Friday May 10, 2013 .... Day 7

Today was really cool. We visited Vina Indomita, a winery about an hour away from where we are staying. It sits on top of a hill in a valley so the views are great. There were so many acres of grapes, it was so cool to see that many in one place. It's amazing that they can take care of that many and there is only one harvest a year according to Chilean law. This means that if something happens to the grapes that year, their profits can be hurt pretty badly. We were taken to part of the building where they ferment the grapes. There are huge aluminum containers that  can hold up to 100,000 liters of wine each. They are all filled and this is their cheaper wines. The more expensive wines are kept in barrels and now I can understand why they can be so expensive. The barrels cost $1,000 dollars each and can only be used three times. The best wine can only be made in a barrel that has not been used yet. When they sell back the barrels to tourists, they only get $35. We were now going to Pablo Neruda's house, a famous Chilean poet. His house was very eclectic and had different themes for each room. Everything and anything had its purpose in representing something more. The house was located on the beach so we sat on the beach for awhile and just hung out. We came back to the university to dance. This time I think the teacher just made up dances but they were all really fun. This was the best dance class and everyone was really into it. This ended our day.

Thursday May 9, 2013 .... Day 6

This was possibly my favorite day so far. We started our day off with dance class in the morning. Today we got to learn the Cueca. It is Chile's national dance. The guy is supposed to dress like a cowboy while the girl is supposed to dress with Asian clothes. I am not really sure why they picked these things to wear for the dance so I will have to do research on that and find out. The guy is supposed to court the girl by dancing around her. In the first part, she is supposed to act uninterested and walk away. When the girl begins waving her towel, they begin to dance. As the dance progresses, the girl acts more and more interested and by the end of the dance, they are dancing together. I wasn't that good at this dance but it was a lot of fun seeing everyone try it, including me. Now that class was over, we were on our way to visit LAN, a Latin American airline. This was the coolest thing ever. We got to go in the hanger where they fix the planes. Jose showed us the place. We learned about the different checks planes have to go through like the A, B, and C checks. Depending on the condition of the plane, it may have to go through all three of these. If it can pass through only the A check, it saves the company a lot of time and money. Jose's job as an industrial engineer is to design the order that a plane gets fixed and how the checks are done in order to reduce the costs as much as possible. The coolest part of the day was sitting in the cockpit of one of the planes because we will never get another opportunity to do that. That ended our trip to LAN and we were off to Vina del Mar to end our day.

Wednesday May 8, 2013 .... Day 5

Today was a very interesting day. We started our day at about 9:00 for a day of lectures with a worker from LAN, a Latin American airline company. His name was Jose and he was great. He was very interesting and kept the lecture fun. He taught us about the Chilean culture, business, politics, music, art, and how geography affects all of these. Chile was a pretty isolated country because a chain of mountains runs along the length of the country, making it more difficult for people to move in and out. This allowed certain parts of the culture to evolve much differently than its neighboring countries. Differences range from types of dancing such as the cueca and business practices such as trusting each other more easily. We took a break and got lunch at the school cafeteria. It is always really interesting going there because I cannot understand anything anyone is saying and not all of the students speak English. Finding a table where we can all sit together is near impossible but it does give us a few good laughs. After lunch, we had a few more lectures and then we were on our way back to the hotel. We had our small group meeting and then we went out to eat our favorite food here, empanadas. I have eaten so many empanadas since I have been here, it's probably pretty unhealthy. There are so many to choose from to. It is like going to a Peace-a-Pizza where you can order any kind of pizza you want. So far I haven't been to adventurous and have only eaten empanadas with chicken and cheese so I will still have to try more. Tomorrow we will have a company visit so it will be very interesting. This concludes my day.

Tuesday May 7, 2013 .... Day 4

Today is Tuesday May 7, 2013. We started our day off around 8:00 to leave for Santiago, Chile's capital. Santiago is home to about 7 million people and accounts for approximately 40% of Chile's population. We arrived after about an hour and a half long bus trip and went to Chile's Stock Exchange. It has not been used nearly as much for actually trading stocks on the floor because they went digital in the mid-1990s. The woman teaching us about the stock exchange was very good. We took a group picture and then made our way to the largest cathedral in Chile. The cathedral was impressive. I could only imagine how many people could have fit in it. After leaving the cathedral, we visited a museum about Chile's history and history of Santiago. We went to a market for lunch and I ordered baked chicken and French fries. The food was very good, it may be the best I've had on the trip so far other than empanadas. Empanadas are similar to calzones and you can get practically anything you want in them. I have only tried cheese and chicken so far and I plan to try many more. After we ate lunch, we visited the Presidential Palace in Santiago. The president does not live there, he only works there. I found that pretty interesting and our tour guide was interesting too. He could only speak a little bit of English but overall he was able to communicate with us well enough for us to understand him. The highlight of the day was traveling up the mountain on the incline and walking the last steps to the top. The view from the top was amazing. We were able to see all of Santiago and many mountains and other towns. I was able to get a decent amount of pictures from there. It was just a very peaceful area. This concluded our day of touring and we headed back to Viña del Mar.

