sitting across the table at dinner last night, I watched an older Chilean sociology professor take a deep breath and begin to speak . .
Even if I hadn't understood the language she was speaking (luckily I did), I imagine that I would have been able to get a sense of the story. A truly talented storyteller, she paused in crucial moments, to look around the room, and continue with the rythmn of her message.
and, as usual, I couldn't help but think about how similar we all are-simultaneously waving our hands, pausing for effect-letting the images settle in with the audience, before we continue-
an act of sharing, communicating the moments that elicit emotions--storytelling. and what is it about "us" that makes us all storytellers-all wanting to reach out in some way or another to connect.
and what is it about us that makes us tell our stories the way we do, is anything every inherent in our nature?-- the language, the gestures, the organization of thoughts even---are all learned and socially constructed systems or behaviors.
I was thinking the other day about how much I love to tell stories, how it's like a good desert, or something. How important it is to me, to try to tell them in the right way, even though I'm not sure I could describe what "the right way" is and how sometimes I tell a story here in spanish and it has the same meaning as it would english and sometimes it just doesn't--
and couldn't.
I digress. I'll come back to the storyteller.
___________________________
Friends My Age Count:
like a billion.
seriously.
and all different nationalities: Japonese, Sweedish, German, Chilean, Arizonian--
It amazing how much can happen in a week.
I have so much to tell right now that my head is literally spinning because I don't want to forget anything.
Let me just tell you all about my new friends.
The Sweedish Girls:
Three girls--Malin, Pernelia, and Ramona-- from Sweeden came to check out Ana Maria's house as a possible place to live a a little over a week ago, and we exchanged numbers. they speak little to zero spanish.
They texted me soon after that to invite me to go out with them, and right about the same time I had just made friends with Patrick and Rebecca (from the states) so I dragged them along with me.
That night, which was last thursday, Malin, Pernelia, Ramona, Rebbeca, Patrick, and I met up with a big group of their Chilean friends. One in particular, Cristobal, lives with Pernelia and speaks perfect English. We went to see one of his Chilean friends who was playing guitar, and then about ten of us went to this crazy discoteca and danced our pants off in a huge circle.
Patrick, Me, and Rebecca-Los Gringos
Me, Rebecca, and Cristobal
Rebecca, Karina, and Manuela
Rebeccah and Carina trading tongue twisters in English and Spanish.
I contributed the Wood Chuck one.You know? How much wood would a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck could chuck wood? A wood chuck would chuck as much as a wood chuck could chuck if a wood chuck could chuck wood.
They were totally trippin over that one.
Patrick and Cristobal
Manuela, Patrick, (guy whose name I don't remember but did a mean roger-rabbit), and Pablo taking a momentary pause from mad dancing on the discotec floor to snap a photo
Pablo, Rebbeca, Me, and Karina
Patrick busting out his Frat-tastic moves.
It was, to say the least, a blast.
---
Remember how last Tuesday was my first Rotary meeting--well, let me tell you--I may have gotten a little more out of that meeting than I was ready for.
On Wednesday night at 9:30pm the house phone rang, and it was for me.
A voice who I did not recognize and was speaking in spanish said-Hello I met you last night at the rotary meeting. I know you don't know many people here, and I was wondering if you would like to go to a "fiesta" with me.
(fiesta. remember that. he said fiesta.)
I am thinking. . .hmmm--who did I meet last night that was under thirty. . . and I could only think of one guy and I figured it must be him. A fiesta, I thought, sounded like fun--I said sure. when? and he replied-oh. . . tonight.
-what time? I said.
-uhhh. . . how about 11:30?
-ok
-I'll pick you up then.
Now, at this point I wasn't even really sure how he had gotten my number or my address, but I assumed he must have called the Rotary president, which made me feel safer about the situation.
Ana Maria was-of course-distraught, as usual, and intensely worried. . .
she walked me out to meet him. and asked him about a billion questions, after telling him several times that I had class the next day and needed to be home early (Welcome back to 10th grade Meredith)
then as she looked around the corner at his car, she was even like, "Who else is in that car?"
and he was like, just me.
poor guy. he has braces too. I've been calling him braces (frenillos) when I forget his name, which by the way is Pedro Pablo.
Not Pedro. Not Pablo: Pedro Pablo-which roughly translates to Peter Paul, but is really more like Billy Bob in my mind.
But this is about the point in the evening when I stopped feeling sorry for him,
because we didn't go to a party--we went to a discotec, a very small, very dark, very smokey discotec.
