My time in Chile is coming to an end.

It´s so weird. I remember during week two thinking, "goodness, I have six weeks left. Sooooo much time," and now all I can think of is how quickly it has passed by, as cliché as that sounds.

I´m ready to be home. I´ve had an excellent time full of lots of sporadic moments, but I can´t wait to get home to my family and WSU. That´s one of the things about traveling, I always feel good to come home. It´s amazing experience but I always come back feeling proud of where I come from.

My time here has been exhausting in a good way. I´ve accomplished learning more Spanish. I´ve had six articles published in a fairly prominent newspaper. I made a lot of great friends down here. I learned a lot about a culture that I knew nothing about when I arrived. More or less, I think I´ve accomplished everything I came here to do.

One of the hardest parts of going home is answering the question, "so how was it? Tell me ALL about your trip." Where do I even start with something like this? The big moments, like meeting President Bachelet or accidentally being cast as an extra in a Chilean movie? My very first salsa lesson or the time I tried my first completo? My decision to leave my host family? Sútbol? The internship? I can´t even pick out the most important bits to share, because they´re all so much a part of the experience as a whole.

Perhaps I can share my biggest lesson. I can never expect to understand a culture or another group of people without living in it. It´s so funny to think of all the stereotypes people have about cultures they don´t understand. I surely had them about Chile. I had my expectations... lots of latin music, hot men, long nights of dancing. And yeah, I got all of that. It lived up to my expectations. But there´s so much more to this part of the world. Their love of a good time, a good night out. The fight for more women´s rights. The way everyone gives out money to the people begging on the streets without judging their intentions or whether they´ll just use it to buy a pack of cigarettes. The countless numbers of songs and chants they have for soccer games. These and so many more that I could never finish listing.

A few entries back I promised a worst of/peeves of Chile list, so I´m fulfilling that responsibility with this entry.

1. Nescafé

The Lonely Planet guidebook thoroughly warned me of this problem, and for my first month in Chile I was thoroughly warned of the acidic, powdery mess that is Nestle´s version of coffee. During my first month in Chile, I wasn´t even aware that real coffee existed here until I stunbled across a restaurant with café cortado on the menu (apparently they had café cortados at restaurants I had frequented previously, I just couldn´t undertand the menu). Well, that was great. But the point is, Nescafé is the common version of coffee here and I cannot wait to get home and have the real version at my disposal.

2. PDA

It´s called "pinchando" between people who aren´t dating, "pololeando" between people who are... and it´s everywhere. There´s people making out on the bus, in the streets, on the elevator, at the dinner table... and if you go to the beach, it is EVERYWHERE. Frankly, it´s a little overwhelming. I feel bad for the single people in this country.

3. A lack of central heating

I know I´ve gone over this. But it´s really, really sad. Along with this is never having dry clothes. I hate putting on damp clothes when it´s freezing.

4. How every TV talk show has a table dancing/lap dancing segment

You know, this part is actually a little funny but really uncomfortable at the same time. Their versions of the Today Show and group talk shows always have these guest stars/porn stars who wear next to nothing, hop on the desk and do a little booty-shaking for like ten minutes. It´s so weird. I can´t figure it out.

5. The Reggaeton beat

All of the youth here are obsessed with reggaeton, and the rhythm is always that same, typical, pulsing, boring beat for every song. There´s really only so many ways you can dance to it.

6. Saying something in Spanish and receiving a reply in English

This happens so much. I want to be like, "yo, I´m trying to learn the language here. The least you can do is help me out a little." And I have to wonder, what if I spoke French, or German? I mean, I could come from any other Western-looking country and they would have no idea.

7. Anti-Bush sentiments

It´s not even so much the sentiments as being approached and harrassed at random about him. During my first three weeks here I was harrassed on five different occasions about Bush, four of which were by absolutely random people on the bus, or on the street with whom I didn´t initiate conversation. It´s really a matter of respect. I wouldn´t approach a Chilean student in the U.S. and say, "Pinochet blows. THAT was a bad choice" or anything along those lines, so I feel like the same respect is deserved on my part when I visit their country.

8. Not knowing who to trust

This is really a given with any travel situation, but it does become slightly exhausting at times. I feel like it also dampens my interactions with the people here.

I peaced out of work early on Friday and, with my friend Jessica, headed to the booming metropolis of Santiago for the weekend to museum-hop.

In true Jessica-and-Monique style, we also pretty much ate our way through the weekend as well, downing fruit salad from the fería, completos, lattés, alfajores and white wine during our 3-day stay. Our excuse is that this is our last week and Chile, so we´re going to eat as much Chilean food as possible before we return to the states... where I can bet money we won´t be able to find 3-completo-italianos-plus-two-drinks-for-$2 deals.

