Happy 30th Birthday Talluah.

“Would you like to have a sleep-in for your birthday, mum?” 

Sounds like a nice gesture doesn’t it?  Just so there is no ambiguity, 7:15 is now considered a sleep-in.

The day started with presents at the breakfast table as the girls and I had a big day planned for Talluah.  Talluah is now sporting some of great fashions from Valparaiso.  Though she would look fantastic in anything today she was particularly beautiful in her jacket made by a local artisan.

We met up with Boris this morning and headed out to Quintay.  If you’ll pardon the cliché, Quintay is a sleepy little fishing village forty-five minutes south of Valpo.  It was once a whaling station and there is a very small museum with photographs from the 1950s when the station was in its heyday.  The museum isn’t a highlight but it does allow you to get to some great viewpoints along the craggy shoreline.

Talluah is a keen seafood fan and Quintay offers some great fresh seafood.  Boris showed us parts of Quintay that we wouldn’t have found on our own, such as Playa Chica (Small Beach), which is in the opposite direction to Playa Grande.  We went out to Playa Chica to help walk off lunch but the day slowly changed from brilliant sunshine to a crisp breeze.  We headed into town to catch a colectivo but in winter they aren’t very regular so we waited for the next bus.  In the next fifty minutes the crisp breeze turned into a fog, which forced us to huddle in the bus stop.  When the bus driver opened the bus we ran to the warm vehicle.

Back at the apartment we sang Happy Birthday by the glow of a single candle on a lemon merengue cake.  Thank you to all the people who sent birthday wishes and helped out with the Spanish lessons Talluah was thrilled. 

Rainbows and lollipops.

It’s my last night as a twenty nine year old.  Apparently turning 30 is not all about me.   This morning I skyped my parents and had a little whinge about the lose of my twenties when my mum informed me that she was far worse off then I as she now had to come to terms with the fact that her baby was thirty.  Luckily my darling husband chimed in and said, how do you think I feel I’m not married to a twenty something anymore. 

Another performance of Protest Lake took place today.  The protestors (we’re unsure of their motivation) approach from one side ready with their placards.  The carabineros drove up in their green buses with windows covered in mesh.  The water canon also made a special guest appearance.  We find it’s best not to hang around and see what develops.  At the moment there are two main groups of people protesting.  The first is to stop the damming of part of Patagonia.  The other group is the uni students who want free education.  

It’s raining, it’s pouring.

According to our guidebooks and other anecdotal evidence we have had a year’s worth of rain in the last three days.  It rained through Monday night and in the morning when we awoke it was still pouring.

We didn’t pack any wet weather gear and are yet to purchase a raincoat or umbrella.  We live on a pasaje, a street only for foot traffic.  There was no way we could get to the end of street without needing a complete wardrobe change.  We decided against using the plastic tablecloth from Truce’s party and opted to let the kids stay home for the day.  An hour after we announced the news the cloud departed and we had the bluest sky we’ve had in months.  Once you’ve told kids they can wag school it’s near impossible to reverse the decision. 

Indiana showed us her passionate side and stayed in her PJs until after lunch.  Not wanting to waste such a beautiful day I suggested a trip to the park.  Forty minutes later we were finally ready to go.  When theses kids have a day off they really take it seriously.  Luckily the lure of a muddy park was strong enough to get them out of the house and we all enjoyed our three day weekend.

School policy is that if a child misses school she has to catch-up with homework and class work.  Indy and I spent ninety minutes on Tuesday doing all the work she missed at school and we didn’t finish it.

We had more rain this morning and two little smiling faces climbed into our bed and asked if they could have another day off school.  This time we were one step ahead of the weather and set about getting ready for school.  Fortunately we were right and the rain turned into a light mist by the time we had to leave.

Yellow.

We caught up with our friends from The Yellow House and they've increased their range of services for people travelling through Valparaíso.

