oh how the weeks continue to fly by. i only have classes monday through thursday (with only one class mondays and tuesdays) which means three day weekends every weekend (rough life i know), so the time has seemed to be passing at an almost alarmingly fast rate. it's amazing how even three day weekends can feel short! next semester will definitely be a shock for me as i jump back into the insanity that is my life at the uofa: into marching season, my new job as an RA, and a full load of upper level classes (but they're all either communication disorders classes or spanish, so they should be pretty good!). but all the craziness of next year aside and plans for when i come home, i still have almost two-and-a-half months left here, and i don't want to waste away the time i have here thinking about things for when i get home.so the last few weeks have been really good. i feel like the Lord's really been showing me and teaching me alot as i've kinda come to peace about alot of things. i'd gotten really frustrated with myself for a while because i felt like i wasn't doing much here, and in the years past i think i've picked up the twisted way of thinking that if i wasn't doing stuff, that i was wasting my time and something was wrong. while i generally go out with my family or friends on the weekends and occasionally do stuff during the week, alot of times if i'm not in class i'm just hanging out in the house working on homework or reading the endless amounts of spanish literature i have to read (or more accurately-thinking about how i should be reading spanish literature and how i don't want to be...). but i've realized that while sometimes i may be a bit lazier than what's called for here (sleeping in has become a bad habit), i really think the Lord's calling me to a time of rest here, which is a concept pretty foreign to me, but it's been really great, especially since i've allowed myself to be ok with it. i've been reading rob bell's book velvet elvis (incredible book-if you haven't read it, DO) and in one part of it he talks about how he learned that he had to take a sabbath, b/c if he didn't he would lose his soul in all the doing. i feel like this time is kinda like an extended sabbath for me. not to use that as an excuse to not do anything, but just in the sense that the Lord's calling me to learn to rest in Him and learn to just be, instead of always feeling like i have to be doing. plus i'll have plenty of doing to do when i get home.
and now, i think i'll leave you with a story/description of something that has become a very big part of my life here in chile-las micros. so every morning/afternoon when i go to valparaíso for my classes, i take the micro. i flag one down three blocks from our apartment and then ride it to my university. the micros are a huge part of life in chile. they're everywhere and almost everyone uses them at least sometimes, even if they have cars, just because they're super economical, especially if you're just going around town (because parking at times can be a hassle and gas is even more expensive here than at home). supposedly there are bus stops, but really you can pretty much flag one down anywhere and they'll stop to let you off about everywhere, which is great except that it makes for some pretty interesting traffic situations and a longer ride. luckily there's a part of the ride to the university that goes right along the beach, so it's a pretty ride. when i come home i take the micro as well and it drops me off just a block from our apartment, which is pretty nice. ok, so today i got on the micro coming home from my class in viña (so it was a much shorter ride than when i come from valparíaso) and i happened to get on a micro that was jammed with people. i could barely get inside the front door, let alone make it the two feet to where you normally pay the driver. but no big deal. the crowds like that are relatively common and usually the number of people on the bus equalizes people fast. well... this time that didn't work out so well. more and more people just kept getting on. i have no idea why the driver kept stopping to let people on. at one point, i was holding on to a rail by the front door when the driver opened the door and i managed to get my arm caught between a lever for the door and the rail... so here i am trying to move out of the way so people can get on with my arm wedged betweens these two bars, looking very much like a gringa... gotta love situations like that. luckily the door closed after a minute or so and i was "free" again. or as free as you can be when you're wedged in between so many people, so close that i'm continually bumping into 3 random people i've never met. so when it comes time to get off, i've managed to make it to about the middle of the bus, which means i have to try to squeeze my way out without killing 5 people on the way with my backpack... it's a hard task. i definitely took a huge sigh of relief when i stepped off the bus and no longer felt like a sardine. so welcome to chile, where the micro drivers are crazy and at times the concept of personal space gets through out the window of the micros!
this is a great picture. i've probably ridden this exact same bus. i tend to favor the "2 viña buses" as they always come close to my house and are easy to spot. there's a ton of different micros that go all over the place, so you have to be careful to get on the right one (once i got on the wrong one and had to ride it for about an hour before i could get off and get on the right bus, and that was after going about 1/4 of the way to santiago...).well, now you understand just a little bit better my life in chile (cuz the micros really are a big part of it!). until next time, i love you all and wish all of you that have finals the best of luck!
