I was robbed and tortured….

Not literally, but if you have ever had that excruciating painful feeling that your ear drum was going to explode than you have probably flown with a stuffy nose….try having to land 4 times in a row! My ear is STILL plugged! It slightly empties every time I blow it though, so I am hoping by tomorrow it will be gone.  As far as being robbed, … if you are from the U.S., Canada, Australia, or some place that has a flag that looks like it’s out of a street fighter video game (I am guessing South Korea) you are charged to enter the country. Aprox. $140 U.S. I call it a welcome gesture from Chile, we are know you are going to spend your money here, but give us some now just in case you don't spend enough!! Then if you walk out of customs looking like you don’t know what you are doing a guy runs up to you asking if you want to save your bags somewhere, so since I had a layover there for a few hours I reluctantly said ok. He ended up walked me up an escalator and straight into the LAN airline line and then asked for a tip….after I gave him $10 and he only had $3 in change to give me I realized I just paid him $8 to walk me 50 feet.  But you live and you learn!

I landed in Punta Arenas at 3:15pm and when I walked off the plane I was greeted by a gust of wind followed by many other stronger gusts of wind. They slapped me across the face saying, "Hola Jenny, welcome to your new home." Then I finally saw a man with a sign that read Senora Jenny Christopher…I came to find out he was a taxi driver once we walked up to his yellow car. But he was really nice. He pointed out many points of interest along the way to the city. Like a big park, a “mall” that looked like a bunch of cement buildings behind barbed wire…kind of reminded me of what an American prison would look like. …he also pointed out a guy on a bike riding up a small hill in the wind with two saddle bags on either side. I should say he was more like swerving trying to stay upright than riding.

We pulled up to the house where I will be working and have to get buzzed into a locked front gate. A woman that you just have to like by looking at her opened the door said, “hola” and did the side cheek kiss…..that’s how they greet each other here. They call this lady Cali…short for Claudia, she handles the operations for the company. As we walk through the house I meet Marta, the human resources lady that hired me, Anthony the cook, a few other Chilean interns and Chelsea…she was the other American intern that was going to be my mentor….basically show me around. She took me to the Yellow House…this is where we will be sleeping, eating and all that living stuff.  The house has two rooms each with 2 bunk beds, yeah I know summer camp. There is a full kitchen with a stove from the 1950’s that requires some secret love to get it working.  We have one bathroom with our own shelves on it. The shower is pretty much made for someone that is 5’ tall. The water falls directly into my face so my face gets really clean!

It is the end of my first full day here and I feel surprisingly comfortable with where I am. Perhaps it’s my experience being abroad in the past, perhaps it’s my age, or perhaps it’s being with others that have been here for 3 weeks already and can answer my many questions.  Whatever it is….I am so thankful that it seems like it’s going to be a easy transition.  Plus I had tacos for dinner tonight…how much more southern Cali can you get!

Asta otro tiempo.

~Yenny