Monday, May 31, 2010

2 months down...

...with 3 more to go!!

Sorry for the long delay between blogs but life here has really taken over and I'm way beyond busy these days...not that, that is any different than when I'm living in the states! My life has finally settled into somewhat of a routine and I'm so accustomed to living here that I feel as if I've been here for a year or more.

School is going well. Spanish class is moving along slowly but nicely...with the help of some of my native speaking friends. Business classes are good as well. I got a B+ on my first operations management exam and have another exam coming up in just a couple of weeks. Management models is by far the most boring class I have here. The problem is that the material is so easy and presented in such a simplistic manner that I can't stay interested in it. I have to give a presentation for the class in 1 month. Guess that means I should probably start reading the material! I definitely put the 'pro' in procrastination! lol

Work is going better than I could have ever imagined. I've become very close with one of the girls there, Susana. I g
o to her house once or twice a week to hang out and chat and spend some time with her family. She's a native from Concepcion but went to Australia and learned English. She's studying to be a translator and teaching English with me. We're also good friends with Ryan & Salvador who are our co-workers as well. Ryan and I trained together and have remained friends ever since. He's from TN and moved to Ecuador to start a business to help clean up the city. Now he moved here for a few months while his company is developing. Salvador is Chilean by descent but grew up near Vancouver Canada. He's been in Chile for 5 years and teaches English at Berlitz and in Coronel. We're a pretty close group and recently had a couple of bbq's at Salvadors' house (which is where Ryan is living too), with some of our students...always a good time!!

I'm teaching a lot these days. I have a regular class Mon-Fri 8am-9:30am with 2 students from a biz called Price-Waterhouse where they work in the audit department. They are beginners and some days are a real struggle to get things across to them. But I welcome the challenge and have to say it's the most rewarding feeling to watch them learn and grow with a new language! I have another class Mon & Wed nights from 7:15-9:30 with 3 students, all guys (Felipe, Raul & Carlos). They are level 4 and a lot of fun! Felipe & Raul are thru a government program here called 'sense' where the
gov't pays for their lessons. Carlos is a university student studying IT. They are very creative and do such a great job with role plays and make me laugh all the time!! And my other class is the one I've had from the beginning, the husband and wife couple (Marcela & Gabriel). I recently learned that they are both doctors (psychology & gynecology). They are still a blast and I have such a great time with them!!

This job has actually put a new career idea in my head!! This happens when I travel abroad...when I moved to Spain it made me realize I wanted a masters degree. Now I'm debating on getting my doctorate!! lol I've really been trying to weigh my options. When I return home I will only have 7 classes to take to graduate...that's just about a year left. At that point I can either find a job with a company and move out of Ohio while trying to start my design firm; I can start looking for grant money for small businesses when I return and try and build a client base by the time I graduate; or I can pursue a doctorate and work on getting a position teaching
in a university while working on my design business!! Oh the decisions I will have to make!

So that is basically it for this update! I have no complaints and am loving life as usual. The weather is getting colder but we've been lucky because there hasn't been a whole lot of rain yet...although I hear it's coming soon. The aftershocks have been plentiful over the last couple of weeks but they've been small, so no worries. Ximena & my host family is still spoiling me as usual!! Being an English teacher has opened a lot doors to some new friends through Ximena and I'm actually helping one of her clients, Juan Pablo, practice his English. We got to hang out and meet a bunch of his friends on Saturday night and then we all went salsa dancing together at a club called Bonita...I forgot how much fun that was!! Sindy (my classmate) and I still try and get together once a week for a dinner or lunch but it's hard sometimes with our schedules.

I'm dropping in a few albums in this blog. The one above is of a bbq at Salvadors house an
d then some pics of the pizza I made for Sindy & her roomie a couple weeks ago. The next album is some old photos from my trip to Pucon and Parque Rio with Ximena. These were the photos from her camera. And lastly is an album of pics from just this past Friday. It was a beautiful sunny day out and I called Ryan to do some museum hopping with me. The museum of Natural History is super close to my house, complete with an outdoor dinosaur park. So we did it 'American tourist' style and took some silly photos there and then headed to the university & a small art museum!

Monday, May 10, 2010

Time is moving fast!

It's been a couple weeks now which means I'm down to just 3 1/2 months left...time really is flying but it feels like I've lived here so much longer than that!

Updating from the last blog:

I officially have my Chilean id...yay for being legal!! Now I don't have to worry about carrying around a copy of my passport all the time. Also on an odd note, I have to use my id whenever I use my credit card. Here, not only do they require your signature but they also require you to write your RUN number on the receipt. Think of it like a drivers license number!

