Nerenberg Sabbatical in Chile 2011-2012: A Collection of Observations (#4)

Here goes another round:

1 Fake palm trees - The climate is perfect for palm trees but the ones that we see most often are three that are on the Estadio property and are covering up some sort of communication tower - perhaps cell phone, perhaps something else. Either way, it is a great landmark to know that we are almost there.

2. Supermarket pet peeve - People leave their half full carts anywhere in the store and go off looking for something. There ends up being a "taco (traffic jam)" of personless carts in the aisles. Not sure why people don't push them through the store but they don't. In a daze one day I took off with somebody else's cart and didn't notice until I had added five things and was on the other side of the store ;-)

Near the deli counter - more carts than people....

3. A neat bonus about blogging is that we got contacted by a first grader and his Mom from Clinton, Mississippi asking Elisa some questions about Chile for his school project. The weather contrasts probably aren't as profound for a kid from Mississippi as they are for a kid from South Bend, Indiana but that was her emphasis.

4. A tennis update for South Bend friends - We now need another father-son team for matches back home. They had a special day at tennis where they had parent/kid match-ups. It was very cute although Jonathan kept getting angry at Rob for messing up ;-) Rob did get second place when the parents played each other so he must be doing something right.

The orange team

5. While the students are not actively protesting anymore (actually I read somewhere that after six months after Christmas they silently declared it over), based on a walk through a neighborhood it looks like the public schools are still on strike. This is the way that they show that the kids are not in school - the tables and chairs are all hung from the school fences. Guess that says it.

6. In Plaza de Armas there are often street entertainers but this was the first time I ever saw somebody providing entertainment by solving the Rubik's Cube and other puzzles! I am not sure how lucrative it is though.

7. A sign telling you to that during the holidays at the end of the year you should cross with responsibility. No don't drink and drive signs here - just watch out for pedestrians?

8. All the rage of 7-year old birthday parties are spa parties. Elisa keeps coming back looking like a different version of JonBenet Ramsey. Of course, they include a palta (avocado) facial ;-)

9. A "Frozen Limonade" - a cool drink that didn't go down so well. Sounds like you can't go wrong with a name like Frozen Limonade - no? Well - it was a lime slushie with chopped up mint leaves. Renee, queen of the granizado (slushie), even rejected it after putting in three over-sized sugar packets. I think that the main issue was the mint leaves clogging up the straw.