smog, shrimp and sweet summer fruit in Santiago

My time in Santiago ended up being pretty low key, which was nice. A girl I met through church who has an apartment in the city, but she works about 2 hous away with her family; she just uses it mainly on the weekends. So I was able to stay in her apt by myself for the week, which was fabulous! When I got there on Saturday, I was able to go to a birthday party. Then I went to service Sunday morning. They had service in the park actually, which was cool. We hung out there for most of the day. The park was actually next to this gigantic mall. I went there afterwards with a couple of new friends, who were also visitng from the US. What´s funny is that walking around the mall, talking in English, but having everyone around us speak in Spanish made me feel just like I was in a mall in Miami! (For those of you who have been to Dolphin Mall in Miami, you know exactly what I am talking about! LOL)

The rest of the week I just spent touring around a bit. On Monday, I was able to meet up with John and Kay Hoyt (they lead the university students at the church). We went to a cool place called Cerro Santa Lucia.The view wasn´t too bad. But behind me there should be LARGE mountains, you just can´t see them because of all the smog! LOL





Here are some shots of the city:





After that we hit a cool artesan place where I bought fun arts and crafts stuff! (I just love going to arts and crafts fairs! My mother and sister and I were regulars at the ones they had in Arizona!)

The next day I went to a place called Mercado Central. Kay told me to follow the smell of the fish to find it. I assumed that meant people were cooking fish. But as you can see from the photo, it was this huge place where they were selling fish, fruits, vegetables and then also had restaurants. Quite the surprise!


Here is my yummy garlic shrimp lunch that I ate! At the restuarants they also serve you bread with the red sauce in the bowl called Aji. It is kind of like a very spicy salsa. It is SUPER yummy! I do miss spicy food (they don´t really like spicy food in PY)


Every restaurant seems to have their napkins displayed like this. The actual napkin is probably about 4 inches square and so they just pile them up in these metal vases!



One of the things I absolutely loved about Santiago was all the yummy fruit that I was able to buy! I think the strawberries were the best I have ever eaten. I would swear they were covered in sugar, they were so sweet and juicy! I was also fired up to find raspberries (my fav fruit, in case you didn´t know!)



I also went to Cerro San Crstobal (cerro by the way = hill). This one was cool though because you take a cable car-like thing to get to the top. Despite the smog, the view was still amazing! Here are a few photos:






I finished my week by visiting a natural history museum and a science museum. I even got an english tour guide for the science museum, which was cool!

Next stop: Viña del Mar.