THREE WEEKS to go - Goodbyes

All being well, three weeks from now I'll be sitting in a cramped seat high above the Atlantic trying to get drunk enough to stop worrying about the pets freaking out in the hold below. Three weeks to go!

Already the lasts have begun. I had my last class at a business to the north of the city and cycled home for the last time via the old road with it's magnificent views of Santiago to the west and The Andes to the east. I marked exams for the last time today and used the bathroom on the 3rd floor with the paper towel dispenser that doesn't work for the last time. I paid the bills for the last time and sent out invoices for the last time. What was so long quotidian has just become nostalgic.

And with the lasts come the goodbye parties. On Sunday I had my first with one of the families that has adopted me here in Chile. My mum died when I was 16 and ever since I seem to have carried around a lost puppy vibe which makes people want to look after me. Here in Chile I have two families that have treated me like a son so it was a bit emotional saying goodbye to them. But, with a cocimiento* and my special Irish Whiskeys (the secret is extra whiskey) we made the best of it.

Next I have my goodbye DJ set at my local pub and then the 'danceable' goodbye party with my friends (I'm trying to think how to anglicise it. I wonder if Aga-doo would go down well). Then I'll have my goodbye picnic in the Andes. That will almost certainly be emotional.

A few people are trying to string out the goodbyes for as long as possible by accompanying me to the airport. I'm not having it. Getting to the airport is stressful enough. I don't need to be worrying about the logistics of 30 or so wallies half of whom are still on their way and half of whom need the toilet. Nope. The final few days will be just for me to say goodbye the way I want to. Snif.

*Cocimiento is a traditional dish from the south of Chile. Get a huge pot, fry up chicken, pork, sausage and some veg, fill it full of white wine, bung in a few kilos of shell fish, eat, sleep.

Five weeks and nine days to go - Ringworm and Finnish

Here in Chile everybody has football fever. What time is it? It's football o'clock, Who's your favourite player? Pele, etc etc. Yes. It's the Copa America.

The main difference this makes, apart from the increasingly annoying Chile chant (above), is that the streets are full of Chinese-made football tat and you can just about make out the occasional vuvuzela above the noise of the traffic. Apart from the amazing tension tangible throughout the city when the national team are playing, my favourite thing is the random cheers erupting as various immigrant groups celebrate their team's goals. I live in the centre surrounded tower blocks filled with Colombians, Peruvians, Bolivians and, as I discovered today when their cheers almost shook the cat off the balcony, Venezuelans. So, go red wine!*

Apart from football, it's cold. Today the temperature dipped down to zero for the first time this year (in Santiago). I took Dog for a long walk in the park around 8am and I don't think either of us particularly enjoyed it. My hands hurt and her ball chasing was particularly lacklustre. I had a quick check on temperatures in Finland and discovered that most years there are between 60-80 days when the average (AVERAGE!) temperature is below zero. Dog and I are going to have to get our act together quicksmart. 

Finally, Cat has tiña, ringworm in English. Strangely this is neither a worm nor a ring but a fungus. It also means that I have to shampoo his ears three times a week. How has it come to this? I found him on the bloody street!

Right, time for the final espisode of Game of Thrones. Speak soon. 

*The Venezuelan national team is nicknamed the Vinotinto, red wine, because they play in burgundy shirts. 

Six weeks and four days to go - Smog, More Strikes and Incan Gods.

So. Lots to report on.

Firstly, winter has arrived; however, this doesn't mean snowy streets and snowmen with inappropriately placed carrots but instead disgusting levels of air-contamination trapped in the city by the cooler air which, as any science teacher will tell you, is less disposed to rising and taking the filth with it. Normally this is assuaged (big-word high-five!) somewhat by winter-rains washing the air clean but this year Kon* is angry (or not paying attention) and it hasn't rained since Kon knows when.

Kon-man

Pre-emergency level has been declared for the last couple of weeks which means that children aren't allowed to do Physical Education at school because breathing too heavily might turn them into Dickens style urchins coughing up black lumps into a dirty tissue.

A very long snorkel please

Talking of school, there hasn't been much of it lately, nor University neither because everyone's on strike. I've mentioned the strikes before, they're kind of a tradition. That said, normally they'd have resolved themselves by now and we'd be back in class making up for lost time. This year the strikes have become quite hardcore: sporadic and passionate. Not quite at the level of the impressive 2011 protests which saw running battles day and night between students and police and eventually caused the academic year to be cancelled completely, but serious all the same.

