Happy Days!

Hello all! I am reporting from a small house in Howmans Gap Alpine Center, Victoria Australia where people say “rubbish” instead of “trash”. CRAZY isn’t it. I just got here two days ago and am stationed here until mid-August as a ski instructor. “Skiing in Australia??”, you may say. And I say, “see photo below, Madame”.

(I don't have wifi here so I am using a personal hotspot to post this... Data barely works either so you're going to have to take my word that there is snow here and that it is beautiful. I'm Alaskan so I know what beautiful is)

Let’s back up a bit. After school ended in May, I headed home to Alaska for a month. While home I adventured and felt like a total tourist in my own state. College will do that to you I guess. 

After I got my fix of mountains and family (just kidding I could never get enough of those two things), I got on a plane and spent two days traveling to Melbourne, Australia! There, I spent 24 hours in the city and by the ocean (we saw a jellyfish!!) with a friend.

After getting my city dose I got on the Falls Creek Motor coach and headed up to the mountains. 

Now that I am up here at 1,238 meters and it is snowing I start ski instructing tomorrow! I love it here. I am living in a house with someone from France, Germany, Sweden and many people from all around Australia. It is true what everyone says about Australians… I have yet to meet someone here who I don’t think I would be best friends with. Honestly, it is a little unsettling how kind and outgoing everyone is but I think I’ll get used to it. A pleasant surprise.

Ta Ta for now!

Maggie

Bacán.

Hiking Cerro Providencia in the Andes! Muy Bacán. 

After my series of unfortunate events last summer, I decided to go all in for $UMM3R2k!9. Right after my exams, I flew down to Viña del Mar, Chile, where I participated in a month-long Spanish and medicine program. I stayed with a host family with three little girls (10, 7, and 5), had daily Spanish classes, and got to shadow different doctors in clinics and hospitals. It was kind of intense...but also very awesome. Every day brought new moments of challenge, awe, exhaustion, and inspiration. Overall, the people I met in Viña, Valpo, and Santiago were incredibly kind and friendly. I even got to spend some time with my brother, Sebastian, who flew down two weeks after me to start a language program as well.

 Street Murals in Valpairiso 

 I found another Eph, the lovely Astrid!! Here, she shares a contemplative moment.

Valparaiso mi amor

With my three host sisters!! Florencia, Nancy, and Helen

Nice. 

Samantha, our very cool cat. She likes to surprise people when they open their window blinds, as depicted in this photo. I was shocked when my host sisters told me she was 10 years old because she is lively and so very sly. Then by the end of my stay, I learned they had been speaking in cat years all along. 

Sebastian and I at Las Dunas in Cón Cón. 

One of the highlights of my trip was definitely hiking Cerro Providencia. A group of us went right after it snowed in the Andes, and it was truly breathtaking.

Best. Day. Ever. Not depicted was the condor we saw, which was truly a wild sight. They look like giant majestic prehistoric creatures meant for snatching up baby goats. So here are some memes instead. 

Also...

Not many Chileans speak English, and Chilean Spanish is pretty unique. As Lucy can attest, Chilean Spanish has a whole slew of phrases and words used all the time, but that you probably won't hear anywhere else in South America. Here is a list of survival words in case anyone might need it someday!

Chilean Slang 101: 

-Pololo/a: boyfriend/girlfriend

-Huevón: A word to refer to literally anything (like 'dude' or 'buddy' in English, but also can have offensive or naughty meanings, especially when used in the plural form)

-Cachai?: "get it?"
-Cacho: "I got it!"
-Arto: a lot (instead of mucho)
-Altiro: immediately, like right now!

-Po: no real definition, just an affirmation after you say anything (ex. "sí, po", or "no po") 

-Bacán: Cool (a.k.a "the only work you really need to know")
-Carrete: Party (but like a rager)
-¡Chuta!: Sh$t!
-El taco: traffic
-"Que feo tu modo": "How ugly/evil your ways" Not actually sure if this is just a Chilean phrase, but it was used all the time haha
***Also, no one uses Adios. Only Ciao. And Chileans can tell who is a foreigner just by the way you pronounce Hola.

