NEW BLOG!

Hello again, blogging universe! I know I bid you all farewell in my last entry -- and it is true that this particular blog has to come to an end now that I'm back in the States. HOWEVER, I've been missing updating this blog so much since my return from Chile, I decided to extend my blogging to los Estados Unidos. That's right, get excited.

Check out my ongoing adventures (admittedly less foreign, but still entertaining!) at http://tarakims.blogspot.com/. I'm really glad that so many of you followed my blog while I was in South America, so I hope I can continue to hold your interest even now that I'm back in the Northern hemisphere :)

the end.

Well blogging universe, this is it. I am back in Lancaster. I have hugged all of my family members, eaten some Mexican food, and briefly considered unpacking my suitcases. I'm really home.

I'm trying to prepare myself for a lot of processing in the upcoming days, weeks, maybe even months. At the risk of getting too clichéd, Chile is a part of me now and I won't be the same again. That's one of the amazing things about having the opportunity to study abroad for a whole semester, or even a whole year -- spending that amount of time in another place can't help but leave a lasting impact. Instead of just being a tourist who visits a faraway country and snaps some photos, you get to really live there, breathe in the air, walk the streets, use the public transportation, get to know the people, absorb the history, observe the current attitudes and styles and slang, feel the city's ebb and flow of day-to-day life. The first month gives you the very unique opportunity to get a real glimpse into another place, and the following months offer you a chance to make that place mean something to you, to find where you fit amidst so much that is foreign.

I could go on and on about what an amazing semester this was, what my favorite parts were, what I'll always remember, how it changed me, what I learned -- but I would rather talk about those things with each of you in person now that I'm back in the States. I know this will make you all terribly sad, but I guess this blog has reached its end now that I don't have any more South American adventures to report on. I'm definitely glad that I chose to document my semester in this way; it's nice to know that a piece of my time in Chile will continue to exist, floating somewhere out there on the internet, if I ever want to go back and look it up. I like records. I hope you do too, and I hope you enjoyed following my adventures as much as I enjoyed telling you about them!

Chao.

first u.s. transaction

I bought a Cosmo (go ahead and judge me) and it cost $5.13. What?!?? I only had a five with me, so I had to embarrassingly leave my magazine on the counter and run back to my seat to get more change. I'm trying not to think about the fact that this amount of money could have bought me lunch every day for a week in Santiago.

bienvenidos a... the united states?

I'm sitting in the Miami airport, waiting for my connecting flight to Baltimore and trying to comprehend the fact that I'm really back in the States.

As I went through customs, all of the airport officials greeted me with "Welcome home" -- and it's crazy to think that they're right, I'm an American, I'm returning to the country that I call my home. After four months in Chile, I've gotten used to being an obvious foreigner. I'm used to people staring at me because I don't fit in, I'm used to having to work a little bit harder to make myself understood, I'm used to being slightly unsure about how things work. It's strange to belong again all of a sudden. No one looks twice at my blonde hair here, and no one expects me to have any trouble communicating with them.

I've only been here for about an hour, so the reality hasn't fully set in yet. I keep having to make the conscious choice to address people in English instead of automatically speaking to everyone in Spanish. When I fish through my wallet, it's filled with pesos. My computer is set to Santiago time and Santiago weather. This is going to take some adjusting.

MY ENTIRE SEMESTER HAS JUST BEEN JUSTIFIED

My host mom: There are some gringos who are very, very gringo. Some of my host students have a hard time here in Chile because they are just so gringo.

My host sister: Like Tara?

My host mom: Oh no, not Tara. Tara may be a gringa, but she's not very gringa.

YESSSSS

back to the beginning.

I'm back here again, and I'm trying to remember how I fit everything into my two suitcases the first time around. I'm starting to suspect I must have defied some laws of physics. I'm usually the kind of person who starts packing days in advance...but lately I've been a little bit in denial about the fact that I'm actually leaving, so I made the unwise choice to put it off as long as possible. Now I need to get this tornado of clothing, toiletries, books, scarves, and Chilean Christmas presents (that's right, get excited) under control before 8 pm. WISH ME LUCK.

starting to say goodbye

Things I'm going to miss about this place

• living in my own casita
• Chilean slang
• never having to wait for the metro
• the exchange rate
• the Chilean food I have come to appreciate: completos, manjar, alfajores, paila, palta, chirimoya
• Cerro Santa Lucía
• clubs that play nothing but reggaeton and cumbia
• street vendors
• the awesome views of the Andes
• my cute host parents
• the current summer weather -- I'm dreading the temperature shock that awaits me
• all the people and places that have become familiar to me
• being surrounded by the beautiful Spanish language all of the time

Things I'm not going to miss about this place

• the crazy cats who think they own my casita
• the lack of consistent hot water
• sticking out like a sore thumb because of my blonde hair
• having such a long commute to my university and my friends' houses
• performers on the bus who drown out the sounds of my iPod
• machismo
• the Chilean food I am sick of: cazuela, pino empanadas, lentils, rice, everything that is bland
• paying for bottled water
• being so far away from the people I love

almost there...almost.

