falling with style

i have arrived safely and lived through my first 36 hours in chile without incident. well, except for paty (my ´mom´)´s car not starting in the parking lot and needing a jump and then it starting to sound like the muffler was dragging along the cobblestone type streets halfway home. but other than that, it was great. the last bit of the flight was amazing, because out the window were absolutely breathtaking views of the andes. my god, i have never seen anything like them and let me tell you, they are something to write home about (haha, sorry). from where i live, by the plaza egaña in ñuñoa (i know i know, two ñs -- which definitely makes me sound stupid when trying to say it), i am about a 3 minute walk to the metro which makes the rest of the city really easy to access. we had our first class today, which was pretty cool, getting to meet everyone in the program. we are already making plans to go to the beach this weekend. by the way, its like the perfect climate down here...averaging about 75-80 degrees (except for in the subway) and without humidity. amazing. anyway, so we´re probably beaching it up this weekend. ill be sure to think about all of you freezing your butts off in mi (or wherever). my housemate is pretty cool too. shes been her for two weeks already so she knows all about how to use the bus system and how to go to the beach and stuff. a good friend to have. it also makes it easier when trying to understand paty, who´s spanish is very chilean, meaning that it is heavily accented and full atypical spanish words. i love it here already, but i do miss you guys a lot. its strange being so far away, speaking an entirely different language. sometimes i feel pretty glamorous and all bilingual and stuff (although im only sort of). although today we were hanging out in a large group after our orientation class and speaking english obnoxiously and i definitely felt like a stupid imperialist american. i guess that comes with the territory. te extraño mucho. photos to follow in the next few days i hope.