(mini) vacation!

The week of Fiestas Patrias

Ok so this past week I didn't have school, because of fiestas patrias. So during this week, we were all celebrating Chileanity and the independence of Chile. This meant a lot of dancing and even more food. Everywhere I have been now during september, I have seen Chilean flags. Literally everywhere. On our front yard, there is also a Finnish flag, which was a super nice thing to do, even though I didn't even ask for it.

The national dance of Chile is Cueca which was danced everywhere in Chile during this week. I myself am a terrible dancer so it was kinda relieving for me to find out that in my school, unlike many other chilean schools, dancing cueca is not obligated. Instead I did get to ride a mechanical bull, play musical chairs and participate in tug of war. We even came the king and queen of sack race with Pedro! That's pretty much all I did on the last day of school before the break. In the friday evening we had the first roast of this week (spoiler alert there was a lot of meat eaten during this week) with our crossfit group, and it was THE best meat I have ever eaten (sori iskä).

I had basketball trainings on Monday and Tuesday so I had to wake up a bit earlier. On Tuesday we started to prepare the foods for the 18th. I made korvapuustit which turned out pretty well, even though I made quite a few mistakes along the way.

On Tuesday night we also went to a fonda in San Vicente with my friends. Fondas are pretty much a chilean thing and there isn't really a good translation / description (vertaisin ehkä jonkinnäkösiin markkinoihin suomessa) for them, but a lot of food stalls and dancing is involved.

WEDNESDAY. 18th of September. A lot of food, especially meat. I would say pretty close to the amount of food us Finns eat around Juhannus... I got to fly a kite as well!! Don't actually remember if I have flown a kite before, maybe when I was like 4 or something, idek. Managed to get the kite in to a tree though so that didn't really go as planned, but it's fine. I had also been told about a game called taca taca, but I had no idea what it was, before I played it. Literally the last thing I would've ever guessed it to be, as in, it was table football (pöytäfudista?!) and I'm famously not good in it (tönön pöytäfudis nevaföget) so it might as well could've been the first time I played it. But it was fun. Later that evening we went to a friend's house, who was having a little get-together.

On Thursday we were just suffering from a food coma. And in the evening we went to the fonda here in San Fernando with my family. It was great, and I ate more amazing food. On Friday we drove to Puente Negro for lunch, it was about 45 minutes to the east. As we got closer and closer to the mountains the more I wanted to go skiing.. I haven't skied in likr maybe 4 years, thanks to my knees ":)"

Saturday was a bit different. We drove to Pichilemu, which is also known as the Surf Capital of Chile, and I can totally agree on that, the waves were amazing. The Pacific Ocean was looking as good as it was when I last saw it, as in about 7 years ago. The water was cold, but not the coldest I've ever experienced. We spent some time on the beach, it was sunny so it wasn't that cold but it was super windy, and the sand was everywhere. I think I'll find sand in my hair even after this year lol. After coming back from Pichilemu, we went to the Fonda in San Vicente for the night. My last fonda for probably ever, kinda sad but it went great.

Today, as in Sunday, we grilled and ate more food and played some more taca taca. Altogether the week went really great, and it was definitely very different from the independency celebrations in Finland (linnan juhlat on muuten aika vaikee selittää espanjaks äksdee) tomorrow we go back to school and we start a period of exams, still not sure whether or not I'm gonna do them though.

Tsemppiä koeviikkoon ja ylppäreihin suomalaisille, te pystytte siihen!!

Nothing further for now :D

Saara