Things with Berlitz are finally moving along and I have officially begun working. I finished up 3 double training shifts last Tuesday, then got called in to cover another teacher and give my first class on Wednesday evening. A lot of you know that I really don't like standing up in front of people and presenting. I mean I've trained many a staffs in restaurants and spoken at wine tastings but it's just not the same as presenting in a classroom. I'm that person that runs out of breath and says "ummm" a lot. I have
to say that the thought of me teaching was a little hard to grasp but since I've been down here it seems I just keep challenging one fear after another, so why not add this one to the list?! During training I had to teach my boss a few times and the other new teacher that was hired along with me. I was nervous at first but my boss is pretty awesome so after the first time I was really comfortable. My first class was only 2 students, a husband and wife couple named Marcela & Gabriel. Things started a little slow but within 10 mins I had them giggling and having fun with the material. The class was 2 hr and 15 mins and it really flew by. They were so much fun and eager to learn. I let them get creative with their dialogue and just have fun with it and they loved it. After the class Marcela told me that she really liked my class. I went downstairs to return the lesson book and fill in the ped card (it's the attendance/comment card we fill out after each session) and my boss came in just smiling with a weird look on her face. She asked how my class was and I replied that I thought it went well but with that look on her face, I wasn't so sure. She started laughing and asked how I felt about taking the same class again next Tuesday and of course I said I'd love to. I asked why the funny look and she informed that Marcela approached her and said that she really enjoyed my class a lot. She also requested that I be their teacher because they like me better than the other one! Haha, I couldn't help but laugh from excitement. Of course I don't want to step on anyones toes but my boss said she was proud and not to worry about it. She said way to go for stealing a class from someone on my first day! Now that was a great ending to a long day!!!
So tomorrow I will be teaching Marcela & Gabriel again. I also got a call and should be teaching a private student right after them as well as a couple more days this week! On top of that, we have a client that is a business sending their employees to us for a morning class. They are a level 1 (aka know no english) and I will have 1 of their groups Mon-Fri at 8am for a little over an hour each day. I was so worried I'd never have enough hours to make this job worth while and now I'm finding myself to be the dependable one they call when they're in a jam. I love it!! Before I leave I'm going to talk to my boss and see how difficult it would be for me to try and pick up some classes to teach back
home. I think it'd be a great way to make some extra money and it's something I like doing. I never thought I'd say that I enjoy being a teacher!!
My coworkers are great. Last Saturday the owner, Cristian, threw a BBQ at his house for the new teachers, there are 5 of us in total. It was a holiday here, Labor Day. We had tons of food, karaoke and dancing. It was so much fun to be around such great people!!

Classes at the university seem to be going well. I had my first exam in operations management week before last. I was only 4 questions but all essay writing. Wow am I glad I asked to write it in english. I took me every bit of the 2 hour time limit just to write in English, I would have never finished it in time if I had to translate to Spanish!! As for how I did on it, well that's still unknown. I felt pretty good about most of it. I really studied and felt prepared with the material it covered. But we had class last week and no tests were given back. I'm going to ask a friend of mine about it tomorrow...maybe they do things different here and don't hand back exams...who knows!! My other 2 classes are moving right along. I actually need to do some homework tonight for my spanish class.

As promised, this blog is much shorter than previous ones. This is the last part, I promise ;) Yesterday was Mother's Day and I went on a field trip with my host family (they now claim me as their adopted daughter lol). We started up north and stopped in a coastal town called Tome which by some miracle was missed by the tsunami that followed the quake. We had some lunch overlooking the pacific ocean. I had mariscal caliente, it's a seafood soup with a white wine and stock broth with a bunch of different seafood in it topped with an egg. It was super yum!! Here are some pics of Tome!! (click the pic)

The point of this trip was to travel further north to a town called Dichato. This town unfortunately was not missed by the tsunami but rather destroyed by it. The people were warned to run for the hills right after the quake. But after a half hour the gov't said no worries, nothing happened and you can come back down now. Then the city got rocked by 4 huge waves! The place was demolished. Businesses, homes, people, cars, plant life...everything just gone. The pictures don't do justice to the devastation that you feel by seeing it in person. You can't help but to cry for them. The pics don't have captions on them but you can see where roads just washed away, bridges fell, boats washed up on land, and homes fell apart. I know this isn't the happiest way to leave a blog but the one thing we went to do was honor those who were lost and those who lost so much. In some the final pics you will see a statue of the virgin Mary. It is surrounded by nothing but dirt and slabs of what used to be homes, but yet the statue itself looks untouched. This has become a sign of hope and prayer to the city. Click on my photo to look at the pictures. Remember this is what it looks like after 2 months of clean-up. Click this link to see what it was like before cleaning began: http://media.ft.com/cms/e4cd2ebe-287a-11df-a0b1-00144feabdc0.jpg

And here are a couple links to show you what it was like when it was a live and thriving city: http://image02.webshots.com/2/4/42/34/111944234GQCiEn_fs.jpg

http://static.panoramio.com/photos/original/33452214.jpg

Love and miss you all!!!