Here are a few pictures from various excursions and everyday life here. I hope that you enjoy. I will be leaving Santiago in 30 days. Kinda nuts. This has been an unreal experience, and it is tough to leave. At the same time, I am happy to be going home for the holidays and cannot wait to see everyone.
Alright, pictures......
This is a homemade empanada. Filled with diced beef, onions, a hard boiled egg and an entire olive(including pit or its a bad empanada!).
Empanadas make me happy. I am going to miss these, unless anyone wants to learn how to make them, I hear that it is fairly easy?
Hiking in the Andes just south of Santiago.
Haircut from the host mom and Kelly, my housemate from UCSB. They did a great job hahahahaha, but seriously my hair looks amazing as usual.
This is my host mom at the largest cheese shop in Santiago, so they say. I think they just mean that it is really big and well known. It is located at "La Vega" marketplace up in comuna Recoleta. This is a huge market that covers a fee acres of land that sells anything you could ever need in food. They have barrels and barrels of everything from onions to olives to some fruit that has not yet been identified. The best is shopping in the large lots behind the market where vendors come with fresh produce. They sell behind the market so they do not have to pay a fee. There, bargaining and haggling is law. If you are not yelling, then you are not buying or selling. The entire dynamic out there was crazy, I kept expecting fights to break out among the vendors, loiterers and just people whom seem to hang out there. Regardless you could buy 10 heads of iceberg lettuce for $1.50. That makes it worth it.
More of La Vega and potatoes.
La Vega and a quiltro (street mutt). One other cool aspect about La Vega was seeing many restaurant owners there (with their apprentices) looking at produce and stocking up on various items.
This is homemade ceviche. Absolutely unreal. Chile has taught me the importance of a few key items in many meals: cilantro, tomatoes, peppers, spicy peppers, onions and green onions. These are staples. (Also a little bit of curry in risotto)
My host brother Pablo's birthday cake. (bags of chips in photo for scale). Cake was unreal. Huge first of all. It consisted of heavy pancakes layered between manjar(dulce de leche) and a kind of sweet orange paste/jam. Unreal.
Last picture. Campus and Cerro Plomo. Never gets old.
Chao.
Morning view (south) while making a nice Nescafe (granulated coffee).
Afternoon view (north). This place is awesome. We surfed this little point break. It is right in the town of Pichilemu, called 'la puntilla'.
Star gazing is amazing in Chile, even though the constellations are upside down from our N.Hemisphere stars.
Empanadas make me happy. I am going to miss these, unless anyone wants to learn how to make them, I hear that it is fairly easy?
Haircut from the host mom and Kelly, my housemate from UCSB. They did a great job hahahahaha, but seriously my hair looks amazing as usual.
This is my host mom at the largest cheese shop in Santiago, so they say. I think they just mean that it is really big and well known. It is located at "La Vega" marketplace up in comuna Recoleta. This is a huge market that covers a fee acres of land that sells anything you could ever need in food. They have barrels and barrels of everything from onions to olives to some fruit that has not yet been identified. The best is shopping in the large lots behind the market where vendors come with fresh produce. They sell behind the market so they do not have to pay a fee. There, bargaining and haggling is law. If you are not yelling, then you are not buying or selling. The entire dynamic out there was crazy, I kept expecting fights to break out among the vendors, loiterers and just people whom seem to hang out there. Regardless you could buy 10 heads of iceberg lettuce for $1.50. That makes it worth it.
More of La Vega and potatoes.
La Vega and a quiltro (street mutt). One other cool aspect about La Vega was seeing many restaurant owners there (with their apprentices) looking at produce and stocking up on various items.
This is homemade ceviche. Absolutely unreal. Chile has taught me the importance of a few key items in many meals: cilantro, tomatoes, peppers, spicy peppers, onions and green onions. These are staples. (Also a little bit of curry in risotto)
My host brother Pablo's birthday cake. (bags of chips in photo for scale). Cake was unreal. Huge first of all. It consisted of heavy pancakes layered between manjar(dulce de leche) and a kind of sweet orange paste/jam. Unreal.
Last picture. Campus and Cerro Plomo. Never gets old.
Chao.
Granola + Te con leche o cafe. This day was special as our host mom made us banana bread. She used the recipe from my gringa roommates, but added tea. Final product was delicious.
This will be the largest building in South America upon completion. It will also be surrounded by three smaller sky scrapers to complete, the Costanera Center. The building will reach 300 meters in height or, 984 feet.
This was a bomb shelter. Or customs going into Argentina. They were in no rush that day to move anyone into their country. No worries haha
In Argentina, in the hostel. We decided to sample their beverages.
Calle Aristides Villanueva, Mendoza, Argentina. Best part was that there were trees. Big trees and lots of them. A nice change. Santiago does not really have trees.
Cab rides are amazing. Especially when they are in Peugeot's from 1950, with a chain smoking driver.
See, we were stoked!
Preparing for our bike+winery tour, with some wine. The man who rented us the bikes seemed to be more concerned with serving us wine than his other customers, excellent.
It is pretty in Argentina too!
Aca tambien es lindo.
This is absinthe. 75% alcohol. They make it at one of the wineries. I did not sample it in the tour, instead I tried a grappa style alcohol made from pears. Strong stuff, I think hard liquor is more popular in Argentina than Chile where the wine/beer keep us all happy.
Next stop.
This was a cool winery that we did not enter, but it was pretty with the mountains in the background. Sorry if it did not really come out, all of these pictures taken with a Sony P&S.
Some of us had to wait for the rest of the group and decided to get artsy.
Going home. More Andes action!
I will be coming back to go here one day. Great trip to Mendoza. I loved Argentina in general, people were welcoming and it felt like Italy. Now back in Chile, chillin.
Bus Station, Santiago.
Sunset at Playa Principal, El Quisco, Chile.
Cabanas. Pretty nice spot.
Playa Principal in the day time.