Imagine a small stage, and a bald chilean singing latin-american ballads with hand mic. He sang for the first thirty minutes or so---ALL LOVE SONGS--and then they started playing latin-american pop--it was even Reggaeton--
and he took me upstairs to a little balcony area where it was even darker and proceeded to try and chat with me.
In the first hour he told me he would like to teach me the following things:
1. How to dance salsa
2.how to horseback ride
3. how to CAMP in chile
4. how to fish in chile
5. about the city in general
He said he wanted to take me to some sort of swimming pool the next day, and I was like well. . . I don't know. . . I may have to do homework or something. . .and he was like-did you bring a swimsuit?
and I just looked at him like, "is this really happening?"
(we hadn't really danced at all yet--the ballad boy was still singing) Frenillos told me that chileans were just more romantic in general. He then proceeded to pull me up out of my chair and try to literally teach me how to salsa.
He said, "I'm going to teach you some rythmn."
I stopped, and was like, "listen buddy. I don't need your rythmn. I have plenty of rythmn. This gringa knows how to dance, thank you."
So, we danced and the funniest part of all was that he was doing these really odd movements-like with both hands in front of his body, palms up, doing the "come hither" motion, and I just kept thinking" Please GOD get me out of here somehow." He tried to teach me salsa on the dance floor about five times, even though each time I was like NO PERO GRACIAS. at what point, he was like--Yeah, you're a good dancer, but don't you want to get better?? I can help you. and I couldn't decide whether to laugh or just walk away.
Finally, I just told him I was really tired and had class the next day. To which he smoothly replied,
"Well, I was thinking we could stay 'til about 3am. Sooo, you wanna go now or stay 'til 3?"
I said, "now, please."
I ran into him a couple of days later--he was nice, but I could tell he must have gotten the point.
Men are agressive here. seriously.
___________
I also have a new friend who is amazing attractive, intelligent, funny, and pretty much the most all around perfect human being I have ever had the opportunity to meet. (or at least he thinks so. . . Just Kidding. . . I guess he is pretty cool--or re-bien as they say here--as in you're so cool you are re-cool).
Akshai is the fulbright scholar who moved in on Sunday. He has pretty much made my life exponentionally more entertaining. He's like fun in a box. He's hilarious and just good company. I'm really glad he's here----most of the time.
He reminds me a little bit of Woody Allen, seriously.
The only major problem is that he sort of bursts into English a lot, and so we have been speaking english more than I would like. I really want to avoid speaking english as much as possible, but sometimes it's just a relief to not have to work or think to hard to form simple sentences.
And we've decided that we're just way funnier and way more charming in English.
He mercilessly teases me about my "southern accent"--uhhhh. . . did you know I had one of those??? because I didn't. Seriously, I have been to several different parts of the US, and I have never had anyone comment that I had a southern accent because my parents aren't originally from the South. However, Akshai, who "doesn't have an accent because he's from Arizona where they speak perfect english" seems to think that I do.
For example--Do you use the word Goober? Because I happen to say Goober all the time. For example, as a noun:
"Stop acting like a Goober" or "Don't be a Goober" or "You're such a Goober"
or the adjective Goobie:
"Wow, that was goobie" or "What a goobie idea"
At some point--I called him a goober--and we both starting laughing so hard that I almost choked. He seems to think that this is definitely a Southern word, but I'm not convinced.
He also gets some odd kick out of "Roll Tide" and likes to teach it to random chileans and then prompt them to yell it at me.
But I pretty much told him that he has no place to say anything about my slogan because his is:
"Fork 'Em"
Fork 'em??? seriously??? 'em??and I sound southern-Whatever.
He also says some really weird stuff like "weak sauce."
as in, "man, weak sauce" or "that was weak sauce"
like "lame" or "that was lame" --the equivalent here is the word "fome" like "que fome"
doesn't it sound like we have such fun conversations? right.
________
Veronica moved in on Monday. She's from Germany and is super sweet. You know you can use the word super in spanish too? They kinda pronounce it like Suu-pear.
Me and Veronica-Don't ask me what we're doing-some kinda dance move-
Veronica, Roberto (an english professor at the university who shares an office with Akshai), and Akshai (also trying to rock the same dance move)
Veronica's kinda shy and really nice. She and went out by ourselves last night and met up with another German girl (who is also named Manuela) and some chilean friends at this place called Triciklo (that's right-Tricycle) because one of our chilean friends, Christian, was playing. He was awesome. Good times-we got to practice our spanish a lot.
------
I guess you're wondering about my classes. I'm warning you. I'm going to be a little detailed. sorry.