Monday May 6, 2013 .... Day 3

We did so much today. We started off the day at around 8:00 in the morning and ate some breakfast in the hotel. We met up with a couple students from the university and took a city bus to the school. The drivers are pretty aggressive in general but that is like any other city. We arrived at the school which sits on top of a big hill and took a tour. The tour was led by two students and they showed us everything from the auditoriums, to classrooms, and to the fields. After that, we were able to eat lunch at the cafeteria. Because of the picky eater I am, I only ate bread but that was more than good enough for me. After that we had class for about three hours with an economics professor. He seemed to know anything and everything about the Latin American countries' economies. He went in detail about different things such as GDP, different indices, and why certain values of currency would have drops or gains. It was interesting to learn different facts about the Chilean economy. Most of the economy is driven by mining, forestry, and grape and wine production. Also, because Chile has a smaller market compared than the world, more and more companies are merging and tend to dominate different sectors in the market so they can compete worldwide. After our class, we were able to walk around Valparaiso and drive to the top to get a better view of the city. The view was great and the weather was perfect to see everything. Valparaiso and Viña del Mar are two cities connected on the Chilean coast. From the top of Valparaiso, we could see both cities and more cities further away in the distance. We finished our tour at the harbor and shopped a little bit and then we had dance class. We were being taught the Salsa by students at the university. It was probably the highlight of the day and watching everyone enjoy themselves only made it better. This ended our day of touring.

Sunday May 5, 2013 .... Day 2

Today is Sunday, May 5, 2013. We arrived at Santiago International Airport at about 8:00am. Chile is located in the same time zone as home which I did not know at first. After getting off the plane, we regrouped and went through customs and security. Now we were on the homestretch. The last thing we had to do before we left was line up at the ATM and take out some money. There are about 500 Chilean Pesos for each $1 USD. We met up with Jorge, our group leader, and two students who go to college in Valparaiso. They will be showing us around the following two weeks and introducing us to more students. We got on our last bus trip before we made it to our hotel in Vina del Mar. The trip was about an hour and a half but the scenery was great. There were mountains everywhere you looked. The valleys before the mountains were full of trees and crops. We passed by a few small towns on the way and passed by Vina Indomita. This is the vineyard that we will get to tour later on this week and see how everything works. Before we knew it, we were in Vina del Mar. The city is great. It is located right on the beach in central Chile. The weather was perfect, not a cloud in the sky and the right amount of wind so it wouldn't get too hot. We walked around the beach area and ate at Tiki Taco. I ordered chicken quesadillas and they were some of the best I have had. We continued walking along the beach and watched some mimes mess with people crossing the street. We even saw a Jack Sparrow look alike. We took pictures and made our way back to the hotel and now I am here writing my blog.

Saturday May 4, 2013 .... Day 1

The first day of my trip was Saturday, May 5th, 2013. This is where I am beginning my two week trip to Chile with Pitt's Plus3 Study Abroad program. My day started out by waking up around 7:00 to get ready for the trip to the airport. We hopped on the bus and made it there with much time to spare. While we sat in the airport waiting to go, we went out to eat and had a chance to get to know one another. Then we were off. The plane was much smaller than I had expected and we sat right next to the engine. However, that was insignificant because in one more day I would be on the trip of a life time. The flight attendant was even nice enough to give us a handout with facts about different planes. The flight was going to Dallas Fortworth International and we had a pretty long layover there. About ten of us ate dinner at TGI Fridays and got to know one another a little bit better. Some people played cards and some people read books as we waited for our flight to Chile. I decided to read Game of Thrones which was a very good idea to bring. So far I have read a decent amount on it and in the down time of the trip, I plan on finishing the book. Only 600 more pages to go. We got on the plane and flew throughout the night. When I woke up the next morning we only had about one more hour to go before we landed.