¡Hasta luego, Arica!

As hard as it is to believe, today marks my last day in Arica.  The two months just flew by and it feels like just yesterday that we were in orientation trying to meander our way around the city for the first time.

Tomorrow our groups leaves for Temuco, a city with a population of about 300,000 people that's located 600 kilometers south of Santiago.  What a change of scenery it will be!  The green, lush, wet terrain will be quite different than the brown, dry desert that is Arica.  After a week and a half in Temuco we will hop over to Bariloche, Argentina for four days to relax and enjoy our last few days as a unified group.  After that, October will be finishing and we'll all head on our separate ways for our ISP's.

My ISP month seems like it will be quite the adventure.  I will be spending the first two weeks in Valdivia, a quaint city in La Región de los Ríos (The Rivers Region).  Valdivia is known as "The Pearl of the South," and is thought to be one of the most beautiful cities in southern Chile.  I absolutely cannot wait to go!  I'll be traveling and staying there with one other girl, Elyse (who is actually from Olney, MD -- the same town Jimmy! such a small world).  We'll spend most of the two weeks in a clinic  doing research and gathering information along with getting the skeleton of our papers done (all while experiencing the city, of course!). From Valdivia (this is all tentative, but probably won't change much) we'll head to Pucón for a few days, where some of the most beautiful volcanoes and lakes in Chile are supposed to be.  From there on we will move on to Santiago, Valparaíso, and Viña del Mar.  Exploring, trying to not seem like tourists, using our spanish, and getting to know the Southern culture.  I'll then be flying back to Arica on the 22nd of November to meet up with my friends who are staying there for their ISP's and head to San Pedro de Atacama that night.  Four days I'll return to Arica, do the final revisions on my paper, take a deep breath, turn it all in, and prepare to present my findings to the group.

Doesn't that sound crazy?!  Fingers crossed that it all works out.  Assuming it will, I know it's going to be amazing.  Here it all is written out more clearly:

• October 19 - 27:  Temuco
• October 28 - 31:  Bariloche (Argentina)
• November 1 - 12:  Valdivia
• November 13 - 15:  Pucón
• November 16:  Santiago
• November 17-21:  Valparaíso/Viña del Mar
• November 22 - 25:  San Pedro de Atacama
• November 26 - December 5:  Arica

and then after the program is over...

• December 5 - 13:  Arequipa, Cusco, Aguas Calientes, and Machu Pichu! (Peru)
• December 14-15:  travel HOME. 

Wow, that just makes my head spin!  I will definitely be taking all of this one day at a time trying to make it the best experience I possibly can.  Fingers crossed (again) that by the end I have a camera full of pictures, a blog full of stories, a successful ISP, some money in my bank account, and a lifetime worth of memories.  And of course, my sanity :). 

Next time you hear from me I will be 1,700 miles south in Temuco, Chile!

Chao,

Brittany

to end, a photo from our cena de despedida (farewill dinner) with our families last night:

more photos:  picasaweb.google.com/bliebhard

Cruzando la frontera -- crossing the border to Tacna, Peru

Once again I am way behind on my blogging -- I am almost two weeks behind on this Tacna post! But as usual, better late than never.

Tuesday, October 4th our group loaded our giant, aquamarine turismo bus once again and started on the road to Tacna, Peru.  It was a very quick ride, only about an hour in total (30 minutes to the border + 30 minutes to Tacna), but somehow in that short amount of time we crossed two time zones. Crazy, right? We loaded the bus during Chile time and got off the bus in Minnesota time! The first night we just got settled into our hotel and ate dinner at the restaurant there, which was really nice. It was on the seventh floor of the hotel and had a beautiful overlook of all the beautiful city lights.

Overall, the differences between Arica and Tacna really surprised me.  The actual size of the two cities are pretty similar, but they felt so different.  Arica has the feel of a small town - everything is very calm, even the downtown area. The city mostly consists of single family one-story homes and small tiendas.  Tacna, on the other hand, really felt like a city. The first thing I noticed is that everything is so much taller.  Two story buildings equipped with rebar and scaffolding so they can be built up even more, and even some interesting architecture. The downtown streets were lined with wedding dress shops and specialty medicine clinics - dentists and orthodontists, plastic surgeons, optometrists, etc.  While it may seem random, there is a little reason to it:  Tacna is a tax-free city so Ariqueños (people from Arica) and Chileans as well as Peruvians travel to Tacna to utilize these services.  In fact, most of the city's revenue is generated by "foreigners" that travel to the city for just that reason.  The city really felt like a metropolis - everything seemed to move at a faster pace - which was a nice change from the sleepy city of Arica.

