Summer as of lately...

Just as the temperatures are starting to get just a tiny bit cooler at night it's hard to believe my Chilean summer is almost over! I've been slacking as of lately in the blog, and even journal-ing daily events.. but hey, it's summer!

On the 6th of February I was invited to go to Valparaiso with Emily, her Canadian mom, and her mom's friend for 4 nights. We stayed in a lovely little hotel on Cerro Conception which was such an old building but with a brilliant rooftop view over the city and harbor. In the days Emily and I headed to Viña del Mar and also to Reñaca (known as the young and "hip" beach.. but not quite on a Tuesday!) We also made the best out of the nightlife in Viña on Monday and Tuesday even randomly visiting the casino to check it out and we met up with two friends from Santiago one night. After a few days of taking in sun and eating delicious seafood Emily and I hopped on a bus on the night of the 9th as I had to go and meet-up with my host-family at another beach and she had to return to her summer host-family in another beach as well.

After spending a much needed relaxing day on the beach in Las Cruces with my family we left on Friday morning to go to el campo or the country. Here is where my host-dad is from and his parents, and two sisters still live on the same piece of land. Now coming from Ayr and seeing a lot of rural Ontario in my short lifetime I have never experienced country like this before or even as one of my Chilean cousins said "este es campo, campo!" There were chickens running around freely, a stray kitten, sheep, baby chicks, grape vines growing so naturally and the family and their houses were so close together. The days at the campo may had passed slow but the kids were able to do something at night at least. On Friday night the cousins and I went to go and see the final soccer game for the 18-30 local age group. After the game they had an tent set-up for a dance. After waiting around for a bit deciding if we should stay or not, waiting for the music to be good I decided to say, "hey... let's just go in!!", I mean why stand around doing nothing? There were people of all ages in there and we had fun. Although after not sleeping so well for a week I was pretty tired by 2 am and just wanted to go home. Eventually my host-parents came and picked us all up and I was so relieved!

On Saturday night was the wedding of one of my host-Papa's cousins. I didn't get to go to the main wedding part but I sure had fun at the reception. In Chile they have a tradition at weddings where in one wedding cake the tie string to different small plastic objects (usually things such as a wedding ring, baby, cupid arrow, etc.) Being a single lady I was able to pull out one of the strings and what did I get... a baby! My host-family laughed because this isn't the first time that I've pulled a baby out of a wedding cake as I did the same thing when my host-Mama put together a mock-wedding for one of my aunt and uncle's anniversary! I seriously love receptions at weddings, and really just dancing overall now! I danced the night away with my cousins and we got home around 4 am.

Today the 18th also marks 6 months since I've arrived here... where has the time gone?!