First Week of Classes

After weeks of waiting and trying to kill time, the classes finally began last Monday. Unlike previous first days back, I felt ready for the start of classes.

My current programme consists of six subjects (known as ‘ramos’ in Chilean Spanish). They are Spanish Language, Development of Interpreting and Translation Abilities, Translation Technology, Professional Aspects of Translation and Interpreting, Mapuche Games and Grammar for Foreigners which started three weeks ago. Classes in Chile last an hour and a half as opposed to an hour in Scotland, and the day starts at 08:15. I have three classes that start at 08:15, which requires a six o’clock alarm and a few cups of yerba maté in order to warm and wake up!

On Monday, my day started at 08:15 with the first class being Spanish Language. The speed of the Spanish instruction was daunting and linguistic jargon was frequently used. However, when I read over the sheet after class, I realised that it was not actually that dissimilar to the textual analyses I have done in Scotland, albeit in Spanish.

Later that afternoon, I had my first class of Translation Technology. Although on the first day the only activity we did was the popular ice-breaker, ‘two truths and a lie’, we had our first assignment on the Friday. We had to edit a translated document to fit certain formats, including font and size and editing the colour to a specific number of the colour wheel. I found it rather like completing a model kit in Spanish!

My two other 08:15 starts are both Development of Translation and Interpreting Abilities. The classes involved summarising articles in the other language and some quickfire interpreting practice of single words. However, the most exciting and bizarre thing that happened was on Wednesday when as I looked up, I saw a dog lying under a desk in the classroom, something not seen at Heriot-Watt I can assure you! However, I do not blame the dog as it was perishing outside at the time!

Professional Aspects of Interpreting and Translating was taken by one of the most memorable lecturers/teachers I have ever encountered. He had tattoos up and down his arm and came into the class listening to punk rock on his Classic iPod. He was hilarious however as when someone asked what language the classes and coursework would be in, he responded by saying Swahili, which gave me fits of the giggles for the rest of the day. However, the whole class was stunned when he told us he had subtitled two episodes of Game of Thrones!

My favourite class however was Mapuche Games, the Mapuche being the native people in Chile before the Spanish arrived. Instead of fighting each other, the Mapuche would play sports to settle disputes and the class teaches us the sports played by the Mapuche and other aspects of the Mapuche Culture. The class involved our lecturer whom I presume to be in his seventies, telling us how to play the game. He sort of reminded me of a grandfather in many respects and brought back memories of my Papa teaching me how to play Golf when I was younger.

In general, it has been a fulfilling, but busy week. One thing I do like is that the Chilean students are quite happy come up and speak to us. It is often the case in many countries that home and exchange students do not mix but this is not the case in Chile. As there are virtually no other exchange students on our course expect the three of us from Heriot-Watt, it definitely makes me feel at home.

Everton de Viña vs Huachipato

On Saturday, I decided to go to Mall Marina and buy a ticket for my first Chilean football match between local team Everton de Viña and Huachipato, who play near Concepcion, the third largest city in Chile. I was quite nervous as it was the first football match outside of Scotland and England that I had ever been to in person.

I initially arrived at the wrong part of the ground due to the taxi driver dropping me off at the wrong gate. When I go through the gate, I realised that by mistake, I was in the section with Everton’s Ultras, Los del Cerro! However, a helpful steward let me through the barrier into my section which ran along the side of the pitch.

The story of the match was surprising as although Everton were bottom of the league and Huachipato in mid-table, Everton for the majority of the match were by far the better side. They played a very nice style of football, playing both long balls mixed with some fluid passing and tiki-taka. Despite their dominance, Everton were unable to convert their chances, the closest being a chip over the Huachipato goalkeeper which ricocheted off the upright. Huachipato also had their chances and would have scored had it not been for a brilliant goal-line clearance by an Everton defender. With both sides missing key opportunities, the match ended in a 0-0 draw. The game was a feisty affair however as both sides finished the game with ten men.

The atmosphere was unlike anything I have ever witnessed before. The noise coming from the end occupied by Los del Cerro was incredible. They had banners, flags, trumpets and samba drums and the singing was constant. I noticed that the atmosphere got louder as the game went on, particularly at the end when the fourth official allotted five minutes of added time at the end of the second half. The songs started by Los del Cerro eventually spilled over into other parts of the ground and there were several moments when the whole stadium was a wall of noise. The passion displayed by the fans was immense and they do not hold back on voicing their opinions. Every decision that went against Everton would cue a tirade of passionate outbursts directed at the officials and any set-piece taken by Huachipato goalkeeper which took a while to complete was met with a chorus of whistles.

Everton’s stadium, Estadio Sausalito, was refurbished for the 2015 Copa América and is therefore quite modern, with good seating and facilities. The stadium stands on the opposite side to the Sausalito Lagoon, facing the Translation and Interpreting Faculty at the PUCV Viña Campus. This meant that the surroundings were vaguely familiar, though it did take me a while to figure out exactly how to get out of the ground! At half-time, fans dash to the food and drink kiosk for a cup of tea/coffee and a packet of biscuits. Others bought sandwiches that were packaged in the same way that those in Marks & Spencer are in the UK. Getting served however is almost identical to trying to buy a drink in a bar/nightclub. It requires a fair amount of jockeying and force as queuing is non-existent!

All in all, it was a terrific, pulsating and fascinating experience. I hope to go again to watch another great game of football.

