Lago Todos Los Santos and Volcan Osorno

A great day of turismo today. I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but on occasions I have something I want to do on a trip and I get fairly peeved if we veer of course from this. This was what I wanted to do on this day, so I was pleased. We headed out from Puerto Varas in the direction of Lago Todos los Santos, which I don't really know why it had my attention captured so much. I had seen some pictures and said, yep, that's the place. I didn't read too much, but I did know that the National Park it is inside (Vicente Pérez Rosales) was the first in Chile. So that's something to the story. We were lucky with the weather and got some great views of the volcano.

This was meant to be a photo of us in front of the volcano. Of course, I am standing in front of the volcano, so you can't see the thing. Still a good shot of la familia. We carried on, stopping every now and then to try and get the volcano in the shot. Sometimes the clouds would cover it up, other times it would appear from behind the clouds. Our first stop was the Saltos de Petrohue. You have to pay a couple of bucks to go in, but it is well worth a visit. I am always fairly impressed by waterfalls, the sound and everything.

Just as we were about to head off from the falls we saw the volcano appear again from behind the clouds and looked to get the shot with the waterfall and the volcano together. This was the best I got, which turned out quite well. I have this wide shot option on my camera which has come in quite handy on this trip. Some pretty extensive scenes to take in.

Here we are again with the volcano - new angle this time, from the lake itself. Lago Todos los Santos. In the end we took a short boat ride with a very nice man, Jaime. It was 3,000 each for a half hour ride, which is absolutely fine. Six dollars is not very much and it was a great way to see the lake. You can do a ferry crossing to the other side, but that takes quite a long time, so this was a great opportunity to just take a quick look around. Later in the day we went some way up the volcano and had a very good lunch. The lady from our accommodation recommended that we go and check it out. It is at the base of a skifield, which of course you would think it adds double to the price, but it seemed it was quite a reasonable price (or that everything in this town is quite expensive). We are on the road again tomorrow, off to Chiloé. That's another place I have never been too, looking forward to checking that out.

Freestyle en la Iglesia

This is a story of modern times...

I sure have to say that today was a weird day. A couple of weeks ago, I finally came across some freestyle football players online. I haven't discovered any footbag players, but at least it's a pretty similar general idea. So every Sunday they meet at Bellas Artes. I went a fortnight ago, but couldn't make it again last week.

So anyway, I got down there and we started playing.

There are always some people walking by who want to have a kick around. Without fail, they kick the ball on to the road. It didn't really matter today as that part of the street was blocked for some reason.

I filmed a couple of short little videos with my camera. I have to start making more and more use of that, particularly for filming things. Anyhow - I didn't hit anything particularly special, no long runs. When you're playing with others though - it doesn't matter so much.

Particularly for me, I have been playing solo for six months now. I have really been missing the sessions with Caroline and Copey where you just call up and it's time to play. So it has been good to find these guys.

Here is a short little video of three of us playing together. I think these kind of videos are always fun. There are some great ones of Honza, Vasek etc. I filmed one a couple of years back with "Bevs" when he was visiting Canberra.

Anyhow. Our next stop was Plaza de Armas, which is the main square of Santiago. We were going to put on a bit of a show and hopefully get some bucks. We played a while, then a policeman signalled to me that I should come over. I partly played stupid (the other part was that I didn't really get it), and even now I wasn't sure what he meant. I think to stop blocking the pathway as too many people were watching.

That was only the beginning of the weird adventure though. We were able to play a bit longer, then went into the city centre. The some girls approached us and asked if we could do a performance at their youth event. por que no?

Well I can tell you exactly por que no, but instead we went there. It was some sort of "modern" church just across the road from La Moneda, the presidential palace.

The kind of modern establishment where they murmur to themselves (speaking in tongues???), place hands on each others heads and, a more rare element - perform some kind of fashion show in the middle of proceedings.

Aside from the language barrier, I honestly couldn't really understand what was going on. I don't think I would have got it if it was in English either. I will just say that they were all completely crazy. After the "fashion show", then there was some kind of contest where there was a crowd vote for the most popular, but yelling and screaming.

I think these were the exact types that old mate Jesus was throwing out when he cleared the traders from the temple. Anyhow, then there was some kind of dance off after the fashion show, and a couple of us presented our skills in that time. I have some video but I will have to make some edits to that, as it doesn't look so good.

So some of us headed for the exit, but then it was decided to stay. The deal that had been struck was these bunch of crazy people would give more and more likes to the page of the freestyle group. A deal worth it? Who knows?

All I know is that it was definitely the most strange place I have given a footbag demonstration. It even beats out the Castlemaine Prison!

My first cover

I sure have been busy this week. What I haven't even got the chance to write about is that I have my first ever cover of a printed newspaper.

Here is a photo of the bunch of the team at I Love Chile, with a few copies of the paper in hand.

I wrote a story about the retirement of Fernando González. Unfortunately I didn't get to interview him, but that might happen in the future. I also wrote a bunch of other stories in there. If you want to read a digital copy - click here.

I have also started teaching some English classes - my main one is with Héctor, a tattoo artist. We are having a daily conversation class as he prepares to head to Europe. A good bloke, we have some cool chats.

busy times

I have been pretty busy lately, doing a bunch of things for the newspaper, or for my own entertainment.

Right now I will just make a list of what I have been up to, and maybe in the future I will add some accounts of my journeys.

Last week I went to the Tesoros Humanos Vivos event, or in English "Living Human Treasures". This was the launch of a search for more "treasures". I did a short interview with the Minister for Arts and Culture, Luciano Cruz-Coke. The week before I had gone to an event with British minister Jeremy Browne, though I think I wrote about that already.

On Friday, I went up to La Serena. Actually I left on Thursday night and got there about 1am. I was thinking of just wandering around the town until I had to head off again, but decided to stay in a hostel. There was a HI there, so I stayed there. Unfortunately my "I used to work in a HI hostel" fell upon deaf ears. Always worth a try though...

