I realize I haven´t updated in a while, aside from random articles and essays I wrote long ago, so sorry about that. It´s not that I´ve been having fewer adventures, or that I have any less desire to write about them, or even that I´ve been more busy.
It just seems that whenever I finally get home and lie down in my bed, my computer at the ready, I always seem to instead crash and wake up 3 hours later, music playing randomly, a long line of lkjjjjjalksdjlkjlk on the page in front of me, my computer still perch precariously on my lap. And then I realize it´s just pointless. So here I am, before class, eyes mostly open, dedicated to writing.
That said… life has been pretty much normal. Class is interesting, at times. I think I´m continuing to get better at understanding, but the chief rule I figured out is that just because a class is in Chile doesn´t mean that it´s any more interesting. I certainly took boring classes in the states, and though these seem pretty interesting at first, it´s way too easy to space out and work on something else, in this case the short story I was working on.
On that front, I think I´ve finished, but it needs a great deal of editing and soul-searching before I can show it to anybody, so chill out. I found out the name for the “type” of writing it falls under, which is “meta-fiction.” It´s a story about a guy trying to write his first fictional piece, so it´s basically an embellished account of… stuff. You´ll see, and it´ll rock your socks.
In other writing news, you´ve no doubt seen the articles that I´ve posted here from Santiago Times, which have run the gamut of pretty interesting to mind-numbingly dull. I´m falling out of love with the ST, I think, which is a shame, because the two things that I´m really enjoying about it are being in touch with the Chilean current events and the comradery of the office. It´s just that the work we do is so often just a translation of other news stories, or a better-developed, more thorough version, but it still doesn´t really feel fulfilling. My friends are doing all sorts of internships that sound really fascinating and inspiring, and mine just doesn´t, so I´m going to look elsewhere.
Then again, another reporter there and I have been trying to figure this out, as far as how to make the ST both interesting and rewarding, and I think I have a new drive to be a more active reporter. No answers yet, but it´s all stuff that ´s on my mind, and that´s the point of blogs, right?
One of the most fun parts at working at the Santiago Times is being the host of What´s Up, Chile?, the weekly news show that the ST interns put on. I´ve greatly enjoyed it, though it´s been more than a tad frustrating. Each week we´ve either had technical problems, or people missing, or both, and so it feels like we (read: I) haven´t been able to put together a really good show. This last Monday was especially annoying, because we put on 40 minutes of our 2-hour show before realizing that the broadcast had just been messed up, and people couldn´t hear it at all. There was apparently a button on the computer that solves the problem immediately, but… I sure as hell didn´t know that, and nobody was there to tell me.
Still, podcasts will be available when I can get in there to do them, which unfortunately doesn´t seem like it´s going to be soon.
On a more annoying subpoint, we get a ton of reading in class, and one of the books that I have to read is something called “El Malestar en la Globalizaciòn,” by Joseph Stiglitz. Wait a minute! That sounds a lot like the book “Globalization and its Discontents,” the book that I have sitting on my shelf back home, that I´ve been wanting to read for a long time, right? Of course right. But rather than read a book that I already own, in English, I´m forced to read a photocopied version in Spanish. Lame.
I went through another pang of Giants envy this week, wishing I could watch the games, though in hindsight, the first two were probably entirely missable. Just watching the second game on Yahoo Sports was just too painful, so that sucks. Go Giants, or something to that nature.
I´m about to buy plane tickets to Peru for September, to hike Machu Picchu and check out Lima and Cuzco, so that´s pretty exciting. A tad expensive, but definitely worth the trip, I hear. More on that soon. I´m going to Viña del Mar this weekend, which should be a fun trip, but I don´t really know what to expect yet. More on that when the time comes. I went to Valparaìso this past weekend on a guided tour with EAP, and it was fun, if a bit annoying to walk around a fun town with a tour group and no freedom to explore. I´ll explain Valpo a bit more when I get the pictures online, so check back.
And, in the story that I was trying to avoid telling, I had something of a disturbing encounter last Friday, when I had a run-in with a drunk cop at a club, who seemed to like messing with people and abusing his power. There was no physical harm, nobody got in trouble, and everything is kind of funny in hindsight, but it definitely shook the calm that has been Chile, as there are a few problems, it seems. I´ll tell the story in full some time I have more time, as I need to get to class in a few minutes.
So there´s that, a summary that probably sounds pretty downer, with lots of promises to be more interesting in the future, which probably pretty accurately matches my mood right now. But I´m not worried, I´m sure that everything will work out. See you soon!