El groupo de CIEE

As fun as it would be to just come down to Chile and travel around and such, I actually came here to study. My program is run through CIEE, an organization that runs foreign study/teach programs all over the world. They do a lot of the heaving lifting for me: they get me enrolled into the local school, set up meetings, extra classes, get the paperwork for various legal stuff, ect.


So, as I mentioned in my last post, I met up with my group on Wednesday morning at the airport. It was quite a site to see a ton of gringos just sitting on the airport floor. From the airport we took a bus to a city called Reñaca, which is just to the north of Viña del Mar. It is a super touristy place, but fun nonetheless. 
The time that we were there was spent either in various meetings about the program, or safety, or whatever, OR out in the area having some fun :)


The beach in Reñaca is a really active place, but due to the Humboldt Current that carries arctic water up from Antarctica, the water is a bit too cold to actually swim in. That, and the waves were really strong at that beach.


I am really liking the people on my program, as well as the staff from CIEE. Everyone has been great. I feel it is going to be a really fun 5 months :)


I met my host family this afternoon and am now all settled in my new room :) My host family is just a Mom and her daughter, they live in a rather large house on el Cerro Recreo in Viña del Mar. We made lunch and talked for a while, and they are some really wonderful people. I am going to enjoy it here.


Desde Chile,
Matis
(Es como se llama 'Matthew' en castellano)