But back to museums. The first stop Saturday was Museo de Bellas Artes, situated in the indie-trendy Bellas Artes district of the city. I have to note the building itself was worth the 300peso (60 cents) entry, though the exhibits were less than captivating.

Next was the natural history museum, which was pretty much in the sketchiest part of the city. We got slightly past the point with the preserved 8-year-old (he was a tribal sacrifice or something that was locked up and froze to death... it was pretty gross and morbid)... and then we decided to get out of there. Luckily admission was free.

Then there was Yarur´s new Museo de la Moda, which opened in June, featuring vintage clothing from the 1700s to 1990s owned by this super-loaded Chilean family. I don´t think it was worth the $5 admission, nor walking in freezing cold rain for 20 minutes... but it was neat to see. And the New York Times raved about it in a full-page article.

After being thoroughly soaked to the bone by Mother Nature´s rain spell, we sought refuge in the apartment, where we ended up spooning by a space heater and watching episodes of Papi Ricky until we were warm enough (and our shoes dry enough... I was dumb enough to wear Converse) to buy completos. It was pretty cute.

Sunday required a trip to the artesan/book fería at la Plaza de Armas to buy chocolate, fruit salad and gifts for our friends and family. Then we booked it back to the apartment to watch the World Cup finals, bought completos at half-time, and made it home by 6.

During the finals of the FIFA U20 World Cup yesterday, La Rojita took 3rd place with a 1-0 win over Austria. The goal is accredited to Martinez, but the overall stellar performance and professionalism demonstrated on and off the field has to go to Cristopher Toselli, goalie/my personal favorite. He also broke a U20 record for number of minutes without a goal scored against him (492... so he only beat the record by a minute or so, but who´s counting?!)

It´s been interesting to see the difference in press coverage over the incident in Toronto following the Thursday slaughter by Argentina and the fights that broke out with Canadian police. The same AP story I see repeated over and over in Canadian and US publications says the players were completely out of line, attacking the cops to the point where they had no choice but to whip out the taser. Chilean news (which, by the way, every major news station and newspaper in the country was in an uproar over this for all of Friday and Saturday... if there was any other news going on in the country I´m not aware of it because this was basically the only story covered) said it was more or less a case of discrimination... the players were only trying to meet-and-greet with fans when the police came out of nowhere and attacked them, treating them "like animals." And last I heard, I think FIFA said the players were only responsible for their actions on the field... but don´t quote me on this.

I love the media.

As for me, I think they were young, rowdy, frustrated guys who stepped a little bit out of line and the police totally overreacted. I don´t think there was need to attack , taser and injure 18-, 19-, 20-year-olds whose careers (and physical well-being) could be put in jeopardy. I think a few of the hotheaded players made some bad decisions to act up, and this could come back to bite them in a few years. I feel bad for their parents who had to watch their sons in the spotlight like this, and i feel really bad for the players who felt the need to stick by their teammates but didn´t want to get involved and now may face consequences in the future.

But overall, I´m really pleased with them this year. So they acted up a little, and perhaps they wanted to be world champions. But they played an incredible season that totally compensated for the failures of La Roja in the Copa America. And I am so stoked to see what some of these boys will do in the future.

So I haven´t updated in a week, I´m having huge blog withdrawals and I´m leaving for Santiago in T minus 5 minutes... but the briefest of sports updates is absolutely necessary.

Recap:
FIFA Sub20 World Cup
Last night, Argentina v. La Rojita
= DRAMA DRAMA DRAMA
Yellow cards like candy
Really angry Chilean players
Argentina won, 2-0
Took an entire Canadian police force to keep La Rojita from beating up the refs (look this up on YouTube, the TV footage was incredible. For WSU students, think of that time Tony Bennett flipped out on the court and threw off his jacket and whatnot. This is like 5x better)
La Rojita was later tear-gassed on the streets or something (if I understood the news correctly) while signing autographs, 7 were arrested
Hella drama between Canadian officials, police, FIFA, Chilean fans and the Sub-20 jugadores

Main point: Basically, there are a lot of angry, angry people in Chile and Canada right now.

If you can read Spanish, I´m sure this article explains it so much better than I could in under three minutes.

http://www.emol.com/noticias/deportes/detalle/detallenoticias.asp?idnoticia=263126

Updates to come.

This just in: I LOVE my job.

In case you haven´t already noticed, I´m a lists person. I like them, they´re effective at sharing information, and I use them a lot.

So I made a "best of" list for Chile of things I like the most so far. I might tack on a "best of part deux" in a week or something, but for now, here´s a few things that make my life about this country.

