XXX INTERNET CAFE & THE PURITY OF AMELIE Chile Journals Jan 6-7th

JANUARY 6TH


I bought my ticket back home today. I leave January 27th at 3:45 am.


I feel okay about this. I think. I mean, the options are better in the states for making money. I have a job waiting for me—a book to adapt to a screenplay, screenwriting classes to take and a place to live and my car! But…I said goodbye to that—to my work especially. And it’s hard to go back. How can I go back?!


But it’s time—my frozen check card dictates that it’s time to go back… of course my ticket back cost almost as much as I had saved because I had to buy it so quickly… which means when I return I will have pretty much no moola to my name.

Back to doing the nose to the grind.


I arrive at Chicago O’Hare at 6:55 pm. My friend Jess said she would road trip down to get me. Arriving in O’Hare saved me 300 bucks. Gotta tighten the belts here!

JANUARY 7TH

Puke, puke ahhhh! Vomit! I’m just in shock—so *******-what! WTF?! What is wrong with this city?! ******* disgusting bullshit! This city is driving me crazy!!!


At internet café—PORN CAFÉ! This guy exposes himself—yep whips out his ****** and w***** off on my leg! I didn’t realize at first—I mean his face and most of torso is covered by a little wall but oh no—his ****** was there for the whole world to see! His leg and thereby p**** were like centimeters away from me—I’m going to be sick.


I freaked out—I tried to get K’s attention but I couldn’t say what the effing problem was—she just kept asking, “what-what-what?” I pointed and pointed—I’m sure I looked like I was having a stroke—and then she looked down past my leg—her face went disgusted and I jumped up to pay my internet tab—K followed!


I wouldn’t look at the man’s face—cause I was afraid he would have some sick ass smile on his face. He saw me when he walked in. F***** PERVE.


I feel dirty—this place is dirty—I am sick of the hoots and hollers—the whistles, the men who stop talking the moment they see you and stare until you walk past—JUST STOP IT!


Sigh. I guess this explains why the keyboards were always sticky and there was white stuff on the chairs… and come to think of it, men would go in the bathroom all the time. Ooh and they would look at me before they went in. Oh gross.
I need a drink. I need to get out of here.
LATER

I tried to drink it away but I have no alcohol tolerance. I was done by one—one drink that is. We watched "Amelie" trying to get lost in the purity.

It didn’t work.

CONCUSSION, PLANE TICKET AND FIREWORKS Chile Journals Jan. 1-2

JANUARY 1ST 2010! NEW YEARS DAY!

So yesterday was crazy.


I went rock climbing with K and R. The first course went well except that everyone is yelling at me in Spanish—I am learning fast left and right in Spanish but it was confusing and I was trying to focus on climbing higher…


Then came the second course and well, something happened. I was up there and so close yet not to this ledge. I wanted it and I kept thinking, Ethan Hunt—Ethan Hunt, Nerissa! And so I mustered all my leftover strength and jumped aaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnndd slipped—I didn’t catch the ledge and I don’t remember what exactly happened… but I found myself on the ground and my head hurt and back hurt and there was blood and that freaked me out. That would freak ANYONE OUT! Cause I didn’t know where the blood came from or what was going on.


*The rope was caught in a crevice and slipped out when I missed the ledge causing my body to swing like a disoriented Tarzan into the opposite jagged cliff so I was informed later. The blood was from my head. And yes I cried. Stupid emo.


Then I helped K move in to our apartment—YEP SHE’S OFFICIALLY A NEW ROOMIE—but my head hurt so bad and I was tired.


R wanted me to go to the doctor but I think I’m fine… if I wasn’t I wouldn’t have woken up today right? Besides where would I have gone? He said he had a friend who was a doctor but I don’t have insurance.


Then K went out with a friend for New Years and my roommate and I celebrated together except I wasn’t much fun. I mean, I smiled and walked about but I really hurt. I looked in the mirror and my back was all scratched and it hurt when moved my arm—which makes me think I might’ve bruised another rib—which is fine, I brought my rib brace with.


I just feel spacey.


