i will always be a coffee addict at heart (jueves, 2 septiembre)

Today was a super busy day. We sang and played at a Methodist school for special (mentally retarded) students on the southern side of Santiago at 10am. There wasn´t much space on the stage and the jazz band was really crammed in there. I played tenor and alto sax today, and improvised on the new song they´d learned yesterday. (Yesterday was uneventful---we performed for a jardín infantil-kindergarten and preschool kids-went to Líder to get food, and returned to El Tabo for a rehearsal). I´m really enjoying playing the tenor sax again. The jazz band is really laid back and we play most of the music without sheet music, so I have to improvise a lot more, which is good practice. Compared to the jazz bands I´m used to playing with, it´s a lot more casual. No one sits or stands in any specific order, just wherever there is room on the stage. There´s not much sheet music, and I have to transpose the music we do have. It´s okay to play to play withoutt music because then the music has more soul, more emotion. Today I really got lost in the music and it felt great.

Playing for the special kids was interesting. A few of them were dancing around, clapping, and rocking during it. Others just kind of sat there with emotionless expressions on their faces. It brought back memories of when I worked at the Arc, which I don´t miss at all, but am glad I worked there because it changed my outlook on life. I could never work in a special school like that, but I really respect those who do. After we sang / played, we waited around for what seemed like an excessively long time before the bus came to pick us up to go to the Interscolar.

The Interscolar was at Universad Andrés Bello in a huge room which is really the gymnasium. Our performance went well. Out of twenty schools who had come from all areas of Chile, our school was ranked within the top three! Tomorrow we have to go back to compete against more schools to see where we´ll be ranked. I was kind of surprised we were in the top three because our choir is small and not evenly balanced (3 tenors, many sopranos and altos). We had some nice harmony parts in a really bluesy arrangement of ´Amazing Grace´ (which I am getting tired of from having to hear and practice it so many times). The kids are getting really good at pronouncing the words in English.

After the conference a local TV station interviewed the director and a few students, so our school choir also got to be on local TV. The kids were very excited about this. We also sang a celebratory encore on the streets, complete with a few upturned hats to collect pesos.

Then we went to the mall (the kids wanted to go so we went). Everyone else ate at a chicken/ burger place, but we found a Subway (!!) where I ordered a vegan sub. Subways in Chile don´t have spinach, but they do have acodos, corn, and ají, a spicy type of pepper. Then I found a Starbucks! Although I quit drinking coffee before I came to Chile in order to avoid caffeine withdrawals (coffee is rare in Chile, and strangely I don´t miss it a whole lot). Plus, it´s better for my health and for my wallet. I couldn´t resist the Starbucks, so I ordered a vanilla-hazelnut soy lattee. It was cold and rainy that day, so Starbucks was wonderful! My students have never heard of Starbucks, but when I went there, a lot of them were also ordering lattes or cappuccinos. Some of them took pictures of them in the Starbucks. It was kind of cool because Iquique doesn´t have a Starbucks (or any coffee shops for that matter), and my students and fellow directors asked me lots of questions about Starbucks and the coffee house scene in the US. I was able to share some aspects about that part of US culture with them. For them, coffee shops with live music is a completely new idea. Now many of my students want to visit the US to experience what an ´open mic night´is like. Strangely, I felt homesick for Theo´s and Cool Beanz back in Rock Island.

The other thing that was sort of funny but memorable is the experience my students had with the rain today. To understand this, remember that Iquique is in the desert and it never rains there. Many of my students had never seen or felt rain in their lives. Santiago is different, like Illinois climate but without snow. In Santiago it probably rains once or twice a week. As soon as it started raining my students got excited. When we got off the bus, the kids--all of whom are in high school--started dancing in the rain, jumping in puddles, and taking pictures. They asked why I wasn´t excited about the rain so I explained about the weather in the US.

On the way back to the campamento we listened to Bob Marley and the Beatles on the bus, and I wrote for a while. It has been an awesome day!!!

written by

Sara Florecita on September 2, 2010 from Santiago, Chile

from the travel blog: año de dos inviernos (Chile 2010)

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