When dogs attack, Mistaken for a Mormon, Becoming Chilean, and Grammar Answers

So about 2 weeks ago I was bitten by a dog.

It happened in Las Condes, which is a well to do neighborhood of Santiago.  I finished a class and was on the phone calling a student and passing by a woman talking with a friend and her dog, and the dog started barking at me.  Then it bit me in the back of my leg.

I looked at my ripped pants that I had only worn twice and called out to the woman.  She didn't even notice what happened until she came over. She apologized, and when I asked what she was going to do about my pants she told me she'd pay a maximum of 20.000 pesos, which is about $40.  When I told her my pants cost more than that she started saying I was taking advantage of her.

After trying to reason with her for a few minutes I gave up, telling her I didn't agree but didn't have the time to settle it then.  I got her name, ID number, and phone numbers.  I also gave her my business card.  My student was waiting for me for my next class.

So my student for my next class picks me up on the way out of his office and we then drive to my place for the class, and when he saw my ripped pants he insisted that we go to the police right away.  After 4 hours of driving around between the police station, hospital, back to the police station, and home, I was exhausted and wanted the whole ordeal to be over with.

To make a long story short, I had black and blue marks on my leg where the dog bit me and that I now have to get a series of 5 rabies shots. (Luckily it didn't draw any blood.)   I was also mistaken for a Mormon at the hospital.  (I was wearing black dress pants, a white dress shirt, and a black tie that day.)

After getting home at 11 that night I went to sleep but was waken up by a phone call at 12:30.  After filing the police report the police forgot to give me back my ID card, so I had to go get it.  I waited until the next afternoon, and after talking to multiple people in the office and being told to sit and wait I finally got it after being persistent and asking again and again (which included a half hour wait).

So what's happening with it now?  The woman was truthful and gave her real name, ID number, and phone numbers.  I'm buying new pants in the next few days and am compiling documents showing the classes I've had to cancel to get the rabies shots (on specific days between 9 and 11 in the morning) as well as the class I lost the night of the incident.  I'm going to ask her to pay me the full amount of the pants as well as my lost classes.

Here´s what the rabies shot paperwork looks like:

No matter how many times I tried, I was unable to rotate the pictures above.  To save you from craning your necks sideways here´s what the gray box says:

No olvide que usted ha sido mordido por un animal sospechoso de rabia.  La rabia siempre es mortal.  Ud. está en peligro.

Translation?

Don´t forget that you´ve been bitted by an animal suspected of having rabies.  Rabies is always deadly.  You are in danger.

It's a frustrating situation, and I just want to get it settled.  I hope that she'll cooperate with me and take responsibility, but given her attitude I'm not hopeful that it will happen.

On a much happier note, I am now a permanent resident of Chile!

My letter that let me legally stay in the country for 6 months while the government processed my paperwork expired on Friday, so I went in on Tuesday to file for an extension.  While looking around I noticed a friend of mine was also there, and so after we got our numbers we got to chat and catch up.

After about an hour wait my number was called, and when I went to the desk the woman pulled out a small but official-looking document.  She gave me a half sheet to sign acknowledging I was getting the paperwork from her, and she gave me another half sheet with instructions on what to do next.

Here's what it looks like:

Looking at it, my residency was processed and approved on April 13th.  I got this on May 22nd, and I still never got the official letter in the mail that it was processed.  (Chile is notorious for taking a long time to mail out the letters to people).

I was a bit surprised that I didn't need my passport or get any type of stamp in it, but apparently my new ID card will indicate that I'm a permanent resident.  Permanent residency will allow me to get a credit card, a more comprehensive bank account, vote in elections, and pretty much do anything that Chileans can do.

I'm just a few steps away from completing the process.  I registered with the International Police and they took my photo and gave me a new registration card, and after that I went to the Civil Registry to apply for my new ID card.  Once there I found out I needed photocopies of particular documents which I didn't have at the time, and I didn't have enough time to get the copies and return to complete the process, so I decided to finish that part another day.

And I have taken another step towards becoming "Chilean".  I ate not only my first but my first AND second  completo on Friday.  For those of you who aren't aware of what they are, here's a visual aid:



What is that, you query?

Well, it's tomatoes, onions, mustard, mayonnaise, and a hot dog bun.  Oh, and under all of that is a hot dog.

I have seen plenty of completos in my time here, but I've never had the desire to eat one.  So how did I manage to eat TWO of these in one day?

I have a Friday class at lunch with a great student, and he always orders us each a sandwich from Dominó, a  famous sandwich chain in Santiago.  Instead of the usual sandwich this Friday, however, I was greeted with 2 styrofoam completo-shaped containers.