The next day I went to the "Big Bang" event at Las Campanas Observatory. They are beginning the process of building the Giant Magellan Telescope, which is going to be a huge thing. I met many astronomers, the Australian ambassador and some other important people. There was also a free lunch, which is important :)

The hill behind me is Cerro Las Campanas, which they exploded in order to begin the building. While the explosion didn't make much of a dent in the mountain, they will be making 70 more blasts.

Here is a picture of me inside the current Magellan Telescope. This was pretty cool to go and check out, though it would have been even better to go at night, when the stars are in full force. The Atacama Region (where the telescope is) and much of northern Chile is renowned as being the best place in the world for star gazing. I would like to spend much more time getting outside of Santiago, and doing things like that are a good chance.

We have also been working on the next edition of the I Love Chile print newspaper. That should be out next week, I wrote a bunch of stories in there. I reached one of the goals I set myself a while back, and have written my 200th article on the ILC website. Here you can see all of my articles. I have been writing a lot less articles lately, as I have many more administrative tasks to do, but hopefully I will get back in to the writing mode again very soon.

I am also back to my studies, I have two more subjects to go until I have apparently Mastered the Art of Writing. By midway through the year I should have myself a Master of Arts (Writing). We are currently talking about practice-led research. To be honest I don't really know what I am talking about, but I am getting some good feedback from my tutor in the weekly discussion posts.

The best news story this week though, has been the similarity of former Energy Minister Rodrigo Álvarez, who quit on Monday. The guy looks exactly like George Costanza, and Jason Alexander even agreed on Twitter.

The worst news story was the case of Daniel Zamudio. That is not a pleasant story at all, and I don't know why there are neo-nazis in Chile. That's not something I am so interested in going into in my blog, you can read any news to know more about that.

Late yesterday afternoon I got an email from the boss asking if we could cover an "exclusive event" at Concha y Toro. They are a well renowned wine company, so of course I said sure thing. We had a full degustación, then some food afterwards. I got to meet some other writers and some of the people who run the company.

They have a sponsorship deal with Manchester United, which is very interesting from a sports management perspective. It also got some wheels turning in my head about some grand ideas involving world tours, footbag, freestyle football and a match between Man U and La U.

Speaking of La U, I went to the game (Copa Libertadores) on Tuesday night. They knocked Penarol from Uruguay out of the competition, with a goal in the final minute. The other team were not so happy and there was a bit of heave-ho at the end.

So that sums up pretty well what I have been up to. The next adventure: this weekend is Lollapalooza, and I have a press pass. Foo Fighters are playing a 2.5 hour set, that should be awesome. Unfortunately there are very few other bands on the lineup I actually want to see, but it should be fun to go along.

Write on...

Today I have been feeling fairly productive with my writing - I have begun work on some new projects and resurrected some old ones.

However, I did just take the thought that I had not written anything for my Masters or for my job, which are probably more important than these tasks. It's the weekend however, and these are the "on the side" projects, which I am hoping will grow and grow.

I am not going to post the links to them at the moment, because they are not ready - some are active, but not ready.

Anyhow - yesterday we went to an event, where some guys from Tumblr came along and talked to some artists about using Tumblr to spread their creativity. What I was even doing there is a good question - but I tagged along as Francisca was representing the architecture and design firm she works for.

I asked quite a few questions, as I do already use Tumblr, but I was interested particularly in using it for I Love Chile and for creating some things to promote footbag. So in my mind, I was thinking these projects as we talked. The first is quite simple - and I have set it up already. It is simply sharing information about freestyle footbag.

The footbag community has really not done a good job of promoting itself with the social media platforms that are already available. I am hoping this will change it - and also give a voice from within the community, but give it a worldwide voice.

The second (well, third if you count I Love Chile), will be something I think has a huge amount of potential if other people start submitting regularly. The concept will be quite open: South American Freestyle. This will be a mix of "extreme" or "freestyle" sports, pictures, videos, interviews, events, whatever. The key will be it will be all about South America. So either the action happening in South America, or South Americans making the action happen elsewhere.

The key to this is maybe some rich companies will come along and find some cool stuff they want to have as part of their event, then maybe they will get me to be a part of the event and give me lots of money... after all, you never know your luck.

Next week I am going to head to the IV region to check them starting work on a new telescope - they are going to make a big explosion and it's going to apparently be a game changer for astronomy. That could be an adventure anyway...I've never been to the north of Santiago and haven't really gone too far south, so I think it's time to change all that.

I would like to buy a camera too...it's something I've been planning for a while, but haven't seen anything really catch my eye for the right price. I don't want anything special, just something I can take a few snaps with, and something portable - but not with the low resolution of my phone.

Opeth are playing in Chile in a couple of weeks...At The Gates in a few months, and Soilwork too...plenty to be excited about.

We are having our housewarming tonight which should be some good fun. I will try and keep up to date with my new projects and let you know how they all go. Let's see what happens...

Skateventure through Chile and Peru

A while ago I came across the story of some Kiwi blokes that went through Peru and Chile, with a bit of a difference. They were doing their travel on longboards.

It sounded like fun so I got in touch. Here is the interview I did with them. I am going to be writing a story for the print edition of I Love Chile about their adventure.

1. Was this your first long distance (ie multi-week) skate trip? What inspired you to choose the location?

Yes it was actually, my friend Troy who also came on this trip had previously done a crazy trip from the top of Thailand to Singapore and I saw the great experiences he had, meeting amazing people, dodging elephants, past snakes and I thought that would be an amazing adventure to do. That really inspired me to get involved and I had heard many great things about Chile and Peru thought it would be a great place to explore.

2. Part of the aim of the trip was to promote sustainable travel - do you think you got that message across in Peru and Chile and what can everyone do to make their trip a bit more sustainable?

Yes well somewhat, sustainability is probably not as front of mind for people in South America as it is from where I come from. In saying that we received positive support for our goals and what the trip was about. In terms of what people can do, try to incorporate activities that don't require using vehciles or burning of fossil fuels. Obviously though flights and other transport are hard to avoid, so perhaps look at ways to offset the emissions from your flights through verified carbon credits.

