Happy Independence Day, everyone! We had a party last weekend to celebrate. There is still red white and blue all over our apartment and we have American heroes posted all over the walls. My favorite is a picture of Lewis and Clark next to Lois Lane and Clark Kent. We had apple pie, burgers, and hot dogs. Never mind that it was around 40 degrees--who cares?
Chile went on business as usual. We had our closing assembly for the semester on Wednesday and then had time to wrap up grades and the like on Thursday and Friday.
The end of the semester always brings showcases and performances, and I was introduced this week to something called "Acrosport". It involves some dancing, some cheerleader-like moves, and lots of still poses.
It was cool! They had groups perform from every level in high school.
On the 4th of July itself I spent my day organizing preschool and kindergarten work. I ended up with glitter all over myself. And in case you were wondering, P is for Pig, Purple, Pot, and Penguin.
I brought my trombone back from the states and have been playing in the all-teacher band. They named themselves Montes Inc as a play on the founding family, the Montes brothers. It's been a lot of fun. We play some ska, raggae, and a little jazz.
Band rehearsal. Mauricio, a music teacher, Alexis, one of our accountants, who plays drums, and Juan, a religion teacher.
Pablo in the back on guitar, another music teacher, Rody, an English teacher, on bass, and Rodrigo, a Catholic deacon and one of the Montes brothers, on sax.
I'm trying to track down pictures of our performance on the last day, we set up outside during recess. It was a blast!
Last weekend I went back to El Colorado with my host brother Clemente. We had a big storm the week before so the conditions were excellent.
Cleme is a great skier! We explored the whole place and spent a good part of the afternoon in the park. It was a great day.
Another one of my students, Felipe, has a family condo at El Colorado. We found him in the morning. I'm hoping we can ride together again, we had a great time.
The English Team surprised me on Friday with a 4th of July party! I had no idea, I thought we were having a meeting. Thanks guys!
Doughnuts, Reese's, and lots of red white and blue. So very American.
We closed out the semester with a great catered lunch in our auditorium. Last night we went out for drinks to celebrate the beginning of winter vacation and I cleaned up the apartment to prepare for all our guests. Elaine's family is in town and Jon and Barry arrived this morning.
We welcomed Jon and Barry in typical Chilean style with an Asado. I was on the grill today and everything turned out well. We also made pisco sours and lost of pevre and palta.
We invited over some other Americans we met last week for their first asado. It was a great way to kick off break.
Lots of exciting adventures in the next weeks. We head up to Valle Nevado tomorrow, another ski resort close to the city, for two days. After a day to look around Santiago we fly off to Bolivia and onto Peru seeing Machu Picchu and Lake Titicaca along the way. Stay tuned!