As I said, this summer I really am packing it all in, because on Sunday I flew straight to Palo Alto, CA to start my job at a clinical neuroscience lab at Stanford. I will primarily be working on a clinical study called EMPOWER, and conducting research on effective opioid tapering methods and developing effective pain management strategies for patients with chronic pain. Although I miss Chile, and am currently still jetlagged and confusingly speaking Spanish, I am really excited to be in this beautiful place, and to get to work on this study. Plus, I definitely needed a break from all that Reggatón. The word on the street is that The Sybenator is also out here, and I hope to track him down for some adventuring soon!




Sending everyone much love and good wishes,

Carmen 

Europe and the Purple Valley

Greetings from the land of the Purple Cow!

After slogging through spring semester, my family spent a few weeks in Europe before settling in for the summer. It was so much fun, but also absolutely exhausting. We covered a lot of ground, and, fortunately or unfortunately, the mountains were by far the best part and the only place where I took reasonable pictures (I was going to say good, but then I realized that Connie will probably be posting soon...). Here's a scattered overview:

For all you geography nerds out there (Evan and Andy pay attention), the overall route was Paris-Stockholm-Rome-Venice-Dolomites (plus a bonus day in New York City at the end). In case you can't count, that's a lot of airports, and the two busiest train stations in Europe (bonus points if you can name them).

We did all of the typical tourist stuff:

Saw Notre Dame post-fire (from afar)

The Eiffel Tower

And the view from the top (sooooo many stairs)

Saw lots of ruins in Rome

And had LOTS of LOOOOONG museum days. I'm currently researching/debating with Jay whether I can log these as ODs in the "other" category...

We even happened upon a stage of the Giro d'Italia

And of course, it wouldn't be a blog post by me without a skierg. I can happily report that the skiergs in Sweden are far inferior to ours (no ercolinas yet).

But now for the mountains. We spent a week in the Dolomites, staying for a few days at two different "huts," which are among the nicest hotels I have ever been to, and certainly the best and largest quantities of food I have ever seen at a hotel restaurant, or maybe any restaurant. While the first hut made us pay extra for hot showers, the second hut actually had automatic doors, so it balanced out to a very civilized "wilderness." Spent a lot of long days exploring and saw very few people (as it turns out, no one else wants to hike in calf deep snow, no matter how nice the view is). Should have brought skis, but oh well...

This summer I am part of the small minority of the team that decided not to live at Lucy's house in Sun Valley, so after another long day (I really feel like these are loggable) of walking around New York City, I headed up to Williamstown for a summer of math. So far, as expected, it's been a lot of math (I've actually had to request breaks at times), but I've also had plenty of time to get out and explore. So far it's only rained half the days and it hasn't gotten above 80 yet, so I'm hopeful that the predictions of a miserably hot and lonely summer will fail to come true (although as I'm writing I just looked at the forecast and it's going to be 85 tomorrow). I met up with Jakin Miller (Williams class of 2024!!) for a rollerski last Saturday (no pictures, but I promise I'll get some for a later post), and, of course, I've been spending A LOT of time with my best friends, the ercolinas.

Hope everyone is enjoying their respective summer adventures!

Miss you all,
Lime

p.s. To all current and future blog slackers (and I admit I am usually a member of that group), I would like to point out that although far from perfect, this post demonstrates that someone with relatively little free time and very little creative talent can actually put together an acceptable post and avoid whatever terrible punishment the captains have devised for failing to post. Keep it in mind.

When we're not training we're...

Aesthetically-minded burrito enthusiasts 

Puzzlers 

X-treme sports spectators 

Block party crashers 

Bike rack fixers...

...still bike rack fixers

Tea drinkers/TV watchers/sullen young adults

Cloud gazers 

Being woken up by herds of sheep passing by the house at 7am

Last Days of Winter

After three weeks at home I am now down in the Bay for an internship at UCSF. When I left last Thursday the snow was disappearing quickly now that it is not freezing overnight. Here are a couple shots of (what hopefully won't be) my last days on snow for the summer.