Wednesday morning we left for our first pasantía to Peruvian health center.  We were greeted by one of the directors of the hotel who presented a really fascinating powerpoint on the fundamentals and basics of the the health system in Peru. After that we broke up into six groups to participate in visitas domiciliarias (home visits) to various patients of the clinic.  The different groups included tuberculosis patients, pregnant women, the elderly, newborns, and two others that I can't remember.  I chose to participate on the newborn visit, which we did with a matrona (midwife or OB/GYN).  It started off with a bit of a rocky start since our patient wasn't home, but we ended up just visiting a different one.  The last time the woman had visited the clinic was during her eigth month of pregnancy, which was when the clinic referred her to the hospital for her birth.  During the visit the matrona asked her questions about the labor and delivery, post-delivery procedures, breastfeeding, contraceptives, etc. Unfortunately, the woman had a very, very bad experience at the hospital.  This was her second child, and because of a bad experience with the first one she wanted the delivery to take place at home.  However, she developed a case of pre-eclampsia and was rushed into an emergency c-section.  From there, the anesthesia didn't take and she could feel every single part of the surgery.  To make it even worse, there was a team of medical students overseeing the procedure, and she could hear everything the doctor was telling them.  It was an incredibly traumatizing experience for the poor woman, and as a result of it she no longer had any trust in the health care system (which is why she hadn't been attending her controls, or check-ups, with her new child, which is why the home visit was necessary). The rest of the visit went smoothly - the matrona emphasized the importance of solely giving breastmilk to the child for the first six months, they discussed contraceptive methods, and went over signos de alarma, or warning signs that tell you that your child is very sick and needs to be brought to the doctor or emergency room.  Overall it was an incredibly fascinating visit and I feel really privileged that we were able to partake in it.  Afterwards the matrona assured us that "horror stories" as this patient's aren't the norm, but that unfortunately, they do happen.  It really opened my eyes to how good we have it in our country.

That afternoon, after an amazing lunch at Mar Adentro, a great seafood restaurant in Tacna, we visited a comedor, or community kitchen.  The comedor provides one meal a day, at a very cheap price, to participating families who rotate doing the cooking.  About 40 families participate in the center we visited.  I got the chance to talk to two of the leaders of the comedor and they told me that one of the hardest parts is the lack of refrigeration.  Many, if not most, families in Tacna cannot afford a refrigerator.  For this reason, food needs to be bought every single day; the concept of "buying in bulk" does not exist because there's no way to store the food.  This also limits the types of foods that can be made, as the only available items are whatever's at the market that day.  All in all, it was great to see how the community comes together to provide for each other when few resources are available.

Thursday morning we headed to Viñani, a small health center located in the poorest area of Tacna (you could almost consider it a slum).  After touring the health center we went to the "conference room" of sorts to participate in a nutrition workshop for pregnant women and recent mothers.  These women voluntarily sign up for classes that occur every two weeks that have varying topics on pregnancy and motherhood.  My Peruvian partner for the workshop was named Carmen, and she had a newborn baby who was only 10 days old!  We learned about which foods are appropriate for children of different age groups and also learned about the importance of nutritious diet while pregnant and breastfeeding.  At the end we prepared our own meals based on what we learned and presented them to the class. It was a really, really great experience -- probably one of the things I've enjoyed most so far this semester.

After another lunch at Mar Adentro we headed back to the same neighborhood (called Ciudad Nueva, or "New City") and met up with with a group of second-year obstetrics students.  Most of the girls were around our age and were studying at the local medical school in Tacna.  We paired up with them (I was with two great girls named Leslie and Jenny), and were given a paintbrush, can of paint, and some stencils and were put to work painting house numbers in Ciudad Nueva.  The neighborhood is essentially a giant slum that's just popped up over the past ten years.  The houses are organized in blocks called manzanas, but within those manzanas it's hard to tell what the home are actually like.  From the outside, it seemed like many of the houses were just dirt floors with metal sheeting for doors and walls and a tarp roof.  Consistent running water is also a scarcity as most of it is consumed by the local copper industry.  Anyways, as you can imagine, having house numbers would be beneficial for many reasons, but our primary one was to assist the health teams doing visitas domicilarias, or home visits.  It was nice being able to get involved with the community and interact with Peruvian girls my age -- it always makes me feel more confident in my language abilities, if nothing else.  We took lots of pictures together afterwards, especially ones showing off our new blue Avatar-ish hands (a result of the non-washable paint).

