a teacher without students...

For the past week, education has been the news in Chile. Secondary students across the country have been on 'paro', with dozens of high schools actually taken over (en toma) by students. At issue is the law on education, passed days before Pinochet left office in 1990. The students have three specific demands: that students get free transit passes for school hours, that the fee for the national university entrance exams be dropped, and the end of the 'jornada escolar completa' that has them in school from 8:30 to 5:40. The mobilization finally hit our school on Friday. In the morning the kids had class meetings where they talked (read: shouted) and voted on further action. The kids here are most interested in the last issue, of the full school days. They all walk to school, and those that take the uni entrance exams probably all fall in the category that doesn't have to pay anyways.

Anyways, today at about 9 am all the students marched past my window on their way to meet up with the other high school students from this region for protesting and such things. There are maybe 30 kids in school, mostly seventh graders. Students are meeting with the government today, and pending results of the discussion, tomorrow may or may not be a national strike day. Since we have nothing to do at school, we're thinking of going downtown and taking part in the madness.

The protests are supposed to be 'peaceful', but on Friday a few of my otherwise docile eleventh grade boys were disturbingly excited about the prospect of chucking rocks at riot police. A lot of them genuinely care about the issues, but a lot of them are very misguided revolutionaries. What is impressive is that students have really mobilised in the past week, largely with the support of parents and teachers' unions. There's a lot of talk about seizing the opportunity to reevaluate the education reform of 1990, to shake up the system, turn out something better. I'm certainly watching the news. This weekend I gaped at the high schools downtown that have been taken over by the students -- they have signs everywhere, chairs and tables jammed in the gates, students camping outside. The signs are pretty standard -- stuff about the comercialisation of education, the right to education, also a lot of direct appeals to Bachelet. Her election slogan was 'Estoy Contigo' with pictures of kids, families, pregnant women, you get the idea. So now there are a lot of '¿¿estas comigo??' signs. People in general seem to be disappointed with Bachelet -- a case of unrealisitic expectations?

Well, I think I'm going to head home. A teacher without students...sad indeed.

I had, by the way, a fantastic, very Chilean weekend. Will write /post pictures asap.

Pucon

This weekend, we decided to trade the temperate smog of Santiago for the chilly (but much clearer air) of Pucon. Pucon is a small town in the lake region of Chile, featuring its own active volcano and massive lake. We spent all of Friday night on a bus, met up with Mat and Gil in Temuco, then piled onto another bus to Pucon.

The fact that it was low season didn't quite mask how touristy Pucon is. It's small and quaint looking -- little wooden houses, mountains on all sides, with the volcano rising, snow-covered, above the rest. There are summer homes all around the lake, and hostels everywhere. We took over a hostel-cabin, where we meet two backpackers from New Zealand. We used the two extra bodies to wrangle a cheaper fee for the minibus and tourguide to take us up to the volcano. We didn't go all the way to the crater, but we got pretty close. The view was amazing -- the photos will say it better than I can. I actually felt my lungs unshrivel a little bit up there. It was a clear, sunny day -- considering the season and the BC-like climate, we were really lucky not to be rained out.

Half of the group decided to hike around the volcano. Sinmi, Shayne, Christine, Mat and I were not as excited by the idea of plodding around in the snow in sneakers so we set up camp on a patio. When our companions slid down the volcano two hours later, we were napping peacefully in the sun. We went back down to town, where showering and such things ensued. I went for a stroll with Shayne and Sinmi and bought inordinate amounts of fruit at a stall. I couldn't help it...grapes and apples and tangerines and bananas and tomatoes and cucumbers and peppers and avocado...I CRAVED fruit.

We all went out for dinner later, to celebrate Mat's 19th birthday. Food was unremarkable, but we were sitting with Chris, who is possibly the most unintentionally hilarious person ever. I laughed all the way through my oily chicken and fries. On the walk home we gawked at the volcano some more. At night you just see a little red glow floating in the dark, it's pretty cool.

