Say among the nations, "The LORD reigns."

So, I'm going wayy back for this update, but it was a fun trip and there are some neat pictures so it's worth writing about.

Central has two different study abroad programs here in Chile. My program here in Valdivia and then a shorter 6-week summer program up north in Valparaíso. I knew one of the girls who was coming down for this program so we decided to try and meet up for a weekend. It was a little difficult finding a weekend that worked, and a place to go since we're about 13 hours away and she had classes on Friday. So we tried to do some research and settled on Curicó. Needless to say it wasn't quite what we expected when we got there. It's supposed to be a really cute town but was strong affected by the earthquake because it's located pretty close to the epicenter, and also because most of the buildings are (were) over 100 years old and made of adobe. On top of that, it was winter so low season for any touristy things. However, we made the most of it and had fun exploring the city, riding micros, visiting a winery and eating delicious food, climbing a random hill, and getting to know our hostal owner (and locking her out of her house when we left... oops!).

Then on Sunday we decided it was time for a change so we headed about an hour south down to Talca. Talca was also pretty affected by the earthquake but it was a larger town so we got do a little more exploring. Plus, it was sunny which was a nice treat for Greg, Rachel and I who by that point had already experienced enough rain here in Valdivia. We found some ice cream (yum!) and eventually were directed by some friendly people to another nice hill where we could walk around and there was a good place to eat. Fabulous, except we needed to take a collectivo to get there. We found where the collectivos were passing, but every time our number passed us it was full. Problem. So we flagged down a random collectivo and the driver said even though it wasn't his route he would take us there. He showed us where to go and also gave us his phone number and said he'd come back to pick us up if we needed to.

The park/hill ended up being beautiful and the lunch was also absolutely delicious. We walked around for a while and even got to take a nice boat ride on a small river. For lunch we had a huge pot of chicken cooked with mariscos and ponche - which is like sangria but made with white wine. We were all satisfied and decided if anything that lunch had made our trip worth it! Plus it was cheap :). We called the collectivo driver and had the best taxi ride back to the bus terminal - dancing laughing and singing the whole way - and we saw Ashley off and then the rest of us waited for a few more hours playing cards until our bus left to go back to Valdivia.

I started writing this blog about two weeks ago but never got around to finishing it. Now I'm sitting in my room with all my bags packed to leave Valdivia tomorrow night. I'm all done with my classes (finally) and it's hard to believe that my time here has really come to an end.... so I feel like some reminiscing is in order. I've been walking around with a lot of mixed emotions lately. I keep thinking of things I would love to do here - go skiing in the Andes, travel further south or north, go to Buenos Aires, spend more time with the friends and families I've gotten to know and love - but at the same time I'm very ready to be home in the arms of my friends, family, and fiance! It's hard being torn between the two cultures, knowing that when I leave a part of me will still be here, with the way of life and my friends. It's also hard not knowing if I'll ever see these people again. I would love to come back but at this point I can't say if that will be possible or not in the future.

A few weeks ago we had a long weekend due to holiday that fell on a Monday. A while back when I did Un Techo Para Chile, I met a chilean who has a class with the other girl from Central and we hit it off pretty well. She's super outgoing and a lot of fun to talk to. She's in her second year studying history and education at the university and after the weekend we would get together once a week or so to eat lunch and catch up a little bit. She even met Jake when he came - which was quite the funny picture since she's barely 5 feet tall. She lives up in the countryside (campo) just north of Santiago and invited me to come visit her home and family with her. Of course that has been one of my favorite things to do here in Chile, so I made sure to take her up on the offer and went home with her for the long weekend.

It was a very nice relaxing weekend and I can't explain how good it felt to be separated from "city" life. We walked almost everywhere and I got to see the sun after being stuck in the rain for way too long in Valdivia. I also loved getting to see her life which is quite different from the families I've met here in Valdivia. Her family is adorable and incredibly frienly (they called me their prodigal daughter all weekend!) but they come from the lower working class (compared to the family I live with, whose kids go to the most expensive high school in the area) and her parents work to provide for their kids so that they can study at the university and have opportunities that they weren't able to have. They make a lot of sacrifices for this (like putting off the completion of their house!) but are proud and happy to do it. And if you ask them, they say they don't expect anything in return once she graduates (although, of course she will continue to care for them). This was just really interesting for me to see, as it presents a pretty typical different parent-child interaction of Chile. For instance if you go talk about going out for lunch or dancing with a chilean, occasionally they'll say they can but that they have to call their parents to have them deposit money in their bank account. At times this has been weird for me, after being "financially independent" for some time now but has been just another thing to learn about the culture here.

We didn't do a whole lot over the weekend, and that felt good. We mostly just hung out with her friends (who she hadn't seen in 3 months) and we watched a couple movies. I also got to go to mass with her Sunday morning and a Bible study afterwards. It was fun to meet some more of the community at church. Everyone was very welcoming (like always) and an older man even bought me cake and coffee! This is something that I've fallen in love with in regards to Chilean culture - their warmth and hospitality, especially to foreigners. And it's something that I'm going to miss a lot. In a lot of ways been fun to be "the gringa" and to talk about my life in the US to Chileans and see their reactions to some of our traditions (like the drinking age, fraternities/sororities and the changing of lasts names with marriage). And, I think I've had to explain Thanksgiving at least to 10 different people now too. :)

So that's that. I've got one more weekend to post about and then my upcoming travels as well. Tomorrow I leave Valdivia and head up to La Serena which is about 7 hours north of Santiago. I'm looking forward to seeing the sun again and enjoying some warmer weather (it might hit 60! haha). Then I fly out Wednesday and get home on Thursday afternoon. It'll be good to be home, but it'll also be hard to leave this country that has very much become a part of who I am.

Oh, for those of you interested... a large part of why parents pay for everything is that jobs are extremely hard to come by here without a college degree, and if you find one, you're lucky to make more than $10 for an 8 hour day of work - not necesarrily conducive for paying for college (which costs about $5000 a year at the public universities, not including food and housing).

Me with Belén and her family