Check out the view!

Hi everyone!

I made it through my first week of school successfully and so far everything has gone pretty well. I have figured out the metro system to the best of my ability and know how to get to school, the mall, and back. I can pretty much buy whatever I want with no problems. I still kind of rely on the cashiers to either write down how much things cost or show me with how many fingers they hold up, but that is fine. When I am in a restaurant, now can tell people what to put on my sandwich or salad and it comes out pretty close to what I ordered. I am amazed with my progress.

Well, yesterday my classmates and I made plans to go rafting in the Andes mountains... however too many people bailed on the plans, so we had to cancel that. Cecilia woke me up this morning and told me to get ready quickly to leave for San Cristobal. It is this really famous statue on the top of a mountain in Santiago. So we left. It was hot out, but not too bad, about 85 degrees Fahrenheit. Here is a picture of the Virgen del San Cristobal.

So this is the statue. It is very very big. You can go inside the base and it is a small chapel. To get there, we took a ride up a lift to the top and walked down to get back. The view is the reason to go. It is absolutely beautiful from the top although the smog is thick. Carlos tells me that because Santiago is surrounded completely by mountains, the pollution just sits on top of the city because the wind can't reach to carry it away. It is like we are in a big bowl. So here are some of the views: (I took like a million pictures, but I only have a little bit of space for pictures on this blog, so I wanted to save some room).

See the smog? It is pretty bad - you can't see the skyline... or the huge mountains that are right there. But, it is really cool to see this much of the city.

I will write more some other time... For now, things are wonderful and I have few complaints. Miss you all. emily