Three weeks down, nine to go...

School has officially started. We have been in it for to weeks now, and I have already given a speech and taken an exam. I've got another speech on Monday and an exam on Tuesday, plus tons of other little odd jobs. Things are moving incredibly fast, and I love it. For once I'm not wishing we would just get on with things, I like fast paced classes. My lengua class is taught by our program director Florencia and I really like it. It is just the simple learning Spanish class. Our lab is super easy, just listening and answering questions. Our lab teacher, Guillermo, is awesome. He is around 60 years old and has a British accent after studying English somewhere in London or Britain. He speaks very intelligently and you can tell he is constantly trying to think of how to make it as easy as possible for us to understand. My culture class is interesting, but I don't really like it. The teacher is cool because you can tell he is really in to the material, but he is super hard to understand considering he speaks solely in español. He blabs on and on about "identidad chilena" and "la famila chilena" and almost the entire time we have no idea what he is saying. He hardly ever asks us if we understand, doesn't pause long enough for us to say something, and speaks in incredibly elevated language. It is rather frustrating, but we are figuring it out. My Gramática teacher makes me die every day from either laughter, boredom or a mix of both. She talks to us like we are in kindergarten, it is absolutely ridiculous. I have not learned anything new in that class, it's all stuff we have already gone over in Lengua. Hopefully it will get better later when things are more difficult.

I am getting along really well with my family. My dad, Yerko, and I have been doing a lot together and he treats me like his own daughter. I love it. I haven't gotten to know my mom, Loreto, very well yet because she is very busy with work. My 17 year old brother, Yerko (yes the same name as his dad), and I haven't talked a lot because he is with friends a lot. He is very nice though, and I hope to spend more time with him later. My 8 year old brother, Andrei, is hilarious. He loves me right now because I play piano for him, and he is just learning. He always wants me to play and sing for him, and he quizzes me on the names of everything in the kitchen when we eat dinner together. I also have two nannies, both named Mary but pronounced differently. One is the normal pronunciation, the other is pronounced like Mah-ry. They are incredibly nice to me, and I cannot believe how much they do for us. They do laundry every morning, and I don't get it back till it is washed, hung dry, ironed and folded perfectly. They do all the dishes, and make all my meals. I don't even have to get up during meals for anything, they bring and take away everything. When I wake up in the morning my cereal and bowl are ready and waiting, and they always make sure to give me a snack for school. Their constant questions are "Was the water in your shower hot enough?", "Do you have any dirty clothes for me?", "Would you like to eat something?", and my personal favorite "Would you like dessert?". My family is already treating me as one of their own, even the nannies are starting to call me "mi niñeta" (my little girl). I love spending time with them, and they are all making my stay here much better.

I haven't done much since the last time I wrote, other than school, tons of homework and some trips to downtown. We went to Concepción yesterday and got to meet the president of the school. We also went to lunch at the beach and ate tons of cheese empenadas and fish. I'm pretty sure they had to make around 70 empenadas for us. The beach has black sand so I am bringing home a water bottle full to go along with my bottle of New Jersey sand. I also bought a present for Kristin at the mercado there. This week I am having coffee with my compañera on Monday, and we go to Viña del Mar in Valparaiso this weekend. Should be a nice weekend, and I'm sure I will have a lot to write about after.

Well, I think that I have written enough to take up sufficient amounts of time from your busy schedules =). I hope you are all doing well, I miss each and every one of you so much and can't wait to come home. Talk to you in a few days, chao.

Kayli

P.S. If you would like to see pictures just head to my facebook. I have 80 some odd pictures there. Love you all.