                               

Friday morning we met with another group of obstetrics students at their university, this time with girls in their fifth and final year. We split up into groups and discussed various health problems in the Peruvian context - my group discussed eating disorders, specifically anorexia.  It was interesting to see how their views and experiences of eating disorders compare and contrast with ours.  After that we had the rest of the afternoon free.  I, along with many others from the group, decided to take advantage of the tax-free city and bought some more alpaca gear.  After a few hours of shopping and wandering the day came to an end, and we once again hopped on our turismo bus and headed home to Arica.

Oh, I almost forgot - we also booked our train tickets to Machu Picchu. I can't remember if I ever posted about it, but about a month ago I got my flight home pushed back and I am officially returning to Peru and visiting one of the New Seven Wonders of the World!

Chao,
Brittany


and of course, food photos!

Train, costumes, beach, Las Peñas

Yet another week has passed by.  This week marks week #7 being in Arica, how crazy!  My semester abroad is almost half over.

Last weekend was a really fun time.  Not only did we have an amazing week in Putre, but we got back on a Friday afternoon so we had a whole weekend ahead of us when we got back.  Saturday I went to my cousin's birthday party (Fiorella, she turned 12), which was pretty entertaining.  She's everything a diva 12-year-old girl could be.  The party basically consisted of her and her friends dancing and singing along to American pop hits - everything from Katy Perry to Justin Bieber to Lady Gaga and many more.  It was kind of fun to watch them try to sing along, because obviously they don't actually know the words or understand the lyrics, they just sing what the words sound like to them.  One girl came up to me and asked "So wait, you really know what they're saying right? You understand the whole song?" I laughed and told her yes and she proceeded to ask me what some of the lyrics were saying (the current song at the time was Hey, Soul Sister, a personal favorite of mine, and as I learned a favorite of my host mom as well).  I did my best but it was a little iffy at time since the song lyrics don't really make sense in English as it is ("my heart is bound to beat right out my untrimmed chest" -- you get the point), but it was fun and they thought it was really cool.  After that I headed over to one of my friends house for her host sister's birthday party which had a costume theme.  Another girl's host mom just happens to own like a hundred costumes (not really sure why), so we all got to dress up and it was a really fun time.  I wore what I think was supposed to be a little red riding hood costume and put my hair in pigtails, and the girl's mom came up to me and pulled on my hair because she thought it was a wig!  There really are no blondes in Chile!

The rest of the week progressed pretty slowly with quite a bit of homework every night.  Wednesday I got together with two girls and we made chocolate chip cookies which was super fun!  We're all kind of missing the ability to cook our own food (or have options at least), so it was really nice.  And chocolate chip cookies just taste like home.  It was a bit of a struggle though for many reasons -- 1) chocolate chips do not exist in their own form in Chile - after much searching in the grocery store we just settled for a few blocks of chocolate to cut up, which worked fine.  2) No measuring cups!  This just including a lot of estimating and resourcefulness (i.e. a coffee mug and a large spoon).  3) The ovens don't set to a specific temperature!  Just a dial that ranges between not-so-hot and hottest.  But, despite all that, the cookies turned out great.  I brought a plate home for my family and my mom was so happy and intrigued (cookies aren't really a thing in Chile besides packaged ones like chips ahoy).  Apparently her and my brothers enjoyed them because when I went to the kitchen for breakfast the next morning there was only one left!  I'll have to give her a recipe and make them with her sometime before I leave.  

Friday came along and some of our group opted to participate in Las Peñas, a religious trek/ceremony that occurs every year in Arica.  It essentially consists of people trekking ~25 miles through the desert to a small church where there's a sighting or special statue (I'm not exactly sure) of the Virgin Mary.  People hike there to give thanks or to ask favors of the Virgin.  Depending on the severity of the favor, people do different things.  My mom told me that some people who are very passionate and committed and are asking a serious favor (such as to cure a relative who is very sick) will do things such as do the travel whole trek on their hands and knees or carrying a backpack full of rocks.  That's commitment, I tell you. On the other hand, it's also just a way for families to do something together -- literally people of all age (from babies to the elderly) participate.  However, I opted out, as they decided to do the trek overnight and to me staying up for ~36 hours while walking for ~6 hours doesn't sound very pleasant.  Those who did go, though, had a good time.  I spent most of the night at a friends house making guacamole and white sangria (with white wine, ginger ale, peach juice, kiwi, grapefruit, orange, and lemon, yummy!) and eating cheese.  It was a really good, relaxing night.  

