It happened...

Saturday morning I had a breakdown. The crying hysterically, completely losing my mind kind of breakdown. It was bound to happen. I was holding on to sanity by a single thread and it was going to break eventually.

It was a combination of things. The neighbors had a all-night, very loud party. So when the alarm went off at 5:00am, I was overly tired. We were going to the temple with our ward for the 7:30am session. I love going to the temple, but this time - I was crazy anxious about it. The language barrier was my biggest fear. How was I going to find my way around? How would I know what to say and how to say what needed to be said?

The feelings of isolation came flooding in. I honestly feel like I've been dropped into some alternate universe. Things look the same, mostly. The people seem the same, but I am completely lost. I don't understand written words. I don't understand spoken words. I can't leave my house. I don't have a car. Even if I did have a car, where would I go? I can't talk to the grocery store teller, so I can't even run to the store for milk. I can't call the locksmith about getting our locks changed. I can't call about buying a car. I can't buy ink for my printer or ask where I go to buy ink. I can't order a burger at Burger King. I can't order pizza to be delivered. I can't go to the park in front of our house and visit with the neighbors.

You've read it all. You get the idea. On Saturday morning it all came crashing down around me. The isolation and pressure was more than I could take. Hysterics only begins to describe it. Poor Greg... He couldn't do anything. I wanted him to hold me and get the hell away from me all at the same time. It wasn't pretty.

I eventually pulled myself together, took a hot shower and we headed to the temple. I wish I could say that the minute we walked in the door my attitude changed, but it didn't. First, they don't rent clothing and we didn't know that. So we had to meet with the temple president to get permission to use the sets that they have on hand for missionaries to use. (When you've recently had a breakdown, things like this push you further over the edge. It was all I could do to hold it together.) It was no big deal really. They cheerfully got us clothing and we went to change.

Not a soul in that woman's dressing room spoke English. I managed to stumble my way into the different areas (which were all in spanish). Greg asked for earphones to allow me to listen to the session in English. Thank goodness. They also arranged for an English speaker to be there at the end of the session to help me. Thank heavens. That was my biggest fear. I can not speak Spanish and I had no idea how I would make it through.

I have to say that I was barely holding it together the whole time. But it did put things into perspective for me. I realized that no matter who or where you are, we are all God's children and we are all struggling with something. Every single one of us has challenges. Mine right now isn't so bad in the scheme of things. We pray every day and in every one of our prayers we thank our Heavenly Father for this opportunity. We are blessed to be here. But we tend to think that blessings are all butterflies and roses, but sometimes in order to get to those blessings, we have to climb over obstacles that will better us in the long run.

I will be better knowing the Spanish language. I will be better after having experienced life here. I do not doubt that. But sometimes, I just need a minute to cry through the struggles. It doesn't mean that I doubt or regret. It just means that it's hard.

When we got home, Greg rounded us all up and we headed with the dog to the park. Just what I needed. Fresh air. It ended up being an amazing day.

BICENTENARIO PARK, VITACURA NEIGHBORHOOD IN SANTIAGO, CHILE

The dog LOVED the dog park! He was so tired when we got home he slept for hours. It cracked the kids up!

We were freezing once the clouds rolled in. I thought my sweater would be enough - nope - so I stole Greg's jacket.

The building (that is being squashed) is under construction and will be the tallest building in South America once complete.

After spending the afternoon at the park, we got our grocery shopping done, bought cell phones and ordered Pizza Hut for dinner.

That man of mine knows how to cheer me up. :) Thank goodness I have him to be my rock through all this!

Wah Wah...

I know everyone has been on pins and needles waiting for the results of last night's neighborhood meeting. Well... Wah-Wah-Wah... Nothing exciting to report.

I wasn't able to attend as I took the kids to church, so Greg headed over alone. They discussed the issue at hand for an hour and the last hour was spent socializing. It seems that all who were in attendance felt like just getting a guard would be the best idea. Apparently if you put in a little house thing with a bathroom, you can hire 2 shifts of guys and they will patrol the neighborhood. This allows for not a large investment up front and then if we decide it doesn't work, we just stop.

It would be $40 a month per home and would serve as a deterrent. We'll have to vote in a neighborhood council, which we assume would resemble an HOA, to facilitate and run this type of thing. They'll do more research and meet again.

Greg did learn that we have "THE" pool in the neighborhood and that previous tenants would have everyone over to swim all the time. They also get together frequently to BBQ and share meals together as a neighborhood once the weather warms up.

Awesome! I wanted a friendly neighborhood. Now I have until the weather warms up to learn to communicate with these people. We are still working on getting a spanish teacher set up to work with both me and my kids. It's been a little slower moving than I had hoped, but in Chile everything moves at a slower pace (except the traffic). I am learning to breathe and wait. I'm also learning not to leave my home until AFTER the scheduled arrival time. They call it "Chilean Time". I love these people!

I'm spending my day trying to translate "A Whole New World" (from Aladdin) for Andrew in a way that will be easy for him to learn. 4 weeks until show time!

Happy Friday the 13th Friends!

Whipping Up More Surprises

I was SURPRISED already today by the potato fiasco (previous post). Now I am 'surprised' again by chocolate pudding. Or my attempt at chocolate pudding that is.

I bought a package of what I thought was chocolate pudding.

I google translated the directions and went to work. I was excited to surprise my kids with a batch of chocolate pudding for dessert.

About halfway through my mixing, I began to wonder about the consistency. It seemed too light and fluffy and not at all chocolate colored. I continued whipping for the full three minutes only to find out that I hadn't made pudding. I had what seemed to be chocolate whipped topping. Not very sweet chocolate whipped topping at that.