As of right now, I'm taking five classes:
1) Espanol para extranjeros con Profesor Omar Salazar
Although I am sure I could survive without taking another spanish class, this class is a plus for several reasons-
*the professor is kinda like my advisor and asked me to take the class--even though I will only be able to attend once a week due to a conflict in my schedule.
*There are people from many different countries in the class-germany, Japan, England, and the U.S-it's a great way to learn more about several cultures all at once
*It has been a good way to make friends and connect with people who are experiencing similar moments as they adjust to chilean life.
*My other classes are mostly lecture classes, and this class is much more conversation based- it's another good opportunity to practice speaking.
*We will be studying a lot about Chile in general-it's geography, politics, cultural norms-It will be very educational
Since I miss the class on Wednesdays, I went after my other class to chat with Professor Salazar about the class.
He has been extremely kind and helpful. I ran into him today, and he invited me to attend a program that he is developing for next semester on latin american studies for different university professors from several international universitites. He acted like the invitation was a pretty big deal (as I'm sure that it is), but I'm not quite sure what role he believes I can play--nevertheless, I bet it will be a really neat experience.
2)obras clasicas de literatura hispanoamericana con Profesor Mario Rodriguez
I'm kinda in love with this class. Dr. Rodriquez's thoughtful and informative lectures have me on the edge of my seat every class. The first class he talked all about the ways we were going to focus on the texts through the subjective perspective of the reader-why the class is named the way it is-what qualifies a "classic" text-
a phrase by Ricardo Piglia: "un libro que nunca termine de decir lo que tiene que decir"-a book that never stops saying what it has to say.
which transfroms into "toda interpretacion depende del lugar desde donde se lee" This is a key concept for the course: that all interpretation depends on the place from which the text is read.
Now, most of the stuff so far in this class isn't new for me, in terms of theories about the way we read, because we haven't begun to specifically talk to much about the texts themselves, but the point is that it's cool because it's all in spanish----
it is all in spanish,
and I still understand. This may seem simple, but it is a huge deal to me. I feel like I am finally in that place where Rodrigo was talking about, that I broke through the barrier level of my spanish--my ear has gotten so much better.
The second class we talked about the difference between "history" and "maps." it was also awesome because he went into a detailed explanation about the ways in which history in a modern sense is seen as cronological with linear time. however, there could be parellel times, and potentially a character in a text could exist and find various alternatives to their existence, and potentially each of those alternatives could coexist-he referenced Quatum Physics-but it also made me think about String theory- and the implication of that vibration on time.
-This lecture reminded me a lot of my Math and Music honors class.
He went on to say that within a "historical" perspective or reading-we are always slaves of the future and slaves to progress--
which led into his discussion of maps. which is way of looking at time or literature as a map-imagine thinking about time as a series of branching, interwoven, connecting lines. the important points are were the lines cross eachother-along with the entrances and exits-or where you enter and/or leave the map-but most importantly the constant relation between the map.
He said to make a map signifies to move oneself and to lose oneself. and this is even more interesting to me when you think of the map as less of a concrete document or fixed entity and more of a constantly changing representation of the lines based on the perspective from which you are looking at the map--more like Google Earth--ha! I wished I'd thought of that to tell Dr. Rodriguez about-but seriously--think about it.
Literary analysis=Google Earth
nice.
and he referenced an essay by Borges where he describes that there are really only four histories or four "shells" for all literature:
the war, the return, the search, and the sacrifice of god--Borges argues that all the stories in the world use one of these four histories or really one of these eight histories, because you have to include each of their counter-texts.
Lastly, he went on to talk about the ways in which Borges defines Southamerican desitiny as determined by violence.
exhale.
cool class, huh?
and I got all that in spanish-yipee.
3)obras clasicas de literature chilena con Professor Marcelo Garrido
This class is exactly what it sounds like--a chilean lit class. and sadly, I have only been to it once. last friday. On tuesday at 5:00 I went to the classroom and there was another class there-so I walked all the way across campus back to the humanities building to check the schedule and it said that the class was actually in the education building (at that point I thought I had just written the location down wrong)-so I walked all the way back across campus, up three flights of stairs to Education 308. I opened the closed door to find a professor in the middle of a lecture-
but it wasn't my professor.
at this point I began to feel like it was my first day of high school, and I was lost in the halls without anyone who would help me.
I walked all the way back across campus to the humanitiies building again to look at the schedule one more time. . .
only to finally see that Professor Garrido teaches two classes on Tuesdays: one at 2:00 and one at 5:00-and the schedule is just little squares with the professor's name and an 8 number code in each square simbolizing the class. My class had actually met at 2:00 in the humanities building--go figure.