Even though my semester is essentially over -- classes are done, I'm finished with final exams, I've turned in my papers and presentations, I fly home this weekend -- I still have one last thing standing between me and freedom. I have to write an essay about the internship I had this semester and turn it in to the director of my study abroad program.

This paper requires no research. It may be written in English, unlike all of the other work I've done this semester. It needs to be about 5 pages. AND I CAN'T DO IT.

I never cease to be amazed at how many things I find to occupy myself with on the Internet when I'm supposed to be doing a paper. I have spent my entire morning doing everything except putting words to paper. I don't know why this is so hard. gahhhhhhhhhhh

la isla de pascua

I just got back from 5 days in what seemed a lot like paradise. I can't even begin to express what an awesome way this was to wrap up the semester.

You know you've just arrived in tropical paradise when you're greeted with leis as you step off the airplane!

The island was so beautiful it almost didn't look real. Can you spot the rainbow?

Pretty much the entire island was formed from volcanic eruptions. This is an old volcano that we visited on the second day. Its last eruption was hundreds of years ago; now, the locals use it to grow vegetation that can't be produced on the rest of the land.

And of course, the huge Moai statues are the main attraction on Easter Island. The indigenous community there, called Rapa Nuis, constructed them for their chieftains to represent their forms after death. At one point, there were over 900 Moai displayed all over the island -- but they were all destroyed during a civil war. In the 1960s, anthropologists began studying the island and decided to reconstruct the giant Moai. Now, Easter Island is a historical site protected by UNESCO, and you can see tons of the Moai in various states of restoration.

They're huge! It's amazing to think that they were all carved out of the side of a cliff.

The stone in the background is what the Moai were carved from. I love that you can see them poking out of the hill, like they're about to stand up and walk away.

Our third day, we spent the afternoon on the biggest beach on the island. It was the most beautiful beach I've ever seen...and isolated in the middle of the Pacific Ocean! Easter Island is about 3,000 miles away from its closest neighbor -- so even though we were technically still on Chilean soil, we were pretty far from home.

All in all, it was our most relaxing trip yet -- due to the combined facts that our finals are over, we got to sleep in until 9 every morning, we didn't have to bundle up in winter coats, there was lots of lounging by the pool deck, and we sat on the beach to watch the sunset every single night.

It's hard to go back to real life in Santiago...if you can call this whirlwind of my last few days "real life." I'm flying back the States on Saturday night, and I have an intimidating to-do list to accomplish before then. More on this later.

one island, many names.

Easter Island = Isla de Pascua = Rapa Nui = I am going there for the next five days and I am incredibly unbelievably excited.

Aside from the vague promise of beaches and volcanoes and giant statues of heads, I'm not exactly sure what to expect out of this trip. But "tropical Polynesian island" is pretty much all I need to know...and I promise to report back on all of the amazingness in a few days. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

welcome to the jungle

Remember my cute little casita in the backyard? Well, I no longer live in the backyard. My poor casita is disappearing into the selva.

This is what I see outside of my window.

This is the very overgrown sidewalk leading to my front door.

This is what it's like when I have to walk down the sidewalk to get to my door.

Aaaaahhhh it's even starting to creep inside!!! I don't know how much longer I'm going to be able to hold it off before it takes over completely. If I don't make it home next week, you can assume I missed my plane because I didn't anticipate how long the bushwhacking would take.

facts about the southern cone

1. The ozone layer is thinner here.
2. The UV rays are stronger here.
3. It is much, much, much easier to get sunburnt here.
4. Buy aloe if you plan on making it out alive.

okay, here's my obligatory "i can't believe it's already december" post.

I know I've said this with each passing month. But it's true. Time is moving ridiculously fast and I can't believe that we're entering the season of Advent, peppermint-themed drinks at Starbucks, and winter break. (On a side note -- the Starbucks here still use a wintry theme to decorate for Christmas, complete with snowflakes and snowmen and pine trees, even though it's summer in the southern hemisphere. It must suck to be a confused South American living in a world that has a northern bias.)

Until my plane lands in cold, miserable Baltimore, I'm going to keep living in denial and telling myself it must be July.