1. LA ROJITA (namely, Arturo Vidal and Cristopher Toselli... they´re kind of amazing)

La Rojita is the name for the Chilean Sub 20 national team, which is currently playing in the FIFA World Cup in Edmonton, Canada. They´re all 18-20 years old and I´m kind of in love with them (plus they´re a refreshing counterpart to the Chilean national team that got booted out of the Copa America earlier this week during a horrendous 6-1 loss to Brazil... there´s a lot more drama to that story, but you can read it all online).

Currently La Rojita is the only selection in the Cup that has no goals against them. Oh, and they beat Portugal last night... Nigeria is up next. I love these boys.

2. The obsession with 80s music here, plus hearing Spanish covers of English songs.

3. Mullets. I know this should be on a "WORST OF" list, but I think it´s the funniest thing ever. There´s this phrase we coined week one... "Chilean men would be so much hotter if the weren´t all sporting mullets" and heavens to betsy is it applicable. They are EVERYWHERE. At least they tend to be more subtle than, like, the all-out butt rock kind of mullet that can be found in some parts of the U.S. I blame the 80s music.

4. Any time any Chilean person tries to say anything in English. We tried to teach a guy how to say "tickle" the other day and it was a lost cause.
Us: "Flatten your voice. TIH-ckle"
Sebastián: "Tayyyyy-ckle."

5. Any time any Chilean yells the one English phrase they know at us. I also think this is funny, because you never know what you´re going to hear. It typically tends to be something along the lines of "Bush is a horrible person" except with more profanity, or someone drunk man bursting out in song, "youuuu arrrre sooooo beauuuuutifulllll to meeeeeeee."

6. Chilean slang. They tack on a "po" for any statement that needs emphasis. There´s a lot of sípos, nopos, en serio-pos, but my favorite is "¡chaopo!" Also, "cachai" on the end of a sentence is synonymous with "do you get it?" But the verb "cachar" is used for a lot of things in casual speech and when someone says "voy a cachar" they could really be referring to any action they are about to do. Pololo/polola are other favorites of mine; those mean boyfriend and girlfriend, respectively. And "pololear" is the all-inclusive verb for when two people who are dating hook up. My friend´s host mother explained that to her... I reckon that conversation must have been awkward.

7. Pan with every meal. The food here in general. Which, by the way, the word here for every damn thing on the dinner table is "rico".

A brief glimpse at my first family meal in Chile:
Ambar: "¿Te gusta la sopa, Mónica?"
Me: "Sí. Gracias, es muy sabrosa."
Ambar: "Sabrosa.... mmm, yeah. ¿Pero es rica, sípo?"
Me: "Uhhhh... ¿sí? Po."
Ambar: "La carne con arroz es muy rica, también. ¿Quieres pan, Mónica? Este es súper rico."
Me: "Right..."

8. An ocean view to kill for from every house. The rich have it, the poor have it, everyone has it. It is absolutely breathtaking.

9. A decent lunch for less than US $4.

10. The obsession with dancing. My host grandfather told me that dancing here is a separate, non-verbal language here where people can connect with total strangers in a way that cannot be expressed with words. I thought that was really interesting.

11. The dramatic narrator for all of the commercials on Warner Channel. I wish I knew how to make a recording of it to put on here. So try to imagine these phrases with a really thick, super-dramatic male, mid-40s Chilean accent:
"Ya volvemos con... TRAH-VE-LERRRRR"
"Mujeres iiiiirreverentes. The L Werrrrrrrrrd"
"Nueva serie... nueva temporada... Studio 60 on de Sunset Striiiiiiiiiip"

It kills me every time.

12. While we´re on the subject of announcers, the way the La Rojita announcer says "Alexis Sanchezsssssssssssssss"

13. Subtitles. Because when you´re watching Seth Cohen´s antics on the first season of the O.C. or all of those subtle jokes on Gilmore Girls, it just can´t be translated. The subtitles tend to cut out proper nouns and everything so it´s all totally lost. Not like anyone here would get it anyway. Can you just imagine Arrested Development or The Office subtitled?...

14. Chivalry. At least in my experience, the men here have been a little more chivalrous as far as picking up the tab for an entire table and walking us home and making sure we get home safely and whatnot. Of course, there´s different degrees of it, as in any culture.

15. Open doors and hospitality. The first day I went to my friend´s house on Cerro Castillo, she said her host mother flipped out when she let me leave without eating something (mind you, I was only there for about three minutes). Kind of like how grandparents are always shoving food down our throat in the states, well, everyone here does that, regardless of age. And they are so open to guests, too. For the first few weeks here, my same aforementioned friend couldn´t distinguish who was part of her host family and who wasn´t because there were always tons of visitors flocking to her house. I love how social everyone is here.

Preview: a "WORST OF" list is in the works.