I added some powdered sugar (called: Azucar Flor) to sweeten it up and called the kids down for a taste test. My chocoholic Alex wasn't impressed. I talked Andrew into trying it with a chocolate cookie as a spoon. He wasn't impressed. I ended up dumping it down the drain. Andrew suggested making no-bake cookies. Great idea Andrew. Now if I could only find cocoa powder.

**UPDATE: I belong to a group on Facebook called "English Speaking Moms in Santiago" and I just read on there that cocoa powder is called Chocolate Amargo and can be found near the powdered milk. There may be no-bakes in our future after all!

Apparently Potatoes Grow in the Ground

I know. Potatoes grow under the ground. In the dirt. I know that. You know that.

I wanted to buy regular old baking potatoes for a potato soup recipe that I am making for dinner tonight. While at the store on Saturday, I searched for brown potatoes. I finally found a few in a small section near the purple and red potatoes and bought a bag:

As I began peeling these "brown" potatoes, I realized that they were incredibly dirty. Like COVERED in dirt that became mud once I began to wash them.

When all of a sudden, to my surprise (and disappointment) I find that these mud covered "brown" potatoes are actually mud covered "red" potatoes. WHAT?!?!

Why on earth would I pay extra to get a bag full of muddy potatoes? This doesn't even begin to make sense.

Whatever. Red potato soup it is...

Here is an unwashed, washed and peeled potato - all red:

Drama in the 'hood

Apparently the week before we moved in, 4 cars were stolen from our cul-de-sac. 2 from the same family. This is something that happens often here. Theft is a huge issue. I am constantly being warned about the potential danger and how to protect myself and my belongings.

Our neighborhood has formed a Neighborhood Council/Watch. They are attempting to coordinate installing a gate at the entrance to our cul-de-sac. Keep in mind that cul-de-sacs are laid out a little differently. We are in the typical circle shape, but there is a grassy area in the center with a little park. In the corners of the circle (if a circle were to have corners) there are additional houses that are connected via a shared driveway. It is difficult to explain.

Here:

(Yes, I drew it out on a post-it and took a picture. Yes, I am a dork. Yes, I take pictures of EVERYTHING.)

Anyway - back to the story.

So, if you see the little sketch above, you can see my house is in pen. There are houses all along the circle drive (which I didn't draw) but there are these 3 little shared driveway things on the corners. Does it make sense now? The arrows in the top right show the entrance into our little cul-de-sac and where the potential gate would go. *I also drew a little park in the center - you're welcome...

So there has been a little bit of debate regarding this potential gate. Shortly after moving in, we were added to the email list. Apparently, it's a fun way to get your opinion out there regarding the gate by replying-all to these emails. I, of course, have to copy and paste all these communications into Google Translate. It's pretty funny stuff. There are 25 houses in our cul-de-sac and there are some people with serious opinions.

One guy, who's car was stolen by the way, is ANTI-gate. Interesting. He says that if a thief can start a car without keys, without setting off the alarm or waking an entire neighborhood, that thief will be able to get through a gate. True. Good point guy with the stolen car. He suggested a guard be hired.

The majority of the other neighbors are PRO-gate and many are concerned about the guard. One woman mentioned that the guard would cause problems for nanas that come and go. Good point lady with the nana.

Another mother was concerned that the guard could be a pedophile. Yikes! Good point lady with the kids.

Anyway - we're PRO-gate, but as renters, it's not really our decision to make. Greg will head over to the meeting tomorrow night at 9pm (just BEFORE dinner). We'll have to see how that goes.

This morning, the Carabineros (Chilean police) were parked in front of the shared driveway just to the left of our house. Wonder what that was all about.

Stay tuned...

Placing a call in Chile

I've mentioned before about how I've taken for granted that the whole world works the same way. I've assumed incorrectly about lots of things; banking, real-estate, etc. I've also assumed wrong about telephones.

In Chile, you have phone numbers. Phone numbers for land lines have 7 numbers, like they do in the US. Phone numbers for cell phones have 8 numbers. Nobody has area codes. Not so bad - but there's a catch:

If you call mobile to mobile, just dial the phone number - or for some silly reason you wanted to make it more complicated, you could dial +569+ then the phone number.

***NOTE: To dial the + sign, you press and hold the zero. Who knew?

If you call land to land, again just dial the number

Here's where it gets complicated:

If you dial land to mobile, you must dial 09+ the number.

If you dial mobile to land, you can either dial +562+ phone number or 02+ phone number.

I think...

It is all so confusing! Good thing I don't have any friends yet. I wouldn't be able to call them!

Chili Cheese Dogs (sort of)

Dinner last night. Yes, I know. I take photos of everything. But come on - you've got to see this. That 'hotdog' is as big as my dinner plate. If we had gone a little more authentic, it would have had mayo and sauerkraut, but I didn't go there. Not yet. The chips are BBQ. Look closer. They're yellow corn tortilla chips. So they do have a little bit of BBQ seasoning on them... a little bit. Close but not the same.

We're feeding the missionaries again tonight. I think we'll go with taco salad and brownie sundaes. The oven will work well enough to make brownies. The brownies are from a mix at this point as I have not found any cocoa powder, but we make them at least once a week. I also found some Hershey's chocolate syrup! We tried another brand and it was not the flavor we were used to. Discovering Hershey's was a pleasant surprise.

GOOD NEWS: Someone is coming out to fix my oven. So I may be cooking soon! Cross your fingers for me :)