eNCORE
This meal wasn't very good
Before we were wine
Follow The Light
Unfortunately this is not tofu.....
If you want to slow your life down just don't go on the internet. I have been without internet in my house for these last two weeks and time has been dripping like cold molasses. Slow and Sweet. I really wanted to go out with a bang for my last blog but it looks like Amy Winehouse might of stole my thunder so I think i'll just pay for beer and slip out the back door. I am not sure really where the back door leads or even where the back door is but I look forward to the Journey.
I want to thank everyone at CIEE who gave me this opportunity to do this public blog, especially Lauren and Marshall who were far more then a pleasure to work with. I hope everyone enjoyed it because I sure had a blast doing it! Welp, See ya later!
A_MOR LOVE Project © 2011
The word awkward does not exist in the Spanish language. The closest would be uncomfortable. This experience was not uncomfortable. It was awkward.
As I am sure a lot of you know that in Latin America when men and women greet each other they touch cheeks and do an air kiss. In some cases they actually kiss eachother on the cheek. I am not sure how you move up from air kiss to cheek kiss status but I will let you know when I find out.
I have found that most Latinos, especially ones who live farther away from United States have this stereotype that all "Gringos" are cold, and not intimate with their greetings and if they do take the time to salute each other it is with a distant handshake. I find this to be quite a fallacy. Just because the majority of North American culture greetings don't consist of cheek rubs and air kisses doesn't mean were a bunch of grinches walking around with hearts of stone. Personally, I am know for my secret handshakes, bear hugs, and full on make-outs.
During this trip and all my past trips to Latin America I have always made it one of my goals to silence all North American Stereotypes, so when it comes to greeting people I got more kisses the the Hershey's factory.
Everyday at school I greet everyone. Students, Teachers, Secretaries, Janitors, Counselors, Parents and who ever else I make eye contact with. Sometimes I arrive 15 minutes late to class, but anything for breaking stereotypes right?
Business was good, stereotypes were being broken, that was until I met a faculty member Francisca. After I had a couple of short conversations with her, It dawned on me that I had never gave her a genuine Latino greeting. One day right before I was about to close the door to my classroom, I spotted her. She was smiling and walking right towards me. Ok, this is it, this is my chance to give her genuine greeting but for some reason I became extremely anxious and before she was in cheek rubbing distance I fully committed to the greeting. With my neck fully stretched out of my classroom door,lips puckered and my cheek tilted sideways for the embrace, Francisca was a world away. The worst part of all is I held the pose thinking that she would realize that I was trying to greet her and approach me faster. Wrong. The only thing she realized was that I completely botched the greeting and it looked like I was waiting for her to lay a big wet smooch on me.
Untitled from _MorLove Productions on Vimeo.
Sarita is an animal, she ate two of these bad boys!
No matter where you travel you typically find yourself in some place that is famous or prides itself for some type of food. If you are in Castroville California you are probably eating fried artichokes. If you are in Naples Italy, you better be eating pizza. Baja Mexico, I am sure you are on your 8th taco. Argentina, steak it's not just for dinner, it's the only thing they have. Santa Cruz, California, I don't know what your eating but it is probably organic.
So what is Chile famous for? What can you find in every corner,nook,cranny or crevice of this country? Completos and Empanadas………
For me I find the empanada to be very comparable to a deep fried hot pocket. Gnarly. Although you are able to find some baked ones that are quite scrumptious, the deep fried ones have tainted their reputation and its hard not to picture a hot pocket when you find yourself contemplating buying one.
Anyway, I am not here to write about empanadas, I am here to write about Completos. A Completo is essentially an extremely advanced hot dog. Just picture a hot dot created by Steve Jobs. Awesome, that is if you are into hot dogs….
They start off the Completo with a golden toasted bun, yeah picture that immaculate marshmallow you toasted last summer, like that but but a million times better. Then they throw in a dog that has been boiled to perfection. Once they got the dog snuggled in the cozy bun they delicately place tomatoes that have been sliced by angels wings on top of the dog. With every tomato in place the Completo is ready for the pickled cabbage. They dress the tomatoes with the pickled cabbage like a new born baby. Gently and with lots of love. After the Pickled Cabagge has been arrayed across the bare skin of the tomatoes, it is time to kick things up a notch. This is when they lather on the thick and creamy avocado spread. Like a skillful painter, they don't miss a spot. Now that the insides of the Completo have been covered with this rich and buttery spread they are ready for mayonnaise. Yeah mayonnaise. Once the mayonnaise has been applied you are free eat your Completo or add more condiments such as extra mayo,ketchup,mustard and my favorite, hot sauce.
