1) The gate in the front yard is really hard to close. I don't even know how to describe it, but you have to make sure this nail-like structure is matched up with the hole perfectly, and then shut it both strongly and quickly. Everytime I think I have it down, the next time, I can't do it.
2) Sometimes, the lever you use to flush the toilet is stuck, so I have to go open the tank at the top and flush it manually.
3) They prefer powdered milk, which means you need to mix it with water in order to get the final product. I have yet to figure out the right ratio of powdered milk to water, and it usually turns out looking clumpy and gross. I guess it's better than the other type of milk that Chileans drink, which is milk you don't have to refrigerate until opening. I've had it a couple of times here and it's fine, but the concept of not refrigerating milk right away always seemed a little sketch to me.
4) My family appears to eat less than I do, which feels like a rarity in Chile (usually, it's the opposite problem). In fact, they don't really eat dinner, but rather something called "Once" (pronounced "On-say," it literally means "11" in Spanish). When they first told me that, my Spanish was so shitty that I thought they were just telling me that the time they eat dinner was 11. "Ok, that's kinda late," I thought. "But I'll deal." The real deal turned out to be that Once is surprisingly enough, not at once, but just another word for tea time, or something of the sort. So you have tea, a little bit of pancito (bread), ham, maybe some avocado, and you're good for the night. You can imagine my surprise the first night I was there that at 6 PM my host dad declared Once and served me some food and tea. With regards to lunch, because they don't eat as much, I end up looking like a gordita, chowing down everything and serving myself seconds, while they're satisfechos with some soup and salad. When I'm like, "Pass the chorizo, porfa," I can tell they're incredulous/mildly disgusted at how much their new norteamericana eats. They tell me to help myself to whatever I want, but I know that they're secretly judging. Also, they always finish their food before I do, and they're unfortunately left waiting for me to finish. I have 2 theories about this: 1) They put more food on my plate (they already know how much I chow down) AND 2) I talk more (surprise surprise), which vastly, and unfortunately for them, decreases my average bites per minute. They've quickly caught on that I eat like a 15-year-old boy (or at least in their eyes), so they make it a point to always tell me that I can heat up the leftovers after I eat Once. So basically, I'm like the Cookie Monster of the house. Except I don't just steal their cookies, I steal all of their food.
5) I have to make my bed every morning here. Back in the States, I never made my bed. I know, I'm a slob, and you know what, I embrace it. It just always seemed counter-intuitive to me. You make your bed look nice just to mess it up a few hours later...why do that to yourself? You're wasting precious minutes of the day, when you could be, for example, I don't know, being socially anti-social and going on Facebook. At my last host family's house, my host mom made my bed every day. I would plead with her and insist not to make my bed for me, that I felt bad because I would always remove the blankets at night anyways (it was the middle of summer and I would schvitz like no other) and that it was ok for me to not have my bed made. And she would shoot down my arguments and say that she is my mother here ("¡Ya mi niña!") and that she enjoys taking care of me, thus, she is going to make my bed every day. Oy vey. Here, in my new house, the day after my first night here, my host dad pops into my room and says, "Te recomiendo hacer tu cama," which is a super nice and polite way of basically saying, "Hey slob, clean that shit up and make your room look less disgusting, barbaric, and savage-like by por favor, making your bed. Shit, you're a sloppy mess." So, even though I would rather not, obviously, it's their house and I'm going to respect their way of doing things (because that's how I roll) and make the bed. So I begrudgingly and sleepily do it every morning after I wake up. I have to admit though, it does make my bedroom look 8000 times nicer.
On the other hand, besides the fact that they're a legit family, their shower is off the hook. At my last host family's house, the showerhead was fucking bipolar, and would change temperatures every 20 seconds. Literally. Every 20 seconds. Or, if I was lucky, it would stay at a nice temperature for a minute or two, and then just change all of a sudden again. I wish I was kidding, but I'm not. In my 6 weeks there, I could never figure out how to get that shower temperature just right. So half of the times, I would usually end up taking super quick showers that would just go over the basics (conditioner, body wash, out!). Shaving became out of the question for a while. My hair would get greasy because I didn't shampoo it enough. Hey, it was a survival instinct. If you had scalding or freezing water running down your back, you'd understand. Finally, after the first month of unsuccessfully attempting to maneuver the shower, I asked my host mom to help me, and she basically said it was "muy facil" and left it at that. And when I would ask her how many turns of the hot side and how many turns of the cold side she would recommend to me, she would just be very vague about it and say whatever suited my mood. Grrr. So I just dealt with it still for the last 2 weeks because I didn't want to appear like an ungrateful gringa and I didn't have the heart to tell her that the shower was fucking loco. But here, the shower experience is straightforward and easy, which immediately translates to AMAZING.
So I can't close the gate properly. I have to deal with toilet water occasionally. My milk has yet to be clump-less. I present myself as a 15-year-old boy. And I have to make my bed every morning. That all becomes worth it for the legit family, the location, the wi-fi, and the "just right" showers. It's all about the tradeoffs. Hey, I can deal with that.
totally wrote a long comment that got deleted. bascially the milk, toliet, shower are all shitty here. my roommate thinks the milk here is delicious and superior to the milk of california since it can sit on the counter...nasty.
ResponderEliminar~katie alva