Apart from the fantastic service and views you get from staying at the B&B, they can give you a real taste of Chile.  The Yellow House offers cooking classes where you are taught how to make traditional family recipes.

If you've brought your walking shoes you can join in on one of their walking tours and learn the stories behind some of the more important buildings and places of Valpo.

And for those who want to be able to converse in Spanish, The Yellow House offers Spanish for Travel.  Learn from qualified native speaking Spanish teachers.  Lessons are a combination of theory and real life practice in the city.  What better way is there to learn a language?

If you're staying in Valparaíso for a night or a month you must call The Yellow House.  They will do their very best to make sure you have a fantastic time here.

Saved by the bomberos.

We made plans to be spontaneous today and waited outside the Lider for 45 minutes to catch a bus to Laguna Verde.   A place we have never been to and still have not been to.  For even though the bus to Laguna Verde has said name plastered over its windscreen we did not see such a bus.  Fortunately for us the bomberos were doing a demonstration across the road so we watched that instead.

They had ladders lashed together to form a star, a pyramid and an A-frame.  They even did a demonstration of jumping into a net, something I thought they only did in the movies.

I’m lousy at buying presents and with less than a week to go for Talluah’s birthday we went for a walk around some of the funkier shops and Talluah was instructed to give me a subtle sign when she saw something she liked.  The subtle sign was hidden in this phrase, “I like that.”

Truce has a thing for holding onto people’s ears.  The more tired or worried she is the more she plays with someone’s ears.  You know you have passed the Truceworthy test when she holds your ear.  We asked her if she plays with her teacher’s ear at school.

“No,” said Truce.

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t know how to say ‘bend down’ in Spanish.”

Later in the day I had to make an emergency dash to the Lider to buy milk.  While I was waiting for the green man to appear the Laguna Verde bus went by, four hours too late.   There’s always next Sunday.  

Weather report.

Ricky very tactfully fore mentioned that our t-shirt to jumper ratio was way off but I’m going to drop the tact.  The person responsible for researching and packing for our year away should be sacked.  Talk about dropping the ball.  I looked in our Lonely Planet and I browsed the net but I somehow failed to grasp that Valpo is a port and is therefore often cloaked in fog.   Fog alone doesn’t cause an issue it’s when you combine it with 3 degrees and slippery cobble stone roads that it becomes a problem.  I watched a lady in 2 inch heels slip over on the road this morning.  I jogged over to help her up in my sensible converse sneakers and nearly joined her on the ground. 

Ricky and I both seem to have arrived in an interesting place with our Spanish skills. We are hearing a lot of words we know but are quite unable to understand their meaning when put together.  This afternoon I was asked a question at the school.  I discerned the words running, my son, change and tomorrow.  I could do nothing but stand there with a frustrated look on my face and ask my friend to write it in an email.  Now all I can do is hope she will.   

Postage paid.

By chance we were playing on the slide outside our apartment when the post lady rang our doorbell.  After a quick conversation we found out that she had mail for us.  All very exciting in this age of electronic correspondence.  Doubly exciting because there were two letters for us.

She then asked for 100 pesos.

100 pesos isn’t much but my inner voice has short arms and long pockets.

There’s a stamp on the envelope.

Apparently you pay the post person to deliver your letters here.  Isn’t this their job?   I’m just glad that we don’t get junk mail or we’d go broke.

One of the letters requested my presence at the Department of Long Waits and Plastic Chairs.  Good news on the visa front thought I.  So I put on my Sunday bests and headed for the Dept of LW&PC but now that it is the quiet season not as many people are here looking for work.  Instead of the mandatory 90 minute wait I was able to go in straight away and speak to the person I spoke to last time.

Yet again there is a detail that needs to be clarified on my contracts.  I need to have an annex added to the contracts, signed and notarised to state that I am not working at opposite ends of the city simultaneously.  I have a feeling that at Christmas time, as we are packing our bags, I will see a stamp in my passport allowing me to stay in Chile for a year.