Santiago - Day 3

Today was a bit uneventful, but relaxing and successful.  I slept in a little, had breakfast (again with struedel - delicious!), and then got ready to go out with Ricardo.  We went shopping to an artesania in the Los Condes neighborhood of Santiago for me to finish off my souvenirs for home.  It was a really neat place, attached to a church, in an area called Los Dominicos (like the Catholic Order).  Today was also a holiday in honor for the same group - so the city as a whole was quiet.  I thought that since the holiday name and the place we were aligned, it'd be packed with visitors, but it wasn't.  Which was fine.  The artesania was comprised of buildings separated into storefronts, with trees and flowers everywhere, a few fountains, and crafts galore.  I think you could buy almost anything here - the only thing I didn't see was produce.  But there were wood-carved sculptures, woven sweaters and blankets, paintings, flowers, and more.  It was a neat place, and very different than what I've seen in the states and the markets here.

After some wandering, I got all I needed, and we headed off.  Our next stop was a mall, because I wanted to get some more postcards to send back.  We weren't successful in that regard, but we did stumble across a great wine shop with a way to package bottles in air bags to keep them from getting damaged during a flight.  Perfecto!  I now have some wine to bring home from Chile, which is fantastic.  The mall itself is similar to what you'd see in the states - stores (and people) everywhere, as with any American holiday, fake plants, and a massive food court with all the classics like McDonald's, KFC, and Pizza Hut.  We ate here, at a "parilla", which is basically a place that sells grilled meat (like Argentina is famous for).  It was pretty tasty.  One major difference I saw, though, was in the parking garage.  This mall has a way to tell you how many parking spaces are empty in a given row, and not only that, lights up the spaces with red or green to point you in the right direction of a free spot!  How cool is that??  And how have we, as a people who are constantly looking to make life easier on us, not come up with it in the US yet?  I was thoroughly impressed, and I think Ricardo was laughing at me.

I feel like I'm getting along a lot better with my Spanish now.  It's crazy - I've had conversations in Spanish about sports, the US, World War II, Immigration, and all kinds of things I'd never have imagined I could.  Granted, I don't talk too much, but I can definitely get around with my vocabulary.  Obviously, it needs improvement, but it's comforting to know that all my studies haven't been a total waste over the last 10 years.  But it also reminds me that I want to be fluent and need to work harder for that to happen.

We drove around a bit more before heading back home to wait on Ljubica to get back from work and have a Chilean dinner to celebrate my last night in South America (and the Southern Hemisphere).

Afterwards I packed up and arranged all my things in my bags, weighed them to make sure they were okay to take on the plane, and settled in for the night.  We're going to go out to buy some post cards tomorrow, and get into the city again, so I'm excited about that.  It's a sad thought that this time tomorrow I'll be on a plane back to the USA, but at the same time it's a happy thought, because I've been away long enough to be ready to get back and see my friends and family and get started on all this grad school work again.