Month Number One

This has been a wonderful but busy month! I arrived in Chile on the 24th of August, went straight to an orientation until the 26th, and was with my family and biking to school at 7:30am in the morning on the 27th. I arrived at school and was quickly told, among other things, that I had a little more than a week to learn the dance that my class was learning in physical education. One week later, I was dancing the traditional dance of Easter island in a feather bra and skirt alongside my new classmates in the gym. I feel very fortunate that I got the chance to learn the dance because a lot of the other exchange students in my district told me that their teachers said that it was too late and they couldn't perform with their peers. It was a lot of fun and is something which I will remember for the rest of my life.
 

I have also gotten to see a lot of new places this month. My second weekend here I went with my host brother to Puente Alto, where the paternal grandparents have a house. We ate empanadas, napped, drank tea, and went to three different stores in search of a special kinda of cake.

The following weekend my host mom, host brother and I went to Melocoton, where they have a second house. It is around one hour away from our apartment in Las Condes, but feels very different because it is a small village among the hills. The air is cleaner, the view of the mountains is closer, and there is no wifi, making it a very relaxing place to be. We enjoyed walking around the town, making cookies, and playing cards.
 

Additionally, this past weekend we went to Quintero, which is around two hours away and located on the beach. The maternal grandparents have owned a house a few meters away from the beach ever since my host mom and her nine siblings were young. Seeing as abuela had ten children, the gathering was very large! I got to meet a lot of aunts, uncles, and cousins. We cooked for hours and then all ate together in order to celebrate Chile's independence day, deisiocho. After the meal we went on a family walk on the beach and found a huge starfish eating it's deisicoho meal. It was so incredible to see. We watched for almost and hour as it slowly pulled the small snails towards the center of its body, where it's mouth is. Sadly, as we were leaving a young girl and her grandmother came and removed that starfish, along with a few others, to dry out and use as decorations.


 I also did a lot of running and literally "ran into" some breath taking views! I was running down a street in the village which lead to a path which ran along the rocky and beautiful shore, and that lead to a cave and an even more beautiful view of rocks and waves. I was so grateful that my mom suggested that I bring my running shoes because getting to run along that beautiful view was my favorite part of Quintero, and I wouldn't have found it otherwise! Climbing on the rocks and taking in the waves, the flowers, and the crabs scuttling in small pools of water was one of those moments where I really realized that this is real. i am here. in chile. breathing the salt of the pacific ocean. and I get to be here for a whole year. How lucky is that?!

In general this month, I have really enjoyed spending time with my new family and making friends at the school. My family is very kind, and shares the same sense of humor as me and my hilarious parents at home (love you too mom and dad!), so we laugh a lot! My brother Pedro is also fairly close in age to me, so we bike to school together and know a lot of the same people. They call me Emmita, or Emmi, hense the name of this blog "Emmi In Chile." School has been very wonderful as well. I am playing on the soccer team, and the structure of school here in general is very conducive to making friends because all of my classes are with the same 30 people.
I cannot believe that it's already been a month and I look forward to the following months in this beautiful place.