Was just looking at a map in order to visualize just how far we are from home. It’s this far. Notice how it says “Antarctica” below the blue dot. That because we’re just not that far from there.
Here’s a bit of a surprise: people have been universally nice and nearly all of them speak English or has someone nearby that speaks English. There is a strong link between Chile and the U.S., and many Chileans are extremely familiar with the U.S. and Americans. This is slightly different than Buenos Aires – where you found fewer English speakers, very busy people many of whom were shady, and were generally Argentina-centric or European in nature.
Chileans also don’t seem to have a judgmental bone in their bodies.Take today, for instance. We took the Metro (2nd pic below) to Los Dominicos. Here you buy Metro tickets from a person, not a machine. So up we walked to the window and spewed out our finest Spanish:
“Dos billetos para Los Dominicos, por favor”.
As you can imagine, it wasn’t the best Spanish you ever heard, yet the ticket person counted out two tickets and asked for the fare, which is where the international interaction came right off the rails (we don’t know numbers that high in Spanish! USD1 = CLP1000ish).
Chileans seem to be Americans, in the continental sense of the word, more than anything else. It’s very comfortable so far, and not really that much more challenging language-wise than it can be in Chicago.
Here’s something else about Chileans: they believe education is a right. And if you don’t believe them, it says so smack on the front of the national university.
Here’s a bit of a surprise: people have been universally nice and nearly all of them speak English or has someone nearby that speaks English. There is a strong link between Chile and the U.S., and many Chileans are extremely familiar with the U.S. and Americans. This is slightly different than Buenos Aires – where you found fewer English speakers, very busy people many of whom were shady, and were generally Argentina-centric or European in nature.
Chileans also don’t seem to have a judgmental bone in their bodies.Take today, for instance. We took the Metro (2nd pic below) to Los Dominicos. Here you buy Metro tickets from a person, not a machine. So up we walked to the window and spewed out our finest Spanish:
“Dos billetos para Los Dominicos, por favor”.
As you can imagine, it wasn’t the best Spanish you ever heard, yet the ticket person counted out two tickets and asked for the fare, which is where the international interaction came right off the rails (we don’t know numbers that high in Spanish! USD1 = CLP1000ish).
Chileans seem to be Americans, in the continental sense of the word, more than anything else. It’s very comfortable so far, and not really that much more challenging language-wise than it can be in Chicago.
Here’s something else about Chileans: they believe education is a right. And if you don’t believe them, it says so smack on the front of the national university.
