Este soy, yo dire para deja/ este pretexto escrito: ésta es mi vida.

"This is what I am, I'll say, to leave
this written excuse: This is my life."

A few days ago Ana Maria and I went shopping for groceries. After we had purchased our groceries we walked out to the sidewalk to try and find a taxi. So, as we are walking along the sidewalk there's another larger lady who is looking for a taxi as well. She's wearing a turquoise dress and is about half my height.

We see a taxi, throw our groceries into the trunk, and get in. There is already another lady in the front seat. So I move all the way over and Ana Maria gets in after me, and suddenly the lady in the turquoise dress is somehow also in the backseat with us. At this point Ana Maria is pretty much pressed up against me, and the lady in the turquoise dress shuts the door, puts her groceries in her lap, takes a deep breath, and says,

"Soy Gordita. Lo Siento"

which means I'm a fat little one, sorry. (but said the I'm sorry part like she was only half-apologizing-and half saying-I'm fat-get over it.)

and I almost said right on, but I couldn't figure out how to translate it.

I was so surprised that those words came out of her mouth that I had to take deep breaths to keep from laughing. but i thought you know. . .

when we got back to the house and were recounting the story to Veronica, we got into a fit of giggles.

Ana Maria said she was ticked off because that lady had to pay the exact same amount as us but took up more space . . .

which made me laugh even more just thinking about it, and I told her. . .

that in a few months if she keeps feeding me the ways she has been feeding me, I'm going to get into a taxi and say,

Dude. I'm fat. I'm sorry. . .

and pay for everyone else's ride.

----------------------------this story may not seem as funny on paper. . .or computer screen. . .

I've been thinking about gender roles and stereotypes here. I sorta think about this topic a lot anyways. The men here are extrememly vocal, even more vocal then they were in Santiago. In Santiago they would sorta whisper or speak to you as they walked past. "Americans" have a tendency to say that it is way more sexist here, I happen to think that men are probably just as sexist in the US, just not as brave or as vocal. Maybe that's because the women in the US, are more likely to a) yell back
b) give them the finger
c) throw something at them/ or drive a car in their direction

or maybe it's just because in the U.S. as long as you act and speak as though you are Politically correct, then you are?? hmm

anyways, so a few days ago Ana Maria and I were walking along and two guys in a truck started yelling me, all nice things. "Love of my life, my heart, my soul, my day. . ." Ana Maria got a kick out of this and told me not to worry because the men here only yell polite things.

great, I thought.

Then yesterday Ana Maria and I had the luck to walk through a construction site.

Building on the left, sidewalk, and truck with six or seven construction workers sitting on the truck.

As we're walking up, I'm thinking, this will be interesting. The guys are all talking and laughing loudly.

We walk by, and they go silent.

and then without saying anything, they break into applause.

applause.

and I think I turned about eight shades of read, meanwhile Ana Maria is laughing and waving and winking.

I about died.
_____________________
Monday Ana Maria and I went to sign up for my salsa classes. (I'm going to take Salsa classes-how cool is that?)
I met the professor who seems really nice, and he tells me that I need to find a partner and sign up on the 15th of March.
Then, as we're walking away. . .this guy runs up behind us. He had just spoken to the professor and was looking for a partner for the salsa class too. He's in his last year at the engineering school, probably pretty close to my height, and seemed polite enough.

But I didn't really have a chance to respond because Ana Maria responded for me (Have I mentioned she's kinda a major TYPE A).

"Oh, she'd love to. . . How nice. You two are going to have so much fun."

alright, I have a salsa partner. We exchanged information because we have to register together on the 15th.

Tuesday afternoon my cell phone rings------BY THE WAY-------
sidebar--I got a text message from the British chap on saturday and didn't even realize it until Monday night because I still don't know how to work my stupid phone. lovely work mere. lovely work.
--------
my cell phone rings, I answer it-I'm a little shocked because my cell phone doesn't ring, Ever.

and the voice on the other line is a chilean man, and he's talking really fast and acting like he knows me. Im confused. He asks me if I'm at the university or at home.

"umm at home" (me)
" are you going to the university any time soon?" (male voice)
"yes"(me)
" when?'(male voice)
"well. . . I don't know. Why? who is this?" (me)
"I thought we could get together to talk" (male voice)
"Who is this? WHO IS THIS?" (me) thinking [is my spanish not working?!]
"Jorge"(jorge)
"Ohh, Jorge [my dance partner] hi. Well, I have an appointment later with a professor at the university but Ana Maria has visitors now, so I'm not sure when I'm going to get over there. What did you need to talk to me about?"(me)
"the salsa dancing"(Jorge)
"Oh [still confused] but we don't have to register until the 15th, right? what do we need to talk about now?"(me)
" Ok. I'll call you on the 15th. Chao." (Jorge)
"Ch--" (me)
"dialtone"


At this point I am not only confused but upset. When I go upstairs and recount the story to Ana Maria and her friends. . .they all start laughing and basically tell me that I said exactly the right thing, that he was trying to take me out.