Feel free to use extra mayo, they are very accepting of mayo consumption here......
I still have not ever eaten a completo, and it feels good to be clean…..Sarita on the other hand is still very much addicted.....
I wish that tree wasn't there.
I don't have anything appropriate to say for this one....
I saw these guys eating at a McDonald's after the protest...
If you have been looking for the bird whisperer, I found him, he is in Chile.
So many choices, so little selection....
Word.
Is all we need.
SARITAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!
John Cougar Meloncamp.
You can never get enough SOL.
Chile. Surf. I am all in.
Yellow.
Mid-teach meditation.
Dude, Can i get you a beer?
Becoming Legit.
I love FUN.
Flowers| They Make People Feel Good.
My Pocket Art.
So many olives, so little martinis...
So much better then walking.
EMO.
An eggy situation.
We all do things periodically that are completely ridiculous,idiotic, half-baked,nonsensical and well just plain stupid. No. I am not talking about things that begin with bad intention, like starting knife fights, I am talking about innocent things that usually start with good or no intention at all. For example. Putting metal in the microwave. Washing all of your girlfriend's "dry clean only" clothes in the wash machine, then drying them on the highest setting. Jumping in a pool with your cell phone. Reading a map upside down while giving directions. Putting diesel fuel in your husband's brand new "unleaded fuel" truck. Drinking urine from a water bottle. Leaving important things on the roof of your car and driving away. Buying a six-pack of corona light. Trying to text your brother about some girl but actually texting that girl. I think you get the point.
Usually we do these things once and learn our lesson, ok maybe twice. But sometimes we do one of these things with frequency. For some reason we have some mental block that keeps us from learning from these mistakes. Among our friends and family we slowly become well known for doing this one moronic thing.We become infamous. Legendary. We become to have a record.......
In attempt to document my record here in Chile, I am creating the "Just For the Record Series"...Lets hope it is a short one....
Backdraft the Chilean Version
I have now been living with my host family for 2 months. In these two months I have almost burned down their house 3 times. So I guess one could say I almost burn down their house 1.3333333.. times a month, but who is counting.
The Hard Boiled Egg Incident.
Pretty straight forward case here. Starts out with simple intention of bringing some hard boiled eggs to school. I am on a little time constraint so lets turn up the flame to get this jacuzzi going. "Oh no way, Bon Iver has a new album!" " Man this thing is insane!". 9:30. Late for school. Leave the house without socks. 3 hours later, enter the house. " Isis what did you burn!" Oh wait, that kind of looks like the pot I was boiling eggs in but a with an abstract sculpture vibe.
The Ball of Fire Incident.
The burner dials on our stove are all unmarked, so when you go to light the burner with a match it's good to know what burner is spewing gas. My first time trying to light the oven I am pretty much just turning dials and lighting matches, sometimes even going back to the same dial I tried. I don't really remember striking my 17th match but I do remember it resembling a mini big bang theory.
Microwaves are Powerful Incident.
I think you know where this one is going.........
I've had this idea for awhile. This idea to write a post that would reach out to those people who are going through the odyssey or quarter life crisis stage of their life. People who were contemplating trading security for the unknown inorder to chase or find their passion. I had this idea that i was gonna be their "Everlasting light" and a powder keg of motivation. I was going to confidently tell them to trust their process, find their passion, have faith, let go of security, embrace yourself and go with the wind like a tie-dyed feather from the Dalai Lama's dream catcher. I was going to portray my self as a completely worry free, soul searching, passion following, heart listening, process trusting, free of expectation guru. I was gonna be so Badass. I was going to be so self righteous. I was going to be sooooooooooooooooo not telling the truth.
So what is the truth…? Well, lets start from the beginning
In a nut shell I see the odyssey stage or the quarter life crisis as essentially a period where one searches for something that will fulfill their soul and bring some kind of meaning to life. Everybody experiences this stage and goes through it in extraordinarily different ways…that is if this stage even exist in your life
First off…….
