I’ve voted since I turned eighteen. But the truth is that I didn’t really believe that my vote would count for anything. Despite what teacher wrote is true, and people who have political positions, like mayors or senators, take big decisions for our country, the way elections are planed really don’t respond to any democratic way, and actually they legitimize an absolutely filthy way of taking decisions.

It terrifies me how strong are we tied to this system, its laws and rules. For example, the polemic “Fish law” who is almost ready; people who were chosen “In democracy” vote for a law who is destroying our country. But we don’t have much choice because Binominal and political parties make sure we have really few candidates.

Anyway, these elections I actually vote for someone I believed in. Like I told some post ago, I work in Peñalolen, on a political and social movement, which brings together a lot of homeless people. They organized and called people in the whole country, syndicates, students, all kinds of social movements and create a new party, named “Igualdad”. In Peñalolen we had ten candidates, all workers and settlers, who were willing to face up all the vultures from the Municipality to bring the voice of poor people in the commune.

This is the second time we go to an election, and the second time we win. Even thought I keep thinking the same about elections in general, I think people in Peñalolen have demonstrated that we can use a councilor to get stronger, and to fight for the commune. This, of course, as we keep being fighters outside the Municipality

Today we had to do different tests, and I just found out that we were practicing for the final exam. I thought I was good at English, but when I started this course I realized that I’m not. Well, I know some English but it’s not enough to understand everything.

This time I had a lot of troubles answering the activities; I think they were very hard. I don’t know many words, my vocabulary is low. I didn’t get a lot of words. Also I found difficult the questions with reading comprehension, because in Spanish that’s already hard, but its worst in English. I usually go really badly at listening, but this time I found that easier than, for example, writing test.

I think this tests are not so boring, because we can think about examples. But I don’t know how much we learn, I think we learn more talking.

I remember a good gift, and actually it wasn’t on my birthday. A long time ago (I was about fourteen) I went on vacation to Viña del Mar.  I went with a friend, my family, and friends of my brothers.

Well, it turns out that my saint’s day (Valentine’s day) happens to be very difficult to forget, so my mom has always had the tradition of giving me big presents or great days, as if it was my birthday. That year I went to bed the night before, and when I woke up the whole house was decorated. But this time my mom had nothing to do with it, my sister (who I talked about a few posts ago) had the idea of setting up the house as it was my birthday. She was very young then (8 or 9 years) and she made big sheets and put streamers, balloons, she made draws. My friend helped her because she found it so cute. My sister, Cata, also bought me presents at the fair: earrings, a bracelet, a hat, and a little purse. (Of course none of that exists now) They weren’t much expensive things, but for her it must cost a fortune. Later that day my mom invited all of us for lunch. It was a great day, and it showed me how much my sister cared about me J

FIRST DAY

My first day at psychology wasn’t much fun. I remember feeling really nervous and uncomfortable. In my mind it also was a hot and sticky day, but maybe I made that up.

That day all of us who had chosen this career were together. It felt like we were thousands. I sat with a girl I’ve met before - I think taking the english test, but I’m not sure – and that made me feel less worried. Her name is Natalie and until today I feel thankful for that day we share.  

During the whole day teachers came and introduced their working lines. They told us general stuff related to Psychology, and some of them told weird stories. One teacher made us walk all over the room playing games; others had us sitting in a round. I remember it as a boring and lazy day.

Later we all went to the grass and sat there to drink and chat. When I just got into the University I was shy and I didn’t felt Ok in groups I didn’t know. I look back and I almost can’t believe because I really enjoy being in groups know, but at the beginning it was hard. So there are not really happy or fun memories.

I remember two of my Independence holidays as the best, but one of them was in Peru (who were like any other vacations) so I’m going to talk about the other one.

Last year I stayed on Santiago and I organized with my friends a popular fonda, especially dedicated for kids, but with a lot of families invited. We played games with the little ones, like sack race, miracle fishing, and bowling. We also had food stands, and we made kites.  At the end a professional group came and danced cueca. I really enjoy that afternoon, because we saw people having fun and it was a warm and beautiful day. It was great the fact that we had organized all that and it came out so good.

Later that day, a friend of mine invited all of us who had been in the fonda, to her house to celebrate the holidays. We brought the meat left (which was fine, but really I don’t eat much meat) and we make pebre and piscolas. She had at that time a lovely house in Lo Cañas, in La Florida, with a really large backyard, so we soon start dancing. At the late night more and more people came, so we end up being 60 people or more. It was such a fun day; we danced until 6 or 7 in the morning!

I went home at that hour, ate with my family, and moved quickly to another popular fonda we had organized. This one didn’t come so good, because we were all so tired haha. Later that day, after a few Terremotos (or Earthquakes?) we went back to my friend’s house so we could keep dancing. The entire week passed a little like that, but it’s too much to tell…

I’ m going to talk about my sister, Catalina, because she is one of my favorites persons. She isn’t just my sister, she is a good friend. She’s sixteen, so that’s how long we’ve met.

She is younger, and of course we don’t do everything together. She has her friends and I have mine. But we talk about a lot of stuffs, we share our personal lives. It’s nice to have someone to talk to at the end of the day; when I’m tired, angry or disappointed from my own friends, I always can talk to her and we end up laughing. We also share good news, our joys and fine days. She is a great company.

The truth is that I don’t see her as much as I want to, because we are both very busy. She likes history, so she does research at school. She is very smart. She is also very pretty, so she is always suffering from love, but because she has too many options! Ha-ha –ha.

Anyway, when we finally get together (at weekends usually) we have a lot of fun. This Saturday we saw a movie called “Libertarias”.  Other times we have a drink, go to walk, or just chat.

The best part of our relationship is that we’ve lived so many things together. For all this years she’s been my partner on family meetings, trips, and weekends. I really love my sister! J

I started this year with a lot of expectation, because people’ve been talking a lot about it. But nothing special’s happened to me, of course. Anyway, it’s been a good year. I started learning new things at college, like Psychoanalysis. I also took Afro dance lessons, which I’ve been doing since last year.  On my winter vacations I went backpacking whit friends to a quiet and beautiful place, called “Budi Lake”, in the south. I met a lot of people, and almost everybody were Mapuche. Also, since 2011 I’m on a political and social movement, which brings together a lot of homeless people (people who live whit relatives because they don’t have a chance to buy their own), who’ve been organizing since 2006 to fight for better living conditions. They have a lot of work in Peñalolén, where the real estate business grows up but nothing gets better for most of the people who work and live there. I work with them and I amaze every day to see how organization, cooperation and fight are the best way to stop the abuse and unfairness in this country.