Temuco, Villarrica and Pucón

With today the end of U.S. Daylight Savings, we are now 4 hours ahead of Mountain Standard Time and 2 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time. Chilean Daylight Savings Time begins in April and ends in September.

Wednesday, October 30th, we walked home after a visit to the Institute building--very nice building, lots of youth, with four classes running concurrently!-- and followed our noses to a pastry shop.

Bread and fruit tarts. Since we were very hungry, we had to eat them all. Don't worry, Brielle, whatever I don't eat, Elder K. takes care of.

Last-minute Halloween gear for sale by a street vendor in front of the Cruz Verde pharmacy

Chilenos boarding buses along Calle Bernardo O'Higgins in front of a statue of . . . Bernardo O'Higgins, Chile's independence leader. 

We finally got a day off on Thursday, October 31st, a full-blown national holiday in Chile, including pumpkins, costumes, and trick-or-treating. The Chilenos we talked to were surprised we celebrated their holiday of Halloween in the United States, too.

We spent the day adjusting and readjusting the rather touchy washer/dryer until it got through a load of laundry without banging and thumping. The apartment is not large, so I cleaned and vacuumed all the floors and found a place for our scattered belongings in the limited storage space, after which we went out for a walk. Many stores were closed down, but we did find an open pastry shop. (Not the same one where we got the fruit tarts.)

Corbatitas, the bow-tie streudel, with custard-filled horns and spiral pastry. Since we were leaving the next day, we had to eat them all. It is fortunate we walk a lot every day, including getting lost most Sundays because we don't pay attention to the street signs while discussing the day's lessons. I made lentils, onions and chicken for today's lunch after our weekend of eating in restaurants.

Friday morning, Dia de los Difuntos, another national holiday, (Day of the Deceased, a day to visit your relatives in the cemetery,) we packed to go on a short trip to the south with four other senior missionary couples, the Kimballs (Concepcion Mission office missionaries), the Bensons (Concepcion South Mission office missionaries), the Baldens (nurse and apartment inspector for both missions), and the MLS (Member and Leadership Support) Pulsiphers from Chillan, to the north of Concepcion. We drove to Temuco, the gateway to resorts in the south of Chile. It was a wonderful chance to get out of the cities and see the Chilean countryside and its bountiful agriculture.

Fields of yellow rapeseed from which canola oil is made.

Chile's famous yellow bridge or viaduct, Puente Malleco, near Collipulli. We drove past Los Angeles on the very good toll highway.

Our first view of dairy cattle grazing on pasture near Temuco.

Where there is cattle, there is silage.

Rows of poplars form windbreaks around Chilean fields.

Elder Pulsipher called ahead to his friend Tom Woodworth, now bishop of one of the Temuco wards, to meet us at the Holiday Inn. Tom is married to a Chilean woman he met in the mission field. He had many interesting observations on Chile, and took us the "best American hamburger joint" in the country. Everyone agreed they were good hamburgers. (Sister Pulsipher, Bishop Woodworth, and I had a sliced beef gyro with Merken--a Mapuche chili sauce-- from the restaurant next door.) Although Temuco was more like an American city than any we had visited so far, it still has problems with poverty, employment, and church attendance commonly found in Chilean cities.

Overlooking Temuco at the Environmental Center

 Mapuche Indian statues on Cerro Nielol

Saturday morning, we left the giant Holiday Inn bedroom--as large as our entire apartment in Concepcion--and headed for Villarrica and Pucón, a very nice resort area settled by Germans, Swiss and Austrians in the late 1800's. The region is well laid out and clean, with flowering trees and hydrangeas ready to burst into bloom.

Beautiful countryside outside of Villarrica, with one of the best fences we've seen in the country.

 When the clouds lifted, we saw this spectacular view of the Villarrica volcano, Rucapillán. I have photos of the gorgeous lake along side, but I left the Nikon D80 DSLR in the Pulsipher's car, so I will have to post those later. The tree to the left with the tubular red flowers is Embothrium Coccineum, the Chilean Fire Tree.

Elder K. and I wearing our hard hats so we can descend into the lava caves next to the volcano.

The entrance to the cave.

Hardened lava flow, reminding everyone of a type of organic fertilizer we find on the dairy farm. (Our guide's reference, not ours.) We descended pretty far down, in conditions that OSHA would not approve of. But our hard hats protected us from harm.

