Rain, Pancakes, and Busyness

*I wrote this blog a while ago, and so the keep that in mind. ;) These events happened in... April, in fact. Eeek.

In the summer in Chile it doesn't rain much. Up until this day, it had rained twice and when I got out of school one day I was overjoyed to see the rain! I love storms.

The view of my school in the rain: This is one of the patios.

On to the pancakes! Wednesday is my longest school day when I get out at 5:45 and I get to my house at 6:30-ish. I was pretty exhausted, but decided to attempt to make pancakes. We didn't have syrup in the house (I have seen it here though!--American brands but still) I found a simple recipe but didn't measure anything out (no cups or tablespoons here) and winged it. They looked good but ended up being a little heavy. I ate them with peanut butter that Katie and Diane sent me forever ago. They weren't that fantastic... haha. My mom didn't really want to accept that they weren't crepes. Because they sometimes make crepes here, but never pancakes. But I tried anyways. :)

There was an arts and crafts and carnival thing in Molina and so I went to that with Rodrigo and Lobos. We met up at the terminal and got off to Molina and walked to Toledo's house. They dropped off bags and we walked to town. This time, there were less carnival rides and more food and crafts. I wish I would've been with girls because the guys weren't interested in looking at the crafts much. haha. I bought a nice fuzzy winter hat for 4 dollars. I love cheap stuff!

I got a shish kabob and juice too.

I went home at about 8:30 because I had a Rotary trip the next day (next blog post!).

A little bit about how I'm doing! I'm great. My spanish is good. I don't get head aches every day from translating, I don't need to think of every word in english and then translate it to spanish, I don't really have to focus to understand people, and I dream a lot in Spanish! Lots of ups and downs on an exchange with the language. But I'm on an up.

I love my family. A quick recap. I live in Romeral, a small town 20 minutes from Curicó. I love with my parents José and Carmen, my sister Jessica, and I have a sister in Oklahoma who will come home soon. I've heard a lot of great things about her from her family and I'm excited to meet her. I'm not going to lie, I'm nervous too. I'm nervous that we won't get along. Also, my room is her room... but I'll be staying in it until I leave.

The Chilean life is usually pretty rushed and busy. And that has definietly been the case for my family lately. My mom Carmen nevere had the change to finish high school since she had to work to help out her family when she was little. So now, she is taking night classes. After a long day of working, she comes home at 7 or 7:30 and goes to classes at 8. Then she gets back at 10 or 10:30. My dad is usually around the house but often has to rush to do something with the fútbol stadium next door. Jessica has a long day of teaching 1st grade in my school and then she teaches night classes for adults (like my mom). Also, on Friday and Saturday she drives to Talca (an hour away) to take college classes to get her masters in teaching biology. She wants to be a college professor. Sometimes we eat dinner at 7:30 or so before they leave for classes and sometimes we eat at 10:30 when they get home.

I definitely have a hard working family and I'm proud of that.

Depending on my school schedule, I get out anywhere from 1:15 to 5:45. Since there's never too much going on in the afternoon at my house, I take my time getting home. I walk to the bus terminal with friends, go to the mall, or study in the school with friends.

I seemed to have forgotten to write about basketball. In Bariloche, I met a girl named Camila who goes to San Martin. It is a school just a few blocks from mine. A while ago, she said she played basketball and she invited me to play on their team. So when I have time on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday I go to basketball practice with them. The other girls are nice and the practices are tough. They have one of the best girl teams in Curicó.

So that's my life! Busy, busy, busy, but great!