I´ll be the first to admit that I´m not the poster child for eating healthy.  I enjoy pizza, cakes, cookies, and things like that.  Seeing people eat completos at 10 in the morning (with a Coke to drink) however, makes me intestines start to cry just at the sight of what they´re doing.

So I dug in and ate them.  Some mayo and tomatoes fell off when I ate my second one.  I didn´t really enjoy it, and my intestines protested for the next 24 hours.  I don´t think I´ll ever willingly eat a completo again, but some people have told me that eating one is a key ingredient to becoming Chilean.

Last but not least, what are the answers to the grammar puzzle from my last post?

When using adverbs in English, there is not only one correct word order.  I´ve sorted them into groups with the adverbs in boldface:

Group 1  Subject Adverb Verb

Daniel sometimes takes the bus to work.

Some people always need to drink coffee in the morning.

She almost had a car accident.

Group 2 Subject Verb to be  Adverb

I am rarely sick.

They were both late to the party.

She is usually on time.

Group 3 Subject Verb 1 Adverb Verb 2 (perfect tenses, auxiliary verbs, future, and passive)

My brothers have never been to Chile.

You should always eat breakfast.

Exception 1: Sometimes can be at the beginning of the sentence.

Sometimes Daniel takes the bus to work.

Exception 2:  Probably

Subject Verb Probably

Homer is probably at Moe´s tavern.

Subject Probably Verb in Negative

Homer probably isn´t at work.

Well, that´s all for now.  It´s 10 AM and I figure I should go to Dominó to see some people feasting on completos.

Permanent Residency Visa and Thanksgiving Weekend

So it's that time of the year again.

What am I referring to, you may ask?  It's time for me to go through the visa process again, but this year is different.  I'm applying for a permanent residency visa.

The word permanent sounds, well ..... permanent.  My plan isn't to be here permanently, but the appeal of being considered a permanent resident and having a visa that is good for 5 years is very attractive to me.  It always seems like the visa process in Chile is never easy, and so if I can minimize the need to go through it I'm more than willing to do that.

So about 2 weeks ago I began compiling the neceesary paperwork.  Here's a partial list:

photocopies of my passport pages showing my previous visas
photocopy of my Chilean ID card
photocopy of my registration with the International Police
a report from the International Police showing I haven't committed any crimes
a report of all travel completed in the past year
recent photos with my ID number on the bottom with my name
photocopies showing my income with the boleta system
a letter stating why I'm applying for permanent residency
my college degrees approved by the Ministry of the Exterior

They also required proof that I had paid taxes and such in April, but by then I hadn't had my boletas and didn't have to file, so I included a letter stating so.  The same thing happened with a few other requirements.

I was anxious about missing some important piece of paperwork due to what happened this time last year.  As I was at the airport going home for Christmas last year, I got a call telling me that my visa was rejected because I didn't include all of the paperwork that they required.  The missing paperwork was easy enough to get, but I had to wait until I was back 6 weeks later to gather it and get my visa approved.

So I double and triple checked that I included everything that they said I needed before heading off to the post office.  I gave the woman there the envelope and asked for it to get certified (as requiered), and she spent a few minutes typing things up.  She gave me the paperwork for the confirmation, and she spelled my name wrong.  I pointed it out to her, and she had me correct it on the paperwork before I signed it and before it was formally submitted.

I've done everything I can, and so now I get to play the waiting game.  Hopefully by the beginning of January I will have the official letter telling me that it has been approved and is being processed, or en tramite.

With having the paperwork completed, I was able to enjoy the weekend without having it hanging over my head.  Saturday was the TeachingChile reunion, and it was great seeing everyone again.  It was on Bruce's rooftop, and there were burgers, snack, drinks, sunshine, a swimming pool, and good company.

It was really great catching up with friends I hadn't seen in a while, and we found it hard to believe that we are going on two years here.  I also met some new people that are looking to stay in Chile beyond their time with TeachingChile.

After a quick stop home I was off to a coworker's apartment for Thanksgiving Dinner.  It was mostly Americans, but there were a few people from England and a few Chileans also.  Here's what we had to eat:

Turkey casserole

carrots and sweet potatoes

spicy potatoes

mashed potatoes

mac and cheese with tomatoes and bacon, based on my Mom's recipe

Needless to say, I had a huge plate of food.  Even though we're far from home, everyone agreed that they enjoyed the dinner and it was a really nice event.  The Chileans and British also enjoyed having their first ever Thanksgiving.

I hope everyone else had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.  For now I think I'm going to go lounge by the pool.  ;-)

A Family Visit, Switching Over My Visa, and Reuniting with Friends

My dad arrived for a visit last Monday, and he stayed until Saturday night.  It was really good to have him here so that he could see what life is like here, and I think it put him at ease seeing that I am well established.