Some people skip the odyssey or quarter life crisis period all together. They not only find but have the confidence to peruse their passions at a younger age then the rest of us. They become doctors, artists, pilots, Jay-Z or invent things like Facebook. Then we have the people who delay the odyssey or crisis phase. These people usually finish their education with a quite large but deeply self submerged notion that they might of just spent the last 4,8, or even 12 years studying something that they don't want to do or something that they do not love. This is where one comes to a fork in the road. Do they start their lives all over again? Do they ignore the criticism and pressures? Do they trade the security for a chance to find something they love? No. These people choose to delay, so they tuck these feelings back deep down in their brains or souls. I mean really deep. Deeper then those memories of their last night in Cabo with Victoria or was it Victor? I don't remember.Fast forward twenty-five years. The layers that have once contained these feelings have been weathered by 90 hour work weeks and couples therapy. Disintegrated,Splintered and Decomposed they allow these feeling to resurface but this time, it's not a notion it's a certainty. A certainty that they have been climbing a latter for the last 25 years of their life that has been set against the wrong wall. The odyssey stage presents itself once again but this time it goes by a new name. Mid-life crisis. So, they are presented with the option once again to embrace the chaos in order to eventually find peace or continue climbing up a later that rests against the wrong wall. I'm not sure what happens for the people that embrace the chaos because I am in the middle of the chaos but I am pretty sure we get to keep our souls. As for the people who continue to climb towards something they don't want ,well…I am not sure about the whole soul keeping part.
My odyssey period started about two quarters before I graduated college. My last two quarters I began to worry a little that I might not love what I had been studying and it might not be my passion. I quickly concealed these feelings and merely thought I was just getting cold feet about graduating and being an adult. Next came the realization and a more complete understanding how extremely short and constantly fleeting life is .Although I had some idea of the speed of life, I never was able to see it in a physical matter until now. For the first time in my life I saw things age. I saw the complete life of my first dog. I lost every single grand parent. I lost hair. I saw my friends get married and have kids. My baby sister got a Facebook. I was closer to 30 then 19. All of this was instantly a hot shot of fear straight into my aging veins. I instantly felt pressure to be established and the need to seek material security. Was I gonna start over at 25?, "Screw that !" ,most of my friends are already doctors, lawyers, contractors and commercial pilots. I already felt behind an there was not time to start following my passion now. So the grind began and for a year. I worked a a job I hated in-order to try to become established, catch up with society and reach some kind of status. This was the worst year of my life and after I revived my wilted soul I decided I would never have a career I hated.
Accepting the fact that I didn't want to do what I studied was huge for me but I was still completely delusional. I was still a slave to the pressures and the need for security. I enrolled in school again. I dropped out of school. I sent off a million resumes for jobs I had no experience in. I started writing business plans. I Joined a volunteer fire department. I tried to start a taco stand. I was completely out of my mind( that's an understatement). I was searching for instant gratification and the need to become someone, but who? It took me about a year in six months to finally say, "Fuck It, I have no Idea what I am going to do and I am going to try to embrace it" So I did. I was twenty six years old working at a surf shop, making 8.25/hr, living with my parents, and having a big crush on a girl who just wanted to be friends. Man, I was so awesome.
I slowly began to realize that 26 was still super young and there was still plenty of time to figure things out. I began to care less about material security and seeing that doing something you absolutely love brings true happiness. I began to trust the process more. Opportunities began to surface. I was accepted to teach broad. I was giving a blog and marketing internship. Months passed and I was soon in Chile, worry free, and going with flow like a Chilean Sea Bass. Then something happen. I began to think " Man, when I get back I'm gonna be broke" " Where am I gonna live?" "I don't want to work a surf shop again". So it slowly began again. I began sending off resumes to creative firms all around the world. I began thinking of new business plans. I began to run against the process and slowly becoming insane again. I became depressed,worried, scarred but most of all I felt like I had to figure it all out again. This lasted about two weeks and then I realized that I am here to get my fluency back in Spanish, I am here to travel, I am here to learn but most of all I'm here to enjoy. That said I have slowly immersed my self in the process again. Slowly beginning to trust again.
So I guess this brings me back to the beginning.Back to my Idea of telling everybody to follow their passion without a care in the world. Telling everybody that I was the perfect case study. Telling everybody "Just trust your process man, don't worry about the future, every things gonna be golden dude" "Live in the moment brah, it's not about the destination it's about the journey". Although I strive to live like that, (well maybe without the brah part) and strongly believe that ideology, I cant quite rep it yet. I can't tell you not to be scared because I am still very scared of what the future brings and if I will have an opportunity to show the world my passion. I'm Just gonna say no matter how big or how many losses you might suffer,physically and mentally by letting go and choosing a new path they will never amount to the ones you will experience by living someone else's life or doing something you hate. It's your life you choose.
This post sucked but it was extremely therapeutic.
Desperate times call for desperate measures......
Is that the new white iphone!!?????
How does that Corona commercial go....
I'm Single....Just don't know about that mingle part..........
Life guards in Chile are on top of their game...
Santiago lurking.
Seriously. Don't bathe yourself with drugs or alcohol, I recommend Dr. Bronners Magic soaps..
I slept on this beach by myself. It was super awesome. You are super jealous.
© CIEE 2011. All Rights Reserved.
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