo Corro Por CHILE!

hey y'all!! I hope you're doing well! It's been a while since and update and I feel like I have so much to catch y'all up on.  I'll go backwards and try to not forget anything.

alright so yesterday me and 5 other of my WT vols participated in a 10k sponsored by orbitz gum which raised money for the terremoto.  I'm not sure how many people actually ran the race but I would guess around 2000 people? It was super awesome!  It felt good to make some sort of contribution towards the effort as well as run 6.2 miles (and if anyone knows me well, they would know that I literally have run 5x since October, one of my lazier moments in my life....) and at that, i ran it in 1hr 3 mins! that's about 10 min miles!  Also, it was up a mountain (google cerro san cristobal to get an idea). More importantly, I think we were able to raise almost $94k (50,000,000 CLP) which is awesome (i think this conversion is correct but it seems like SO MUCH - which is great)! here's the link: http://www.orbit10k.cl/.  With that said, the smog here is slowly killing me.  I'm a lil flemmy and snotty today and i think it's because of the run yesterday and generally runs in the smog (and living in the centro makes it hard to avoid smog ie lots of traffic).

After the race we went to a gringo bar (which is so strange!). Everyone in there talks to each other b/c there's this weird gringo connection that you automatically have to almost everyone in there (convo goes like "where are you from? howd you get to chile") it was awesome i will say to watch some of the NCAA games (we have a baylor graduate with us and who would not want to see duke go down). unfortunately it was not in the cards for us be we got some delish tacos and chilean beer (which is DELICIOUS, they have some really good dark beers down here and a brewery in valpo so i should be a happy camper :)) We also went there friday night to watch another NCAA game and stay out a lil later drinking pisco gingers and piscolas (the national liquor i guess you would say?).

Last week was pretty intense and why i have not been able to update as frequently.  We were in class from 10am till 530 almost everyday with 4 of those days following with spanish class from 6-730pm which was then followed by trying to find a quick and easy dinner.  It was funny, one night we went out for sushi which was full of all chilenos except us.... until about 6 German/Scandanavia/Danish (dunno?) enormously tall dudes walked in (im talking INCHES taller than me) and i just found it funny.  Also, i sorta expected this, but i am MOST definitely the tallest woman in in country (i mean, maybe not... but i wouldnt be surprised ha!) and i would say that probably 1 in ever 50-75 Chilenos are taller than me, and it's funny b/c if they're taller than me, they are significantly taller, or so i feel like ive noticed. who knows.  but as also expected, i get starred at A LOT.  it's frustrating sometimes and difficult to ignore, but other times i just put on my blinders and ignore it back which i prefer.  but sometimes it's hard not to notice.  let me share with you a brief scenario: i am standing at the bus stop.  the man directly next to me is just starring at me. not at my legs (like others) but at my face, and i randomly notice him, again like 1.5 feet, call it 16 inches from me, and he just keeps starring. i look away and still he is starring and doesn't look away until it's time to cross the street.  in america this would be different because upon being caught starring at someone, one would either do the awk smile and look away, or just immediately look away trying to play it off. i experienced the starring culture a lil with baldricks.  but im slowly coming to terms with it. they are not necessarily looking in a sexual way, it's just a place where starring is not considered rude and that is just something that i need to get better at.

This last week we learned about teaching and wow am i in for it! it is definitely going to be a challenging experience! i will probably have about 350 students who i will see for 45 mins per week! wow. how am i supposed to teach anything much less get to know their names.  with that said, if anyone has teaching games/classroom management/general teaching tips i would love to hear them!! we did lesson plans last week and they are so much more difficult than i imagined but at the most i will be making 2 lesson plans a week and we also have a book of good lessons from the vols last year as well as all of our group's lesson plans from last week.  but i will be teaching (most likely) VERY beginner English.  I will say that last week was super stressful at the beginning (imagine learning 'everything you need to know to teach' in about 4 days. yep, it was A LOT of info at one time. but i feel much more prepared. and imagine this: the ministry of eduction vols get ONLY one week of orientation before going to teach. at least with world teach i got three weeks!  So on Sunday, i think, we will be moving to a new hostel in Barrio Brasil with all of the other Ministry vols and begin Ministry Orientation on Monday.  We will go to our home-stays on the following Saturday, April 10 and then begin actually teaching the following monday April 19 I think.  I am becoming increasingly ready for it all: I'm ready to get a little bit out of the city and 'thrown to the wolves' so to speak.  I am definitely learning spanish and my comprehension and vocab are improving but i entirely too easily rely on other better speakers in more complex situations.  we have spanish class which is helpful but i definitely need a lot more!  additionally, i'm ready to see more of chile! i sometimes forget that I'm in south america in Santiago.  There are a few things that make me realize where I am: reggaeton music, the stray dog population, and the 10k which helped me to realize "wow! im really here!" Chile is such a beautiful country and I cannot wait to see it! I hope that I can see as much of it as possible but wow, I am totally stoked to start traveling and hiking etc etc so on and so forth for the next 8 months :D

Check this out:
http://www.sonyericssonopen.com/News/Tennis/2010/Tournament/Miami-Champions-For-Chile.aspx

and another interesting article in a totally different way:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/13/world/americas/13chile.html

PS: earthquakes are terrifying.  I've experienced two aftershocks, one last night (6.1).  They have been hardly anything comparatively (obviously) and I just cannot imagine going through an earthquake.  How awful and absolutely horrifying.