We went back to our cabin for pisco and games. I won (or lost, depending how you look at it) at 'Never Have I Ever', as per usual. There were more rowdy games, including some bizarre songs from the kiwis. Good fun had by all -- except for my tummy, where the cheap wine and bad chicken where having their own party. In the small hours the rest of the gang hit up a discoteca -- I chilled at home with Mat and Gil and watched American tv shows dubbed in Spanish.

The next morning we were up bright and early for our 9:15 bus. These Latin Americans, man, they have this bus travel thing down. We took the 'classico' (read: cheap)bus, and even then, there is an airline-style host who distributes cookies, tucks you in with fuzzy blankies, closes your curtain, and passes by with airfreshner every few hours. The trip was 11 hours, and I slept through almost all of it. All that for about $15. The only odd thing was that they played the same episode of Buffy -- the very first one -- on repeat the entire trip. I saw Buffy being dropped off at school every time I cracked an eyelid.

We were back in Puente Alto in time for tea, which after a weekend without, I kind of missed. All in all, good trip -- short, but the view was worth it.

Tune in next week for loving grade eight in spite of myself and the dirt on the host family.

what's black and white and red all over??

It's a not a newspaper -- it's my Chilean diet. Inordinate amounts of black tea, white bread and red meat. I CANNOT believe how much tea is drunk in this country. Tea at breakfast, tea between classes, tea after lunch, tea after school, tea before bed. Adults, children, everyone. Every time you go somewhere, no matter what time of day it is, someone is bound to offer you a 'tecito'. People keep telling me tea is good for you, but I don't know how much anti-oxidation my body can take.

Any positive health effects of the tea are bound to be offset by the negatives of the bread and meat. Yesterday Alyssa, the project coordinator in Chile, invited the Puente Alto team (James, Shayne, Sinmi and me) over for dinner. Alyssa is vegetarian -- it felt so good to eat CHEESE and VEGETABLES. And the bread....my downfall. I love it, but I eat far too much of it. My favourite is this dense disc that looks kind of like a squished hamburger bun with tiny holes poked in the top. It's my breakfast, part of lunch, and dinner.

Breakfast is a quick affair at around 7:45: tea and bread, choices of various jams, marmelade (made with the membrillos in the garden) or butter. Lunch is the big meal. We eat in the school cafeteria. Some kind of beef with rice or mashed potatoes, salad and bread. This happens at 1:30 (in fifteen minutes!), by which time I am so ravished that everything seems delicious. And it's warm, which after 4 hours in a classroom that I swear has some complex system of reverse-insulation, is very appealing. I generally get home from school at about 6:15, and an hour or so after that we sit down to 'once' ('eleven' for the non-hispanophones). Dinner is skipped in the Santiago tradition of big lunches. 'Once' looks a lot like breakfast, tea and more of the devilishly yummy bread. My host family is originally from southern Chile, and they tell me that there people lunch at noon, dine at 5, and have 'once' before bed.

I hear good things about the seafood here, so I'm hoping to get down to the market some time and eat some good Chilean fish. I'm getting treated to various delicacies at home -- last weekend we had cordero asado al palo, literally a rack of lamb on a spit. Will post a photo eventually. This weekend we're making empanadas, undoubtedly with more beef.

I hear the kids screaming and reggaeton has started to pump upstairs, so I think it's lunch time. Off to get my daily shot of iron and empty carbs!!

dia del alumno

Thursday is the eye of the storm at school. There are no classes in the afternoon and the teachers get a few hours to plan, meet, and work. And I get the internet! Which is good, because I am supposed to be teaching a unit on Romeo and Juliet to my 10th grade elective class and I have no idea how to do Shakespeare with ESL beginners.

