CHI CHI CHI LE LE LE

SO I say this everytime...Its been a while. Soz.

Life in La Casa Grande has returned to normal after the quake and we are officially back to school after a long but well deserved break. Been getting the odd tremor through here and there but nout more than usual and nothing unexpected. Its been great to get involved with the relief aid out here and we had THE BEST night ever a couple of weeks back.

Shortly after the quake - the red cross and us guys helped bag up clothing donations and load them on to the back of a truck. Maria then asked us if we could help out at the local disco - they were asking for food donations instead of entry fees and needed us to collect and pack them. Disco time? Sure. We're game. So we head to the red cross to see the huge lorry get packed and go - all jump in cars and parade around calera - lead by the police with sirens blaring. The lorry is honking its horn...and people started filing on to the streets to see what the commotion is. We drive past people who start clapping and cheering. Amazing. We then head to the disco where we boogie whilst collecting food. People are turning up with dry pasta, tins, nappies, oil. Me and kerrianne decide to take a break for a while to throw some shapes and hit the dancefloor. We were suprised with the sight we saw - this disco was rammed, hot and sweaty. So we headed for the middle of it and joined in with the Chi Chi Chi Le Le Le Viva Chile chants. Brilliant. Ive never felt so patriotic in my life. PLUS do chileans do dance training??? These girls can SERIOUSLY shake their hips and my british ones in comparison just werent the same. 4 hours later - we head home with probably the best feeling of accomplishment ive ever experienced in my life and the ongoing promises that we shall and will create a disco appreciation society between the volunteers out here and become regulars whilst teaching our hips to lie.

Its REALLY annoying uploading photos on to here - so if you wanna see pics check out the Gap Chile facebook page and browse away.

The new additions to the house have been a treat for us ladies who were starting to get withdrawal symptoms if we left the group dynamic - is sharing a room wierd despite the space we have at the moment? I hope not because we're not going to change it.

So this year kicked off to a good start and theres an awesome atmosphere in the school - we were all dreading the first couple of weeks because our nursery director (Maribell) told us that the first few weeks will be the hardest for the kids to adapt as for many its the first time they would have been away from their parents BUT 3 weeks in and we still have kids who are crying when their parents arrive to pick them up. Brill.

The kids have warmed to us pretty quickly but the long break in spanish has definately had a toll on my mother and not so mother tongue. The only languages I seem to be speaking at the moment is caveman or jibberish. Aaaah well...I feel for this reason alone I seem to be able to bond with children pretty well. Pointing and general grunting seem to be common ground for us.

We have also decided to do lent this year/compete who is going to break lent. And for some stupid reason we decided to give up bread and chocolate. Bad Choice. Plus my spanish vocabulary doesnt cover why I cant eat bread but can (and will) continue to eat truck loads of pancakes and other doughy assortments.

We've also been bezzying up to the VSP in Chile with a few memorable moments with the boys. We're all picking up the beautiful american accent and every other word that seems to be coming out of our mouths is "sick" or "brochillin". Maybe its time to ween ourselves away from this before we start teaching the chids to speak in this manner - plus its ended in a few tearful moments - throwing up in the sea, getting hit in the face and putting my wetsuit on backwards. I feel ive made a strong impression. Mission completed.

Anyway for now i feel its time for:

Over and Out,

xxx

Terror-moto

With my dad insisting to know all.. I have promised to write a blog and lets face it..this has been probably the most exciting thing so far.

La Casa Grande and everyone who inhabits it are all fine, well and safe. Our thoughts go out to everyone less fortunate. We have been amusing ourselves since the quake lastnight and have been in high spirits (if you dont have your sense of humour..what have you got ey? except your health i suppose!) Phew!