Unfortunately or fortunately for me, I was just a little to slow to pick up on all that.

I probably totally offended my dance partner.

great.

___________

Tuesday I went to my first rotary meeting, and it was lovely. Unlike my sponsor club (Sunrise Rotary) which meets at 7am every Tuesday for a breakfast meeting, this club meets from around 8:30 to 11:30ish for a dinner meeting. There were about thirty members at the meeting, all older men, and they were all extrememly warm and funny. I'm excited to have the chance to get to know them more. They all joked about hooking me up with their grandsons and such. There was an extrememly interesting presentation on the closing of a local school, and I learned a lot about the Chilean public education system, which is governed by the municipalities. I need to read a lot more about this before I can speak intelligently about it, but it is a very important and controversial topic here.

I exchanged my sunrise rotary club banner for theirs and will be bringing home the concepcion club banner to my sponsor club when I return. I think one of the greatest things about rotary is that are always open: open to learning, open to hearing, open to experiencing and to change.
_________________

Today, Thursday March 8th, is Women's Day here. Patrick (my new friend of North Carolina) informed us that we have that in the US too-we just don't celebrate it. They were handing out flowers in the streets that say "The woman is not only affection or sensibility. The women is the conductor and the dynamic. The woman is the will."

To all you women out there-Happy Women's Day. You are the will.
-----------------

This week is sorta an experimenting week for me. I went to see Professor Omar Salazar on Tuesday. He helped me look at all the possible courses and pick out some I was interested in. He gave me all the professors, class times, and rooms and building of the classes.
I have about seven classes that I'm going to check out this week, and see which ones I'm interested in.

and all I can say is so far. . .It has been interesting. Things don't work on the same time schedule as they do in the US. Everything is flexible. The schedules, rooms, and professors are always really set. and it's basically like a non-stop don't worry be happy attitude. Sweet right?

well, it is unless you are an anal "American" who is used to always being at class five minutes early. I've missed two classes already because they weren't in the rooms I thought they would be in or because they start at different times than what I thought.

but all is good. . .

I had a great class yesterday morning. it's a obras clasicas hispanomericanas, and I was pretty stoked because I understood everything that was said. This class seems like it will be right up my alley.

Within the first ten minutes the Prof broke out Barthes and "The Death of the Author," and I was hooked. The class will be looking at the intertexuality of the works and examining them always from the perspective of the subjective readers. should be good. . .

The Director of the woman studies program is out until next week, but I am anxious to meet her and hope I will be able to take one of her classes.
_______________
Friends My Age Count:
3!

I met two more students from the U.S.: Rebecca and Patrick. They're exchange students from North Carolina and are both great. I'm excited because hopefully I will get the chance to travel with them a bit. Everyone says that you should try to avoid making friends with people that speak your language because you will practice and use the language a lot less, but we are all pretty committed to trying to learn and practice our spanish. We hung out after our classes today and grabbed some lunch together, and for Most of the time we tried to only speak spanish, which is good. I think we can keep it up too. I really don't want to speak that much English while I'm here. I feel like I may only get this chance once, this year, and I want to speak as much spanish as I possibly can. Cachai??

________________

I'm sorry this entry is so ADD, but here's some pictures of the university:










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Ok. . .against my better judgement, I'm going to put this in here. We had to write a poem in our class today. At least I think that's what we had to do. and we had about twenty minutes to write twenty lines. No laughing where I can hear you, and I'm not translating it on purpose. sorry the title is so cliched

Perdida en tradducion

una guerra de palabras
empieza en mi mente.
Los sonidos, ideas, y signos
mezclan hasta su esencia
esta perdida,
suspendido
en un espacio
entre dos idiomas
sin la capaz
ser o tratar identificarse.

Cuando el humo desaparece
y las ideas encuentran sus propias
palabras, formar y conectar con las letras
de esta idoma,
Todavia, recuerdo la naturaleza
de guerra,
ideas abstractas que estan buscando
por una manera criar
su propia existencia
con sonidos sencillos.

No comment. . . except that my preferred writing genre is definitely rambling random confessions and not poetry.

_______________
This segment goes out to all BSC students/ Alums.

If you have ever been a BSC student there is a part of you (I imagine) that will always connect the image of the Ginkgo tree with your time at 'Southern, with fall and Munger, with change and cycles, with time and the lack of time. The leaves of the Ginkgo turn bright yellow during fall, imagine a thick yellow fall, with silky leaves.

