After lunch on my second day here, my host-mom asked me if I wanted to go with them. I still didn’t understand exactly where we were going, but I’d take any excuse to see places I’d never been before, so I jumped at the opportunity and decided to go. We jumped into the car and off we were. She showed me the route to the metro I have to take to school and it’s actually quite simple to find. The only sucky part (coming from living in the center of Helsinki) is that I have to walk for about 25 minutes (I know, oh mi goodness xD) to even get to the station. But anyways, now I know where it is and it makes life so much more simple. Now I have a route to take if I want to go to the shopping mall (only 4 stops away with one metro) or to school (2 metros, but not a long trip). I remember on my first day here when I went for my walk I had absolutely no idea where I was supposed to go, so I walked for about 15 minutes. Lol. Now my world here is already much bigger and I can go places better.
Angela drove me around the Nunoa neighborhood, or Barrio, as they call them here and all the way to the Barrio of Providencia where my school is located. I gotta say, it was a relief seeing the metropolitan area because I thought this was it, the suburbs and even around my school it was very quiet and sall compared to even Helsinki. With Jenni we thought that we’d never see more people or the city area but now with our metro connection to the local mall, we have found one part of the bigger city with more people. And there’s yet so much to discover!
After the car ride I came home and ‘Whatsappe’d’ Jenni. I found the mall, we should go! So, we decided to meet around 5.30 PM at the metro station and so we did. Holy cow, I must say I was petrified of taking the metro for the first time, and I had to do it by myself. It’s not that Im afraid of adventure, but I’ve never been keen on metros, and leaving the house knowing that it would be pitch black dark when I was going to come back was a bit of a scary idea. But I did it, and in the end, the metro seemed very clean and simple, so that even I (ME, who gets lost in the Helsinki metro with only two rails….!) could manage taking it to scool and to town. Gives me much more freedom and a ence of security in a way now that I start to know my way around even a little.
During these three days I’m happy to say that my understanding of the Chilean accent has gotten a lot better even though it might not be visible to the host-family due to my continued chipmunkness, still. I have learnt to distinguish in which words they leave letters out and thus it’s much more easy to understand their fast speaking pace. Now it’s not just a continupus ramble of words but now that I’ve learnt in what way they say some words and what they add after others, it’s much more easy to follow conversations. I can’t yet speak in this way, but I’ve started to mimic them to an extent so that instead of saying ‘Como estais?’ I now say ‘Como tai?’ and instead of saying ‘Estan rico (tasty food), I say ‘Tan rico’. It seems very simple and like a small deal on paper, but when you’re listening to rapid speech constantly, it makes the worlds difference to understand these little things of their specific dialect. And I’m so happy that already after three days I’m capable of understanding more. In speaking, I definitely need more time… But with this small advancement I have more hope that I did yesterday and the day before.
Another veeeery peculiar thing that I have noticed in only three days is, that when I think back to my blog entries or chat conversations I’ve had with people, the first language I think about them by is Spanish. Not that I could write this in Spanish, but specific words and sentences don’t come into my mind in English, definitely not Finnish, but in Spanish. I have no idea where it came from but I find it very interesting. And even though the first day I dreaded the fact that no one really speaks English here, I now feel that it’s so very good to wake up every morning to a completely Spanish speaking environment, because if you start your day from the get-go with a certain language and continue to use it throughout the day it starts to stick. I’m so happy that I can see these small advances already myself, just hope that others could see them too soon. Really want to be able to properly communicate.
Like I earlier mentioned, the family I’m staying with for the start is absolutely awesome. It includes a mom, dad, two daughters (aged 14 and 17) and an extremely cute grandma. The eldest daughter has been an exchange student herself in Switzerland and knows English which, despite my huge advances lol, comes in handy when I need help. She is so open, keen to help and extremely nice towards me. It’s great that she understands what I’m going through because she’s been through it herself, too. I appreciate all her help so much and so do her parents J Angela and Freddy are amazing too, so helpful in teaching me the routes, picking me up by car from the metro station in the evening when it’s too dark for a girl to walk alone, teaching me words and just in having me as a guest and being amazing hosts. I feel welcome and now that I’ve learnt to communicate with them more, it’s possible to have a conversation deeper that ‘si’, ‘no’ or ‘
no se’.
Also now that I’ve learnt the rout to the metro station and know sort of where we are situated, I feel much more secure and settled in here than I did before. And the good thing about this is, that it’s only my third day here.
Ooooh… Before I finish this entry, I have to mention the Andes. Holy cow.. I didn’t notice they were so close before today because it’s been so cloudy and rainy for the past two days but MAMMA MIA, when I looked out of the window this morning and saw the mountains from the window, I almost fainted…. Coming from Finland where Lapland has the most mountain-like features, this view was simply paralyzing. And to me the most amazing thing is, that you can see a palm tree at the same time as the Andes rise in the distance. It’s so surreal and so different from back home I know Toolo was an amazing nature scene in Helsinki but seeing the Andes from your window is something else. Just WOW.
I’ll add here a picture taken from in front of our house so that you can see what the view on the street is like (with the Andes in the background) and another one of the Andes and me. Simply breathtaking. The Andes I mean. Not me. No no. Ahh, but the view.
I’ll add here a picture taken from in front of our house so that you can see what the view on the street is like (with the Andes in the background) and another one of the Andes and me. Simply breathtaking. The Andes I mean. Not me. No no. Ahh, but the view.
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| Me and the Andes |
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| The view from my home street |
More later on again, enjoying my last free days before school starts :) that's gonna be interesting :)
Anywhooo, take care of yourselves and others,
be back later,
yours,
Maria
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