a new dawn and the same skies. una aurora y los mismos cielos. new skies. new skies. blue skies and dark skies- and there is always morning. . . a new day.
. . .you know-
you think-
living abroad-
what an adventure-
and it is. It is wonderful. But it is also sad.
People (non-chileans) arrive and they stay for a semester-or a year-or more-and then they leave. They arrive just like I did and leave (like I will) and there are all these exciting new friendships, new memories and moments, new connections. . .
sunny afternoons with coffee
wanna-be jog-walks in pretty parks
eggs (fried, scrambled, sandwiched)
Singing english songs in loud karaoke pubs
bus rides
pizza (or the chilean version of it)
MOMENTS people. that is what I'm talking about. and you start out being people sharing the experience of struggling to adjust to a new culture and life and all of a sudden. . .
You're friends.
I haven't written for a while because things have been happening. Big things. Great things. Sad things. Things that can't be summarized into blog entries. Things that make me realize I am more than visiting here people. I'm living here. crazy.
So. happy things first.
There's a boy in my life. In "chilean" I would call him my pololo. Nicolás. We're still dating. He's lovely. I mean seriously. Look at him. and funny. and smart.
makes me laugh a lot. We saw Ratatouille today-in spanish. It was awesome. We tried to see it last week, but I got the time wrong and we ended up seeing Transformers.
Sad news.
Sally is gone. and things will NEVER be the same without her. I miss her. a lot. all the time. No more random bursts of Sound of the Music songs-
no more pant-annihilating splits
no more 5am eggs-parmesan-oregano-
no more forest gump in british accent-
no more fun slang swapping-
no more great adventure walks-
no more "hello lovely" notes-
I miss you Sal. You know that. But I'm so thankful that I was lucky enough to hang out with you for a while. I'm not going to get any mushier than that. You got my friend love letter. MISS YOU SO MUCH.
Sally Paula Dodge-light of our lives-has gone away. Here some of our last days together:
Sally's Despedida:
Pre-party. me being lazy
These were supposed to be brownies from scratch. not the dry cake-like blob you see inthe photo. I am not happy here. not happy.
the leg. always with the leg. ha
that's right we're eating. we're always eating. check out the dry cake blob in the back ground. i tried to make it better with powdered sugar. the chileans were the only ones that liked it. and they loved it. go figure
sally and nick-check out the festive eye wear
haha
Sally and isabel
aww look at us. this is in our apartment by the way
Pierre (my roomie) me, Akshai, Jano, and Rose
I MISS SALLY!
Sally you are amazing, and we miss you.
_________________________________
I went flying. FLYING above Concepcion with George and his daughter Betsy. It was incredibly cool. George flies gliders and joined a local glider club here in Conce. I had an amazing time and saw some amazing sites. Check these out:
The Hanger! 
our friend
George and Betsy
me on my first flight--in the front seat!
and lift off. . . 
check out the river bio bio
coming up on the University
check out the clock tower. . .thats the beginning of the quad
There it is up closer (the university). In this photo, above the clock tower is a white building-to the left of that building is the humanities building--where I study. cool huh?
closer
Check this out. The round building-if you draw a line from the round building down to the bottom right corner-you will run right through the crfd building where I teach. It's yellow.
there it is in the bottom right corner of the photo
and back again
hanger again!
before flight two
this is the glider right before take-off
look at that beautiful blue sky. I had such a amazing morning. Sadly, George and Nancy have also returned to their home in the states. They had an amazing Vulture party before they left, which was what we call a secret santa party. Did you know that people in other parts of the U S of A call it something else, not secret santa??? something about an elephant or something. I can't remember. But Nanc and George, being the amazing and gracious folks that they are, had a party to give away all the stuff that they weren't going to take back with them to the states, and we had a blast.I got number two or something, and Nico (also known as "my team mate") got number three-but luckily our stuff was never stolen. In these photos you can see my sheer excitement at picking the package with tupperware and this awesome apron (which You can see me wearing in the pics above before sally's despedida):
look at me. sad almost. Nico's like-Ha. yes, I am with her. 