SO as kerry has mentioned that little high maintenance dog of ours had friggin peed on my bed and I. was. Not. Happy. So off i stropped to another room because i couldnt be arsed to change the sheets at 12am when there were made up beds elsewhere in the house. Managed to snooze off despite obvious excitement for hitting the beach at 4am (we had planned to go camping but none of us have sleeping bags or tents so it was definately going to be an interesting trip) when I felt a tremor start at 3.30 roughly am chile time. So firstly, like the sensible person that i am, I decided to try and sleep through it, but after about 5 seconds it was obvious it was getting stronger until I was sat up and rattling around in my bed. So having earlier broken the group dynamic by moving to a different room (did i mention that stupid dog peed in my bed?) I was alone and wondering what the hell to do. So as i listened for movement in other areas of the house I contemplated getting under my bed because:

a) I had small pieces of ceiling falling on me
b)I had visions that this might be what was happening in other areas of the house
and more importantly
c) thats what the little girl does in The Little Princess and she survived so i thought why the hell not

at this moment I see maria swing my door open and shout "Nina Nina get out of the house...RUN!"- Shit. As i run out of the room I can hear stuff falling off the shelves and as I peg it down the corridor I can feel the floor moving under my feet. This really IS like funhouse.

I meet everyone at the top of the stairs and amongst the quake noise i just hear "run run" and as I follow kerry and kerrianne down the stairs I pause to wonder JUST how well kerrianne is managing to not fall down the moving (dare i say swaying) staircase..but 2 seconds later kerry and kerrianne cause a jam by kerrianne frantically trying the front door to find that its locked...to only keep trying the door (kerrianne..its locked) and kerry arms flailing shouting "where am I going where am i going??" I run past them both to lead the way to the back door (ladies remember? This house does have more than one exit) To panic 2 metres from the door as i hear crashing and genuinely start thinking the walls are coming down...thankfully to quickly realise its everything falling over and smashing in the kitchen PHEW - Back door key engaged...door open...freedom. Ah. Simples.

Wait a second...in my haste I have completely forgotten that i am just in a t-shirt and pants. oh lordy.

after the quake passes and im by now freezing my bosoms off...we remember poor little princess lia has been locked in one of the rooms. That will teach her. No I have not forgotten that she peed in my bed. Uncle jaime appears at the door...notices my scantily clad appearance and tells me to go get shoes, blankets and a pair of trousers from upstairs but he adds "be quick...(dramatic pause) another one is coming" "okay jaime" shit.

I run upstairs...grab 3 apprópriate pairs of footwear.
1) green trainers sent by kerrys mother in the post. done.
2) flip flops. theyll do.
3) red strappy sandals. unlucky.

what? jaime told me to be quick. Grabbed the pissy blanket off my bed and whatever i could find in the dark (the SHORTEST hotpants alive) and peg it downstairs.

Still huddled outside...maria is scrambling around looking for batteries and gustavo is rattling off instructions to us girls. Im so glad i can understand spanish in emergency situations quote "well girls, from what i got of that, its either going to get much better or much worse". Jaime continues to tell us that this was no tremor..this was a terror moto. Yes jaime that sounds about right.

As the tremors slighten...we all move back inside...accompanied by the family who have all braved the small travel here...we bring down mattresses and blankets and all huddle waiting for more. Maria freaks us out every time by pegging for the door every time a tremor starts and by this point our poor british hearts cant handle much more. quote - "girls, if anything happens i just want to say I love you" - three british girls getting emotional on kids gym matts. I then break the tension by asking the question that has been confusing me since i was rudely awoken at 3.30 am "so...are we still going to the beach??" No. Ella we are not. Damn shame.

We salivate as maria passes around chocolate and bread (RUDDY LENT) and fall asleep on kids gym mats. By 11am phone lines are still down...still no agua and no electricity. News from home is letting us kids know that this was a pretty bad quake but we were 200 miles from the epicentre. We manage to get hold of friends in valpo who have declared theyre going to nap and then go in search of beer.

We head into the centre to check out the damage: couple of electricity poles ontop of a car...broken windows but other than that La Calera is intact and is not stopping for anything. We pop into abueli, clear up glass and broken plates, look for lost cat (claim to look for lost cat...that thing is evil) and find hoards of food storage...brilliant, we will come back here when all goes pear shaped.

So thats it for now folks. We got electricity back briefly lastnight....and the toilet flushed this morning (that was a relief cause our ensuite bathroom was smelling FUNKY) But water has gone again...apparantly for 5 days this time. Great. We are so glad we all decided to get up early at 4am and shower before we went on our beach trip.

