And so the eating commences...Chilean empanadas

Peumo is a small town in the 7th region of Chile.  It was named after the large amount of Peumo trees that grow there.  It is surrounded by hills which means it benefits from a micro-climate   For that reason there are an array of plants products that are cultivated there including oranges, avocados, cherries and grapes.  When we first arrived it seemed quite a tranquil place, but my preconceptions were obliterated when everything came alive in the holiday celebrations.

I really did feel privileged to celebrate Chilean independence in huaso country, "the heart of Chile" as I really felt that I got to experience first hand the Chilean culture and customs.  Here is what I was lucky enough to witness:

Empanada making
I fear I may have eaten a year's supply of empanadas in that one week alone. They are very popular in Chilean cuisine and for the British reader they are best described as the South American Cornish Pasty.  Inside the pastry case you can find a variety of delicious fillings, each with its own particular name, flavours and textures.

One filling that particularly took my fancy was la Napolitana, which consisted of ham, red pepper, tomato, black olives, boiled egg and cheese.

They are prepared by rolling out the pastry and cutting it into a circular shape.  The filling is then placed in the centre and the pastry folder over.  Water is brushed around the edge to stick the sides together and then the dough is pushed together tightly.











Then comes the decoration in the form of folding the edges of the dough in different patterns.   This also has a practical function, as each different filling is identified by giving the empanada a different pattern or shape.







They are then cooked at high temperatures in a mud oven, quite like a pizza oven, for about 30 minutes.

In my experience they are best served straight from the oven.  Oh, and they must be eaten using your hands. My Chilean friend Pablo is adamant that "no cutlery is allowed"!

And so the partying begins...

What a week! What a week! What a week!  This country has turned into a fiesta hotspot and it's all in aid of the Fiestas Patrias!

After being at uni just two weeks, we were granted a week's holiday to celebrate Chile's independence day, the 18th September.  Most people were given three days holiday but schools and universities profited from a whole week's worth of festivities.  The date of the celebrations is not in fact when Chile actually gained independence, but it is when the process began.

Despite being given a week off, university students feel the need to start partying from the Friday afternoon beforehand in what's known as las Ramadas.  Classes are suspended from 12pm and the campus is magically transformed into a music festival before your very eyes.  I headed down with some friends at around 5pm and it really had kicked off! The Universidad de Concepción really does lend itself to a glastonbury-esque festival as it is surrounded by luscious woods and has a large expanse of green pasture.  At the end of the large area a stage had been erected complete with musical instruments, gigantic speakers and flashing lights.  Throughout the night different bands and DJs entertained the crowd and I really enjoyed an ecclectic mix of rock, reggae, reggaeton and cumbia.  There was even a cueca or two thrown in, which sent the crowd into histerics as they jumped around waving their makeshift hankies around their head and performing the national dance, Cueca.

After a Terremoto or two, no make that just one as a single glass of this toxic drink consisting of white wine, grenadine and pineapple icecream is enough to set you on your merry way, I was linking arms and joining in as if I'd been dancing it all my life!
The area was also encircled by stalls that students themselves had set up selling all the typical drinks including Ponche (white wine with fruit pieces), Borgogna (Red wine with fruits) and Chicha (a heavily fermented wine).  The beer had a price of 300 Chilean pesos which is roughly 40p!  Insanely cheap.
The party moved at around midnight from the uni to the take aways and then on to flat parties where we ate, drank and danced salsa, bachata and merengue among other things. Definitely my kind of partying.

                    

From that day on and for the rest of the week Chile was saturated in Chicha, partying, barbecues, empanadas and cueca.  Making the most of the holiday time Claire and I went to stay with a friend of hers, Isaac, who lives in a little town called Peumo in the O'Higgins region.  The night we arrived we were whisked off to yet more partying but this time town styley, in makeshift pubs, bars, restaurants, arcades and nightclubs set up especially for the week in what is known as la Fonda.  It really did have the "eat, drink and be merry" atmosphere that us Brits are so familiar with at Christmastime, but with just a hint of cowboy thrown in for good measure. Just brilliant.

And so the Chilean winter begins.....

It seems that Chile is the exact opposite of the UK when it comes to weather.  In England, the further south you travel, the warmer the temperatures become.  In Chile, I travelled 6 hours south of the capital and am now freezing my Royal Rastafarians off (or I would be if I had any)!  On arrival at my home for the next ten months, a cute and slightly dated flat close to the centre of the city, my landlady greeted me with a kiss on the cheek and a lesson on how to fill the "top quality German hot water bottle" effectively.  I guess I won't be needing all those beautiful sandals I packed for a while then.... 

