It's mother's day and I miss my mommy! I put my card in the mail the day before we left for Chile, so at least there was that. Tried to call her today but our service wasn't working to get hold of her. Hi, mom!!!
We spent this morning at church. It was the first day we got to sleep in - and because I don't have my own clock here (purposefully), I had no idea what time it was when I finally decided to get up at 10:15, when our host dad woke us. Church was at 11 -- kinda love that Chileans do everything a little later. Greg spoke and it was pretty awesome to get some of that CCC preachin' goin', like the good ole days. Afterwards we went to the Calestads' home for (late) lunch, and that was muy super. We had bacon-wrapped steak, and four kinds of wine. It was so the best. Since it was our first full day kind of on our own, I decided to recruit some of the locals to hang out with us downtown, and some of us went over to Bella Vista, this very chic arts district in downtown Santiago that we didn't get to visit yesterday. We wandered around, took in some postres (dessert), pisco sours, and cafe, and just talked the night away. On the way out, we stopped in front of Pablo Neruda's home, and I got to take a photo in front. If I were goin to live in Chile, it would be in Bella Vista...maybe. It's kind of where all the hipsters of Chile live, but I don't know if I'm quite there/that. But it's a pretty neat part of town. We stopped for food on the way back home and I had a churrasco, which reinded me of a gyro-meets-hamburger, very Chilean apparently.
Tonight was the, as Greg puts it, the ritual packing of the alcohol. I got three bottles of wine from Concha y Toro from Friday's outting, and two small half liters, which all needed to be Tetris'd into my suitcase as we can't take them oin our carry-ons. We'll see if they make it back to LA with me in one piece. Good night for now. We have a whole day of travel tomorrow, so you'll hear from me again soon! Until then, good night, dear void.