We took things at a relaxed pace but got to see a good amount during his visit: Cerro San Cristobal, the downtown area, meeting my bosses/coworkers/one of my students, La Vega and the fish market, Valpo and Viña, a walking tour of Santiago, and a tour of the Andes mountains.

During his visit I almost lost my cell phone.  It had fallen out of my pocket while we were on the TransVIP shuttle service to his hotel, and I only realized it about 45 minutes after we arrived.  The hotel staff helped me to call my number, and not only did the TransVIP driver pick up, but he promised to deliver it to the hotel within an hour.  Sure enough when we came back from going out for the afternoon my cell phone was waiting for me in the reception.  I don´t think that getting your cell phone back in a situation like that is the norm at all, and I was really lucky and grateful for the honest people that got me my phone back.

When we went to Valpo, we were offered a full day tour in English for a decent price so we went for it.  I was telling our guide Mario about The Amazing Race and how much my dad and I like it, and it turns out he was on it!  He drives a van around to give tours usually, but people on the race came up to him telling him they needed someone that speaks English and that drives a taxi.  He offered his van to take multiple teams, but they said they could only take a taxi.  One of the teams (from what he described it was a father/daughter team so I think it was Gary and Mallory) offered him money for him to get them a taxi and drive, and so he gave the money to one of his taxi driver friends to lend it to him.  And so he was a taxi driver on the show.

His English was perfect (as he had lived in Australia for 12 years), and he gave us a lot of interesting details about Valpo and Viña that I didn´t know before.  Valparaiso is actually short for va al paradiso (or go to the paradise in English), and it was the location of the first newspaper El Mercurio in South America.  We went on one of the elevators that goes straight up and down, and to get to it you go through a cave that has water running through it.  There was a lot more interesting information, but due to the perils of putting off blogging for so long I forget the details.

While my dad was on a tour of the Andes, I took care of my visa.  I didn´t allow enough time on my first attempt as I had to get my dad on a walking tour and my number wasn´t called in time (I arrived at 8:15 to 70 people in front of me with the office opening officially at 8:30).  So the following day I decided to get there at 7:45 that way I´d be right near the front of the line.  Well, this time there were about 100 people in front of me despite getting there half an hour earlier.  Luckily one of my friends from work came in a few minutes later, and we spent our entire wait catching up since we hadn´t seen each other since December.  I got my temporary residency visa stamped into my passport, and then I made my way to the International Police to get an updated card on file there, and then they took another horrible picture of me to put on my updated ID card that I can pick up after my trip.

One of my friends Chris also had a birthday last week, and so we got together to celebrate.  There were a few of us from the program, a few friends we had made along the way, and a few boyfriends/girlfriends, and it was a great time.  Since not everyone spoke English we spoke in Spanish most of the time, and it was cool that we were all able to converse in Spanish and understand each other.  It's also hard to believe that an entire year has gone by since we met each other and arrived in Chile.

And any post of mine would not be complete without some pictures of the food I´ve eaten lately, so enjoy!

Adventures in New York and my Chilean Visa!

After a few months of stress, multiple phone calls to the FBI, and four visits to New York, I now officially have my visa to legally go to Chile.

I took the train up from Trenton and arrived with plenty of time to take my time walking from Penn Station at 7th and 34th to the Consulate at 1st and 48th. I stopped in at a Chase bank to close my old account since there are none in South Jersey, and it was just my luck that the gentleman helping me was originally from Germany. We chatted about life in the States and there and made other small talk.

Then I asked him the question I need to ask every native German I meet: der, die, oder das Nutella? (For those of you that may not be familiar, German has three words for "the". Nutella is an incredibly delicious chocolate spread in Germany, and it does not exist in any German dictionary. Therefore its article is up for debate.) His answer was das. I should really keep a tally of what each native German tells me just for fun.

I then made my way to the consulate. I arrived about half an hour early, but I figured it wouldn't hurt. After about 15 minutes I was called back to go over my paperwork and get a thumbprint taken. Then I sat for about half an hour, feeling anxious about not having my FBI Clearance and if they would grant me the visa or not. I then heard a woman calling me from the back: "Mr. Gum! Mr. Gum!" I walked back, and she handed me my passport with the visa inside and my copies of the paperwork I signed.

I was so relieved that I didn't know what to say. I could tell that I was beaming though, and I just thanked her and shook her hand.

I'm now at a Starbucks near 7th and 54th, and will shortly be making my way towards Hell's Kitchen to meet up with a friend I haven't seen in about 10 years.

Countdown to departure: 21 days

Brazilian Visa Success and Shopping

So yesterday I made the journey up to New York to pick up my Brazilian visa. I could only pick it up between 2:30 and 4:00, but I headed up early to be on the safe side.