The two German girls who are currently staying in the flat inform me that our landlady ,Teolinda, is absolutely lovely, but a little bit crazy.  Indeed, it seems she felt the need to remind us not to do things that seem common sense to me (which I know I tend to lack at times before you say anything school friends) as number eight of the flat rules was "Do not let in stray dogs".  At first this seemed extremely strange to me, especially as I live on the fifth floor of a tower block so it wouldn’t be the easiest thing to do.  However, when I think back to the sights I saw in Santiago, it makes a bit more sense.  After a night out in the capital, we were walking home and were very quickly joined by two stray dogs who were flirting outrageously with each other.  We couldn’t seem to shake them and eventually it seemed like they were protecting us on our walk back to the hostel.  Lots of taxis kept pulling up to offer us lifts home but we kept declining.  After a while a taxi actually parked up near us.  Instead of asking us if we wanted a lift, he asked if the dogs belonged to us!   When he realised they didn't, he proceeded to ask if he could feed them.  Out he jumps from the taxi to open the boot and before we know it he’s tipping a mountain of food out for the dogs from a giant bag of dog food.  Thinking about it later, none of the stray dogs seem to be malnourished, so I guess the Chileans take it upon themselves to look after them if they can.  I think the RSPCA would have a heart attack if they saw them all on the street!

Stray dogs also accompanied us up the San Cristobal hill in Santiago.  We kept crossing paths with them both up and down.  It was quite a trek! The view from the top of this hill/mountain was incredible, and the beauty of it was that the view kept changing due to the smog.  We sat there for about three hours, and every half hour a new snow-topped mountain would come into view as another disappeared from sight!  Apparently the best time to go is first thing in the morning after it has rained the night before so that the smog has cleared.  Fingers crossed for a rainy day next time I’m in Santiago.

Speaking of climbing mountains, I did just that my first full day in Concepción.  There are tonnes of national parks in the hills just behind my university campus.  I went for a little hike with my two German flatmates and two Chilean girls from the lab.  The idea was to go up one side and come back down the route through the university.  The only problem was that none of us had done it before and up on the hill there were no signposts telling us which way to head.  So we went all over the place until we got to a dead end.  Then another dead end.  In short we were pretty lost.  Luckily there were a group of guys doing a dirt bike competition on the same hill.  One of the men took pity on us and as we started to head what we thought was back down again, he pulled up in the pick-up truck that he'd been using to ferry the bikers back up the hill and offered us a lift.  So we all hopped in the back and off we went.  Although he was going slowly, it felt like a roller coaster because of all the twists, turns and bumps.  It really was fun!  The woods we were walking in really are beautiful.  They reminded me of Twilight to the point that when stopped for lunch I kept half expecting Edward Cullen to appear from behind a tree and declare his undying love for me. Nahh, only joking! Sort of.

I took a rather less exciting form of transport to arrive in Concepción than the pick-up truck; the bus.  However, this definitely had its perks and interesting sights.  First of all as taking a bus is the most common form of transport for getting around the country, it comes in different varieties.  For example, when booking your seat you have to decide if you want a normal seat, a semi-bed or a full blown premium bed for those extra long journeys (bus rides here can last as long as 30 hours).  We went for semi-bed or semi cama, which was extremely comfortable and had large foot rests and reclining seat backs.  I’d already been warned that time keeping here in Chile was less relaxed for certain things than in Spain for example, and bus times is one of them.  We left very punctually from Santiago and seemed to be keeping time until a stop in a place called Talca.  We made a stop at a sort of bus depot that is only for drivers.  It has beds and showers so that they can rest after long journeys.  We were sat there for about fifteen minutes, which was obviously far too long for the other passengers.  There was already talk of putting in a formal complaint and then all of the sudden the bus erupted with noise as the passengers started stamping their feet in chorus to try and get the driver’s attention!  It actually worked too! Maybe we should try that in the UK when National Express are keeping us waiting.

I better stop this post before it gets too long, but I have much more to tell from this week.  I’ll leave you with the strange coincidence that I discovered when registering with the police department here in Concepción.  Despite my parents putting a lot of effort into picking an original and uncommon first name for me to distinguish me from so many other Smiths, it appears that in fact I am not the only Karina Anne Smith on this planet, in fact, I'm not even the only Karina Anne Smith in Concepción.  Someone with the exact same name, and someone who is only three years my senior, has registered as a foreigner in this city!  I wondered why they kept asking me if I had been here before!  Spooky or what?!