A week in Chillan

The week started out with a walk to Chillan Viejo which is where the center of Chillan used to be before it was flattened by an earthquake in the 1930s. It’s less than a mile from where we live and there is a plaza, a park and a small museum/cultural center. It was nice to see where Chillan Viejo was since I’d heard it mentioned many times. Later that day Sister Mimi was cleaning out the freezer and showed me three 9x13 containers full of frozen raspberries!! So naturally I went and looked up a recipe for raspberry crisp and made one to have with our dinner. It turned out great and hardly lasted 2 days! (I’d say that’s a sign that the others liked it too!)

Tuesday classes started again at Casa Ursulina (after the break for the independence day celebrations). In the morning there was a wool working class where the women spin yarn from wool. It was interesting and we helped get some of the wool ready to spin. After lunch we went out to the rural town of Piedra Lisa where every other week Sister Mimi and a couple women from the house take projects and teach the women different skills. They have been teaching weaving for a little while now and the women are getting quite good. They teach the class in a rural school that has about 18 students. Kym and I met the students and if we stay here in Chillan will most likely go out there and do activities with them. On the way home we road part way with one of the women in her two wheeled horse drawn cart. It was a fun, new experience.

On Wednesday I played in the Sala Cuna (daycare room) with all the little kids that come with while their moms go to classes. It was a lot of fun and we did a lot of different activities: coloring, playing with legos, reading stories, playing with dolls, etc. The kids are very cute and for the most part well behaved.

On Thursday there was a reflexology class. I went to see went it was all about and was made a “victim” meaning someone practiced the reflexology techniques they had learned on me and as a result I got a really nice foot massage :D In the afternoon there were classes for weaving, home decoration (wall hangings, embroidered cushions, etc) and policromía (not sure what the English translation would be but they take statues, boxes or other things, apply a layer of plaster and sometimes texture of some sort and then paint the object). I spent time in each of the classes and ended with weaving were they were celebrating one of the women’s birthday with the hugest cake I’ve ever seen! (it was not only impressive to look at but also very tasty!)

Friday morning we worked in the greenhouse (a very small one by the side of the house) with Ale and planted tomatoes, lettuce and green peppers. After planting everything we ripped up some cabbage leaves and spread them around our newly planted plants in hopes that this will keep the snails away! If this doesn’t work, the snails will get more of a feast than we will :( Later that day Kym and I went to town. We wandered through the central market and then went looking for shops. Oddly Chillan is filled with thrift stores that sell nothing but American clothes! The prices for the most part are good, I only got a light sweatshirt but envision myself going back in the future as I discover what my clothing needs are. After dinner we watched Forrest Gump. I had never seen it before and thought it was very good.

Yesterday we went to a mass for a priest (Raul) celebrating the 60th anniversary of his ordination. After the mass there was a reception where Raul said a few words and then gave this toast “Drinking makes you happy, when you are happy you don’t sin, and by not sinning you are saved… so if drinking makes you happy, and when you are happy you don’t sin, and when you don’t sin you are saved, LET’S DRINK!” After that the crowd burst out laughing! Apparently after his first mass 60 years ago, another priest gave this same toast. After that we went over to Maria Erica’s house for lunch. She teaches the baking class at Casa Ursulina and is a good friend of the Sisters. We started out with coffee and cookies right after we got there. A little while later came punch and little fried cheese empanadas, of course they made about a million of these little empanadas so each of us ate a lot! Then for the actual meal we each had a huge piece of fish, potatoes, salad and bread. Everything was delicious. After we had eaten our fill Maria Erica brought out ice cream. Of course I thought we were done at this point but I was wrong. She then came out with a Tres Leches cake so we each had a piece of that. Needless to say we pretty much rolled home after all that food !

This morning I woke up to the wind howling outside my window. The news had been predicting lots of wind and they were right! Sister Ruth made French toast for brunch. It was amazing plus I smothered mine in raspberries so it was extra delicious. In the afternoon we went over to the church about a block away from the house to wait for the procession that would be coming through town. Our Lady of Mount Carmel is the patron Saint of Chile and today there was a procession through town honoring her which ended in Chillan Viejo with a mass in the plaza. We started at the church and walked behind the priests and others carrying flags and a cross all the while singing and praying the rosary (there was a load speaker hooked up to a truck leading the group). When we got to the main procession route we waited there until the rest of the procession came by. Other churches had joined the procession along the way, each carrying banners and/or flags. By the time the procession came by where we were standing it was raining pretty hard. Most of the people in the procession did not have umbrellas but kept walking anyway. Unlike most of the others in our group, we did not join the procession but instead headed home after the end of the procession passed by.

This week I started running again. It has been a very long time since I have run on a regular basis so it felt great to start running again. This week I ran four times. Even though I was hoping to run more, it’s a good starting point. As soon as I get settled somewhere I am going to look for some other activity to join… something to get me out of the house and involved in physical activity and meet friends. Perhaps rowing, circus or tennis.

The pictures are as follows: making empandas (me), Casa Ursulina, the church we go to (we can't actually enter the building shown because it was damaged in the earthquake but it's a national monument so it will be restored, mass is held in a partially finished community hall next to the church), pictures from the procession, a typical picture from the artesania part of the central market in Chillan, Kym and I in front of a church in the center of town, pictures from the plaza in Chillan Viejo.