SIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIPSIP!

Aaaaah blog! Shoot, I forgot to write here and then a million weeks went by...how did that even happen?

Okay, so here's what's been going on...

SIP! Sometime after being here for about a month, things went from studying in the library, to actually meeting up with people, interviewing, sharing stories and food, and baaaam, SIPing turned much more interesting!

First, I contacted a woman who lives in a neighborhood called Cerro Navia, where there is a Mapuche ruka (http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruka) as part of a mapuche community center. I spent a long time walking around with her, looking at the center: The community fought for their right to create a center and gain this piece of land, which is situated between the trickle of a river, Mapocho, and nestled within a neighborhood of little resources. As we walked around, she pointed up and showed me how buzzing, hulking electric wires twist their way above the field where the ruka is situated. She explained that the community of course was given the piece of land that no one else wanted, because no construction can be done there. We were standing in the field next to an altar that religious figures climb up during ceremonies, one of the most sacred experiences that happens because this person is attempting to get closer to god. All I could think about was how the power lines must take a lot away from this experience, especially for a people who hold nature in the highest regard. After walking around the land, my contact and I went to her friends house. We walked through a neighborhood that is starkely different from any other area that I know in Santiago. "Do you see this extreme poverty where you live? I don't think so," she told me. The houses there are made out of thin boards, with tin roofes to cover them from the elements. Giant gates guard each house, showing the protections that people take against violence in the area. We went to her friends house, and there I spent hours talking with the two women about their experiences fighting for their rights as women, as Mapuche. I was amazed at how open they were with my, how they shared their food, their stories, and how passionately they have been fighting their entire lives for the rights of their people. I feel so lucky to have met these incredible women, and to have had this experience. Coming to Chile the first time, I had been told about the inequality that exists in the country and in Santiago, but until the day that I spent in Cerro Navia, I did not truly understand the huge disparities that exist within this country nor within the city that I've spent cumulatively 8 months living in.

Last week I went to a workshop in San Antonio, a small town on the coast about an hour and half away. The worksop was at the Health Center in San Antonio, and was about the Mapuche Cosmovision. There I got to talk to a few people, which lead to interviews later in the week! Win!

Ok, I have more stories but my fingers are freezing off!

Basically, I've been having a great time seeing the Kalamazoo kids here in Santiago, meeting up with friends here, going to see the Andes mountains after the rain, which leaves them clean and beautiful from the normal smog, traveling constantly to the coast to meet people and do interviews, dodging the ocassional tear gas and police water hoses, joining in protests, going dancing, seeing my host family, and generally enjoying my time here.

Love to all, I'll post again when I can feel my fingers!