1. el tiempo. not only is the time two hours off until day light savings time en marzo, to chileans, fashionably late is on-time/early. times are relative suggestions. example: the first day in the airport we were told to wait por uno minuto.....4 hours later, we finally left for the hotel.
2. la comida. chile is ranked as 3rd for the world that eats the most bread. breakfast is often yogurt/fruit. lunch is huge. dinner is replaced with "onces" which is a small snack of bread and coffee or some such thing. luckily, the host families are required to give us a larger dinner AND onces later in the evening. also, chileans eat to live. our food is SO much better. every night i've had dinner here has lasted 2 or 3 hours. i love it. we just chill out and chat. last night we cooked our own dinner and ate it on the balcony with amigos.
3. la lengua. chilean spanish is sloppy. they don't pronounce certain ending sounds.."s" or "ido/ado" and the like. so gracias turns in to gracia. y como estas = como estai. also they use a lot of slang and many of their terms are different. example: "guagua" is supposed to mean bus. here it means baby.
4. el clima. IT'S SO WARM :) :) be jeaous. but more interesante, is that the ozone layer here is very thin causing us to burn even more easily. super. i'm hoping my hair gets lighter red ;) evenings and mornings are cooler, which is nice.
5. technologia. i miss my phone. and internet. facebook never works :( i feel so vulnerable and lost without them. but my wonderful roommate says she feels freed because of this...i'm trying to adopt her perspective.
6. el supermercado. we ventured into the grocery store and found that whenever you buy something you are asked if you want to donate your change to a charity. perhaps this is because 1 peso (yes, there is such a thing) is worth like 1/5 of a penny...also the bag boys dont have a salary. they work solely off of tips. another little store we went to had the weirdest process of buying things. you select your item, take it to a counter and receive a receipt. then you take the receipt to the other counter and pay. then you go to the third counter and get your item by handing them your new receipt. weird, i know. and yes, they seemed annoyed at the ignorant gringos trying to figure out the system. haha
7. sonrisas. they don't do it. ok, ok they smile...but not at me. in the US when we pass people in the streets or at the store, if we make eye contact with them it's common to smile. not true here. i'm not sure if smiling has some sort of meaning or if it's just saved for friends and family. like if i smile at a man am i saying i'm "easy?" i find it SO difficult to just stare at people straightfaced!! It feels rude. And I feel like they don't approve of me when I do smile and they don't return the expression. I'm going to try to fit in to their culture, but I hope it doesn't stick because I like the fact that I smile at everyone. As soon as I come home I'm gonna be the smiley-est person ever.
8. el bano. they don't flush toilet paper. they throw it in the trashcan beside the toilet. can you say gross?
9. morales. this is not Messiah. the ISA staff made sure to tell us which bars/clubs were the best to go to. They ask us in the morning where we went the night before. partying is assumed. And apparently people go to the clubs we're forbidden to go to. I am so not used to this lifestyle, even just the language I hear everyday still surprises me. Don't worry, I'm not compromising one bit ;)
10. modales. so...yawning is rude. burping/farting is rude. stretching is rude. putting your feet on furniture is rude. eating in class is rude. you have to keep both hands on the table when you eat.
all in all, i'm liking it here. def haven't adopted it as my home, but its growing on me.
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