Oh, but New Years Eve is CRAZY HERE! The streets shut down completely! Everyone walks around the streets drunk or carrying alcohol—they sing—and fireworks that can be seen all down the coast…


The story goes with the fireworks that:


Vina del Mar, Renaca and Con Con are the richer, upper class Chileans while Valparaiso is made up of blue collar workers—the middle class to pobre. And the fireworks are for the people of Valparaiso who couldn’t afford to celebrate like those from their sister cities. It’s a nice story and the fireworks were beautiful and that’s not the concussion talking, I saw pictures today.

The fireworks started at midnight and that’s when the parties start! Not before and end after midnight, this country parties all next day—today! When I was walking down to the internet café at like 10 am, I heard people still drunkenly singing on a karaoke machine—in ENGLISH! So funny!

They love their 80’s down here! Depeche Mode is everywhere!


And the hair and sunglasses… it’s more 80’s than I ever experienced and I was born in 1980!

I didn’t drink last night either—I felt too looped already I didn’t want to go down that path—

JANUARY 2ND 2010

Decided to leave on the 31st de Enero. It feels like my hearts already left here. Es muy triste! Es no bien! I should be loving every moment—living every moment as if it’s my last cause what if it is?


I want to keep traveling. I hated coming back to Valparaiso from the South.


Maybe I’m not over what happened with our apartment. I don’t smile at people so much now—cause I wonder if they were the ones who did it and then well, I get kinda angry and make threats in my brain and I just don’t want to stay in Valparaiso anymore.

 *Ironic that I despised Valparaiso because on my first trip to Chile I LOVED VALPO and wanted to move there immediately.


It is a beautiful ciudad full of culture and art but most of all a reality check of life outside of the United States.


No matter how broke I could be I will never be as broke as many of the people there. They live in tin cans, burned and falling down. The higher the cerro (hill) the more impoverished they are. My roommate and I only drove up—up—up once and I saw life. Life I’ve never led and hope to never lead…


Living in Valparaiso made me grateful for the United States.


The events that happened earlier and are later expressed in upcoming journals are not…awesome.


Yes someone tried to break into our apartment 2 weeks after we moved in and yes it made me quietly paranoid and angry towards my neighbors.

But, because that happened I learned a pretty valuable lesson about what it means to be an outsider—not just language or culture but in understanding a different set of actions and consequences. But most of all it was about fear and the loss of power that happens when you don’t know the rules. (Not laws but societal rules).

138 Days until Departure and I Have to Pee

12:30 PM

Ooooooooooh it's about to happen. Mindy, my roommate, is walking upstairs WITH her credit card in hand! Guess what time it is--no not Tool Time!

IRELAND!

I'm going to learn some Gaelic. Mindy says she wants to learn Gaelic too. She told me to learn it first and then teach her.

Okay! So Mindy is getting the search ready. Tickets are down a $1 from yesterday. I'll take it!

We've decided on 3 weeks. 3 WEEKS!

We fly to Dublin and travel east and south. Then we will take a boat to England--from there we wander England and Wales (potentially), eventually taking a train north to Scotland.

From Scotland we make our way to Northern Ireland via boat (or cold swim) and wander-wander-WANDER (laugh & prance too) south and west eventually heading east and north back to Dublin to fly home.

BUT WAIT! As we are booking the tickets we find ourselves on a 22 hour layover in JFK.

NEW YORK CITY BABY!

So we are going to grab a cab, get a hotel room (Garment District) and I'm going to show Mindy around NYC for my birthday!

Gosh I've been missing New York so much lately. This is good. Really good!

Can you tell how excited I am? I almost need to run to the bathroom and tinkle.

1 PM

Okay I held my bladder AND it's official.

I'M GOING TO IRELAND!

Eek! 138 days until departure!

I have to pee.

Nothing More than a Gnat in the Hair

Today I sat with a TOTAL STRANGER and chatted about life. Not about our ideology of living but of the honest what-what joy and sorrow of being alive.

It was awesome. It was painful. I guess if I put it in an analogy (cause I love analogies!) it was living.

It was honest too. I had nothing to lose in telling the truth. He was a clean slate. He knew nothing of my past woes or willfuls and I nothing of his. So we spilled--on accident mostly--what affected, afflicted, reconnected us to life.

People.

We discussed people and their choices--our choices made upon their choices and where that has led us now.

This is all ambiguous to you, but know that our conversation mattered to me. Enough that I'm sitting here on my couch watching the Military Channel (Hitler's Bodyguards) at 1 something in the am wondering not about the future or even the past, but who I am now.