Video recorded from my balcony. 2011.

The main problem is that Chile is The Neo-Liberal paradise. State control has long been sold off to the highest bidder and schools are now independently run much as any other business is. As we all know, businesses exist first and foremost to make money; that means reducing costs (low salaries, little investment) and increasing profits (high tuition fees). Teachers are pissed off with the low salaries, students are pissed off with the high tuition fees and everyone is pissed off with the lack of investment. You don't need much of an education to see that A+B+C = Strike!

Let the lesson be that education is not a good to be bought and sold (Who voted 'Cameron?').

OK. That'll do for now. I'll be back soon with details of my cat's scabby ears.

*Godchecker.com. YOUR GUIDE TO THE GODS
Discover almost 4,000 gods, goddesses and spirits from around the world - Genius.

Ten weeks to go.

On the weekend I had my big Buddhist sale and freed myself of all the stress-bringing possessions I could get a fair price for. The truth is that it was almost a giveaway; I hate mixing business and friendships but I did make enough money to cover the costs of the kennels and to buy myself a new laptop.

 Old laptop, a kind donation by V & A

Now I just have to do my usual three weeks of indecision and reading up on computer spec. before I commit to the model I want to buy.

Mostly the garage sale was just a great excuse to get lots of friends over, gossip and drink tea and mate (South American tea).

Delicious mate, mixed with water and drunk through a straw with a filter at the end

Twice my poor San Franciscan neighbour was dragged from his flat so people could see how much we look like each other; apparently the neighbours have been confused as to who they're speaking to.

The vet came by again yesterday and gave the penultimate jabs to Dog and Cat and check they still beep when neared to the requisite machine. They do.

And today there is a strike. You can set your watch by the student strikes and consequent marches. Each semester starts quietly until about two months in when strike is suddenly called, classes are cancelled and re-cancelled until finally encroaching holiday-times force both sides into breaking bread and making peace.

Marches are usually good fun to see, half carnival followed by half-Beirut (Christ, showing my age with that reference. Hang on! -Checks Guardian front page-) or half-Burundi (nice save), and with the added bonus that the main roads are all closed to cars so today I could whizz along on my bike to the doctor's appointment to be told I need physiotherapy on my knee because I keep whizzing around on my bike.

Me, bike, whizzing

Oh, and for the last time for me, and for anyone in Chile (neo-liberal reform), I got my tax-rebate last night so I treated myself to a nice bottle of malty beer. Will this rationing never end?

Happy days.

17 weeks to go - James Brown and Interstellar

It's raining. When I woke up this morning (for the 4th time - last night I got caught up in Interstellar so the snooze option had to work overtime to get me vertical today) I heard a disturbing sound. However it was not the jingle-jangle of a thousand lost souls but the tiny tap tap of a thousand rain drops on the rubber bush leaves.

   Rain is usually overdue in these parts and much like snow in England, is received with excitement and writing things on twitter. It should help to clean the contaminated air for a few hours so now's the time to breathe heavily.

   Much has been tackled on the Finnish front. Flying with the dog seems to be prohibitively expensive so it looks like I'll send her over first to be received by Skinny Girl and then I'll take a thirty-hour budget flight via Panama and the Dominican Republic with the cat. That reminds me, I must take them both to the vet ASAP.

   I've also spent many rather frustrating hours trying to update my CV. I can only presume that all computers have a pre-programmed bug which deliberately stops at least one sentence from lining up correctly with the others on the CV 'wizard'. Bloody wizard wouldn't last five minutes in middle-earth grumble grumble.  In the end I got it to look mostly right and told myself that I wouldn't want to work in a company that gives any weight to such trivialities anyway.

Help me with my c.v. Gandalf. 

   So. lots to do. Buy a dog kennel, buy flights, buy a new keyboard because everytime I need a comma I have to push the button three times. Moreover, like a panicked father expecting a child, I've put myself down for a lot of work so time is rather scant which in turn means it's passing more quickly and then I have less time to do everything. Yoiks! Perhaps some books will fall off my bookshelf soon and I'll realise that my father has travelled through time in order to communicate with me and help me create a crazy upside-down world in which we all get to Finland OK.

Ooh! Good thunder!

Back to work.