pizza day!! 5/10/11

Today was fortunately not an early day. We got up at a decent hour, and had breakfast at the hotel. All of the coffee here seems to be instant, but compared to instant coffee in the United States , the instant coffee here is honestly awesome. Also, it seems that here is fresh fruit every morning, such as apples and oranges, and I think that’s also great, because sometimes it’s so expensive in the U.S. After breakfast, we went to the university and had some lecture time. It was about Chilean business and Jaime Rubin de Celis gave the lecture. His presentation was excellent because it not only concentrated on Chile but also on all of Latin America. I found it especially interesting because when we asked questions, he gave his honest opinion on Latin American or Chilean issues. I think this really helped me learn about the culture because he gave an outside and inside opinion on Chilean issues and conflicts. For lunch, we had pizza. Pizza in Chile is nothing like pizza in the United States.  The pizza was a piece of cheese, ham, sliced tomato, and flat bread. It was certainly different than I’m used to but it was good. Also I can’t get over how absolutely delicious Chilean grapes are. They have seeds and are huge, but they are so sweet and delicious. They’re so sweet in fact, they’re considered dessert. After lunch, we finished our lecture, and gave our company presentations. I feel like I received an enormous  amount of feedback. After this, we learned a reggaetown dance. It was kinda raunchy, but it was really fun to learn how they dance and interact. I liked the lesson a lot. I ate at the taco bar and got an enchilada. It wasn’t quite as good as my mom’s, but it was probably the most “normal” meal I’ve eaten thus far in my trip. Then, a smaller group of us decided to go out with the Chileans, which was incredibly cool because I actually got some one on one time to ask them some questions about their culture and their way of life. I had a lot of fun with them and learned a lot. Tomorrow we visit our first several companies, and I’m really looking forward to it!!