La historia del Pati Perro

Oye! In just a few weeks I'll have been here for five months in Chile. Having reached the halfway mark it seems like a great time to recap my time here so far.

Day 1: April 5, 2013 Whoa!?!?! Where am I? Oh, right I'm in Chile. I can't believe I did it.
May: Yay, for hiking, I have so much free time! Teaching's not a bad gig. Snow?!?!
June: Miss my family, California burritos, and sunshine. It's cold. #CaliforniaProblems
July: SNOW, SNOW, CAMP, POLLITO PIO.
August: Boot Camp, freak weather patterns, crafting, falling in love with Coyhaique. #happeningnow

It's been a long and adventurous four months. I will always remember walking out of Balmaceda airport into the brisk wind of Patagonia, my first Chilean barbeque, the first time I asked what is 'po' and so many more things. Can't help but get nostalgic thinking about the first pleasant whiff of pollution causing wood fire smoke, or more seriously when my host mom called me 'hijita'.

Right now, I'm feeling grateful, tried, inspired, and content. Grateful to the family around the world who support me. Tried by those little battles to force myself to do something, and conversely, being ok with doing nothing. Inspired by my students who are incredibly talented and my host mom who works hard to support her two daughters. Content with my current trajectory. This weekend, I couldn't believe it when the thought crossed my mind that I could live here indefinitely. I will miss this place.

I was talking with a friend recently about traveling, as I get ready for yet another adventure. I told him how my love for travel started at a young age. When I was a baby I walked, then ran, then naturally decided to fly (at least that's what I like to believe). He asked what countries I have been to. I've been to Australia, Uganda, New Zealand, Rwanda, and Chile. Then he asked if I knew other parts of the US to which I responded: New York, Mississippi, Tennessee, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Nevada, Alabama, you get the point. "You are like the pati perro," he said. First, I smiled and laughed with him. Then I realized I had no idea what that meant. "Que es eso?" So he explained to me that the pati perro is a person who likes to go beyond the boundaries and see new things. I know dogs are known as being man's best friend, but this was a new comparison to me. I can't wait to see where the next four months will take me. These are the tales of the pati perro.

June

May

June

Seniors

Happiness after receiving package from USA>Homesickness

July

Nievita!!! Que bacan!

Click Pollito Pio above

Mis Hermanitas Bonitas

Hiking with new friends

August

My favorite playground (nature)

My Other Playground

Warm enough to only need one jacket

Tomas

Mida, un perrito!

El Valle Entre

¡Hola! Espero que todos estàn bien y con buena salud. Para hoy yo gustaria conversar acerca unas cosas simple pero muy importante. Obviamente, hay muchos momentos cuando nosotros estamos muy contentos, pero, ¿qué pasa con los tiempos en el medio? Ahora vamos al valle entre...

Hopefully soon I'll be able to hold a whole conversation in Spanish, however for now I'm just having fun stumbling through. Tonight, I was able to sit down with my host mom Rudit and as I solicited her help in making sure that the passage above was comprehensive in Spanish we began to talk. To my surprise she asked me if I wanted to come back to Chile. ¡Por supuesto!-Of course. Then she said, "well, you should come back to Coyhaique and visit us."

The End - Fin

***

Not. All that I just said is very true, and estoy super feliz que mi mama chilena me quiere a volver otra vez a Chile! But how did we get to that moment?

[Living here is so hard is because everything I see or hear about everyone else seems so awesome. My life just seems so boring, once you look past the fact that I have a job and get to travel to new places now and then. I really wish, I could be [anywhere else] posting selfies, hashtagging, and/or checking-in with friends about how awesome my life is. Brb gotta check to see if anyone facebooked me...They didn't. #fml]

If you're not slightly befuddled by this, or if you find that you can really identify with this, then chances are you are suffering from FOMO. FOMO aka the fear of missing out, seems to be on the rise due to the various social media with which a person can boast their latest feat. Whether you're on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram everyone just seems to be having the time of their life.

I like social media as much as the next person, but at the end of the day I know that life isn't always a scene from a rom-com. Yet, even I am susceptible to feeling inadequate. Although, we now have the power to control how people perceive us and to know what people are doing instantaneously many of us come away unhappy. Why?

 ***

I'm absolutely enchanted with the landscape in Coyhaique. I love that you can hike to the the top of a high peak only to find that every way you look there's another mountain and beyond that another. If only I could jump from one to the other. The view might be even better. Even though I know it's silly I found myself stressing about making time to go check out all these different mountains. I also know that these beautiful giants are nothing without los valles entre. Sometimes the valleys are lush and impressionable. While other times they're ugly, bare, and lonely. No matter what they look like doesn't change the fact that I have to go through the valley to get the next mountain.

Therein lies one of the biggest fault of social media, a false sense of reality. We think that we can skip from mountain to mountain, living from status update to status update. Unfortunately, unless we can learn to enjoy the time between posts and appreciate from afar those peaks rising from the valley floor before us life, we will continue to be anxious and dissatisfied.

The view's not that bad from the valley floor.