Two tests and two papers down; one research paper and several despedidas (good-bye parties) to go before my flight on Sunday. I can’t believe how fast my time here is coming to an end (though for better or worse, this week has been dragging on and on, probably because I’ve spent essentially all of it shut away working on these assignments).
So, by way of study break, an abbreviated list of:
Things I will miss about Chile:
- My friends.
- Public transport. Granted, the existence of such a great metro system (plus buses) here is a necessary response to the problems of mobility that a city of five million people built long before cars were invented tends to face (as opposed to, say, Norman, where walking to a grocery store (at least from my apartment) is completely infeasible), but maybe this is just another way of saying that I really enjoy city life. I’ll miss my fifteen-minute walk to school and having a grocery store three blocks away and minimarkets on every corner and taking walks to the Moneda and generally not having to rely on cars at all.
- Fresh produce. The other day, I bought two kilos (that’s 4.4 pounds) of Gala apples for 500 pesos chilenos (that’s $.95) at the feria (the farmer’s market set up in the street two blocks away from my house every Thursday and Sunday). Last Sunday, I bought three kilos of mandarin oranges (excessive? definitely not) for 1000 pesos. How will I ever re-adjust to US prices?
- Speaking Spanish! You can’t speak Spanish in the US (well, as a white person) without coming off as a pretentious and obnoxious show-off; I’m really going to miss it.
- Seeing the snow-capped cordillera of the Andes from my balcony.
- The public parks and museums and centro of Santiago.
Things I won’t miss:
- The lack of Indian food in this city.
- Sharing the kitchen with sixty other people.
- The pollution.
- Doing assignments and reading dry history texts in Spanish.
- The lack of central heating at my residencia.
So, on balance? I don’t know. I don’t feel ready to come home at all!