Over and Out,

Ella Touching Cloth Duran

"Thats so hot" - Paris Hilton 2010

Okay so just to start this off I would like to say a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all my fans out there (you know who you are)...i shall get to the events of that delightful night but all in due course.

Also a MASSIVE shout out to our NEW and dare i say beautiful volunteer Kerrianne Connolly who has decided she too would like to find her roots in the chilean land, change her name to pablo and put on 3 delightful well earnt stones.

Okay so Think this should probably start out with a mention of the CUTEST kids ever....(i say cutest..i cant control them in the slightest despite my best OI YOU LISTEN) but cute nonetheless orphan kids who we had the pleasure of spending a xmas party with which as all xmas parties have: waterslide, tug of war, waterballoon volleyball and the essential coconut shy. Followed by the onslaught of all the sugar we could find to fill their lovely bellies ready to return to the nuns (haha -thats a sentence i never thought id say). A massive thank you to everyone (im not even sure if youre reading this) but everyone who helped in some way with the container. Thanks to the nottingham school that donated SO much stuff we were totally overwhelmed by the goodness that luckily still exists in this world by all the people who helped load, donate, unload and generally support the project we have going on here. Im guna put it out there and say thanks to the Conollys - family of Kerrianne - who have done nothing but support this and load the container up - sending you love from across the globe. Well done to the Duran family for working their asses off too dare i say - all i had to do was watch the chilean men unload. KA CHING. Computers, books, furniture. We managed to salvage some decent presents for kids who really dont have much so on a truly serious note thank you. thank you. thank you.

AND the numero uno family durans arrived in the Chile land and OH BOY did they bring jokes. Started off with my mother running into our room at an atrocious hour (8am is NOT acceptable) and presenting me with a very early christmas present WHILST jumping on my bed. Mother you are just too cool. And low and behold she has purchased me some very snazzy very comfortable rollerskates and declares roller hockey war.

So we put the walking sticks to good use before we pass them on to the red cross (i promise it all is really going to a good use and not just for accessorizing out slightly violent hockey games)

Kerry gets a taste of the Durans competetive side by getting taken out by Mr Duran who shortly takes himself out soon after.

This is La Caleras new up and coming rollerhockey team and boy do we take this seriously.

So seriously infact that the skates get taken to the streets to practise our stides....until kerry stacks it up a curb, gives herself an amusing knee graze and sulks home, pride dashed.

Andrea Bowie takes her leave and returns to the homeland forever. Peace salvador...the sound of your feet and bracelets will haunt me forever.

Followed by plenty of water times:

Here (i probably shouldnt write this...i think the O'neill family will ring my neck) we had totally undestimated the current whilst rock jumping and on our return this is pretty much what happened, kerry proceeds to tell me MID swimming and i quote "im not a very good swimmer". er? I dont know what to say on that matter kerry. Youre in the water...youre guna have to SOMEHOW get over that. Also this may also have been how she lost her camera (well i say lost...more like broke...maybe more like drowned) whilst our second attempt at rock climbing a few weeks later (if you think we mightve learnt you were wrong) followed by "KERRY NOOOOOOO" splash. ow. An escaped giggle on my part and a full blown argument between kerry and ella where kerry thinks it acceptable to lecture ella for kerry falling in the water with her camera and i think its perfectly acceptable to find the whole situation very amusing. Considering that all except kerry (and her camera)managed to scramble up the rocks unharmed. Oh actually saying that...kerrianne scraped her arm. WHO IS SENDING ME THESE VERTICALLY ROCK CLIMBING CHALLENGED VOLUNTEERS?! this is unacceptable.

A trip to the beach christmas day..yes you heard. beach. christmas. day. Whilst you poor english sods were cosying up to the fire trying to hide from the blistering cold outside (what the hell is white christmas all about) we are all cosying up to the sea, checking out the local talent and getting our tan on. This is us on a beach. Yes i am wearing a jumper. That is just how Chilean i am.

We also play a spot of rounders. 2 lovely american lads joined us for this. Team ella totally won. Boomshakalaka.