Saturday afternoon I headed to the beach with some friends.  We laid in the sand, walked through the water, enjoyed the sun, and just relaxed.  After ending the afternoon with some shrimp and cheese empanadas, I was perfectly content.  Later that night was Eileen's (another girl from my program) 21st birthday party.  Her host family (her parents and two sisters, who are close to our age) threw her a wonderful dinner party for all of us (yes, all 24 of us).  Her sisters, who a few of the sweetest girls I've ever met, loved playing the role of hostesses and were so happy to make us different Chilean drinks.  After a little while we all sat down for dinner and her dad gave one of the best toasts I've ever heard.  I swear, we all (well, at least I), started to tear up.  He expressed how truly thankful he was to have all of us come to his family's home to celebrate the birthday of his new daughter, and how admirable it was for us to venture to a new country to learn about a new culture, and how after all, we all are equal - the only things that differ us from one another are the color of our skin and our language.  It was a beautiful toast, a beautiful dinner, and a beautiful day and night. 

With regards to my classes and homework, thing are continuing on.  I've been a little frustrated with the work load this week because it seems to be piling on, but in all reality I only have 1.5 weeks of class left so I can't complain.  I'm still struggling a bit with the theme for my Independent Study Project, which is becoming a little stressful, but I'll figure it out.  

Tomorrow late afternoon we leave for Tacna, Peru which I'm super excited about.  We'll be there until Friday.  I don't really know much about the city or what we'll be doing (haven't done any of my background reading yet), so I guess it'll all be a surprise.  I do know that everything is super cheap there so I'm going go try to scoop up some more alpaca gear.  Once again I won't be bringing my computer with, so no Facebook/e-mail access probably, but I'll definitely be putting all of my new pictures up next weekend along with another blog post.  

That's all for now!

Chao,

Brittany

Photos!  picasaweb.google.com/bliebhard

northeastern chile 1.0: text version

So here goes my post to tell everyone about the absolutely amazing week I had on our excursion east.  I'm going to try to break it down day by day so it's a bit more manageable and I don't start rambling about unimportant things.  Here we go!

Day 1:

• We all loaded into our tour bus (yet again) and left Arica around 9:30am.  Putre technically is only about 60 km away but it's also 12,000 feet above sea level, which makes for a long, winding drive.  We stopped 4 times on the way to take a breather and adjust to the quickly rising altitude.

Almost to Putre - view from the bus

• After an absolutely breathtaking ride, we arrived to Putre in the early afternoon. We checked into our home for the week, Hotel Kukuli, and ate lunch. Almost immediately many of us were feeling the effects of the altitude - shortness of breath, pounding hearts, headaches.  Eh. 

• Lunch concluded and we walked to the town center to a small meeting room where we'd be having our classes for the week.  We met the excursion coordinator, Aldo, who acted as our "guide" of sorts for the week and he gave a presentation on the Indigenous Health System and Putre's context in particular.  I can't say I paid much attention to any of this - I was nauseous, light-headed, and feeling like I couldn't breathe.  One girl got up because she thought she was going to faint (and proceeded to puke outside the door) and I swore I was going to be next, but somehow I made it through the presentation. We were given some coca leaves to chew on or make tea with after an that helped a lot. 

• Later that afternoon we visited the local CESFAM (Centro de Salud Familiar; aka public health center) for a tour and to speak with the staff. The place was very tiny (sometimes they only have 5 or so patients a day!) but had a nurse, dentist, psychologist, and child developmental workers on staff.  There's also a paramedic that lives in the building who can be called 24/7 if an ambulance is needed.  The interesting part is that most of these people aren't actually residents of Putre but of Arica and they spend every other week in Putre.  Working in a small CESFAM like Putre's wouldn't be thought of as a very prestigious job in the Chilean medical field (the majority just enter the field for the money and prosperity instead of the desire to truly help people of all locations and statuses), so it's hard to fill the positions full-time to somebody who's interested in staying long-term. 

• Free time, dinner, bed.  Altitude sickness = no appetite and energy, so it was a bit of a rough night.   On top of that, very very cold!  The temperature dropped to around 30 degrees Fahrenheit around dinner time (and there's no heaters!) so we all piled on all of our warm clothes yet again. Thankfully there were about 5 (heavy) blankets on each bed so it wasn't too bad (minus the already suffocating feeling of not having enough oxygen).  My heart was still racing from chewing on coca leaves all afternoon, but after a while I drifted off to sleep.

