Olives and Spanish Classes

I left Punta Arenas quickly. I think I spent less than 24 hours there. It was either that or stay there for over a week and pay more to get to Santiago. I just spent two weeks in Santiago, Chile. Mainly because I didn't really know what else to do and thought it would be nice to stay in one place for a while. So I signed up for Spanish classes at the same school I went to some years back. My worry about Spanish school is that it is pointless. If I'm not going to practice after, it does me no good. After my first trip to Santiago and two weeks of school, I moved back to Hawaii where no one speaks Spanish. Then back in September of last year I spent a month studying Spanish in Costa Rica and then went to an island in the Caribbean for two months where I rarely spoke Spanish. Now two more weeks of school and one month left in South America. Don't know where after that. I'll probably forget it all again. Oh well. It's never bad too spend a couple of weeks in Santiago. Even if I didn't really do anything. Here are some highlights.

The Mystery Machine - parked right down the street from where I lived.

And a river of chocolate milk that comes from Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory located outside the city in the mountains.

And then there is Bellas Artes, the art museum that has changed me in ways I can never explain. You have to go there for yourself. The silent movies they are showing in a couple of rooms left me feeling extremely uncomfortable and weird in a good way. They had some cool paintings too, but I got yelled at for taking pictures of them. Here is a pic of a room full of dog statues, most of which were depicted taking a dump.

All in all Santiago is a nice city. I could definitely live there if I could find a way around the olives and the mayonnaise. That stuff is everywhere. On the other hand they have the best avocados in the world. It's a tough call. Ordering a pepperoni pizza that inexplicably comes with olives on it, combined with my lack of Spanish speaking abilities, results in me saying things like, "Olives make me angry." While true, it probably confused and maybe even frightened the waitress. Another good quote resulting from a lack of a decent Spanish vocabulary was, "My beer tastes like cucumbers. Please give me a beer without cucumbers." In truth, the beer tasted like pickles, but I didn't know the word for pickle. I got as close as I could. I guess even with the proper vocabulary, that would have been odd. The bartender took the beer that I had already drank from and put it in the fridge for the next sucker. I made sure I saw the rest of my drinks being poured.