First off I would like to mention something that I have to this point failed to mention, they only drink instant coffee here and if you know me at all, I love my coffee in the morning. So this is a huge adjustment to me. The others don’t seem to have the same problem and I am pretty sure that it is because they don’t drink coffee. Anyway, today we had a big day of touring ahead of us, today was our tour of Concepcion. We started off by going to the school and helping with the day’s first class. At 9:30, not 9:00, we were to meet at the front entrance to the school (Yes I thought they said 9 because again if you know me, if I don’t write it down I will forget,… I didn’t write it down). Once we were all together we piled 14 people in a 12 passenger van and the tour began. We had originally planned to make several stops and get out and walk around, but this was replaced by, “This is the ________, and to the right you will see the _______” as we flew by the landmark. Luckily we were able to get out of the van at a couple of places. The first stop was the Parque de Ecuador. We were told that there were some trails that you could take to get some very nice views of the ocean, but our driver told us that we didn’t have time. So I got a couple of pictures of the trees that I have never seen before and some strange sculpture and it was back into the van. The next stop was the best of the three that were made, and to tell the truth I would have been fine if this was the only stop that we made today. This stop was the beach, Desembocadura, at the mouth of the Biobio river. This was to this point the most beautiful thing that I have seen. It is a scene that I have never seen before. It was the typical exotic beach that is only seen in movies and on post cards. The rocks were and huge and there were cliffs that protruded out into the ocean. The water was a brilliant blue and the waves were crashing on the rocks. The pelicans, sea gulls, and vultures were perched high on the rock watching us as if they were warning us that we were in their territory. The one thing that was different from the postcard beach scene was that the sand is black. It was still very beautiful and we all took many many pictures. Next we went to a museum that was in the same park as the beach. It was very interesting but it was more like a world museum that it was a Chilean museum, plus it was all in Spanish so I could not really tell what everything was.
The next stop on our tour was the mall. It is quite amazing, like I had mentioned before, but two days in a row is getting a little ridiculous. This time it was just for lunch and to show us where the mall was. Dr. Fresch also got us all some Gelato (AKA: Fancy Ice Cream). It was all very good. After lunch we walked to Santa which is the supermarket here and then it was back to the school just in time for the students to get out. Most of the other students went home and I again had to stay because my brother had Basketball practice after school. I sat in on Dr. Fresch’s lecture to the teachers at Thomas Jefferson on increasing reading comprehension, all things that I have already seen in the masters program. One of the other Gringos also sat in on the lecture with me, but he had to leave half way through because his ride was there. I on the other hand had to stay for 2 hours after the lecture until Pancho’s practice was over. I went and watched his practice, and read some of my book. The time goes a lot faster than you would think. After practice we got a ride home with Manuel and I killed some time on my computer while I waited for the rest of the family to get home and have dinner.
Once dinner was over I showed them some pictures of my family and we talked for some time. They were interested in what my siblings were doing and what my parents did. They said that my brother and I looked like we were the actors on Prison Break, and that Aimee looked like one of the students that was here last year. We discussed the plans for our upcoming trip to Chiloe and whatever else came to mind. They have told me to bring one of my friends on the trip with me so Marshall will be coming along. It was very nice to talk to my family and get to know them a little better. It made me feel much more at home. I really fell that I am settling into my new home.