Day 2:

• After a long night of strangely vivid dreams (which interestingly, quite a large number of us claimed to have) and waking up multiple times during the night gasping for air, Day 2 was ready to roll!  We ate a delicious breakfast in the hotel - cereal, bread, avocado, fruit, cheese, yogurt, and juice - and walked (still very slowly) to our classroom a few blocks away.

• Meeting with representatives from the Aymara community!  About 90% of the population in Putre (and the surrounding little communities) are of Aymara descent.  This morning about 10 different representatives of this community - doctors, midwives, farmers, etc - came in to talk to us about their role in the community and their health system.  I was grouped with 4 other Americans and two Aymaran women who came all the way from their pueblo that's about 3 hours away by bus.  These women weren't part of the traditional medicine system but were farmers.  They both came from the same village of about 10 families (and I thought Luverne was small) and their primary form of income was raising goats and farming.  They raise the goats as a food source and make fresh cheese to sell in Arica.  In terms of farming they grew all sorts of vegetables but were known for their oregano, which is also sold in Arica (and many other places as well).  One common thing that was heard among all the groups is that all of the children of these community members had moved away from their villages or Putre after school to live in Arica.  There aren't opportunities for higher education in these places and not many opportunities for work, so unless the children want to stay and work the land like their parents did they generally go to Arica.  These is causing an extreme demographic change in the area -- the population is overwhelmingly adultos mayores (older people).  It really makes you wonder what the future of Putre and the surrounding areas are - with a steadily aging population, who will sustain the community? Will Putre turn into another Chilean ghost town 50 years from now?  It's hard to say. 

• Lunch with the community representatives.  I ate salmon for the first official time, and unfortunately for probably the last time too.  Definitely not one of my favorites.

• In the afternoon class was taught by a yatiri (Aymaran doctor or "shaman" that uses mostly herbs to treat illnesses) and a partera or midwife.  The yatiri performed a few ceremonies to release the soul of somebody who recently passed away and also to wish good luck on somebody going on a journey.  The partera showed us different methods used to turn the baby before birth and also how to unwrap the cord.  Listening to their methods was definitely a learning experience -- a learning experience in cultural competency and open-mindedness.  You have to observe, accept, and support even if it doesn't make sense to you.  Overall, it truly was a once in a lifetime experience.

• Debriefing/feedback, dinner, sleep (with a little exploring in between). 

Day 3:

• Breakfast + load the bus to leave for Belén.  Belén is a rural town (with a population of 28 people) about 2 hours away.  The drive there was absolutely incredible - not like anything I'd ever seen before.

• Once in Belén we visited the posta or health center.  What an eye-opening experience that was!  The posta was tiny - about what you'd expect for a population of only 28 people (plus all the people in the surrounding villages).  It is run by one man, a paramedic who spends every other week in Belén and Arica (when another paramedic switches off with him).  When in Belén he does the work of an entire health team - he serves as the doctor, nurse, psychologist, matrona, everything.  Only very basic services are provided here, but they are available 24/7 because the paramedic lives on site.  For emergencies an ambulance is called in from Putre that will come to Belén and then take the individual to Arica.  Additionally, once a month a full medical staff comes to the area for what is call las rondas or "the rounds" essentially.  Las rondas visit all rural areas once a month and is the time when more specialized care can be provided or even basic care can be provided to those who have difficulty accessing the postas and clinics.  It was really impressive to hear all this one man does for the community.  One complaint he did have, however, was the lack of technology that's available to him.  There's no internet in the area and no cell phone services (companies don't want to pay to install towers in these rural areas when they could profit more off of installing them in more populated areas), and only one fixed phone (which only works with the usage of a calling card, which of course are not sold anywhere nearby and are very expensive).  In other words, besides the posta's radio used to call ambulances, communication is practically impossible.  Such a drastic change from the consumeristic life we're all used to living. 

• After our visit to the posta we visited the school in Belén - which currently as 6 students.  It's an intercultural school where the children learn Spanish, English, and Aymara.  They prepared and performed and traditional dance for us and the school "cook" made us a three typical Aymaran foods - goat cheese flavored with oregano, toasted corn, and llama jerky.  As a group we also brought various candies and kids toys to give to them (silly bands, candy flavored chapstick, toy cars, frisbees, bubbles, etc) because in general they really don't have access to that sort of thing.  It was a really, really touching experience and, once again, really made me open my eyes and evaluate my own life. 