3. What kind of sponsorship did you need to get your trip off the ground and how did you go about getting it?

We received a bit of sponsorship for equipment which helped us a lot, and the equipment was great and held up well considering it got battered around so much! We basically have a website and facebook following and approached a couple of cool companies to see if they would support our cause.

4. The three of you are originally from Christchurch - do any of you still live there and was there any effects from the earthquake there on your trip?

Yes, we have actually all moved up to Auckland since the earthquakes. But all experienced the earthquakes in Christchurch. We didn’t see any noticeable effects Chile, but in saying that we didn’t have an appreciation of what places may have looked like before the Earthquake happened so I couldn’t really say.

5. Where is the next skateventure? Is there anywhere you would not consider skating?

That’s the next question right?! Well to be honest I haven’t looked into it yet. Guy reckons something crazy like Antarctica could be the go, but we would have to create some sort of ridiculous board or wheels to do that. Do you have any suggestions?

6. How did you get involved in longboarding in the first place? What is the scene in NZ like and are the three of you involved in any other sports?

When I was at university I learnt to longboard, as it was a great way to get around the place. I had many other friends who did the same and I guess it just became a fun hobbieof mine. In NZ longboarding seems to be growing rapidly, with groups starting to form and even some downhill competitions are starting I believe. So it’s great to see.

7. Tell us some more about the carboNZero programme and your role in that

Well we help companies in around the world to measure, reduce and offset their greenhouse gas emissions (carbon footprint) with credibility. My role is to help businesses communicate the great initiatives they are implementing to reduce their impact on the environment and also to help raise awareness of what we do at carboNZero. So a cool job, with a company doing great things!

8. Would you consider another skate trip in Chile?

Yes for sure, the people were great, the roads were really good and the scenery was amazing. Chile was a great place for what we were doing.

9. You had your fair share of misadventures along the way, but what were some things you encountered that you could never have planned for?

Well one of the boys got attacked and bitten by a large pack off wild dogs near Tocopilla, we had to not go off the side of the road for 15kms when we crossed the Peru/Chile boarder because off rogue landmines...But really the one thing we didn't really plan for was the crazy reponses we had from people passing us by or people we met in villages. Some people treated us like aliens, others high fived us and others just tooted their horns angrily and wondered why three crazy guys were in their town on Skateboards! We also had to survive on biscuits for a few days, as in a few planned out villages we arrived at bad times and food access wasn't good etc so that was hard, and we actually ran out of sunblock one day and ended up having to rub dirt on our arms etc to stop getting burnt haha. A few desperate times you might say...

10. What has the media coverage of your journey been like so far?

There has been some good coverage here in NZ and Australia, I guess because it is a rather unusual story! But the support has been great, and we are stoked to be able to make a few people smile!

If you want to add anything more, that would be great.

Great, I guess that overall it was a hard trip, we had some hill climbs that lasted over 25kms but the people, the scenery and adventure that we had made it all worthwhile

Also if you could put a link to our facebook page that would be great, we'll be getting more photos, videos up soon for people to see if they are interested.

www.facebook.com/skateventure

Entravistas

I have done a bunch of interviews lately. Well maybe not so many, but a few.

I did one with Miguel Ortiz, he is a comic hero - not in the way that Superman and Batman are, but he has been drawing for more than 50 years.

Chile actually made some of the first comics and zines, which is something I did not know about at all until doing the interview!

I went last night to a Copa Libertadores match. I will write more about that another time. I did another interview yesterday as well.

I Love Chile - February Edition

I wrote the cover edition of the February edition of I Love Chile. It was an interview I did with Marlen Olivari, who is in a musical, which is also called "I Love Chile".

You can now read the digital version for free here

This woman, she shot to fame by hosting one of those TV shows where a woman reads the weather whilst taking her clothes off. She has also been the centre of various incidents, many of which resembled the Janet Jackson "closet malfunction" at the Superbowl a few years back.

She has a kid now so it's all about a "changed life" of something along those lines.

Here's a couple of clips from the show.

I will try to post up some more stuff about what I've been up to writing wise. Yesterday I interviewed a guy, Miguel. He is holding a comic expo, this guy has some stories. He began his writing career with the guy that started Condorito (before Condorito started) and went on to work for Pixar and Disney.

I also mentioned a while back that I was looking to do an interview with these guys that skated through the Atacama. I got my answers back from them. I'm going to write a story for the paper, but I might just put up the questions and some pictures on here, that sounded like a cool trip.

In more personal news, I went and picked up the keys to our new apartment today. We are going to start living our own lives, in a much more central area. Over the next couple of days we're getting a bed, washing machine and fridge delivered, so things are starting to come together in that regard.

I am back in action with my Masters, I just have two subjects remaining and to be honest it looks fairly daunting. That could be a good attitude to have. If you think you're going to come in barnstorming, you will probably come out the other side with your tail between your legs.

For a great example of this see: Canberra Raiders, 2011.

Speaking of Canberra, there have been floods lately.

This is at the Cotter Dam. Well I think the new part which was hoping to save things because of the drought.

That's how it works I guess...

I am about to head off and play a Pichanga (pick up soccer match). I played one on Monday as well, that was good fun. There were a bunch of guys from Singapore playing, and that day I happened to be wearing a Tiger beer shirt.

This match is going to be "Latin America vs Rest of the World". I guess when you think immediately, you would jump to the conclusion that LatAm would be winners straight away. However, fútbol is the world game after all. So it will be interesting to see how that goes.

I finally got myself a pair of boots, so hopefully I can put in a better showing than previous matches. It has been a long drought of goals for me.

Chile played against Ghana last night, and that sure was a weird game. As the commentators said at half time (which went for 35 minutes), "everything about the organisation of this game has been a disaster".

