It's decision time!

If you recall the last entry, we ended with a shot of the hotel Rondo. This is a shot from our window. What looks like a river on the left is actually a channel to accommodate the rise and fall of the tide. (Currently low in the am and high in the evening) It is full now but will soon recede to be a virtually empty river bed. In the distance is the Pacific (about 2 blocks away). Vina Del Mar is a wonderfully clean modern city. The area near the waterfront is beautiful. There are also restaurants every three feet as the city is crawling with tourists during high season (January , February). Living in a hotel means that we are part of the restaurant crowd. Fortunately, we have found a favorite near the hotel where we can snuggle up near a wood burning stove and everybody knows your name. (for the fans of Cheers) lol





This is our hotel lobby. The only down side to staying here is that the Wi-Fi signal is too weak to be able to work on the computer in our room. So that means mucho hours in the lobby and having Skype conversations in a very public atmosphere. We really can't complain too much though as the people here are truly wonderful. They have helped us immensely in getting around and connecting us with people and places. They treat us well at breakfast time too. Today they brought us a special treat of a local fruit called "cheramoyas" (pardon the spelling??).


This is simply a typical grocery store in Vina although some "Supermercados" are monsterous!! They make Superstores look like corner confectionaries! There is one store we visited called "Jumbo" that truly is jumbo. Chileans seem to be big consumers and like to shop. We were there on a Sunday around supper time, and the store was buzzing with people which really surprised us. We aren't sure what the store hours are in general. I wonder if they are open into the late hours?? We will try to find out.....
The small shops seem to close for an hour or two in the afternoon (siesta?!) but remain open until 7 or 7:30 in the evening.




These trees caught our eye. We don't know what they are called (something else for us to research!). They are not in bloom yet, although many of the other trees are fully convered in leaves.


Yesterday (Wednesday) we had another adventure--buying a cell phone. We went to many booths in the shopping mall only to find that no one spoke English. So we kept at it, going into the many cell phone stores along the street. Finally, we found this one. The company is called "Claro". This young man (we don't know his name unfortunately) was totally terrified when his boss told him to come help us. She (the boss) spoke no English, and he did a little. So we proceeded to to try to communicate. It was obvious that he was nervous until we told him that we weren't in a hurry and we would muddle through. Once he relaxed, we managed quite well, and he was smiling and laughing by the end of our time together. We left him with a Saskatchewan pin, and you would think that we had given him a piece of gold. He was just thrilled! The red t-shirt was a gift that came with the phone. It became a bit of a joke with the clerk as it was clearly intended for a little child.



More street jugglers to entertain the waiting cars at the intersections.... We have seen everything from jugglers (balls, basketballs, flaming torches) to a gymnastic trio making human pyramids and tossing young women into the air. It would be interesting to know how much money they make at the end of the day. They work hard at what they are doing! Come on Canadian "squeegee kids". . . step it up!



The following two pictures are of scenery along the highway between Vina del Mar and Quillota. Our friend, Ines, took us to Quillota (about an hour's drive inland) on Tuesday.




It isn't visible in these shots but there are orange groves along the highway.




This shot is of the patio comida (food court) in the shopping mall in Quillota. This is NOT where we wanted to eat; however, restaurants were hard to come by in this city. Quillota is an agricultural based city (not sure of the population), and from what we observed, the economy is poor. We drove around quite a bit, and there was a great deal of poverty by Canadian standards.






Here's something on the menu that we definitely DID NOT try.....a hamburger with a fried egg and fries!! Coke on the side!



This is the "Holistic Learning Center" in Quillota and is part of the reason we went to Quillota. I (Charlene) had found this on the internet, and it seemed to be a possibility for work. The administrator (Claudio) was thrilled to see us. They were looking for teachers and likely would have hired us (Norm too) on the spot. The "However" part is that they were looking for teachers to go to the mines (copper) to teach the administrators. Apparently, the mine administrators need English in order to work with partners in South Africa. While still in Saskatoon, I had read about teaching in the mining towns, and I knew this was not something that I was up for. They also mentioned the possibility of working in Quillota, but the administrator agreed that housing was an issue, and stadards may not be up to what we might want. So......we left them with our contact information and we'll see what happens.



The job search continues as does the search for a furnished apartment. We have looked into this a bit, going to a couple of real estate offices. It seems that Vina is a very expensive place to live....apartments are often rented all year by wealthy Chileans who come to Vina on weekends and holidays. We don't want to pay much more than $500 (Cdn.) per month; however, we have been told the rent here could be as high as $800-$1000! Too much! We will keep looking as we know that there are cheaper neighborhoods. We just aren't sure what to do. If work possibilities do not surface in the next couple of days, we may have to move on to another area.

Randon notes......

Chileans do not seem to use black pepper in restaurants....only salt;

Honey seems hard to come by, and many waiters do not know what I am asking for when I say "miel" for my tea in the morning. This seems strange to us because we have looked up "miel", and it definitely means honey; what I have ended up with is a bottle of "miel de palma" which is not honey at all but more like corn syrup;

Some street vendors spend their days selling items at intersections--flags, sweets, baked goods, etc.;

We are learning not to shake hands but rather to hug someone and kiss on the right cheek; we aren't sure if this extends to man-man contact but definitely woman-woman and man-woman; it is kind of nice....

We have yet to find tissue in boxes (as in "Kleenex"); they seem to sell it only in individually-wrapped, purse-size packages;

Eggs are sold radomly everwhere from road sides to flea markets mixed in with used clothing and other items; they are not refrigerated in the grocery stores;

We have yet to notice accommodations for physically-challenged people; some street corners are ramped, but most are not; not many small hotels have elevators;

We haven't seen any evidence of recycling initiatives anywhere that we have visited;

Norm purchased some items in a stationery store yesterday; he went to one desk to pay, took the items to another desk to get packaged and picked up the items at a third desk; we are realizing that things we take for granted in Canada can be quite different here;

Navigating the phone system has proven challenging. There are different rules for calling cell to cell; cell to land line; land line to land line etc. Add a zero, add a nine, drop the area code bla bla bla. All part of the adventure and soon will be second nature.

Final note....make sure that you know what you are ordering in a restaurant, do not guess or make any assumptions! Last night I ordered what I thought was a corn-based dish only to find out that it was actually pieces of the lining of an animal's stomach! I don't know which animal, but I am guessing pig. I thought it looked kind of interesting as I began to eat and was thinking that maybe I had ordered the wrong dish and got mushrooms instead of corn. However, it soon became evident that the slippery, rubbery things I was chewing on were not mushrooms. I truly felt queasy when I was told what I had eaten! I believe the dish was something with "callos"; I looked it up in the dictionary, and I was sure it said corn. It definitely wasn't! We found out later on that many Chileans love this delicacy and come to that particular restaurant because they know how to cook it up just right. YUCK!!

Till next time,
Love
N & C