• On our final stop of the day we went to Chapiquiña, another very small rural town in the region.  Here we visited centro de adultos mayores, essentially a house for older people who would otherwise live alone, and were served sopaipillas, a fried dough, with goat cheese and a spicy salsa, and guatia, a traditional Aymaran feast typically used for celebrations.  Guatia was quite the experience.  It is lamb, potatoes, and humitas (corn tamales) that are all completely cooked underground.  I took about 10 pictures of them digging it out of the ground because I was so excited about the whole process.  Once it was all recovered from the burning coals we were served absolutely giant portions -- each person got 4 potatoes, 2 humitas, and a giant hunk of lamb.  It was so delicious and soooo filling; I could barely eat half of my plate's worth.  After eating we strolled around the streets a bit.  Chapiquiña is located in the most beautiful of locations, everything was absolutely breathtaking.  But, at the same time, all very eerily quiet.  Besides the centro de adultos mayores, the city is practically abandoned, but all of the houses are buildings are still standing.  My first experience in a Chilean ghost town of sorts, you could say. The most interesting was seeing the old basketball court and playground at the edge of the city, uninhabited and rusty because not a single child lives in the town.

• Another long bus ride back to Putre.  That night we walked around the town a bit and perused though some of the stores for alpaca items (I bought a sweater and a headband) and watched the most beautiful sunset descent over the mountains.  All in all, the most incredible of days. 

Day 4

• Words can't fully describe the beauty I witnessed on Friday, the fourth and final day of our excursion.  We left around 10am and drove to Parque Nacional Lauca, one of the largest nature reserves in Chile, which includes Lagó Chungará (Lake Chungara), the highest-altitude lake in the world. The only complaint about the entire part is that we didnt get very close to any wild alpaca, event though they roam all over the park.  After an hour or so in the park we drove through the small town of Parinacota, a typical town of the altiplano area, and then headed to some termas or hot springs.  All of it absolutely exceeded my expectations.  Anybody can go to a big foreign city, but who can say they got the experience to eat guatia in a small diminishing village and spend time in the outskirts of the Andes talking with Aymara community leaders?  I feel like the luckiest girl, and am trying to soak in all these experiences as much as I possibly can.

I think that about sums up my week!  Next week I head to Peru but I'll try to do another post before then.  Also, I reached my limit on flickr already (frustrating), so I created a new picasso page - my pictures can now be viewed here:  https://picasaweb.google.com/100575919417646923485.

Chao,
Brittany

northeastern chile 1.0: photo version

Here's a few photos from my absolutely incredible excursion to northeastern Chile - Putre, Belén, Parinacota, Lago Chungará, Parque Nacional Lauca and everything in between.  Text to come soon!

recap, ISP, healthcare, días de patrias

So, I apologize that I've completely neglected this blog for the past two weeks.  There really isn't enough time in the day to do everything and then recount it as well!  And by now it would take way, way too long to talk about everything that I've done/learned/experienced in all that time, so I'm just going to talk about a select few.  But, to serve as a quick recap, here's a top 10 list of all that's happened (or that I can remember, in no particular order):

1. Hung out at the port with some sea lions
2. Visited a rural health center (posta), local health center (centro de salud familiar), and hospital
3. Went to a few discotecas (which I suppose would be roughly translated to "dance club")
4. Researched my ISP/discovered a (possible) topic
5. Partook in many wine-filled barbecues (asadas) with my family
6. Ate empanadas on the beach
7. Tried manjar ice cream for the first time
8. Shadowed a Chilean nurse
9. Cooked charquicán, a traditional Chilean vegetable stew with my madre
10. Began celebrating los días de patrias, Chile's 4-day weekend of celebrating their independence day, 18 de septiembre (September 18th).

Yeah!  I think that's a pretty well-composed list of what my past few weeks have been like.  A lot of class (5 hours a day typically) intermixed with hanging out with my family, pasantías (essentially field trips to different health centers), and getting to know the city.  Arica is a really chill place where everything is relaxed and friendly, but I'm really itching to see more of the country.  A frustrating part about SIT programs is that while you do travel quite a bit with the program, they highly discourage any other sort of travel.  So while I'm enjoying my time in Arica, I'm very, very ready to see more! Luckily I will be able to do that come Tuesday when we leave for our first excursion - more on that later!

