Chilenismos 2

There were a few things that I mentioned in the Chilenismos 1 post that I didn't have pictures for.  I went out and took a few so that I could bring you full circle on those.  First of all, whoever came up with the contract for this sidewalk tile has made a mint.

I guess you could say the same for the taxi car company because the taxis are pretty much the same.

Then there are the cars that the carabineros drive complete with grills over all glass.

This is what the processing vans look like - one stop booking if you will...

And this is what the carabinero station looks like -

There have been a number of other striking things, so it is time for Chilenismos 2.  When we came into the country the guy stamping our passports didn't change the date and so the stamped date was wrong.  Once in the country you have 30 days to go to the PDI central office and register your visa.  This was a one hour plus wait.  On Erin's temporary ID, the clerk entered the wrong date for Erin's visa expiration - so it looked like it expired before we entered the country.  After 10 days we needed to go to the civil registry for the next step.  After 150 minutes in two lines they decided that although Erin's visa, which she brought, had the correct date and the computer had the correct date, she had to go back to square one because the PDI clerk made a mistake.  This means going quite a distance across town.  I had the correct date, so got finger printed with nasty black ink and handed a paper towel after having may hands sprayed with something like Lemon Pledge - which doesn't take the ink off.  Ok, the next week we go back to PDI and get Erin's temporary ID corrected.  Then we go to the civil registry.  Guess what?  Yes, another of Chile's famous strikes.  We saw this sign complete with black balloons and no idea when the strike would end (the postal strike lasted a month and resulted in an $80/month raise).

I wasn't totally disappointed because that meant that Erin didn't get the hand ink treatment and we could go to the best chicken place in Santiago.

I have previously mentioned that you often get a cash register printed receipt and a hand written one.  Well, I went and signed up for a 10k run (it will be its own post as it was an adventure).  I went in person because I don't have a RUT card.  The civil registry has to 1) not be on strike and 2) not make mistakes on the paperwork every time you go.

The blue stamp is just that - this is official - my $3,000 peso entry ($6 USD) got me a hand written and hand stamped receipt.  We often go down into Barrio Bellavista, and this is what it looks like.  Lots of restaurants with tables on the sidewalks.

The red restaurant above had very good chow!

This was a warm day and a couple of the stray dogs decided the marble steps at the entrance to the school building were nice and cool.  I've mentioned the dogs are smart - didn't know they went to school too!

There are a lot of palm trees in town and even some bamboo in people's yards.

You may notice the fence by the bamboo.  Pretty much all the houses in the area have fences.

 There are occasional basketball courts, but I have yet to see a basketball.  These guys were playing soccer on the basketball court.  About 5 seconds after I took the picture they accidentally kicked the ball out of the court and it started rolling down the hill.  A guy on a motorcycle turned a quick u-turn and at about 30 mph kicked the ball backward so it didn't continue rolling down the hill.  I was already chasing the ball as the court was fenced in.  I grabbed the ball and the guy on the motorcycle turned a quick u-turn to make sure I got it. He was a Brit and yelled to me in an English accent something to the effect of good that the ball is safe.  This illustrates many things:  1) soccer is pretty important in Latin America and England - why else would moto man go to the trouble.  2) there is at least one Brit in Chile.  3) if this were a basketball in the US, the guy on the motor cycle would have picked it up and kept going.

Every now and then you see a car that hasn't moved for months.  This little number has grass growing through the tires.  On the back is a for sale sign "en venta."

In an earlier post I mentioned the graffiti.  Much of it is really more along the lines of art.  Some of it is pretty abstract/surrealist - perhaps a mix between Picasso and Salvador Dali.

There are things that can tip you off as to how safe of a neighborhood you are in.  For example, if they chain down all of the chairs and tables at an outdoor restaurant it is a pretty good clue that you need to watch your wallet. (click to zoom)

Huevos are a big deal here.  A common dish is a steak with eggs on it.  Erin thought this store was picture worthy - roughly translated - Eggs for better or worse. To the right is a large warehouse with many fruit stands.  I decided against taking pictures inside.