I love the Ginkgo--maybe because in fall, the two ginkgo trees outside of Munger are such a staggering sight that make me want to sit down on the sidewalk and just look up, maybe because my very first creative writing class was with Dr. Sandra Sprayberry, and on the first day she made us go down and hug the ginkgo, and then write about it----maybe it's just because to me they seem like a larger-than-life essence. They make me fell small in a good way.

You get my point. The last time i was in Chile I fell in love with umbrella trees, literally these trees in Angol that look like they stepped out of a Dr. Seuss book.

But a few days ago, I was walking through the UDEC campus and I found these:





Ginkgos. Life has a funny way of reminding you how you are never far from home--that even when you feel as if the world has never been this way before and may never be again--with each new dawn or aurora--you are underneath the same skies (los mismos cielos)--watched over by the same trees, and touched by people and places in the same ways. I imagine that in Birmingham in the next few months, your Ginkgos will begin to bloom again, to sprout new leaves, new bright green leaves. And at that exact same time the Ginkgos here will begin to carmelize, and eventually leave this year's moments behind as we move into winter. Once again my year will be marked by the memory of a yellow autumn . . .

ok-sorry for the cheese. I think. . . that I am done for today.

Oh, one more thing. Patrick, Rebecca, and I are banking on the riots--banking on the riots for some much needed travel time. and that is all I have to say---

Well. . .except for the fact that I'm also going to leave you with the object of Rotary. I had to read these in spanish this week to the standing Rotary club (without warning) and a little rotary knowledge is always good for you:

"Object of Rotary

The Object of Rotary is to encourage and foster the ideal of service as a basis of worthy enterprise and, in particular, to encourage and foster:

First, The development of acquaintance as an opportunity for service;

Second, High ethical standards in business and professions, the recognition of the worthiness of all useful occupations, and the dignifying of each Rotarian's occupation as an opportunity to serve society;

Third, The application of the ideal of service in each Rotarian's personal, business, and community life;

Fourth, The advancement of international understanding, goodwill, and peace through a world fellowship of business and professional persons united in the ideal of service."

I'm the fourth one. Love you guys-
This blogging stuff has helped me to see that I'm officially one of the most long-winded people I know.

Hope you and yours are happy and safe-

una aurora,
Mere

English below:

Aquellas Vidas

Este soy, yo diré para deja
Este pretexto escrito: ésta es mi vida.
Y ya se sabe que no se podía:
que en esta red no solo el hile cuenta,
sino el aire que escapa de las redes,
y todo lo demás era inasible:
el tiempo que corrió como una liebre
a través del rocío de febrero
y más nos vale no hablar del amor
que se movía como una cadera
sin dejar donde estuvo tanto fuego
sino una cucharada de ceniza
y así con tantas cosas que volaban:
el hombre que esperó creyendo claro,
la mujer que vivió y que no vivirá,
todos pensaron que teniendo dientes,
teniendo pies y manos y alfabeto
era sólo cuestión de honor la vida.
Y éste sumó sus ojos a la historia,
agarró las victorias del pasado,
asumió para siempre la existencia
y sólo le sirvió para morir
la vida: el tiempo para no tenerlo.
Y la tierra al final para enterrarlo.
Pero aquello nació con tantos ojos
como planetas tiene el firmamento
y todo el fuego con que devoraba
la devoró sin tregua hasta dejarla.
Y si algo vi en mi vida fue una tarde
en la India, en las márgenes de un río:
arder una mujer de carne y hueso
y no sé si era el alma o era el humo
lo que del sarcófago salía
hasta que no quedó mujer ni fuego
ni ataúd ni ceniza: ya era tarde
y sólo noche y agua y sombra y río
allí permanecieron en la muerte.

Those Lives

This is what I am, I’ll say, to leave this written
Excuse. This is my life.
Now it is clear this couldn’t be done—
that in this net it’s not just the strings that count
but the air that escapes through the meshes.
Everything else stayed out of reach—
time running like a hare
across the February dew,
and love, best no to talk of love
which moved, a swaying of hips,
leaving no more trace of all its fire
than a spoonful of ash.
That’s how it is with so many passing things:
the man who waited, believing, of course,
the woman who was alive and will not be.
All of them believed that, having teeth,
feet, hands, and language,
life was only a matter of honor.
This one took a look at history,
took in all the victories of the past,
assumed an everlasting existence,
and the only thing life gave him was
his death, time not to be alive,
and earth to bury him in the end.
But all that was born with many eyes
as there are planets in the firmament,
and all her devouring fire
ruthlessly devoured her until the end.
If I remember anything in my life,
it was an afternoon in India, on the banks of a river.
They were burning a woman of flesh and bone
and I didn’t know if what came from the sarcophagus
was soul or smoke,
until there was neither woman nor fire
nor coffin nor ash. It was late,
and only the night, the water, the river, the darkness
lived on in that death.