After coming down from the volcano, the first thing we saw in the pretty city of Pucón was what we thought were banks of fresh flowers, but these are made of willow wood shavings!

Of course I had to buy some. The flowers were set in potted greenery, so the flowers themselves are on single stems. They were only $1,000 Chilean pesos each, about $2.00 for the smaller flowers and $3.00 for the large ones.

Here, an artesana shows us how she crafts the smaller posy-size flowers from a willow branch.

 To pack the flowers, the stems were taken out and wrapped separately, and the flowers placed in a shoebox.

Family bicycling along the large park in the middle of Pucón. Many Chileans living here are taller and blonder than those in the cities north.

After lunch at a restaurant owned by an American expatriate from Virginia, serving pork ribs with actual barbecue sauce, (a rarity in Chile,) we found our way to the many and ongoing ferias artesenales.

I bought a beautifully made breadboard for $4,000 Chilean pesos (about $8.00), and a pair of silver earrings made by Mapuche Indians with a distinctive design. Mapuche silver jewelry often includes interesting hinges and dangles.

I earlier bought this bag with Mapuche braidwork in Valparaiso. I use it to carry my knitting and crocheting. We got back to our apartment at about 9:30 and went right to sleep.

Hermana Maria Conejo and some of her children soaking up sun on the church steps on Sunday. (I'm not sure which girls are hers.) Her younger son and husband are still in the chapel. The Conejos are an Ecuadorian family who have been through many tribulations but are steadfast and faithful. Maria helped me find the best yarn shop in Concepcion.

Elder Kennington and I have now seen more of Chile in two weeks than most of the other senior missionaries have in over a year of serving here. Our supervisors told us to get to know the country! We're glad for the chance to do just that. Hopefully we will be able to visit more in the future.

Valparaiso

To continue from our last blog post, below, we drove around the Valparaiso bay along the port side and up the hill to the Museo Maritimo Nacional.

The great port city of Valparaiso, Chile

Students outside the National Maritime Museum above Valparaiso. 

With a coast as long as Chile's, the entire national history is on display in this museum, including cool models of ships, uniforms, cutlasses, rifles, cannon, and shot.

Bro. Farias inside one of the capsules used to rescue the Chilean copper miners in 2010.

Soft alpaca wool scarves and woven shawl I bought at a feria artesenal near the maritime musem

One of the fine old buildings common in Valparaiso, now scrawled all over the street level walls

Busy, brash, immensely rich and poverty stricken, Valparaiso is a city full of students, street dealings, and communist slogans.

On the way back to Santiago, we stopped at Los Hornitos de Curacavi, a Chilean cowboy restaurant with dirt floors and mournful Mexican-style music in the background that the Chilenos made fun of. The roasted pork was excellent, the Ensalata Chileno (fresh avocado, peeled tomato, beets, peeled cucumber, carrots, julienned green beans, and peppers) served with fresh lemon and olive oil, was outstanding, and the cheese empanada and salsa picante was to die for. Bro. Farias and Hna. Villaroel thought it was very funny that I should want to photograph my food. I said it was to show my children that I was not starving in Chile.

Back in Santiago, we visited another feria artesenal. I bought lapiz lazuli earrings and a heart pendant set in silver.

One can never have enough earrings.

It was a relief to get back to the temple grounds. We attended a session and ended up being the witness couple. The surrounding garden was alive with families and couples well into the night. We shared what food we had in the Hospitality House with some very funny middle aged ladies.

Friday morning, we visited Self Reliance centers in Republica and Vitacura in Santiago. I like the "Director of First Impressions" titles on the desks. Elder K. and I realized we had been in the country one week. It seems like more.

Vitacura area of Santiago, from the 13th floor Self Reliance center. The 8.8 magnitude earthquake centered just off of Concepcion in 2010 has kept construction workers busy replacing & strengthening buildings throughout Chile.

