Week 2 Santiago

We enrolled in Spanish lessons here in Santiago for two weeks.  As we are 2 of the 3 students in class, there's no way to fake it and we spend most of our afternoons after class studying in various parks and cafes around the city.

 This fountain was a gift to Chile from Germany.  It's in one of the parks we've visited to study.

We had our first pisco sours.  Delicious, but dangerously strong. 

We visited the Pre - Columbian Museum - see Quacker Jack there near the southern point of South America.

 "Where'd you get your hat at?"

We saw this pretty little street in our school's neighborhood.

We haven't seen this billboard at night, but I really hope the cork pops out like the lights indicate.

This HUGE bowl is a traditional Chilean dish that is similar to dressing we eat at Thanksgiving but with more corn than bread.  

Lots of seafood in restaurants here, but not so much in grocery stores.  So, we've eaten lots of fish and shrimp out.  

 Delicious fish filet

 I might turn into a shrimp, I've eaten so many since we've been here.

Friday was J's birthday and we decided to take a sweet treat to Spanish class.  We bought cookies here - they were delicious.  This bakery has been in business for a long time!

What we've taken to calling this park Tree Park.  I think you can understand why.

Studying in Tree Park for the afternoon.  There are many folks selling ice cream out of coolers they carry here.  We like hearing them call "Helado, helado, helado!"  We'll never forget the Spanish word for ice cream.

The mounted police made a tour through the park.

We liked this old building in the Bella Vista neighborhood.

More shrimp - this time for J.

This ceviche made me want to slap my momma.

We learned that there is a Chilean folk character who plays the drums like this fellow.  They spin and spin and dance - pretty dizzying to watch.

The end of J's birthday. I think it was a good day.  All the folks at our Spanish school even sang Feliz Cumpleaños to him.

 Morning from our apartment 

We took the subway to the area known as "Sanhattan" today.  It looks like the newest and swankiest part of Santiago with lots of high rise buildings and South America's tallest building.

This is not South America's tallest building - we didn't get a picture of it.  Just liked the look of this area.

Taking a break in the shade at the park.  The sun here is dangerously intense!

We visited a very large mall over in Sanhattan.  It was impressive, with 350 stores.  

Then, we spent some time studying in the park.  Back to class tomorrow morning!

 Quacker Jack is hiding out in the palm tree there - hard to see him!