hanging out this is me, Nico, Akshai, George, and Carl
Nancy, Betsy, and my big sis Sierra
I have no idea what we were laughing at, but I love this picture.
aww look at the group
Nico. you crack me up. Sally. I'm so glad the leg made another appearance.As you all know who've read along with me, they have been like our second family here. They have taken care of me when I was sick, cooked for me,done my laundry for me, watched over me, encouraged me,. . . and it has been wonderful, wonderful, wonderful to share a bit of this adventure that is Chile with them. I am very sad to see them go and not quite sure what I will do without my american-chilean parents. I love you guys and will miss you A LOT. I feel so lucky to have had the chance to spend time with you both. cliched, but true and heartfelt.
Nico is an artist-an incredible artist. He draws mostly. . . but I guess with this artistic talent comes a great eye. Randomly one day I went to the bathroom, and when I got back he was taking these random photos:
which are
way cooler
than the pictures I normally take.__________________________
My life has been rotarrific lately. I have gave five presentations in two weeks. Rotariffic, I tell you. First, I went to Chillan. I stayed with my host in concepcion's (Gunther) son (Herbert). His family was extremely gracious to host me, and I had a great time. Here are some photos of the Rotarians I met in Chillan:
Club Chillan Oriente brought in these great Cueca dancers to do a little show for me!!! They were amazing.
doing the cueca (the chilean national dance)
This is me, Herbert, and the club president after my presentation exchanging banners.
Me and Rotary Club Chillan Oriente
I also had the chance to go to an opening of a new dental clinic in a school. ( a project sponsored by Rotary club Chillan Oriente)
look at how cute these kids are!! They were singing about the importance of healthy teeth-singing! It reminded me of all the times that my dad used to come to my schools when I was younger to talk about teeth. good memories. love you dad.
Gustavo, me, and Rodrigo (the socios that took me to the opening-super buena onda)
This is Rotary club Marta Colvin (mostly all female), and they rock my socks off. I had a great time at their meeting. These ladies mean business. The woman in the light blue in the middle of the picture is the past district governor, Maria Teresa. She was the first female district governor in Chile.
This is me and the president of the third club I visited in Chillan, club Chillan.
and the club ChillanThe following week, I went to Arauco and Lota to give presentations.
Me and the rotary club Arauco (unexpectedly, I had to stay the night after the meeting (without contact case, solution, or a clean change of clothes or shoes other than the heels I was wearing), and I had to put my contacts in two glasses of water while I slept. The chlorine in the water turned my eyes a shed of red the color of a coke can for about an hour, but by the time I got on the bus back to concepcion I didn't look too scary.
Me at the Rotary club Lota (this is the president to my left). I have to say that these gentlemen asked me some amazing questions, and were really engaging. 
the club in LotaRight after this photo was taking, the man dropped my camera. It's not broken. I'm going to try to take it to Santiago this week to see if they can fix it. Let's cross our fingers. The lovely rotarian lent me his camera in the meantime which was super nice of him.
--------
I'm pretty bummed because Kara should be here right now at my side, but she's not. We were going to travel together for about two weeks, but she had to "POSTPONE"(because she's still coming darnet) her trip because her passport still hasn't arrived. sad. BUT, I'm keeping my chin up because the trip is not canceled just postponed, as i said.
____________
Nicolas is a really talented artist. -the other night we were at a friend's goodbye party, and I could tell he was bored so I pulled out a little pad I keep and a pen out of my purse, and he drew my eye-in like ten minutes. check this out:(I took this picture with my camera in my comp. so it's a little blurry)
how cool is that?????______________
Ok-I'm sorry this entry has been a bunch of random stuff crammed together. I think my classes start sometime next week, but I'm not entirely sure. I'm going tomorrow to check out the schedule for the postgrad classes (I still have to write a paper for my masters class from last semester that is due August 10th), and I'm also going to talk to Emerita (my boss) about how many hours I want to teach and when(which will be hard to say since I don't know my class schedule yet).