One last thing to cover is that you can get hats of professional sports teams from the States.  Check out the Chicago Deers hat second shelf from the top. (click to zoom)

If you look at the bills on the hats you can see they do have the authentication sticker.  And you can also get one for your girlfriend so that she can be a styling fan as well.

Myself - I'm kind of partial to the hat on the bottom with ear flags.  Actually, I have one kind of like it back home.

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Universidad de Chile

The Universidad de Chile is a metropolitan campus, meaning it is split into different concentrations throughout Santiago.  The law school is in the Bario Bellevista area, the dental school is in the Independencia area, the "main" campus is downtown.  The engineering and science campus, where I teach, is on Blanco Encalada, which is more or less in the southern central part of town - a couple 2 or 3 kilometers from the "main" campus.  Within this campus are areas such as physics, geology (where they track all the earthquakes...had a few more yesterday), computer science, and similar fields.  It is really quite an attractive section of campus with buildings that look similar to many buildings at universities in the US. These buildings are the geology buildings.  If you consider that the population of Chile is about 16 million (Michigan and Indiana combined), this provides quite a capacity for geology students.  Keep in mind however that Chile is a huge mining country, particularly in minerals such as copper.

The physics department also has a significant presence.  This brings up something interesting.  The bachelor's degree in computer science is a 6 year degree.  The first two years are spent primarily in math, physics, and chemistry.  There is a debate on potentially shortening the degree and eliminating some of the math, physics, and chemistry - though the old guard likely won't let that happen. A bit of the "I did it that way so everyone should" that seems to be everywhere in the world. I suspect the recent student strike, much of which was based on economics of education, had something to say about it taking 6 years to obtain a bachelor degree. Speaking as someone whose degrees include a couple in computers and one in biology that included two years of chemistry, plenty of math, and physics, I can confidently say that I used virtually none of it in my years in the computer field in business.  I certainly used - and still use - statistics and research methods, but for the most part these were graduate level aspects, not undergraduate, and it was primarily studied in my administration and computer doctoral studies.  I do use chemistry and physics in my research on recovering data from damaged media, but Tracey and Charles are helping me considerably with that at Ferris State. Writing software and needing chemistry?  I'd love to be in on that debate.  While I don't know for sure, I have a sense that many in this debate are academics and have little or no industrial experience. Plus, enrollment in those areas would crash if the requirements were taken out. Ok - enough on that.  Now for physics...

Charles - bet you'd like to spend some time in these facilities!   The engineering area (below) is quite nice as well.  There is a library housed within the building.

Some of you may have noticed the fences.  There are fences and gates around a lot of things in Chile....homes too.  In addition to the fences there are usually guarded gates or guards at the entrance of the buildings.  The various floors often have locked doors. This is the back of the engineering building.  There is a patio area and a courtyard.

The inside of the engineering building has that old charm that you often seen in brick academic buildings.

I think this next building is math, and since probably nobody reading this knows the difference, we'll just say that yes, this definitely is the math building.

Now we come to the computer science building where I teach.  It is fascinating how it resembles the technology building at Saxion University in The Netherlands where our Dutch students come from.  Inside is quite different and the Dutch building is 9 floors or so, but it is still quite similar.

There is a large addition going on, so there are construction barriers and such around the building.  This building sits nearly on top of Av. Blanca Encalada, which is three or four lanes each way.

The computer science area that I am most familiar with is on the third and fourth floor.  You come up the stairs and find the entrance locked.  You need to be buzzed in or have a card (tarjeta).

There is a small kitchen area and just like everywhere else in the world it seems some people help themselves to what is inside...