I have never really been up to New York before a month or so ago. It's interesting walking through the streets, seeing the people, and all of the sights and sounds around me. I stopped for lunch at a place called Corner Cafe, which had some really delicious pasta. Afterwards I realized I walked ten blocks in the wrong direction, which gave me some good exercise and lifted weight from my conscience for not eating as healthy as I could have.

I arrived at the Brazilian Consulate around 2:00 anticipating a long wait in line. I was right, but they ended up going through the line and giving everyone picking up a visa a number and we were able to go inside and sit down. Nothing was happening at the windows, and it seems like they simply did not serve anyone until 2:30. I brought a book to pass the time, and glanced at my watch. 2:32, and no sign of movement from the employees there. 2:33, 2:34, 2:35, nothing.

Finally at 2:41 the signs lit up, and they took their postions at the windows. A woman carried out two huge tubs filled with passports, and the first person went up. She handed him his passport, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that I was the next person. (The ticket I was given V717 made me realize how many people come through there on a daily basis)

I went up to the window, and the woman located my passport quickly and passed it under the window to me. I checked to be sure my visa was inside, and it was. My face glowed as I told the woman "Thank you!" as a wave of relief came over me. As I walked away, then I remembered the phrase in Portuguese "Muito obrigado".

I took a picture of me holding my visa and put it on Facebook. I called my dad to tell him the good news. I called up my program and they were ecstatic. I was just feeling awesome.

Today I did some obligatory shopping for the trip. Since I've been losing weight (20 pounds since November so far) my pants have been getting loose, so I got some new pants at Sears. I also got a Dreamie (a soft sleeping bag type thing) as well as space saver bags that I can use with a vacuum cleaner to save space in my luggage.

I've started packing a bit, and it doesn't look like it will be as bad this time around. When I was going to Germany I had to leave a good amount of space for gifts for my host families, but this time around I only need gifts for the program directors and maybe a few teachers at the school. I have a better idea of what and how much clothing I'll need and what things I'll want to bring with me.

Countdown to departure: 28 days

First Post

So right now I'm sitting in Panera Bread in Vorhees, New Jersey. It's hard for me to believe that in exactly 34 days (February 10th) I will be leaving for South America. This is a trip that I have been planning on taking since April, and I was determined that it would happen this time. (I had tried to travel to South America for an extended period through a Fulbright, then through an alum from Occidental that runs a preschool in Chile, and then through a teaching program. Each of those opportunities did not work out for one reason or another.)

Before I go any further, I should be sure that everyone reading is on the same page about what I am doing: I have been accepted into the TeachingChile program to teach English to kids K-12 at a private school in Santiago. I will be doing so from March 1st until December 15th or so. When I was looking at the orientation that starts on February 19th, I realized that it was shortly before Carneval. Seeing that this is right before Carneval, I did a bit of research and was able to arrange my travel plans to be in Rio de Janiero for Carneval. Apparently it is one of the biggest parties on the planet, and seeing that I had already been to it in Cadiz, Spain and Cologne, Germany I figured going to it somewhere else would be pretty awesome.

I have to say that I have already had a roller coaster ride of an experience getting my visas for Chile and Brazil. It mostly had to do with submitting my FBI Criminal Background Check in early November and basically hearing nothing for close to two months. I then find out that they could not guarantee when I would receive my FBI clearance, which is required to get my visa for Chile, and my visa for Chile was supposed to be required to get my tourist visa for Brazil. After contacing the Consulate of Chile about this, they sent me an email telling me they would process my visa without the FBI clearance and to just forward it to them once it did get processed. When I went up to the Consulate in New York, however, they told me that they would apply for my visa without the clearance, but they would not grant it to me until they receive my clearance. After some explanation of the situation (and a very helpful email from my program) they agreed to grant me the visa without the clearance but forwarding it on upon receipt. My appointment to get my visa is January 20th.

So the next step was taking care of my tourist visa for Brazil. I took the trip up to New York fully expecting them to not to grant me the tourist visa since I didn't have my visa for Chile yet, but they took one look at my application and put it in with the rest of their applications to get processed. I am going up this coming week to pick it up. I practically owe my life to the program director for talking me through the experience and providing me with all of the paperwork and requirements a countless number of times over the phone.

My checklist of "to do" items is growing smaller. I ordered some travel guides and am anxiously awaiting them in the mail. I've pulled out my luggage to get ready to pack again. It's hard to believe that I will once again be away for close to an entire year. The excitement is building, and part of me wishes that I could wake up and it would be February 10th so I could just skip all of the anticipation. Despite that, it still does not seem real to me that I am actually doing this.

I would be lying if I didn't admit that I feel a bit scared and apprehensive. But I know that my language skills are solid, I am a seasoned traveler and skilled teacher, and that I will be with a program that is there to help us with anything we need. Once I arrive in Santiago I am sure that my fears will be put to rest.

Countdown to departure: 34 days