And then came new years..lots of duran disco...manuel and his decks, dodgy dancing and hunks of meat.
Followed by a firework display on the local hill and plenty of ooooos and aaaaas.

And they set the hill on fire. A true moment im sure the whole of chile can be proud of. I infact felt a tad proud to be chilean (YES chilean that is what i am)....firework display, fire on the hill and no firemen nearby because its new years. Well. Done.

Shortly after by chants of "a la piscina a la piscina a la piscina" where some smart person decides to pipe in "SIN ROPAS" the family head back to the house in high spirits for some more dodgy dancing in hope the fire doesnt make it near the house. And even greater hopes that the SIN ROPAS was just a joke. No one wants to see distant relatives hanging loose.

AND we had a christmas MIRACLE. Christmas eve, Jacob (poor boy) runs into our room to tell us that we now have a puppy. Okay if earthquakes cant move us...the news of a so called puppy has no chance. Between the dreams of being buff and brown and taking over the world the words - Puppy - are being shouted round the house to which (rather amusingly may i add) kerry thinks its acceptable mid nap to shout "STOP LYING". Oh dear who invited kerry. Joker. But low and behold (i dont know why this is my new phrase...i blame christmas) the Duran family had indeed been blessed with a puppy. Early in the morning Tia Maria had heard whimpers coming from outside the gate and found a very small, very cute little puppy. Due to its size we all assumed it was pretty new but later on found out she is infact a sausage dog and is 2 months old. Infested with fleas, ticks and worms, we give her every treatment possible, adopt her and name her for what she is. Princess Lia. So feeling on the tad neglected side- well if she gets a name i think i should have one - me and kerry rename ourselves Paris and Nicole and swear to our new LA lifestyle.

Followed by a short but beautiful trip down south, i wish i could say a lot but i spent pretty much the whole time on the bus - a thank you mother nature and your womanly ways - an amusing stay in a hotel smuggling in a puppy and 3 boys one girl sharing a bed (me, and my brothers..and maybe it was 2 beds that we pushed together). Its alright we're related innit. and then finally My english cousin who came with the fam declaring his love for my chilean cousin - IS that alright cause we're related innit? We find ourselves hugging goodbye at the airport and only wishing that this hadnt come round so soon.

Love you duranimos you truly fantastic family. Hope the flight home was ace - hello upgrade to business class - me kerry and kerrianne have a plan for our return home which involves a well planned suprise at the airport. Not long now :)

Peace out

xxx

http://www.gap-chile.com/

3 of your 5 a day

So Yet again ive let the fans down and not put this up and LOADS has happened and i dont really know where to begin.

First and formost the infamous Andrea Bowie returned for Soles wedding which involved some entertaining kareoke from the bride and groom and some dancing with the oldest and toothless men on this planet followed the next day by a trip to help the valpo surf project and a night on the town in the splendid world of Valparaiso.

Here we manage to persuade andrea to stay a bit longer which then resulted in a trip to mendoza to renew our non existant visas...a 10 hour bus ride and some horrendous literature.

I took a photo just to remember how awful that book was. Not the WORST book in the world but basically a really bad book that takes forever to read because it likes to over describe every small insignificant detail in stupidly over stretched sentences which bears no point to the plot of the story or add to my imagination of the place or in anyway contributes to the story much like this one sentence which i have written to prove my point to Kerry and Andrea that sometimes too many words is simply just stupid.

Now what to say about mendoza...well i wish i could say a lot but we basically spent half our time sleeping under a tree and eating really bad lasagna. Cue 10 hour bus ride home. (oh and a trip to a water park where i basically finished that bad book and worked on my super tan - dad im guna beat you this year)

Then on our return we decide to check out the local nightlife that is Calera and we start off in Riqos to some delightful kareoke where andrea and kerry decide to carry this on into the night...even when we went to the local disco they found a hidden door that lead to this delightful kareoke rendition.

I think here its important to note that this was a band. Not a kareoke band...and somehow kerry and andrea forced themselves on stage.

And soon enough it was 1st december.

We have also started to form our own Ocarena band....The Mocarenas.