OH-I almost forgot. I'm famous. That's right. I've now appeared in my second Chilean newspaper. believe it. I will try and scan the giant picture of my face for you all to see-it's hilarious. The article isn't really good. for several reasons. like it says i said stuff I didn't say-like for example the works "sacarse la mugre"-how do i know i didnt say that? because when I read it I had to turn to Nicolas and ask-What does that mean?
anyways-I guess its typical journalism in the sense that there are missing contexts-things I said that weren't mentioned that I wish she had mentioned. Not to mention the fact that the article is written as if she sat and spoke to me.
This is how it really went down.
I was napping and my phone rang. I picked it up sleepily-didn't recognize the number and put it down again, without answering it. Then, it rang again. and again. and again. and again. On the sixth time-I answered it-
"WHATTT?" no, not really. I was nice and said a groggy hello.
it was the journalist. some rotarians had told her that I was super interesting (ha) and that the paper should do a story on me. I was totally confused and kept asking-wait. why do you want to do a story about me again? wait, wait -but why do you want to do a story about me?
we talked for about thirty minutes. she was really nice. ok-BUT the point is that it was a phone interview and in the article she describes me like "she says, her eyes twinkling and with a bright smile" seriously? seriously! you didn't even see me!
then. . . there was a photographer. . . a photographer who came to the university and took about a hundred pictures of me all over the university.
I was telling Nico about the photographer and our convo went a little like this:
(remembered and translated by me into english)
me "yeah this photographer took about a billion pictures of me today all over the university"
nico "why did he take so many?"
me "I don't know. he said he wanted to have lots to choose from. He also told me that he could be a millionaire with my photos."
nico "ha. that's creepy. and you weren't worried?"
me "well, he told me he was going to send me all the pictures. that he was taking so many for me-so I could have them as a souvenir."
nico "ha. and you believed him? You know he probably has all your pictures blown up and all over his walls."
me "great. thanks. that's just great. crazy old chilean men who love me."
The front page of the paper says something like from Alabama to Concepcion following the footsteps of Neruda. my favorite part of the article (not) is a phrase that says-Meredith is known in the classroom for being not only pretty, but also nice! SERIOUSLY-NICE AND PRETTY? IN THE CLASSROOM? NOT SMART? I MEAN IM HERE ON A SCHOLARSHIP PEOPLE!AND I MAKE GOOD GRADES! AHHHHHH
ok. that's all. It really wasn't that bad. thank god I am pretty and nice.
________________
when depressed----watch greys anatomy. It makes everything better. Mere/Der I love you, and I'm rooting for you.
_______________
This week Akshai and Nicole have been at a conference in Buenos Aires, and I miss them.
_____________
so I find myself in the midst of beginnings and endings. and I am living here. and my spanish has good days and bad days. better days with Nico-I'm trying to teach him some english. It is soo cold here, but it is nice to have a warm hand to hold.
______________
and that's it for now I guess. I promise to write again soon. How are you? Let me know. I love emails.
Hope you and yours happy and safe,
una aurora,
Mere
Slow Lament (from Residencia en La Tierra)
Into the night of the heart
your name drops slowly
and moves in silence and falls
and breaks and spreads its water.
Something wishes for its sligt harm
and its infinite and short esteem,
like the step of a lost one
suddenly heard.
Suddenly, suddenly listened to
and spread in the heart
with sad insistence and increase
lie a cold autumnal dream.
The thick wheel of the earth,
its tire moist with oblivion,
spins, cutting time
into inaccessible halves.
Its hard goblets cover your heart
spilt upon the cold earth
with its poor blue sparks
flying in the voice of the rain.
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