Semana 2 En Chile ~ Grace Moody

Things have been great here. I keep saying that to friends and family that ask how the trip is but that phrase could mean anything. It's been hard. Approaching most interactions knowing there could be a road block due to the language barrier isn't easy. Figuring out what's expected from me from my paired teacher who speaks only Spanish is confusing. Learning, understanding, and respecting cultural differences and where I fit into them has been wild. But it's still great. Every day I have to learn something new or shift my patterns of living in order to make the day work at all and it's amazing to be constantly challenged. Each time I'm worried about expressing myself to someone, I try and they try in return and eventually we get through the exchange. No one here has been impatient, no one here has been unkind.

In the city center

My family is wonderful. They always jump to help me with anything I need. Last week my host dad spent and hour on the phone with the internet company trying to find out how I could get on the wifi. Nico, the student I'm paired with has been speaking more and more English with me. It's taken a lot of prompting to get his confidence up but he's getting better and better. I think he's starting to take some pride in being able to communicate and use another language. At first I wasn't sure how to hang out with a teenage boy, at home that's maybe the group I relate to the least. But things are different here and anytime I ask, Nico jumps up from whatever he is doing to spend time with me. We sit together on the bus everyday.

While on the phone getting the wifi for me, Jorge re-arranged the whole room. This is Nico crawling under the table in the office to show me something he translated on his phone.

We've taken trips to the beach (my first time seeing the Pacific), the university, the city center, and a mine. I've seen city, village, and country. The houses are colorful, the air is clear. The music, the food, the shopping, all of it has been fantastic. I'm constantly in between drawing comparisons from here to my home and noticing differences and trying to understand them. There are some things a that are the same everywhere, like family drama, or dogs trying for your attention, no matter what language you use with them.

"Pastors Aleman"

It's been so good for me to get some perspective from Chile and it's people. There are many high school students that I have talked to that have a lot to say about politics and culture, any current affairs you can think of. It's good to have some distance from the things that constantly preoccupy me at home in order for me to invest more deeply in my work here. It's been fulfilling to pay attention and eventually understand what a student is asking me for help with. It's been a huge opportunity to improve my communication skills with anyone here when I have to actively play out what I mean and think and feel for them. And knowing that it's my job to spend time with my family or communicate with my teacher has helped me be more active in building relationships with people I would normally approach with more reserve due to any expected barriers. That is probably the biggest part.

                                                So yeah, it's the second week, and it's been great.