The final score was a 1-1 game, with Matías Fernández scoring the equaliser from a penalty kick. I might do some player rankings on the I Love Chile site. Then again, I also might not. You can read this article about the change of the venue from New York to Philadelphia a few weeks back.

I may have mentioned we went to see Morrissey the other day. That was the first gig I'd been to all year, and we hadn't seen anything since Parkway Drive, back in November. That's something that will have to change.

Opeth are going to be hear at the end of the month, I will definitely head along to that one. I'm not sure if they're still on their "easy listening" run of shows. Even still, they're a great band. I had an excellent time seeing them with Ben many years ago in Sydney.

Last week I went down to the Valparaíso Cerro Abajo. It actually seems like many months ago, but it was just a few days.

This was something I had heard a bit about before coming to Chile. It is an urban mountain bike race through the streets of Valparaíso, often referred to as "the craziest race in the world".

Here's an article I wrote about it. The last time I went to a mountain bike race was when the World Champs were on at Mt Stromlo. Come to think of it, that was already a few years ago. We had the Chilean team staying at the hostel when that was on, which you know what, that was probably my first ever encounter with a Chilean.

After I finished watching the racing, I had a bit of a wander around. It is February which is "go on holiday month", so there were no buses to head back to Santiago. We have spent plenty of time in Valpo lately, and I didn't have a whole lot of money to spend, so I went down to the bus station to see if I could get a last minute cancellation or something similar.

What I got instead was some kind of pirate bus. A man was yelling "SANTIAGO, SANTIAGO, ALTIRO". I thought it seemed like one of these suspicious scams that abound in bus stations, which I guess it kind of was, however, the fact I wasn't asked to pay until I got onto the bus gave me some confidence.

So I paid the price of a coach to go in a hot, stuffy micro, crammed between two blokes who were more suited to playing in the front row. However, I had a lot of things to do during the week, so it was going to be better to be back in town.

One of the things to do was to get my residencia temporal. That means I'm well on my way to getting my residency. After one year I will have to apply for the permanent version. I went into the office on Tuesday, and had to wait three hours for my turn. That was a lot of fun...

So now next week we're going to move into our own place, so I guess you could say things are coming together. I am helping Francisca with some of her work in Australia. This will be a nice little earner for me, particularly when you say it in pesos.

However, at the moment, finding money on the ground is a nice earner for me, so that's not saying too much.

Dear world

Hello to all my many readers (cough...)

I have been quite busy lately, writing a lot in the I Love Chile website, but also searching to get myself a "proper job" in order to survive. I interviewed a TV star for the cover story of the next print issue, which will, um, not be printed (digital only copy...)

Bron left us a few days ago to go to Argentina and Antarctica. I think we showed her a pretty good time. Hopefully she will return to Chile sometime again :) The next visitors we have lined up are Viv and Bret, who will come in June.

Here is a quick little video of me playing Footbag by the pool that Bron took.

Hopefully by the time our next guests come, we will have our own place, and that is looking more and more likely. I won't say too much on that one, but fingers crossed for next week.

We had a good chat on Skype with Jonathan today. It was good to catch up with him. He is in Belgium at the moment. It was funny how we would spend Raiders games about our plans to travel the world, and after all that build up, here we are, and easily able to connect with each other.

Speaking of the mighty green machine, they begin their first trial in just a couple of hours. That means around this time last year, we would have been heading down to Bega with Jonathan to watch the first trial, also against the Storm, without Slater/Smith/Cronk.

My mum described the Raiders as "playing like a pack of girls", although the Bega Roosters women's League Tag team probably put in a better effort in the pre-match. Hopefully things will be better this year. I don't think I will be staying up too often to tune in to a live stream or radio broadcast in the middle of the night, though when I get the chance it would be great to watch.

I don't think it is possible to see it on TV here in Chile - maybe things like State of Origin on DirectTV...I'm not too sure. I just hope that the Raiders are better than the rabble that turned out last year.

Not too much planned for this coming weekend, just going to take things easy. I will probably keep an eye out for jobs as well as conjuring up other money making schemes as well. Let's see how that goes...

Quinta Normal and the Santiago Navy

Got up to some more adventures today with Bron. We're going to get up early and go for a day trip down to the coast, so I won't write too much about it, but I added a few pictures.

This was our basic day:

Bron slept until late and I wrote a couple of articles.

We ate lunch at a place selling empanadas. It was Bron's first experience with them. The ones wer had were ok, but I have definitely had better.

Considering each one cost about 600 pesos ($1.20), it wasn't really a big deal.

After lunch we just went to the park across from Bellas Artes and sat down in the grass and drank a couple of beers. It was good to just while away the afternoon in the shade. Our original plan had been to head to Parque Quinta Normal. The park itself has just been redone and there are also a whole lot of museums within the park.

A whole lot of people were making use of the water fountains that have just been redone. Apparently they light up at night too. One of the really noticable things here in Santiago is the waste of water - particularly considering there is a drought at the moment.

So many people (particularly those who are most likely employed by the municipality) spend hours watering, well they probably water more dirt and concrete than the actual grass. We didn't go into any of the museums, I think we were just content to wander around the park itself. Inside the park there is the National Museum, Natural History Museum, Science and Technology Museum and a few more.

Our wandering took us to the church - Gruta de Lourdes. It seems the church is not used anymore, there is barbed wire all around it and nobody was going in, it also seemed an outdoor altar had been set up directly across the road.

We wandered on from there, came into a kind of industrial area, then made our way back to what we expected to be the park, however it was part of a Navy base. I'm not sure if the guy on either gate should have checked us out, we could have been spies or something, but we had a wander through there.

Considering Bron spent much of her childhood as a Navy Brat, maybe she had the look, so they let us pass without worry. Who knows really, the bigger question is what is the point of a naval force hundreds of metres above sea level.

That I don't know. Once outside the navy area, we walked back into the park, and had no troubles getting back to the metro stop. Of course though, we entered on the wrong side, so we just took a bit of a detour to some of the outer suburbs of Santiago. We got off at Lo Prado and had a walk around there. We came across a nice park which had some slippery dips as well as a skatepark. From there we walked to San Pablo, where we could take the metro all the way back home.