Two weeks ago we had an assignment where we really had to crack down and start researching our possible ISP (Independent Study Project) topics seriously.  The ISP is a self-designed research project that each one of us individually designs and carries out during the month of November; anywhere in the country, about any topic concerning pubic health, traditional medicine, or community empowerment that we want.  To say the least, I've been struggling to find a topic that really inspires me.  I came to Chile thinking I wanted to research some aspect of tuberculosis among the indigenous populations, but that isn't really speaking to me anymore.  Now, for the past week or so I've been doing some research on acute respiratory infections (bronchitis, pneumonia, and bronchiolitis) in children under age 5 with adolescent mothers. In certain areas of Chile (particularly in the South), child mortality rates due to ARIs (primarily pneumonia) are very high.  In these areas, teenage pregnancy rates and poverty levels are also elevated - in the Araucania region in particular, where inequalities are the most extreme.  I've always been very interested in social determinants of health, so searching the correlation between these different factors could be very interesting.  I'm not completely set on it though.  Just today I thought about researching linguistic accessibility to health services.  Chile has a large indigenous population - both Mapuche and Aymara - and while the majority are bilingual, not all of them are, and language barriers are not an uncommon thing.  I have no idea what my focus could be on this, but the universality of it peaks my interest.  Language barriers exist all over the world - which means it's research that I could continue here in Chile, at home in Minnesota, or anywhere in the world.  I'll definitely have to look into that one more.

In addition to all that ISP garb, I'm learning a TON about the Chilean Health Care system.  Learning about the system is very interesting because we're also getting the experience to view it first-hand.  The health system here consists mainly of two components, FONASA (the public system) and ISAPRE (the private system), and then there are also special, smaller systems for military members and those of indigenous descent.  Anybody employed under a contract is automatically enrolled in the public system through a fixed 7% deduction out of their salary.  Those who elect to can opt out of the public system for the private system, in which they pay the 7% plus an additional percentage based on their income, health risks, number of dependents, etc.  Anyways, I could go on and on about everything else I've learned about the topic, but what's particularly interesting are all of the government-sponsored prevention and promotion programs, such a Chile Crece Contigo (Chile Grows Together).  CCC is a program that supports and sponsors women through pregnancy, childbirth, and provides resources for the children and families from birth through childhood.  When we toured the hospital we got the opportunity to talk to a nurse who works who assists mothers through the program, and she showed us the "care package" that goes home with every single newborn child born in the hospital, which included a pack-and-play type crib with sheets, a nursing pillow, a sling to carry the baby in, and clothes ranging from newborn sizes up to 6 months.  Along with this comes training on how to breast feed and also referrals and information on when and where to get vaccinations.  It's been really, really interesting to learn about and even more interesting to see in person.  

Enough with the healthcare garb now (I highly doubt it's interesting to anybody except us public health nerds), this weekend is Chile's independence day!  18 de septiembre (Sunday) to be exact, but you would never know it wasn't actually a four-day thing.  The celebrations started Wednesday for us when we had our own little fiesta de patrias in Spanish class, which included traditional songs, dance, games, and food.  It all felt a little preschool-y, but was a nice break from class and ended with an amazing "buffet" of typical Chilean cuisine.  We split up 15 or so different dishes - salads, entrees, and deserts - and split them between the 24 of us.  I made charquicán with my mom - a (mainly) vegetable stew made of squash, potatoes, corn, fresh green beans, peppers, garlic, greens, and a little bit of meat that's served with rice.  It was soooo delicious - very fresh and definitely something I would make and eat again (I'd probably leave out the meat next time though).  In addition to our class fiesta, all the main stuff downtown started yesterday.  There's a really big fería or fair (market) full of great artisanal products and also a carnival-like thing called las ramadas where there's lots food and games (such as the classic knock-down-all-the-cans-with-a-ball game, but here in Chile you don't win a stuffed animal for knocking down all the cans -- you win a bottle of wine). Today I spent all day in the sun in el centro with some girls from the program checking everything out - it was an absolutely beautiful, sunny, relaxing day. Tomorrow I'm going to my grandparents house in the Valle de Lluta again (they insist they're going to teach me cueca, Chile's national dance), so that should be interesting, haha, and Sunday there's going to be lots of parades and dancing and music (and drunk people) all around the city.  Very, very exciting! 

Tuesday, after our four-day weekend of celebrations, we leave for Putre - an Aymara town about 3 hours east of Arica.  We'll be there for four days learning about traditional Aymaran medicine and community empowerment.  I'm super excited for this excursion, both because it's the first time getting out of Arica and because I think the topics will really, really interest me.  Also, we get to go to beautiful Parque Nacional Lauca and Lago Chungará!  We will be a few thousand feet above sea level in the altiplano though, so it's going to be pretty cold at night, but that'll be okay (I'll just have to layer on the very few warm items I do have -- I reallllly wish I could go back and pack differently).  

