Join the Adventure!
We were at the Family Day (“Kermesse”) for Asher’s school (Mackay) and when we were ordering some pizza, Asher said to make sure we asked for it “sin ketchup” (without ketchup)! So it turns out that most kids put not just a little but a …
One of the more popular snacks (lunches) in Vina is the “Completo”, a hot dog with some unique condiments. In fact, Asher has eaten one of these “Completos” at every birthday party he has attended. A “completo” comes with tomatoes, avocado, and LOTS and LOTS …
Here is Asher’s view of the big Temblor that we experienced our first month in Chile:
This is what it says:
“THERE WAS AN EARTHQUAKE! Hear the story? On the ipad, we were watching YouTube Matty B. The earth started making sounds. We turned up the music. Then we started shaking. ITS AN . . . EARTHQUAKE! I yelled. We jumped into the bathtub and waited . . . and waited. Finally, we go out of the bathtub and got our head lamps. We went outside and met our neighbors. They invited us in. We went in and got Coke Zero and candy and watched Captain America. THE END!”
The big red splotch in his artwork is all the red wine that spilled in the earthquake.
Tired of waiting for traffic lights to turn green? Bored of sitting in traffic? Come to Vina del Mar, where there is always some fun entertainment while you wait for the light to turn green! Check out this guy who is juggling pins while balanced …
Want to know how to get someone to pay their condo fees? Let the whole condo know exactly who is behind on their condo fees and exactly where they live by posting it in the most prominent place in the building – in all of the elevators!
That’s what our Chilean apartment building does when someone does not pay in time! Here is a photo of what was on the walls of all of the elevators in our building! It is a list of all the people who were behind on their condo fees!
So, if you had some problems with Asher’s last spelling list of “Crustaceans” and “Invertebrates”, try spelling some of these easy second grade words. Keep in mind, that most of the kids in Asher’s class are learning to spell these English words as a second …
Often Ben and I go out for lunch—it is the Chilean tradition to have a bigger lunch and a smaller dinner. Most restaurants have a “menu del dia” or “Menu Ejecutivo” (menu of the day) which offers a 3-course meal at a discounted price ($4,500 …
Although the local Chileans didn’t even notice, it was a big night for earthquakes. We had four of them on Thursday night ranging from 4.1 to 5.2.
Vinamarinos (the local term for people from Vina) don’t notice or mention earthquakes until they reach 7.0 or more; in fact, they don’t even call them “terremotos”, they are just “temblors” – or little shakes.
Note the statistic on the top left: Vina has had 69 earthquakes (ones you can see above 4.0) in the past year. That is about 6 per month or 1.5 per week!
Of course, “there is an app for that (earthquake tracking and notification)”; actually, there are many! This screenshot from QuakeFeed.com shows that Chile sits along the “Ring of Fire” where earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are more common. The Ring has 452 volcanoes, and 90% of the world’s earthquakes and 81% of the largest earthquakes occur along the Ring due to the plate tectonics (thanks Wikipedia). It is the green line below.
FYI, QuakeFeed provides real-time updates on seismic activity as well as email notifications for the concerned and the interested, as well as for wanna be seismologists.
At first, they look like child locks—cabinet locks designed to keep children from playing with (breaking?) cups, glasses, and dishes. But then you notice they are on all the cabinets even the ones that are five feet off the ground…where children can’t reach them. What …
