Here

After a long over-night flight trying to make the kids comfortable enough to sleep, hence without sleeping much ourselves, we are here, in Chile. It almost doesn't feel real yet.

Our first few days we spent recovering and having long lunches, full of welcome speeches, with my husband's family. The kids have loved having all this new attention, they love their new room and new toys, playing with their aunts and uncles and cousins and Tata (grandpa). They don't seem to be having any problems living in a new country.

oh, except G REFUSES to speak Spanish. She understands, but she won't answer or repeat... I am sure that will change, but for now I think it is important to respect her process.

These first few days have been vacation-like, but I know the complicated part is just about to get started. After a few days of rest, we started "tramites" (errands), bureaucratic steps, like getting ID cards and practical matters, like getting a cell phone.

It is odd to be back in a country, a city that I knew much better at one time, but now only vaguely remember. So much has changed and so much has remained the same, it is both disconcerting and comforting.

It is a re-encounter with many things, some positive, like the view of the Andes, the corner stores where I ran to get bell peppers and then 10 miuntes later returned to get oregano while we were in the middle of cooking lunch and others negative, like the ambiguity of all bureaucratic processes which result in standing in line at the registro civil to get my carnet (ID card) discovering that I am missing a step, making a trip downtown and standing in line at International Police to register my visa, a step that the consulate failed to mention and that wasn't specified anywhere on the website, and now I get to go back to stand in line again to get my ID or going to the supermarket (Jumbo)--OH MY GOODNESS! the number of people they can fit in a store here!.

I took the metro (subway) downtown today to run some of these errands. The subway system is awesome and would totally be awesomer except for the herds of people that make it intolerable at certain times of the day at certain stops. But it was lovely to walk around my old stomping grounds (I used to live and work right down town, a few blocks from La Moneda--the presidential palace).

I had to change dollars into pesos, so between that and carrying some important documents, like my passport, I was a little nervous. My husband says I am too cute to rob, but I am not sure that is a good enough deterrent ;-) haha. That is another thing that will be hard to get used to-the sense that you have to be cautious and aware at all times.

We went to the cemetery today to visit my mother-in-law's gravesite (my husband hadn't been back here since just before she passed away four years ago this month).

I saw so many interesting things and didn't have my camera

... next time, I promise.