In the afternoon, the four of us flew back to Concepcion, where on Saturday Bro. Farias gave a taller (tah-yer)--workshop--on the fundamentals of starting your own business, in the church on Calle Bulnes from 10:00 in the morning until 3:00 in the afternoon. There were probably 60, mostly women, in attendance. Even an education may not find you the job you want. Thus the ferias artesenales. Our barrio, the University Ward, has begun a cottage industry in weaving and crocheting. I saw some hand-woven wall hangings I wanted to buy, but instead the sister invited me to learn how to make them. Elder K. and I will attend the lessons in weaving on Tuesday evening. I was also asked about teaching computaciones--computer lessons--for members of the wards and stakes in Concepcion.

When we got back to our apartment, we were thrilled to find Elder Kimball had installed our new high-efficiency washer/dryer. Now if only Clint can position it so it doesn't try to spin itself right off the floor.

After the workshop, we stopped at the Super-Lider, which has the best pan de campos, country bread, and a baguette. The Kerrygold Irish butter is more expensive, but more like butter than extra-beaten heavy cream typical of the brands here. I ultimately couldn't resist trying the bread, and found I can tolerate it much better than bread in the U.S. Something about less gluten content in the wheat. Whatever it is, I still have to watch it, but I don't get screaming heartburn or flu-like muscle aches. The cute chicken on the fridge was a present from Elder K.'s sister Heidi Cameron.

Although we had a wonderful time visiting Chile's capital city Santiago and its colorful port, Valparaiso, we were glad to get back to our small-town Concepcion. What a relief. The traffic doesn't seem so bad anymore.

Santiago and Viña del Mar

We hadn't been in Concepcion a week when we discovered we were flying back to Santiago for capacitationes (training) with Bro. Carlos Farias, which turned out to be less like any training I've ever been in and more of a tour of the cities, countryside, visits to Self-Reliance Centers and to ferias artesenales, little shops tucked in the back corners of big cities. It turned out there was a reason for this.

Rising out of the Concepcion airport

Bro. Farias, the LDS church agent in charge of Perpetual Education Fund South, who made all the arrangements for our apartment and assignments in Concepcion, turned out to be fairly young, speaking good English, ex-Chilean navy, trained industrial engineer, father of four, and lover of the intensely sweet Chilean dulces. Elder K., Hna. Villarroel, and I had our carry on bags weighed at the Concepcion airport (17 lbs, the only city in the world I know of that weighs carry ons,) and flew the 50 minutes to Santiago.

Bro. Farias picked us up and took us to the LDS church complex, including the MTC, Santiago Temple and church offices, in the Providencia area of Santiago. Driving through Santiago, a city of six million people, in some ways reminded me of Los Angeles, where I grew up, especially the wide boulevards, palm trees, and tall sun-washed buildings.

LDS missionaries on the last day of training, about to be assigned to Santiago South Mission

Hna K. from the steps of the Hospitality House, with the temple in view. We stayed two nights in a little room with three bunk beds in it. Families from all over Chile stay here to attend the temple.

This cute little abuelita from southern Chile was enjoying her afternoon mate (mah-tay) in the common kitchen/dining area of the Hospitality House.

The Santiago Perpetual Education Fund couple, the Popes, in their office in Santiago. We went to lunch with Bro. Farias and the office couple from Arizona, the Udalls, in an excellent restaurant nearby. Il Papa (what the Chileans call Bro. Pope) turned out to be a childhood friend of Steve Laney, whom we visited while in the Provo MTC. They even sound alike. Wherever we go, whoever we meet from the U.S. is somehow related, went to the same early mission, or has common friends.

Thursday morning we set off for Vina del Mar to visit a Self-Reliance Center. On the way we stopped at the Millahue shop along the highway near Curacavi to buy giant meringues with mermelade (jam) called Reinas, very soft and very sweet, and bar cookies sandwiched with leches dulces, the sweetened condensed milk baked into a caramel consistency that you can find in bags in every market, often called Manjar. 

Chile is known for its hammered copper, which you can buy inexpensively here. I bought these Share Bowls for our change and etc. to free up the cereal bowls I had been using. 

The famous working garden clock in in the National Botanical Garden of Vina del Mar

Picture with Hna Villarroel and the carabineros of Vina del Mar. I am average in height for most Chileans, although the younger generation is growing taller. These carabineros are descended from the German settlers to the south, where you see more blond, blue-eyed, and taller Chileans than those descended from the Spaniards and the Mapuche Indians.

Wulff Castle, across the bay from Valparaiso

(Continued in the next blog post, above)