This basically says that the food in the frig is not for everyone.  If you click on the pic to zoom you'll see a few people have added comments along the lines of the food isn't for everyone?  and a primary example of the end to profit.  I remember back in the day while working at a grocery store to get myself through college that a particular cashier used to eat everyone's food in the frig.  One day we put dog food in there and sure enough, she ate that too!

The pictures above are my classroom.  We moved to a classroom on the first floor on the same side of the building as Blanco Encalada and the corner where the construction is going on.  It is very hard to talk over the noise as I don't have a loud voice like Doug.  We moved there because we needed an open network as not everyone in class is a UC student - so they don't all have network logins.

This is a picture of an extension cord.  With all the computers in the class we need to run power for the 18 students.  The outlets are very similar to Europe except that the prongs are thinner.  So a European plug is too fat to fit.  The middle hole is the ground for those of you that have wondered. There are quite a few outlets in various places in the building that are US simply because that is where a lot of the equipment comes from.

Overall it has been an enjoyable teaching experience.  Everyone in class is respectful and appears to have genuine interest in digital forensics.  I'm also going through link and visual analysis with the grad students, so they are getting a double dose.  The days really seem to be going fast.

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Chilenismos 1

I thought that I'd blog about some of the things I've noticed during my time in Chile.  There are a lot of interesting things, and some of them are quite small or subtle.  For example, when you cross a busy street the walk light is either a red circle like a stop light or a green guy that I call the amigo verde.  Even the dogs are clued in to look for the amigo verde.  He starts to flash when it is about to change to red and pretty much every street I've seen that translates into "run or you aren't going to make it" because it only flashes for a few seconds.  Since the streets may be 4 lanes each direction, run means run, not walk fast.

Most restaurants, apartments, and homes are not heated.  One explanation given is that you really can't run gas lines with all the earthquakes.  In our apartment we have two small electric heaters that you plug into the wall.  This was our "heated" apartment.  We paid our first month's rent and utilities.  The gas bill was about $1.75.  Ok, I haven't cooked much - perhaps 4 or 5 meals a week, and some are things like Erin heating soup from a can.  I can bake a mean salmon and make pretty decent tacos, but haven't found it easy to find ingredients for things I know.  The apartment is small, the windows let in quite a draft, and the walls are paper thin.  We had a small water bill and some apartment grounds "dues" as well.  The thing that pretty much knocked me over was the electric.  Our utilities came to about $375 for the month, and well over $200 of that was electric.  It isn't like we are running the electric and all the lights and appliances all day - so I guess we figured out why few places are heated - electricity costs so much. This is one of our two heaters...

When you go to a restaurant it costs money for water - often more than a beer or something else.  The usual charge is about $3 to $5.  If you want something boxed up to take home it costs about a $1 for that.

Many of the sidewalks are covered with tile.

It costs about $1.25 to ride the subway.

Chile is the most expensive Latin American country.

Rush hour seems like it is an hour later than in the US.

The dogs in Chile are smarter than in the US - very street smart.

A large percentage of people have a dog, and together with the street dogs you can frequently hear multiple dogs barking.

There are police - carabineros - on most corners on the main streets, usually in pairs.  Perhaps I'm getting old, but many of them look like they are teenagers.

The carabineros have vans that are mobile processing centers.  They are parked outside of things like malls and events.  Someone does something wrong and it is out to the van.

Many of the carabineros ride motorcycles - they look like dirt bikes, not road bikes.

About every female carabinero I've seen has been pretty (just ask the male carabineros that stopped to make sure they got out of the car safely).

Police cars are green.

Taxis are black with a little yellow.

A far higher percentage of people smoke than in the US.

There are guys that are out on the streets every morning with brooms sweeping up trash and cigarette butts, so the streets for the most part are quite clean.

There is no such thing as a wood house.  Everything has a cement or stucco exterior.

You can find a Ferris shirt even in Santiago...

How many Chileans can you get on a subway anyways?

They have some pretty cool looking motorcycles around here...

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