Jas and I are in the GI-NorMous town of El Slavador. haha. jk. It´s a tiny town and for those of you who want to google it...probably only our parents, you will find that it has a huge copper mine that sustains the town, the US copper supply, and a large part of the Chilean economy. Not bad for a town of like 7,000.
Anyways, we were invited here to be judges in an English Spelling Bee. Basically, they have a volunteer but she went out of town during this week and they needed a couple of people. The teacher here is BF´s with my co-teacher and so she asked my co-teacher if she could steal me for the day. She needed Jason too and so it worked perfectly. They paid for our travels and lunch and we were able to see yet another place in Chile for FREE! Free is very, very good. We had to wake up at like 5:15am and travel for 2.5 hours but it´s been nice none the less. The competition starts in about an hour.
So, yeah. Not much else is going on down south of the equator. We have 4 weeks left. That kind of wigs me out but what can you do? I´m trying to think of what I can change about myself when I come home to show that I´m "different" now. haha. Really though, it´s like the guys that are in the program who are not cutting their hair the whole time they are here in Chile so that they can go home and look "different"...like they have changed. I don´t know if you know what I mean. It´s like you WANT to be different now then from when you left and for people to think, "Hey wow, look what that experience did to him/her." Maybe I´ll get a tattoo or some kind of peircing...or dye my hair...or binge eat majar and cookies and come back really fat...hahahaha. Ok, maybe not. Or maybe I´ll know a little more Spanish than I did, be a little more aware of the greatness of God then I was, love my handsome husband even more now then when we left, and be a little more aware of what the world is REALLY like. I guess that will have to do! hehe. See you all in 6 weeks then! :)
I can definately understand wanting to bring something back with you from your time in Chile. And looking different might make it feel more real. Appearance changes so fast though, that looking different can't last long.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to hold on to something really meaningful, then why not make a special effort to maintain the relationships you have formed while in Chile. Do the people you have met have your e-mail or this blog address or a physical US address were they could reach you? Your students might want to write to you. You have one month left to collect all their info and give them yours.
Years from now that might be the thing you value most.