Back to today. Well, today wasn't an ordinary Thursday. May 11th is celebrated in all of Chile (possibly other places too?) as Students' Day. The kids got chocolates (along with the appropriate hugs and kisses) from teachers as they filed into school this morning. The first three periods were held as usual. At noon, the kids piled into the gym for a special assembly organised by the teachers. There was a speech by the director, a song by some of the teachers -- and then, the surprise act. Seven female teachers, including myself, barged in through the side door, with some horrendous reggaeton tune ('rompe, rompe, rompe...') blaring. We were wearing full uniform (knee-high socks, ugly blue bag-dress with a dress shirt underneath, complete with school tie), with the costumary campus modifications. Obnoxiously high pony-tales with dozens of colorful clips, bright blue eye shadow, pink blush and lollipops (the kids here always seem to have lollipops in their mouths). We did some cheesy reggaeton moves and then ran off, much to the kids' amusement. There were awards for something-or-other, and then more reggaeton. The hit of the event, though, was definately James. As the kids were walking out, James busted his dance moves. It couldn't have taken more than a minute for packs of students to surround him. James dances like a bendy toy on speed. 'Super bien!!' as all the tenth graders who have crushes on him said. Good fun had by all!

I'm going to get back to finding activities for R and J. Maybe I can get away with just teaching them West Side Story instead...

“Profe, me encantó su clase!”

James makes fun of me. I like to play games in my classes, silly games with names like ‘fruitbowl’ and ‘zip zap bop.’ I’m teaching grade eight to eleven – and the older kids get more into the games then the younger ones. Occasionally I worry that one of them in the dark recesses of their soul hates me for making them run around and say nonsense words. But it’s a fleeting flutter of uncertainty – I like playing the games, and I think the kids appreciate not having be talked at for an hour and a half. So far I’ve gotten them to loosen up, piece together some basic sentences in English, and distinguish the “s” sound from the “z” sound (hence the zip zap bop!). I also get teased for my anal-rententive ways – like making all my kids sign my classroom contract. It’s a pretty poster, complete with stick-figure drawings, that details what I will do as their teacher and what I expect from my students. At least this way they know why I’m giving them my Ipek-inspired mother stare. I’ve haven’t had discipline problems yet, although that last grade 9 class was excessively…energetic. The goal of all the running around is to focus all that extra energy into something more productive.

James and I started teaching our own classes this Monday. We split the English classes with the 2 permanent teachers, giving us classes of about 20 kids. We're free to do our own material, although we are supposed to focus on conversation. There have already been a lot of satisfying moments. This morning once of my students, in a tone of rapture unique to grade 10 girls, exclaimed what I have adopted as the title of this entry. I’m in the teachers' lounge now, and another one just dashed in to give me a kiss on her way out. It’s a kissy-kissy culture, that’s for sure. I get kissed by students at the end of class, and if they see me at the end of the day. And yet, it’s not quite like the primary school around the corner where Shayne and Sinmi are working. I dropped by for the first time yesterday. It took a good 15 minutes to make it across the courtyard. Children SWARMED us, and everyone wanted kisses and hugs and hellos from the 'tias'.

I just spent a half hour or so rehearsing some reggaeton choreography with 6 other female teachers for tomorrow’s celebration of ‘dia del alumno’. We’re dressing in school uniforms and imitating the younger teens, who are all obsessed with reggaeton. We're a random group, from the buff PE teacher to the pudgier librarian. It'll be fun though, and I'm sure the kids will appreciate it.

Computer techie man whose name I do not yet know has told me he's about to cut the internet...so I'll leave it at that. More to come!

andes on my mind

I spent most of my life in an excrutiatingly flat city, where experiencing different altitudes meant pressing a button in an elevator. Since our first aerial view of the Andes -- a ragged dark outline against a golden-rod sunrise -- I've been obsessed. It's 24 degrees today, but there are snow-capped mountains in all directions. I get the feeling that Santiago (which, by the way, is GIGANTIC) would have pushed its way to Buenos Aires were its fences less solid. Even though the smog makes them a little blurrier than they should be, I can't help having the Andes on my mind...

The photo is the view from San Cristobal, a hill overlooking Santiago.