That's all for now, I'll try really hard to write a post about the rest of weekend of celebrations and the trip to Putre next weekend!

Chao,

Brittany

p.s. lots of new pictures are up! www.flickr.com/photos/bliebhar

siesta, empanadas, bistec a lo pobre, etc.

Well, my semester has officially started!  Classes are underway and a sense of normalcy has finally begun to sink in.  I have spanish class every morning from 9-12 and then a seminar every afternoon from 3-5 or 5:30.  Spanish class is broken up into two parts, one part focusing on culture and the other part focusing on grammar and vocabulary, with a different professor teaching each of the two.  Seminars in the afternoon are either the Field Study Seminar or our regular Public Health Seminar.  What I've really been enjoying is the 3-hour break we have in the middle of the day known as siesta, which directly translates to "nap."  Historically this mid-day break began because men working out in the mines would come home for a few hours to escape the hottest part of the day, and their families would take a break as well to spend some time with them.  The tradition held strong in many parts of South America, and here in Arica especially many people go home to relax, eat lunch, and nap.  Many businesses and stores close for these few hours as well. It's definitely a drastic change from the "always rushing" feeling in the US, but I think it's just great.

Monday night I was finally able to give my host family their gifts - a bag of saltwater taffy and an address book with different photos of Minnesota on every page.  I was a little nervous that it was going to be a really lame gift (it's so hard to know what to get!), but they absolutely loved it.  Luckas and Matias attacked the taffy like a couple of starving children and Giovanna poured over the photos saying "ayyy parecen cómo las películas!" or "ohhh they look just like the movies!" After that we watched an episode of "Quién quiere ser millonario" (Who wants to be a millionaire) which was really great too.  Most of the questions are focused on Spanish culture so I'm pretty bad at it, but it's fun nonetheless. 

pisco sour

The rest of the week has just been continuing on - the normal routine of walk to class, class, walk home, eat lunch/hang out, walk to class, class, walk home, do whatever.  It comes out to about 2 hours of walking a day which has been a really easy way to get some exercise in. Other than that, Tuesday night a group of us headed to el centro to hang out, get some drinks, and have dinner.  We wandered the streets and stopped in many tiendas along the way before choosing a nice restaurant with an outdoor patio area where we ate some absolutely amazing empanadas.  I swear, I could eat empanadas every single day and not get sick of them.  I also ordered my first officially legal drink there (woo!), a pisco sour, Chile's "national cocktail" of sorts, which was a little strong but not bad!  It was really nice to just hang out and decompress from all the stress of adjusting to a spanish-speaking life.  We hung out there for about an hour and headed down the block to another restaurant, T&T (or Tartas y Tortas), where we met the rest of the group for Happy Hour (they call it Happy Hour in Spanish too, it's quite funny) and dinner.  We ordered a variety of fajitas, salads, appetizers, and the real winner - bistec a lo pobre.  Bistec a lo pobre (which ironically translates as "poor man's beef" is one of Chile's platos típicos, or typical dishes, which consists of a mound of french fries topped with steak and fried eggs.  Two of the girls thought they ordered a single plate to share, but got brought the larger portion - which was way, way more food than anybody could possibly eat.  It was a great night of food, drinks, and company, and we decided to make it a weekly tradition that we fittingly named "Fat American Tuesdays." 

bistec a lo pobre

Another exciting thing:  yesterday afternoon we got our assignments for what kinds of medical professionals we'll be shadowing this semester (we do various outings to different health care facilities in these first two months and two of the times we have the opportunity to shadow), and I got assigned to a tuberculosis nurse and a matrona, or a midwife.  I'm really, really excited for both of these.  I think it'll be a really great experience and I'll definitely be able to learn a lot from both of them.  I'm not a pre-med student or anything (which I've already been re-thinking a lot during the first week of the program), but the international perspective from these individuals will be really beneficial to my future studies.  Also, midwives here in Chile don't only primarily specialize in birth as they do in the US (for the most part), but they also do a lot with prenatal care and reproductive health in general.  Definitely an experience to look forward to!

Next post: volunteering, hot water heater, salsa classes, aeroboxing, and Walmart.  There's not nearly enough time to write about everything!  Off to class for now.

Chao, 

Brittany

p.s. I put up a few new photos! www.flickr.com/photos/bliebhard