We cooked up some burritos for dinner, which always goes down well. Tomorrow the plan is to head down to Valpo, though we have spent a lot of time in the Region V lately, so the next time maybe we will go somewhere else.

It's definitely worth a visit for a first time visitor though, and of course, it's a part of Australian history. I think I'm going to try and write something based on old mate Watson for my next uni project, the next subject I do will kick off at the end of the month.

Top day in Santiago

As I mentioned in the last post, our friend Bron has been visiting us here in Santiago, which has been great to see a familiar face. She also brought Chicken Crimpy shapes and Tim Tams, that was good too!

Anyhow, yesterday I was feeling pretty good right through the day, I got a lot of things done and then we had a great afternoon. I woke up with a pretty mean headache, which could have really ruined the whole mood of the day.

However, I decided to have a footbag session and a swim. I played with a new footbag from the company Phat Tyre, which they sent me for free - that was pretty nice of them. It's a much bigger bag than I'm used to, but it will be great for doing performances.

Like when I go to the TV station next week... (that one might be a story for another time). I hit a lot of harder tricks, even things like double spinning clipper, which I only learned recently. After the session, I jumped into the pool, which is a great way to finish things up.

So once Bron woke up we went and met Francisca, she has just started working a new job. Once we met, we went to get a completo at Dominó. That sure is an experience for a foreigner. Even for myself, it's a bit of a whirlwind, as everyone wants your place to stand and eat a completo of their own.

Once we finished our lunch, which of course doesn't seem like that much - after all, it's just a hot dog with some extra flavours added, it still makes you very full though. We took a walk and sat by the fountain in the shade. We actually sate there for ages, as it was quite hot yesterday, and there was a slight breeze which made things quite pleasant there.

We walked down through Bellavista and to the funicular to head up to Cerro San Cristobal. Of course, every visitor that comes here we will probably end up taking there, as there is such a big view of the city from there.

Unfortunately the big statue of Mary was having some renovations done, so you couldn't really see it. It was almost like Mary was in jail. I was telling Bron about how enthusiastic Chileans are about Catholicism (sometimes...) and that most big days on the Catholic calendar have their own public holiday. Since we have arrived there have already been holidays for All Saints Day in November and the day of the Immaculate Conception in December.

Up on the hill we had some Mote con Huesillo, a very traditional Chilean drink - apparently drinking it up on the hill is the place to drink it as well. It is kind of like a peach iced tea with wheat inside it as well. It is very sweet, but very nice on a hot day. Which yesterday definitely was.

We went back down in the funicular, then we stopped by the Picasso exhibition at Fundación Telefonica. I have walked past that building a number of times but never gone inside. The exhibition was free, though it was only a fairly small room of mainly drawings, done with pen or pencil. We weren't really in there for so long, but it was nice to be out of the sun.

Bron and I wandered around a bit more, then decided it was time for a beer. We saw a place in the shade, so that looked like a good option. The people on the next table were talking in English and by my excellent perception skills, or what some may call eavesdropping, I gathered they were here in Chile for the Start Up Chile program, and that one of them was talking about Jogabo, the pick up soccer thing I play in sometimes.

Something else came up, they were saying something about telephone numbers and whether you could change them, so I butted in to their conversation and told them a new law had just come through so you could do exactly that. We got talking after that, and made some new mates.

Francisca came along, and we switched from Cristal (the cheapest beer), to a German beer that came served in a boot. The Botín de Oro... We farewelled our new friends, who are working on a pretty cool science project which I may also talk about another time.

We took a bit of a walk and went to a Peruvian restaurant. I had been craving a steak for a while, so when I saw filete mar y tierra (basically a surf and turf), I knew what I was after. We drank some pisco sour there, and of course had to finish the meal with dessert.

Aside from all the sight seeing activities and a bit of fun, I also made a couple of good contacts, and may have even picked up a bit more work. As well as getting a couple of new additions for the I Love Chile website.

Cemetery Gates

Today we went for a bit of an explore in the streets of Santiago. We took the metro and got out at the station Cementarios, which is the home to two different cemeteries in Santiago. We've been here for 3 months now and Francisca has always talked a lot about going there.

Myself, I always found the idea a bit creepy- but today was the day to go. First of all we went to the cementario católica, where the layout is more like a suburb than a cemetery. There are a variety of different levels and buildings, and of course, as in all of Chile, there is an area for the richer people and somewhere for the poorer people.

It is very interesting though, as it's quite a departure from other cemeteries I have seen before. Of course having these things which look like houses, but are actually graves, that's kind of creepy. From the first cemetery, you head across the road to cemetario general, which is a very large space, which of course we could not see all of. Apparently they have night tours there each week - now that sounds even creepier, but I think we will check that out next Friday.

Francisca's grandmother is buried there, so we paid our respects there, and then we went just around the corner, where they have a wall dedicated to people who were killed or "disappeared" during the dictatorship which lasted from 1973-1990.

There was a big controversy recently when the education board, which of course features a former member of the secret police, who also has the last name Pinochet...well, they have decided to change the description in textbooks from "dictatorship" to "military regime".

That didn't go down so well...

It really was an "own goal" by the government here in Chile, as education has been the subject of protests for over 6 months. I'm sure it will continue to be as long as Chile retains the highest price of education in the world alongside some of the lowest government spending.

Anyhow, the wall at the cemetery has thousands of names on it, and it is very disturbing as many of them have their age- there are so many who were 17, 23, etc. So many people so young, you never know what they would have gone on to achieve.

We had a wander around the cemetery, not looking for anything in particular. There are some pretty amazing buildings in there- but rather than the style of the cemetery across the road, which is almost like apartment blocks, these had individual mausoleums. Many of them had very intricate leadlight window designs on the back, and we also came across one that was more like an Egyptian or Aztec crypt.

