Live, local bands a.k.a. "moment of hipness"

We tapped into some great, local music this last week. I went out with my friend Cecilia on Wednesday night to hear a fantastic artist named Pascuala Ilabaca and her group. She plays accordion among other instruments and sings divine. She then adds in guitar, bass, drums, sax, clarinet and güira! So fun. Check out this video of hers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUUnZtTv2DE - if for nothing else its got great video footage from the rooftops of Valparaíso.

Then on Friday night Dan and I ventured out to see an edgy artist - Camila Moreno and her band. We really enjoyed it and she has some fantastic songs as well. Here's a great song and a protest video also taken in Valpo...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0KUY3WmF7E.

To give you a sense of the scene - both nights, we walked a mere 15 minutes down the hill to a local club, La Piedra Feliz, and paid about an $8 cover. The room that staged the bands is intimate and seats about 100! Pascuala and one of her band members from Wednesday night's concert were in the audience on Friday. And another of her band members was playing in another room with another band on Friday night.

Dan and I felt a fleeting moment of hipness!

Laura

Mendoza (dedicated to the Dicus Breen Family)!

Hi everyone. This weekend we went to Mendoza, Argentina and we saw a bunch of cool stuff. We had to go because our tourist visa in Chile expired after 90 days, so we had to go out of the country and reenter. Here it is!

On the way there we (me, my mom, and my brother- Dad arrived a day later) were crossing the Andes and it was very beautiful. However there was this one road called the "Caracol", which in English it means snail cause it went from one side to the other back and forth it had like 30 turns! It was really amazing.


Then when we got there, after we had settled in in our hotel, we went and walked around. First we went to Plaza Chile. There we discovered that it had a bunch of benches that had mosaics with a design ( like ribbon ) that was red,white and blue (the Chilean flag colors ) with a different city in Chile on each- it was very cool!


Then we went to plaza Independencia where we saw a bunch of stuff to buy but unfortunately we did not buy anything -but my mom wanted to come back later. Also in the plaza there was a modern art museum underneath the plaza and we went and checked it out. It was really cool!


By then we were getting pretty hungry so we went looking for a restaurant to eat at, we went looking down the street Sarmiento 'cause that is what the person at the hotel recommended.


We walked past the Sheraton/Casino then we spotted a restaurant that looked good. So we got dinner there. We all got meat (because Argentina is famous for meat). We got "bife de chorizo" y "milonesa"
(we only got two because they were too much for one person). They were really good then we went back to the hotel and went to bed.


The next morning we decided that we would go to the park bigger than Central Park, NYC- so we walked down there and took a bus that was like a tour around the park and we ended in the zoo and looked around there. It had a tons of animals. There was even a condor! After that we were getting kind of hungry so we went down to the lake in the park and had lunch down there. We got meat again but this time it was not that good because it was really greasy. Then we had to go to the hotel because my dad was getting back. So we walked back to the hotel and a couple minutes later my dad showed up!


Like a half of an hour later we went out and walked around a bit. And then we had dinner but all of the restaurants were closed up (because it was only 7pm and most folks in Argentina dine at 10pm) except for the restaurant that we had dinner last night. Since we liked it, we went there again and got the same thing. But dad got something different. And after that we went back to the hotel and went to bed and the next morning we were off again.


It turned out to be a really good trip but the only thing is that it would have been cool to have stayed there a little bit longer because I really liked it.

Grace

things that I like about mendoza, argentina.

hi. I know I already did a blog about going to Argentina, but then we did not know too much about it. so here's a list of things I liked about Mendoza.

1. about every street is lined with trees and huge parks. (including one park bigger than central park)
   
2. it's a beautiful trip through the Andes to get there. (even if it is a little curvy)
3. it has great meat.
4. it has a lot of cool animals in the zoo
5. the taxis were cheap which is good because I am always tired.

by Theo

out of the country again.

Guess what were doing tomorrow. Going to Mendoza, Argentina to renew our visa because we've been here a quarter of the year! It's a eight hour bus ride through the Andes. It's supposed to be beautiful.

The only bad thing is that it's someones birthday today and there's going to be a suprise in each classroom at school. But it will still be there when we get back.

(Mendoza is straight east from Valparaiso on the map)

-Theo

"I understood everything today!!!"

One month into school and there are glimmers of light at the end of the tunnel. Many "end of the tunnel" is too optimistic a phrase...maybe it would be better to say some oases have appeared on the kids' desert sojourn.

Anyways, on our walk home from school yesterday, Gracie said, "I had a great day today Mom. I understood everything!". I couldn't believe it! Of course, this statement was rather disconcerting to Theo. But today he was helping some of the younger kids understand the coach's instructions at soccer practice - so a big success for him too.

They are both making leaps and bounds in their language acquisition - much faster than they even realize. This week both kids were to have read the above pictured novels for their respective classes. I would guess that both kids had a preschool or kindergarten reading level when we arrived in country and now, with our help obviously, they are reading 3rd and 4th grade level books!

I don't mean to down play the slow and arduous process of learning another language. All of you who have experienced immersion are familiar with the long, initial days. This weekend was almost entirely taken with reading the novels for example (we even turned off Skype). One of us would read a paragraph or two and then check in about comprehension and look up some words if necessary - and repeat for all 150 pages.

And there are still tears just about everyday. They don't last long, but I think a combination of exhaustion, frustration, and feeling a bit overwhelmed build up each day. But each day it seems to get easier. And Dan and I couldn't be prouder of these guys for the herculean effort they are making.

-Lojo

p.s. I'll try to get the kids to blog about school again soon.

Lulled to sleep by the fog horn

The fog rolled in off the ocean last night. It enveloped everything in a cool, white mist. Dan and I enjoyed listening to the deep bellows of the fog horn as we went to sleep. It made us think of Dan's dad, Robb, and his stories of growing up in Duluth and listening to the fog horn there.

This morning as I took my morning walk along the water after dropping off the kids, I could barely see through my glasses. The fog was still thick and the horn was still booming.
Laura

Geeky Stuff: mail forwarding

When I traveled abroad by in my college years, I had all my mail forwarded to my parents' house. They would do triage on it: throw away the junk mail, deposit checks, and call me if there was anything important-looking. They forwarded some stuff to me, and even faxed some important letters (I was doing a job search at the time) -- the faxes arrived at the local post office in Costa Rica, and I would take the bus over there to pick them up.

Times have changed, and we don't get much snail mail anymore, but we haven't quite eliminated the need to deal with dead-tree documents and such. Luckily there is a 21st-century solution to this problem, without having to burden relatives with dealing with a bunch of your mail while you're living abroad: internet mail-forwarding services.

Google turns up lots of these services; we've been using mailboxforwarding.com, and it's been working great. The company gives you a new address, and you tell the US postal service to forward your mail to it. They scan all incoming mail and send email when you get some, and they post the images of the envelopes to your account on their web page. You look at the envelope and then select (a) Shred the mail, (b) Open it and scan the contents, or (c) Forward the mail to a different address.

The service costs a reasonable monthly fee, plus a handling charge for each letter that you ask them to scan or forward. The main downside is the setup that the US Post Office requires, which involves filling out forms in triplicate and getting them notarized. It's definitely been worth it -- check it out if you plan to be away for more than a month or two.
Dan