Week 8: Dunzo.

Hard to believe our time in Santiago has come to an end - it went by so quickly but when I think back over our two months in this city, it's amazing we packed in as much as we did.  As Thursday was a religious holiday in Chile (Immaculate Conception), everything was closed so our last day of classes was actually Wednesday.  After 12 hours of classes (we had a make-up ethics class on Wednesday due to the holiday), we were all beat but went out for a big group dinner together on Thursday evening at a restaurant we'd had on our list to try - Giratorio is in Providencia on the 16th floor of an office building - the entire thing is surrounded in glass and rotates while you eat to provide panoramic views of the city.  Although the food wasn't stellar, it was a great way to cap off our trip.

 [The whole crew with the singer who serenaded us all evening long.]

While our classes were finished, we still had a finance paper and econ paper to finish so we spent most of Friday working on those but John, Matt, and I did find time for an ice cream break.  Everyone in Santiago eats ice cream - in fact, I've never seen more people with ice cream cones in one city in my life - as you can imagine, I was in heaven.  There are two ice cream joints in Bellas Artes that are touted as the best in the city and only two blocks apart.  Obviously, we HAD to try both... 

 [Emporio la Rosa -- chocolate and cookies and cream]

[Cafe del Opera -- chocolate -- the clear winner]

As Friday was the last night our entire house would be together (Fred left on Saturday morning for his hike), we opted for dinner and drinks at Cantina - our local watering hole - followed by a night of dancing next door.

 [Suecia 100 - such a great time with this crew]

 [New friends!]

 [Lovin' life]

[With Jamie - our fave manager]

With Fred gone, Saturday was super lazy, although we did manage to make it out of the house for a quick stop at La Piojera - known for it's terremotos (a famous Chilean drink made with sweet fermented wine and pineapple ice cream).  Words can't really do this place justice -- think a big dirty warehouse type room, concrete floors, filled with Chileans (mostly grimy men) sitting at picnic tables drinking terremotos out of plastic cups.  Understandably, John, Matt, and I stuck out like a sore thumb.  In fact, I'm pretty sure that people were staring at us the entire time we were in that place (just as long as it took us to down one terremoto before high-tailing it out of there).  However, we did get to speak to some very drunk locals which was pretty entertaining (drunk, slurring Spanish is MUCH harder to understand than normal Spanish.. and let me tell ya, we aren't very good at understanding normal Spanish)... 

 [The infamous "terremoto']

[Gringos - standing out like sore thumbs]

We spent Sunday finishing up our final econ paper, packing, and managed to fit in a final run up San Cristobal.  John left this evening to fly home to the States and Matt and I meet up with Drew and Addiel tomorrow to head to Buenos Aires for the week.  

Hasta luego Santiago - ¡Volveremos!