We do lots of you favourites and we perform at weddings, birthday parties and barmitsvas. Reservations not always necessary just call La Casa Grande and ask for the gringas.

We then went on the anticipated surf trip up north with Surf amigo Andres.

This involved lots of early mornings...a broken car, an act of public displayed affection gone wrong by a slip in dog poo (that WILL teach you), surf training by watching movies, pilates in the dust, fresh fish, fish sandwich for breakfast and other exciting activities, such as hitch hiking.

On our return we also were delighted to hear that the orphanage are happy to let us get involved and so we went along to suss out the kids and play a few games. Mr Duran is organising a christmas party for the little chappies..and they are all well cute...minus the odd swear word here and there.

Anyways that is whats going down thus far. We have the container arriving tomorrow...HELLO GOODS!!! And the duran hoard a week later where the house has started to go mental..fixing walls, ceilings, gates. Beds are being moved. Ines has been moved back into the office with Judy and we are greatly anticipating the english celebrities that are the Clare and Claudio Duranimos.

Muchos chilean besos to all

http://www.gap-chile.com/

xxx

This is for the brokenhearted

I thought that these two momentous occasions deserved a post all for themselves.

Firstly: I have been reuinted with my childhood love. Yes he is actually a real person. Francisco Tapia. The boy i cried about all the way across the pacific or atlantic who knows, wrote countless love letters to, kept a framed photo of near to my heart always and pined after for 11 years now (yes ladies and gentlemen i experienced true love at the age of 10 years old). Finally, he has embraced my life again and oh boy has it been worth the wait. His young brother/cousin goes to the same nursery school i teach in. Coincidence? I think not. Fate, fate has come a knocking.

And rather more importantly: We bought a crate of strawberries off the market today for 2 quid. That is right a CRATE of strawberries. 2 Quid. a Crate. Ive eaten so many im burping up strawberry seeds.

I feel like my life is finally complete. Until tomorrow when i shall have to wait a whole day to return to buy more strawberries for 2 quid. Thats right, 2 quid.

Over and Out
xxx

Cream all over my face

Its a bit tricky trying to remember whats happened in the past 2 weeks.

So its guna be a sketchy blog and i promise i'll be more informative in the future.

I'll start with the birthday celebrations...SO I decided in a moment of abnormality that it would be WAY more fun to cook for my entire family instead of vice versa...this was shortly after kerry randomly woke up one morning and decided to make soup from scratch. YUM. We were guna do a slighty chilean style of Come Dine With Me but with me basically being the only contestant and therefore the winner. We decided to cook chicken fagitas...followed by every single on of my favourite english pudds: eaton mess, bannoffee pie and YES apple crumble.

All went down well...after a slight miscommunication of what we were eating...no no fajitas not vaginas. They had brought me a cake as well and there i am in my element with a nice pancakey toffee cake...candles blown...when maria suggests me to take a bite. I had ACTUALLY been warned MANY a time as to the chilean custom of cake "biting" but this thought didnt even cross my mind until i feel a forceful thrust on the back of my head and a nice faceful of toffee across my pretty face.

So after planting the WRONG manuels face in a napkin full of cream:

and after he planted my face in a napkin of cream:

We settled down infront of a nice film. Where i was baffled as to why my entire surroundings continued to smell like milk. I have a great HATRED of milk too so i cant say this was the most pleasant experience. Had i been sat next to my sister who has a HATRED of cream..im sure she would have vommed. In fact my hair did kind of smell a bit like vom.

Next day we head to santiago to fantasilandia: where kerry marvels over the price of this theme park for pretty much the entire day - shes picked up some wierd fascination with prices and the lack of trains. Everytime we see a train shes like TRAIN (because there are so many railways but so few trains) that the majority of my family and the boys we surf with think she has a love of trains as they fail to grasp the concept of her excitement. So they continue to inform her of everytime they see a train when she has not been present. I was also still baffeled as to why everywhere i went...the smell of milk seemed to follow me.

We were also introduced to the santiago metro - WHAT an experience. ive never thrusted up to so many strangers in my life. It was quite an intimate experience actually...one where i felt i should have probably introduced myself.