And I think, tomorrow I'm buying a ticket to Ireland. Today I worked hard at being a good friend. This morning I only drank one cup of coffee and switched it out for tea. Last night I went to a jazz club and an open mic poetry jam (oh my!) and clapped for EVERY PERSON UP THERE. It takes guts. And booze.

If I delve deeper into me I find a certain pain that's "afflicted" my senses for a time and have totally despised the affect it's had on me.

But tonight/today after chatting with this stranger about where I've been (not just physically) and where he's going (somewhat emotionally) I think, shit, life's short.

And the affliction that's been plaguing me, when blended with the daily choices I'm making, becomes nothing more than a gnat in the curly hair--annoying for a time but eventually squashed and given no more thought.

So, TOTAL STRANGER (with no danger) who let me let ME out for a bit today, thank you, I needed that.

Just Another Day at the Water Cooler

To paraphrase my co-workers conversation:

It's like we live here.

We get up.

S***.

Shower.

Go to work.

I see the same guests every day.

I saw them last night.

And now I see them this morning.

They always ask, "What's new?"

Well, nothing since last I saw you.

Yesterday.

In fact, nothing has been new for awhile.

Since I'm here every day.

Get done.

Have a drink or two.

Go home.

Pass out.

Come back.

I'm going to start lying to people when they ask me, "What's new?"

I'm dying.

That'll work the sympathy tips.

AMARETTO SOURS, ISRAELI ARMY, AND FROZEN ASSETS Chile Journals Dec. 27th-30th 2009

DECEMBER 27TH

PUCON, Chile


It’s rainy here. Like super rainy! Ahhhh!


Sitting at internet café and coffee shop. But the coffee is good! Real.


PUCON is totally a tourist town! It’s at the base of a volcan. The town has tourist shops all over providing equipment to surf, waterski, ski, climb, kayak, white water raft—you name it. Unfortunately it is a cold, cold rain and I’m just getting over whatever gross flu I had—


CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT?! I got the flu when it was warm out? How does that make sense? I do get the flu every year around Christmas… do you think my body just knew?


Last night we met a bunch of people from the Israeli army. Three years you have to be in it. Two if you are a girl—required! Once the three years is up they take the money that had been paid to them during their army stint and head for South America—like everyone. It’s almost like a rite of passage: Leave army, travel to South America.


I noticed they cooked and ate together in the hostel—like a family style. And it turns out that they didn’t know each other before South America; that they met while traveling.


I guess that’s how K and I met—became great friends—she’s from the USA too. It’s easier to get closer to someone who speaks the same language and understands the same culture…


I would like to get to know more people from Chile though it’s been hard and I’ve gotten sloppy or maybe just overwhelmed by the language.

LATER

STOPPED RAINING!


K and I had a good chat today. We’ve decided to go to Buenos Aires, Argentina in a couple of weeks. Por que no? Why not?!


I’m thinking I’m going to stay in South America as long as I can afford to and just travel all over Chile, Argentina, Peru and wherever I can hit.


When the money runs out, I’ll go home.

DECEMBER 29TH

Back in Valparaiso this morning. Tired. Tired Tired. What a trip. It was really good but was admittedly a strain on one friendship and a great bonding experience for another.


I am at Alimapu! The best bar in Valparaiso and I bet in the whole world. I am biased because they make the best Amaretto Sours—it’s a freaking art here.


I wish I took more pride in my job as bartender.

DECEMBER 30TH

Because I can.


I bought my ticket to Buenos Aires! Kaley and I leave on the 9th and get back on the 18th!


But Houston we have a problem! Big problem!


My freaking check card is frozen!

Apparently my second check card from a relatively unknown bank does not register here in Chile. I shouldn’t be surprised. My Wells Fargo only worked at 1 out of 3 ATM’s but holy Hannah and cheese, that’s half my money on that check card.


Plus, this check card apparently doesn’t work online! Which it’s supposed to but there’s a glitch.

So I bought my ticket to Buenos Aires with my credit card and I have some cash left and enough dinero on my Wells Fargo to get by for awhile… but this means I either choose to live in Valparaiso and work, slowly gaining a savings to travel or… move back to the states.


WHY DON’T YOU WANT MY MONEY CHILE?!

It’s my money…


I want to keep traveling! This is bullshit.