From the cemetery we walked down Av La Paz towards Vega Central, which is a big market. I'm sure I have expressed my thoughts on markets before in here, but in short, they are really not my scene. We got some good things though. It is a big place for fruit and veg. I was surprised when we headed for the metro and it was the station Patronato. I had thought we were actually going in the complete opposite direction.

In a day where the specific aim was to go and explore some new territory, I thought it was funny that we ended up catching the same bus home that I take almost every day of the week.

Delving into the world of TV stardom

Yesterday I went down to the studios of the channel Mega to try out for a TV show. The other day we were having some drinks to celebrate Francisca's birthday, and one friend is kind of a big deal at a TV production company.

In essence, the company is polluting the television with Chilean adapations of other horrid shows. One more recent example is the soon to be released "Secret Diary of A Call Girl" and this show, which is going to be a Chilean version of the show "Odd One In". This was a show that began in England maybe the year before last. I read some reviews and none at all were positive.

So the basic concept is to have four people, and then two teams need to pick which one has a certain talent. So I went in there to show of some footbag. I had to wait a long time to get my run, but I would say I will make it on to the show- it is going to be on Monday to Friday in prime time, so they will certainly need a lot of people.

Anyway, I got down there, the studio is in Ñuñoa. I arrived at the little office and they ticked me off a list and told me where to go. I vaguely understood, but not that well. The directions were basically "Go to this building, then the other building, then another building, and all the people will be there".

OK.

I took a walk around and eventually gave in and called the lady from the TV who had called me to begin with. She came to meet me and was talking on the phone. She must have been talking to her husband, as she said "I Love You" as she hung up the phone and then gave the traditional Chilean greeting of a kiss on the cheek to me.

Nice to meet you too...

So anyway, we just waited around- for ages. I was thinking about similar stupid shows in Australia and how they always have "the tension" and the other buildup moments while people wait hours to get a run. There was none of that this time.

Once I did get a go, I came into the studio. There was a wooden floor which was a bit slippery. They got me to say a bit about myself- in Spanish, then play a little footbag. I had a couple of drops, and did a couple of cool tricks like Phoenix and Spinning Ducking Osis- but then they asked me to keep it below the waist, which was interesting as a lot of the time tricks like ducking and spinning are the ones that get the ooohs and aahs from the crowd.

I'm not sure if I will be involved in the TV show- and I'm not so sure going again and waiting for many hours would be a good use of my time, but I have always wanted to go and play Footbag on TV, and it is something I have not achieved yet.

The day before I went and played Footbag on the streets again. I didn't manage to be as successful as the previous time, only earning 1,100 pesos in about the same amount of time again, just under an hour. I wasn't feeling too good in my shins, so I might put playing on the road off for a little while.

Dancin' in the streets

After almost 3 months I have finally got the courage to actually go out into the streets and play Footbag there. I have been thinking and talking a lot about this, since the day we arrived and I saw some jugglers on the street.

Here in Santiago, when they talk about a "street performer", it is a literal meaning. There are a wide variety of jugglers, fire twirlers and even sometimes acrobats. There is also this guy with these metal circles, and I don't understand how he gets any money at all.

Some weeks ago I was playing some Footbag just near the office where I'm doing my internship. It's just near the Bellas Artes museum, so there's a reasonable amount of people going by. I got talking to these guys for a while told me I had to play on the street corners, that I would be weighed down by all the money I would make.

So to properly introduce you to this segment, here is a video.

You thought it would be some footage of a juggler didn't you! Got you there. How about the "puffy shirt" on Mick Jagger. If you can't see the video, it's Mick Jagger and David Bowie singing "Dancing in the Streets".

So people always say things like "it looks like Riverdance" or "you must be good at dancing" and had a laugh at the end. They also say things like "you've got to much time on your hands". Nick Landes had a good response - "no, I've got too much time on my feet". So I am going to present a segment called "dancing in the streets" and hopefully it will be about my successful adventure in getting money for playing footbag. If not, it will be about the stories of misadventure, which make for better reading anyway.

So anyway, the corner right outside our window is a very popular place for performers, so today when I came home, I decided, this is the day. I packed a few footbags, and also one juggling ball. I hadn't really planned my performance at all, I just picked this day and I was ready.

The first round was TERRIBLE- I dropped it so many times, and decided I wouldn't even bother going into the crowd to receive any payments, as it was unlikely they would be forthcoming anyway. The whole concept is similar to monks begging for alms. When someone wants to make a payment, they hold their hand out the window, and if you don't see them they will beep their horn to get your attention.

So the next round I had developed my plan, only slightly further ahead. I decided to use two bags- one Elemental which has some streamers on it. I would begin with some big high kicks, and do tricks like ducking and spinning. When I inevitably dropped it, I would change to a Hania bag that I use all the time. This one is not really great for performing, but it's the bag I am most used to, so I can step up the difficulty.

My first payment was from a taxi driver. From my research- I really have been regularly watching these performers, seeing how many payments they get, etc. The most I have seen was 5, just the other day. Up until then, 4 was the best I had seen. Today, in my first day, I managed 3 in one go, which I was happy with.

One lady even gave me a luca (a 1000 peso note, worth about $2). I think she was hoping I would give her some change, but I used a trick I found stall holders in India use a lot, "no sir, I don't have any change". That was the truth anyway, as I had just begun.

I wasn't really sure how long to continue on for. At first I was thinking I should push on for one hundred attempts, but I would say I was getting more payments than I expected. I was also getting more tired than I expected.

About 30 minutes in, the traffic patterns seemed to change, often leaving me with no audience to begin my show. That was about 6:30, so I guess that's something for me to keep in mind. In the end, I packed up and came home, conveniently across the road. I counted my coins, which were mainly 100 peso coins. I had come away with 5,400 pesos.

That's about $10.80, which is not too bad for 45 minutes of effort. Next time I will have to continue my efforts. One thing I was a bit put off by, was having someone steal my little bag while I was in the street. I think the more money you get, the more likely that will happen. Today it didn't happen though, so hopefully that's a good sign for the future.