Me and kerry have gradually got the concept of the buses and taxis: my family have stuck a piece of paper with my name and address inside my purse for me to hand to strangers everytime i get lost. haha. We even managed to make it back from an alone trip to quillota where our only directions home were: take a left after blockbusters. Great help there. But Chile has a blockbusters?! Oh goody.

We've been surfing a few more times with the boys and seem to be getting on grand with them. Me and kerry pretty much invited ourselves along to a night out in Valparaiso (where andres lives). Consisted of a slightly lost bus journey with 2 strangers on the side of the road pushing us onto buses and us being pushed off them by conductors who said they werent going where we wanted to go. Here we meet his girlfriend and her housemate and friends of andres's. They were all so lovely. Especially the girlfriend. Im in love with her house and her spanish is a.mazing. Andres showed us the sights of valpo...we ate out and even hit the bars. Couldnt understand a ruddy word for MOST of the night and then stumbled home with 3 boxes of chips and put on a surf movie. Job done.

Have lots to do this week and have been asked to be a drama teacher for 9-10 year olds on fridays, brillo. Plus helping to surf instruct some kids associated with the Valpo surf project this weekend.

Good times.

Thats all folks

Over and Out

xxx

BENNAAAY BENNAY AND THE JETS

The Project has really started to get going.

After the snow its been go go go this end of the line. Me and Kerry are really starting to get into the swing of things. We've been able to take our pretty selves to lots of different places on our own, lots of eating out, talking to randoms and even managed to conquer the fruit market. £1.50 for 2 kilos of strawberries....I AM IN HEAVEN. Im never coming back. I pretty much skipped all the way home.

Kerry came into my room this morning excited by how much asparagus she bought at the market today. I wasnt so impressed...not even after her very long explanation of how much asparagus normally is in England. Yeah okay kerry, i'll leave you alone for a few moments with your asparagus.

We have adults english classes up and running!! Which makes a total of 27 students altogether and as of yet we are just under doubling the red crosses annual budget. (haha this isnt AS impressive as it sounds). 16 THOUSAND pesos raised so far. Good work team. haha. The red cross class are pretty amazing! There is also a girl in there called Macarena. This amused me wholly! I didnt know that was REALLY a name. This excites me.

We also befriended some handsome young men in Vina. One of them had contacted Kerry after he heard we were getting itchy feet and it turns out he is trying to set up his own little charity project. So we've been chatting lately and thinking of hooking our projects up when it gets going next year which is exciting! Lots of beach times for us guys and some nice men to oogle at.

Anyway, we decided to go for a little surf with these boys (i say WE decided...i decided and kerry tried to convince me we needed to plan it a little more) haha nooope. So 6.30 am comes around and we are outside the house waiting at the bus stop with my board. Hold up...bus and a surfboard. Okay maybe we should have planned this a little more. Surfboard slid into the under luggage compartment and a very bumpy ride later (much to a very distressed ella who refused to give up the window seat in the small chance that ANY small chilean attempt to steal cheeky charlie from under her feet) why am i speaking in third person? I blame kerry ANYWAY we arrive in Vina, met by andres who whisks us off to pick up his friend and there we are heading to the water.

Im not sure the boys were used to females being in the water cause 2 bleeding noses and a fat lip later, the boys are looking concerned at how on earth we have managed to bust up our faces in the small ish surf.

This is how it happened: Kerry was given an extra big and heavy board....and decided to instead of surf sing Elton John a lot more. BENNIE B B B BENNAAAY BENNIE AND THE JETS. So when she finally went for a wave, she fell quite rightly on her bum and her board went flying. As she comes up for air, she is still unaware that this huge board is plummeting down towards her head..and all we could do was watch as it landed..on her face. So a quiet defeated kerry gets out...shortly followed by ella and a dodgy roll which also gave her a bleeding nose and a nice fat lip. Kook.

SO in our attempt to erase these rather embarrassing moments from the boys minds, we try to charm them by cooking them a niiiice greasy english brekkie. I think it worked.

We're heading back there tomorrow. Hopefully minus the bust up face. Watch this space.

Over and Out

xxx