¡Vamos el Oro y Cielo!

The Lord’s Day

I write this on Saturday but many of you may be reading this on Sunday which for Christians across Chile and the world, is the day reserved for rest and worship.

In Scotland, I have been to three types of church services, Church of Scotland, the largest church in Scotland, Episcopalian and Free Presbyterian, all of which are Protestant denominations. My family is traditionally Church of Scotland but nowadays, I tend to call myself Christian only, thus not identifying with a particular denomination and I will happily attend any church no matter the denomination.

However in Chile, over 70% of the population follow the Roman Catholic Church and thus there are differences between churches in Chile and in Scotland. The first main difference between churches in Scotland and Chile is the decoration. In Scotland, churches have stained glass and maybe one or two crosses inside, but there are no statues or ornate paintings. However in Chile, there are many statues, mostly of Jesus, the Virgin Mary and the saints. Many light candles as offerings and pray towards them.

There are also many differences in worship. In Scotland, services normally consist of hymns, prayers and some sermons or readings. When you enter the church, you are often given an order of service or a hymn book with the pages of the hymns being shown at the front. In Chile however, it is liturgical whereby people know the songs they are singing for each mass. Most of the singing in the Chilean churches is antiphonal, whereby either the Priest or a Cantor begins and the congregation responds. to some extent, it reminded me of a Free Presbyterian services, apart from the fact that the Catholic Church in Chile has an organ whilst musical instruments are not used in Free Church services. Many of the prayers in Chile are done kneeling whilst this does not happen in Scottish churches.

I expected there to be obvious differences, but what I realised is that we have more commonalities than differences. This occurred to me when at mass last Sunday, the priest gave a sermon on The Feeding of the Five Thousand, when Christ managed to feed five thousand people from five loaves of bread and two fishes. The priest was trying to convey the message of sharing and being thankful. The Feeding of the Five Thousand is one of the most well-known Bible stories in Scotland and similar sermons would be given at churches in Scotland. As it was a Catholic mass, I expected there to be some Latin either written or spoken but there was none and the whole service was conducted in the local language, as is the practice in churches in Scotland. Many of the prayers and content of the hymns were also similar and the Lord’s Prayer was also said. This made me feel both happy and sad at the same time, the latter due to the amount of conflict that has existed between Catholics and Protestants for centuries, from the start of the Reformation triggered by Luther’s 95 Theses to sectarian divisions that have arisen in Scotland, most notably in Glasgow.

Having seen Scottish Protestant services and Chilean Roman Catholic masses, two countries on opposite ends of the globe with different interpretations of Christianity, I realise that we must focus on what unites us, not divides us. Only then can we make the world a better place to live.

Sunsets, Neruda and the First Class of the Semester

This week I had my first class at PUCV. The class was called ‘Gramatica para Los Extranjeros’ (Grammar for Foreigners). Despite the majority of the class being Americans, for me, it turned into Spanish grammar for foreigners combined with French spoken practice as there were quite a few French students in the class. I heard quite a few accents from the Breton accent to the accent of the Paris Banlieues (French for Suburbs). What struck me about the class is that the majority of the students when speaking Spanish preferred to speak in the accent they would use for their native language. This is perhaps a big difference from foreign language teaching at Heriot-Watt University compared to other universities across the world.

I cannot tell you how amazing watching the sunsets here are. Although I had previously attached a picture of the sun setting on the beach, the sunset Holly and I witnessed at the weekend was simply incredible. The sun was deep-red colour and the sunset so quickly you could see the sun literally moving beyond the horizon. I wish I had a video to capture it, but I believe it would not do it justice.

Holly and I watched the sunset with over an ice-cream each. In Scotland, you normally have to choose between a cone or a cup but in Chile, a cone with ice cream tipped upside down into a cup is normal and as many politicians on the ‘No’ side of the 2014 Scottish Independence Referendum said, ‘The best of both worlds’. I had two flavours not found often in Scotland, chocolate orange and mascarpone. Although to many mascarpone ice cream seems bizarre, it was actually very nice and reminded me of when in China when I tried Taro flavoured ice-cream (Taro being a tropical plant and root vegetable) and I ended up having it everytime we stopped for ice-cream in China after that.

I also went with Charlotte to see the former residence of one of Chile’s most famous icons, Pablo Neruda. I watched a Chilean film about Neruda before I arrived so I was curious to find out more about him. Being both a poet and diplomat, Neruda was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature in 1971 and has served as a diplomat representing Chile in Argentina, Spain and Mexico. Neruda’s house is located high up the hills of Valparaiso, which has some incredible views over the Valpo area and the Pacific Ocean. (A picture of the view has been attached in this blog) However, the house is very thin and one can feel claustrophobic quite easily! Neruda was quite a collector, collecting items such as antique maps, paintings, including one of Thomas Cochrane mentioned in the previous blog, bottles of whisky and wine. He died of heart failure however in 1973, shortly after receiving cancer treatment. However, this coincided with the 1973 Coup d’État, when Augusto Pinochet and the military junta seized power and many suspect he was assassinated on Pinochet’s orders due to Neruda’s influence and communist views.

I end the blog with a passage from one of Pablo Neruda’s most famous poems, Muere Lentamente (‘Die Slowly’, in English):

He who does not travel, who does not read,
who does not listen to music,
who does not find grace in himself,
she who does not find grace in herself,
dies slowly.