So, I sent the professor a long email apologizing, meanwhile Roberto (english professor who shares an office with Akshai) laughed at me because he said it wasn't that big of a deal. But---it was to me- I wanted the professor to know that I respected his class and wasn't trying to skip it. anyways, on today the class was canceled. of course i didn't know that until I sat around outside the class room for twenty minutes, but I'll get it next week.
4)Formas del Discurso con Profesora Berta Lopez
This class is pretty much amazing. It's Totally postmodern and the professor is super nice and super sharp. (imagine in your mind that both those supers are pronounced like suuuh-pear) I have spoken somehow in all three classes. The first day we each had to give a description of "What is literature" and I said relation, and then we each had to explain our description, so I said (in spanish-aren't you proud?) that literature was a way for "us" to relate, a way to share our experiences and to connect ourselves to one another.
The second class she started talking about Drag-Queens and then totally called me out:
She was like:
So, Meredith, there are lots of Drag Queens in the U.S. Would you like to tell us more about that or describe your experience and/ or perspective on Drag Queens? (I swear she said that)
and after I closed my mouth,
I just said that I thought that there were people struggling to reconcile their gender, sex, and sexuality all over the world--especially since most of the time popular culture sees all those three things as being intricately related and codependent, but that I believe that each characteristic exists independent of the others.
and then I just took a deep breath.
Today, we were talking about literature as a system. that literature itself is a system, and that each work of literature is also a system--and I piped in that the language itself used to create those systems was its own system-and she got really excited.
She talked about Derrida and Foucault a little and after class I asked her if she had seen the Derrida documentary, and she said no, but that she probably wouldn't be able to follow it in english.
and then she said-[read closely]
hey, why don't you describe the documentary to the class next friday and give a short presentation of the ideas presented in the film.
and i sorta chuckled, and was like oh i don't know it's pretty freakin' complicated--and I'm not sure I could describe or summarize it in english-since the documentary itself in many ways is a representation of deconstruction within Derrida's life--but she said,
well, that's why I will give you a whole week to prepare.
and I said ok. I will try.
and then I thought to myself as I left the room:
NOTE TO SELF:
THINK MORE.
SPEAK LESS.
------------
5. I'm also going to take a class on gender in chilean novels from the 19th and 20th centuries, but it doesn't start until the beginning of april.
-------
There are no such things as copyright laws here, and books are extremely expensive. The library is well stocked, but you can only check out books for one week. EVERYONE just photocopies everything. Since I have to read around twenty books this semester-I was a little worried for a while. I really like books-and in true "american" fashion--I decided that I wanted my own copies. I spent a few days looking in every used book store and new book I could find, and these are some of the major books I will be reading this semester:
I never realized how much I take books for granted--how much they mean to you when you have no way to get them--I mean in fifty years will everything just be on the internet? will bound books be a thing of the past? why is the physical weight of the book and the turn of the page so important to me? Maybe it's just nostalgia, memories of late nights and long car rides-of all the many books that have passed through my hands and the ways their stories, their shared moments have impacted my place and my sense of me.
_________________
Sitting around the table at dinner, I couldn't help but watch the others reactions to the story all slightly leaning in, wide-eyed, breathing when she breathed--and at the end-all bursting out into laughter-together-sharing in the moment-relishing in eachother.
We were at a birthday party for one of Ana Maria's friend who is over 80-There were five other chilean women, Ana Maria, Veronica, Akshai, and me. we had a little too much fun:
Akshai and I both have this book called _How to Survive in the Chilean Jungle: 2_ which is basically a large collection of chilean slang. and someone said something that we didn't understand, and they wouldn't explain (because it was a little dirty) and so Akshai ran and got his book to look it up. and once they figured out what was in the book-it really turned in to a party-the chilean ladies couldn't believe that all these expressions were in a book-it was a hoot.
life is settling in a bit, and the only thing that could make any of this better would be if you guys were here with me.
Hope you and yours are happy and safe,
una aurora,
mere
XVII
Un Río
Yo quiero ir por el Papalaoapán
como tantas veces por el terroso espejo,
tocando con las uñas el agua poderosa:
quiero ir hacia las matrices, hacia la contextura
de sus originales ramajes de cristal:
ir, mojarme la frente, hundir en la secreta
confusión del rocío
la piel, la sed, el sueño.
El sábalo saliendo del agua
como n violín de plata,
y en la orilla las flores atmosféricas
y las alas inmóviles
en un calor de espacio defendido
por espadas azules.
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