Francisca told me it's not something I can make a career out of. I'm not so sure she's right...

A new writing project

I have started a new little project, within which I hope to do 1 interview per week (at least) with Footbag players from around the world (excuse the pun...)

So I started at the top, and his is my first one- World Champion, Honza Weber

http://www.shredglobal.com/archive/sg/interview-2011-world-freestyle-footbag-champion-honza-weber/

The next writing project I plan to undertake is going to be called Streets of Santiago. The basic idea is to get some knowledge of the history behind some of the street names through Santiago- for example, who was O'Higgins, Americo Vespucio and so on and so forth.

I am still working on a few ideas behind that, but I hope it comes out well. I want it to be a serious travel blog as well, not just about Santiago, but about my own travels, and some advice for others.

My plan is to have that one ready to go by the end of next week, so hopefully that goes ahead. It is simply up to me to get it done, so there will be one way to point the finger if it doesn't happen.

Feliz Año- New year in Valparaiso

Happy new year to anyone coming across this blog. We spent the new year down at the coast, where they expected more than 1 million visitors from Santiago alone.

During the week I said something like "I don't really want to go down to the coast, it will be too crowded" blah blah blah. However, since Francisca's brother lives in Con Con, we thought we should go down and visit and take in the festivities, and maybe even escape the Santiago heat for a while. It has been super hot here- a real dry, energy sapping heat.

So it came to Friday and we took the metro to Pajaritos. That's pretty well to the complete other end of the line- I counted it today, 21 stops. It takes quite a long time, it's probably over an hour when you consider the walk to the metro as well. So with that stage of the adventure complete, we arrived at the bus station. What is normally a pretty quiet place, was swarming with people, lots of people simply waiting.

We had booked the 12:50 bus a couple of days before, and of course- this is just one example of what you could call the "culture of inefficiency" within Chile. We looked up the prices of the bus, and there were some seats still left, but the Dear Wife said the bus companies would be untrustworthy, it wasn't like the Murrays or Greyhound where you can just rock up with your booking number, or even just your name and be on your way.

So we went to the office, which was a while away. Seems a few other people had the same idea, so it was a bit of a wait. Including the journey time there and waiting in line, it was almost an hour of the day, for something that could be booked online within seconds. Alongside the inefficiency is also a problem of trust which runs throughout Chile.

So we had our tickets, though there were no surprises to find the 12:30 bus leaving at our estimated departure time of 12:50. It wasn't too long until our bus came along. I got talking to a guy sitting on the seat just over from me. He was from Estonia, a part of the Start Up Chile program.

The basic concept of that is they give lots of money to people with cool ideas. More on that in another post. The reason I got talking to this guy was because I recognised his shithouse Spanish, which reminded me a lot of my own.

So we got talking a bit, I asked him how he felt about this Israeli bloke that promised to start some kind of fund, but has just bailed for Singapore 6 months after arriving, promising to find the "Zamarano of tech". He seemed surprised I knew about that at all- though I did actually write an article about it just a few days ago.

So to end that story, I too would like lots of money from the government of Chile. He told me he was headed for Torres del Paine on New Years Day and I don't think he was too pleased with the news I gave him that there were massive wildfires and the National Park was closed- I told him it probably couldn't be closed for too long, while little did I know, the park will be closed for the whole month.

So we arrived in Viña, and there was the prospect of going out somewhere, but I didn't really think that was such a great idea, with the "big night" ahead. So we stayed and played with our nephews, Tomás y Diegito. It's a lot of fun to play with them, and you know, we have pretty similar levels of Spanish- they are both under 5, so maybe it's time for me to step up my game!

I actually had a snooze as soon as I arrived. We had been celebrating our friend Sofia's departure to Australia with her and her family the night before, and then I only got a short amount of sleep, so it was good to take a rest. Of course that messed up my sleep for the night, but we ended up getting a sleep in, then preparing for the night ahead.

Although we really had no plan, I don't think we could have asked for a better start. We went over to Miluco, a cousin of Francisca. You can see the view from his balcony in the second photo at the top. He referred to it as "a fucking million dollar view" and I told him he had underestimated, and it was a billion dollar view.

There we drank some pisco sour and colo de mono (monkey's tail, a traditional festive season drink from the north). I read that Alexis Sánchez was drinking that while playing Santa at Christmas time, so maybe I will be good at sports/rich after drinking that???? Let's see...

We had arranged to meet with Cecilia, who is a friend of Francisca's that she met in Canberra. Because it is Chile, we turned up at our scheduled time some hours late. We had a lunch at the Chacarerro restaurant, which we had actually come to during our first week in Chile. I ate this sandwich and it was too big, even for me. I spent most of the rest of the day feeling sorry for myself.

We met with a couple of Aussies, they were friends of Cecilia. They took the sensible option of sharing the sandwich that had destroyed me between two, and then we went and got some desserts at a cafe by the beach.

This was followed by a wander over to some more friends in Viña, to spend the afternoon with a few beers, and for me, a big hamburger in my guts. An afternoon nap probably would have done me good, or maybe ordering a smaller meal in the first place.

With no afternoon nap, we made our way towards the centre of the action, Valparaiso. The micro buses sure were packed. The first one we didn't bother to get on, as it left with the doors still open. The next one our little trio pushed our way on to find ourselves inside the bus, and this one even had the doors close.

It was a balancing act just to stand up really, with people trying to get further into the bus, and other people trying to get out. It was definitely a relief to get outside of the bus, that's for sure. We got out in the flat area of the plan, and while there were a fair few people around, it wasn't as CRAZY as I was expecting.

We wandered around a while and found a place to sit and rest up in the hills. It didn't really have a great overview, but more importantly it had a nice place to sit. So we rested there for quite a while and joined some other friends at a Chinese restaurant later on. Of course I didn't need to eat at all, however I hadn't eaten any Chinese food in quite some time, so why not I thought. Maybe that was another decision to regret, I really didn't need that food.

