Crack! went the Egg

Photo from Roy Pequeno.

So back at home for Easter my family and I make Easter Eggs. However, being away from my family I completely forgot about making Easter Eggs. Then about a week before Easter it hit me that I needed to make Easter Eggs. So I began the process of eating eggs for just about every meal.

I believe the others in my house were confused when they saw me cracking the eggs. Instead of cracking it regularly into two parts, I only cut out a small portion on top, and shook the egg whites and yolk out of the shell. So now I had an empty egg shell - with a hole on top. Caitlin and Tom looked at me strangely, and so I decided to explain what I was doing.

In Texas we have Easter Eggs that we dye, put confetti into to them, put tissue paper on top of the shell (to prevent the confetti from falling out, hide the eggs, children find them, and then the war starts. Its basically like a mini-pinata. I also told them that there are some places in Houston, that you can go and buy shells with or without confetti by the dozen. And to my surprise, the very next day I received a package from my parents that had a dozen and a half Easter Eggs.

Thus throughout the Easter Day, I slowly starting taking out my housemates. When they weren't expecting it all you could hear was my arm soaring through the wind and CRACK! Of course we all got a little confetti on us - and the house was a mess. But no one could get mad because there were so many pretty colors!

Pictures of my housemates will be uploaded to flickr soon.

Places have 4 seasons?

Photo from Roy Pequeno.

Well I am not going to lie, being down here in Chile during April is weird. Mainly cause instead of going into Spring - I am entering Fall!

I guess with Easter coming and going has really had me thinking about the weather down here. State-side most people are beginning to put away there heavy coats and busting out all their shorts and summer clothes. However, down here...WRONG!

Being from south Texas, I am use to two types of weather - Hot and MELTING HOT! During the summer (November-February-ish) people would complain about the heat. I would look at them and kind of laugh. I mean the heat has nothing on me. Me and the Santiago Heat had an understanding - during the summer I will put on shorts and tank-tops and sit in the shade. Check!

However, now as we are entering the phase right before winter - I believe its called Fall (once again I am from Texas and really never had the opportunity to experience this) its getting cold. Right now, Caitlin and Meg both sleep in their sleeping bags. Tom and I are a little more stubburn and have decided not to bust open our "sleepings" until May 1. We realized that if we bust them open now, that we will be sleeping in them until October - that's 6 months!

Anywho. The weather is nice and the scenaryis beautiful. The leaves are changing colors and parts of Santiago remind me of that painter that was on PBS - I think Bob with the afro - that always painted those happy tress.

I am really enjoying having this wonderful time. At times it is a bit cold, but nevertheless I am still alive and haven't frozen. Then again, we haven't entered winter. Bottom line - Fall is actually kind of a pretty season.

My Bingo Card

BINGO!

So if y'all read Ryan's blog, y'all should know that a few weeks ago we went to go play bingo. I could go into all the details about how it was great. How we (Ryan, Tom, and I) arrived at 9:30 PM to play the first round of bingo and ended up being the firsts ones there. I could tell you that it was a hardcore game, and that we all had our game faces on. But let me just give you the quick run down.

Here is the quick run down
- We get there at 9ish and buy our cards.
- Around 9:45 the place is bumpin'.
- We start playing bingo, and Ryan puts on his game face.
- The games get intense.
- Ryan wins - sorry no pic of that.
- The guys celebrate the victory with a round of choripan.
- Meg wins.
- Ryan wins again, but Tom receives the prize.
- We leave, so as not to get jumped by the Chileans.

For a more intense and better recap of the night´s events, I would recommend reading Ryan´s blog (title: A Wild Saturday night).

Hurricane Work

Photo from Roy Pequeno.

So after I started working officially I thought things would be great. I would go and talk to my students, and we would just have a blast. The first few weeks were great, then came the crash course into teaching. I had to make a lesson plan.

I am in charge of the Storytelling English Club. This is basically like a required English elective that all 5th and 6th graders need to take. So since I presented this theme of storytelling, I have to plan the semester. So I had to get to work. Here is a picture of what our table looked like one night when I was trying to be productive.

In the end, I got my lesson plan done and my students are learning somethings. I consider that to be a successful lesson plan. Not bad for a teacher with only one month experience.

Isabelle

Photo from Roy Pequeno.

When I made my decision to join HCA: Chile for two and a half years, I was like this is the next big step in my life. I guess somewhere, in the back of my mind, I believed that life would kinda stop and nothing to interesting would happen until I got back. I mean, we all know that the world revolves are ME and not the sun.

How wrong I was.

Back before I left for orientation, I told my sister and Jared (my brother-in-law) - mainly Roni though - that she could not have a kid while I was away in South America. I told her that she can not get pregnant while I was gone. Then thinking about it I went ahead and told her that she could get pregnant in April of 2007 - add the nine months I would be home from my years of service. So during orientation - about two weeks that I had this conversation with my sister - I get a call and of course I am told that "Rolé you´re gonna become a tío again." I was overwhelmed with emotions - mainly something near anger cause I was gone not even two weeks and my little sister was pregnant.

Anyway - back to present day. So this whole time I have been told that my sister is pregnant, but its been kinda hard to believe mainly cause I havent been around her to see it. Her whole pregnancy happened while I was away from the house. So I think I have been doubting the whole thing - and kinda believing that it was a conspiracy that my whole family was involved in to bring me back home. I mean I think I had about three pictures of her "pregnant" but to me it seemed like she had a pillow underneath her shirt.

Well, March 31th - about 10ish Chilean Time - my sister and Jared became the proud parents of Isabelle Nicole Jones. So now I am a tío again and realized there are two options to explain what happened:
1. Realm of Reality -the world doesnt stop for me just - and my sister really does have a new daughter. Or,
2. my family has taken this conspiracy to far and are really desperate for me to visit.

Here is one of the first pictures of the new Jones Family.

Collin & DOG!

So my sister, Jared, and Collin all moved out of the house. I have talked to Roni and she loves the new apartment. From the sounds of it - it sounds really nice. I am sort of jealous of all the cool stuff they got in their place.

Both Roni and Jared are happy, Collin however seems to be a little confused. According to Roni, Collin runs through the rooms looking for DOG (aka Copper - the dog that my parents hvae). Collin will bolt to the bedroom look under the bed (cause that is where Copper hides from Collin), then towards the bathroom, and finally to the kitchen - only to find that there is no dog.

So being the nice tío that I am, I told my parents to buy a dog for my nephew. I also stressed the point that I will reimburse them in about three years - when I have a steady income. My parents agreed.

One day while I was talking to my mom, she asked me to make sure that my bank account was fine. That I hadnt had any charges or strange activity happening. I assumed that there was a scam state-side and that my mom was worried. So I did, only to find . . . that my account had been charged something at Build-a-Bear. I was confused and told my parents to please look into what happened.

About a week later, I received a package with a thank you card from my nephew saying "Thank you for your generosity!" with a picture of a DOG! and Collin.

Thanks to my parents and the use of my debit card - my parents made sure that I bought a brand new DOG for Collin.