We had our meal and we wandered our way down to near the Puerto. Where we were there were quite a few people, but the problem was you could only see the pontoons of fireworks in the immediate vicinity. I would have liked to have a view overlooking the bay, and my original suggestion was at the dunes in Con Con.

It was probably a mix of a lot of things, but I found myself in a terribly grumpy mood, that I just couldn't shake. It is of course meant to be a night to forget everything and have a good time, but I guess the fact I'm not a big fan of fireworks to begin with didn't help that out either.

Our way home was a long one, it took us over 2 hours to get back to Con Con, including a change of bus, and the second one had the awful smell of urine to accompany us back home.

The next day was a day to take it easy. Apparently the kids woke up at 8am, but it was some hours later until I arose. We played a bit with them and once the niños were in bed for their afternoon nap, the adults soon followed.

Today we got on the bus back to Santiago. This morning I was wearing a jumper down in Con Con, but there were no surprises to be greeted with some hot weather arriving back in the capital.

¡Feliz Navidad! - My first Christmas overseas

It's just gone past midnight, so you could be safe to say the Christmas time is done.

This was not my first Christmas away from the family- that was was in Airlie Beach 2009 (Francisca came to join me, arriving in the afternoon).

Here in Chile, as in Europe, the big event is Christmas Eve. In the past apparently it's been a big rush as everyone comes to visit here (their Mum's house), and then runs off to the inlaws afterwards. So in a much more sensible move, they went to their inlaws for the Christmas dinner, then the Christmas Day lunch was on here.

As we were all without a place to go for Christmas Eve, Tia Amelia invited us around. She lives just two blocks away and had a bunch of her family around. Before going over there we got in a Skype session with my family back home, Grandma and Grandpa were visiting too so it was nice to speak to them.

In my younger years, Grandpa used to go an steal grapefruits from where the priests lived. Occasionally he would get me to tag along to help him, much to Mum and Grandma's disgust. I asked him if he had gone to collect any, but he said he's grapefruit days were long gone. Apparently he was out in the surf in just his speedos, while everyone else was wearing wetsuits. It was good to hear he was back out in the action- a hip replacement and a knee injury due resulting from the operation have slowed him down a lot in the last years.

So anyway- Christmas Eve. After getting in the spirit by watching the Festivus episode of Seinfeld, we headed over just a couple of blocks away and were joined by a few more cousins- including Mateo, he must be one or two- he was the star of the show with his dancing at our Chilean wedding.

So Mateo and his brother Pedro were the only kids at the party at the time of present opening. Tio Manuel took them outside to see if Santa had come, but it seemed they couldn't find him. When they got back, it seemed he had made a deposit! Pedro got one of the most sought after gifts by Chilean boys-

An Alexis Sanchez Barcelona Jersey.

Of course their eyes lit up. They got some great presents. One of the older relatives got an iPad for their gift, but little Mateo also got the kids version- an etch a sketch.

Of course, being Christmas, and also being Chile, there was an enormous feast. I talked quite a lot with everybody, as many of them I had only met at the wedding for a few brief moments. They were interested in what I was up to with the internship and wanted to know some more about footbag.

There was of course the obligatory question "qual es tu equipo". When I arrived I said if La U won the Copa Sudamericana, then I would go for them. They did that without losing a game, so now I would say they are "my team". It's very different to just start supporting a team though, compared to my ongoing support of the Raiders (now more than 20 years). It's also very different to see that team win...

So they were happy with the news and said "welcome to the family". Although I have widely read Colo Colo are the most popular team, they have been not all that great this year, and I think plenty of people have jumped on the bandwagon to La U.

We got a good gift for another uncle, Tio Hernan, Francisca got the signature of Eduardo Vargas at the Golden Boot ceremony, so we are going to turn that into a Christmas card.

So the feast was turkey, lots of salads, and of course, hefty amounts of dessert. Chileans sure love their dessert. It really is amazing you don't see more incredibly overweight people walking the streets of Santiago.

One other thing my dining companions didn't get was the fascination of Australian's with cricket. More on that one later.

At the end of the night they wanted to see some footbag- and as I always carry my footbag with me, I was happy to oblige. Even though I had eaten a lot and drank a few beers, I put a few good runs together and they were all pretty impressed with that.

It was good to only have a couple of blocks to go home, and then to sleep in as we were the hosts the next day, so we were already there.

So earlier today we had the whole family gathered here, and once again more turkey, more tres leches, more of everything. Vino con frutilla (wine with strawberries in it) and more. After lunch we went outside with the kids to try out some of the new gifts. I got a pelota de rugby which I am quite excited about having. I hope a dog doesn't steal it like my previous soccerball.

After all the eating, and then some physical exertion, I was pretty tired. The beauty of living where the party is happening, is that you can retire early. I lay down on the bed for a short rest, and soon enough it was many hours later.

After wandering around the house like a zombie for a while, I came good when I realised I would still be able to get in a footbag session and swim at the pool. I had a pretty good session, finishing with a cool combo of vortex>spinning osis and my final trick of stepping ducking osis. As per usual, it felt really good to take a big running jump and splash into the pool.

Francisca went to meet a friend of hers and I stayed around at home. I surfed through some movies on the TV and have been keeping an eye on the cricket on the Cricinfo website. People often ask how can people like cricket, when it goes for so long- a test match goes for 5 days.

Admittedly I have gone off cricket in the last years, but the beauty of the Australian summer tests, are that they are omnipresent. You don't have to tune in to every ball of every match. It can be on in the car when you're driving to the beach, or like me at the moment, you can see what's happening directly on your screen.

Of course some people just use it as an excuse to get incredibly pissed, but that's another beauty of the game. It goes for a really long time, so you can drink a lot of beer throughout the duration.

So it's well past midnight now, not so long after lunch in the Boxing Day Test. The other beauty of the cricket is that on day 3, you can take a quick look at the scorecard and know pretty well what's been happening.

From Santiago, even just looking at the scores, it's a nice reminder of "back home".