We are back from a little trip!

We went for a few days to the North of Chile. It was an approximately six hour drive there but what beautiful scenery along the way and there.

I won't ever forget this trip. I saw many things that I had never seen before. Chile is so diverse, it is truly amazing the differences from one location to another.

I tried papaya juice for the first time, ate several new kinds of sweets and candy and tried a seafood empanada!

We visited La Serena, Coquimbo, Valle de Elqui and a few other places along the way.

Armando showed me this place and I found it very beautiful. It was a fisherman's area with many boats.

 

I love the names on the boats. The one on the left is named Superman!

Pelicans and boats.

Lunch, I am awaiting a seafood empanada.

It was delicious! Sadly, I cannot remember the name of the seafood, because I had never tried it before. If I find out from Armando later, I will put the name here...

A beautiful metal church designed by Gustav Eiffel in Coquimbo, Chile.

The Inside:

I hope you like the pictures.

I am going to sleep now, It's almost 3 a.m. and I didn't realize it!

It's the day of Luuurve.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

May you have a wonderful time today with your sweetheart.

Long time, No blog

Has it really been that long since I posted an entry? Sorry about that. Armando and I are sharing the notebook and we are not used to sharing a computer! That is a big lesson in sharing because we are both major computer geeks.

So far we have done well but I do miss my blog reading time and emailing and just general surfing the net. But that is ok

The baby is doing very well. I hold him every chance I get. He is so tiny and fragile with tiny fingers and adorable feet and of course the most precious face. I am glad we were able to come for this trip and that we got to be there when Gabriel was born.

Armando and I are already making plans for when the baby is older, vacations at our house, etc!

I’ve been looking for recipes from Chile. I have found one thing I like a lot, it is called manjar. It is evaporated milk that is caramelized. I eat it on the bread, which is called pan here. It’s so delicious. That is my favorite thing for the evening meal, manjar, the caramel like sauce on bread and a coffee. Yum!

I tried a cake a while back that is called in Spanish, Brazo de Reina or Arm of the Queen in English. It has manjar in it. I found the recipe in English so here it is, if anyone is feeling adventurous. I will try to make it when I get home. First I have to buy a jelly roll pan though. I don’t have that at home.

Recipe:

 

Brazo de reina   (Brah'so de ray'na)

4 eggs, at room temperature
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup sifted cake flour
Confectioners' sugar
1 can of condensed milk made into manjar (mahn hahr')
Cook the condensed milk in the top of a double boiler until it is a caramel color.
This will take about two hours, and you can do this in advance.  Some persons
place the can of condensed milk in water and boil it, this is a dangerous practice.
Preheat oven to 400° F.
Beat the eggs, preferably in an electric mixer, with the baking powder and salt
until thick and light-colored, gradually adding three-quarters cup granulated sugar.
Add the vanilla and fold in the flour.
Turn into a 15 1/2 by 10 1/2-inch jelly roll pan that has been greased and lined
with greased paper. Bake thirteen minutes.  Depending on your oven, this may
take less time; when you see the edges begin to brown, take it out.
Turn from the pan onto a towel that has been dusted with confectioners' sugar.
Quickly remove the paper and cut off the crisp edges of the cake. Roll, jelly-roll
fashion, with the towel inside and enwrapping the cake. Chill.
Unroll the cake and spread with the manjar.  Roll jelly-roll fashion again,
sprinkle with confectioner's sugar and refrigerate until ready to serve.
_______

Enjoy!

Gabriel's Tree

Today was spent painting the tree in Gabriel's room. Armando, Ricardo and I spent most of the day there at Viviana's house.

Later,we ordered Pizza. Armando's other friend Ricardo and his girlfriend came over and we all played Pictionary in Spanish. Imagine me playing with my Spanish dictionary, looking up the words that I didn't know and then having to draw them! I had fun though and it was great practice.

Here is the tree:

Viviana and Gabriel may get to come home tomorrow from the hospital. We hope they like the tree!

Gabriel Born This A.M.

Bienvenidos a el mundo Gabriel!

Welcome to the world Gabriel!

He was born at 2:30 a.m. on February 1, 2008, a healthy baby boy.

We were all very happy and excited.

Armando is now Tio Armando and I am Tia Michelle.

Isn't he precious?

Hanging around the house

Sorry no pictures lately. We have been hanging around Armando's Mom's home.
His Mom had an air conditioner installed and I am loving the cool air it provides. I was a bit concerned when she first said she wanted it, thinking she was doing that just for me, because I was here but they assured me, they want it too! Mucho calor. It is very hot!
I am looking forward to several things on this trip:
Armando's sister having her baby
Armando's Mom teaching me to make fresh bread
The maid teaching me to make a Peruvian dessert next Wednesday with apples and bananas
After the baby is born and we spend some time with it, seeing more of Chile and maybe Argentina.
I miss home some but here is nice too. I miss our pets a lot!
I finished reading My Antonia yesterday and it was a great book. I was sorry to have it end.
Here is a picture of the garden. Sometimes we sit at that table and have drinks in the evening. You can see to the left a mural Armando painted for his Mother.

 

Yesterday at Ricardo's house

We had a great time yesterday at Armando's best friend's house. We had lunch and spent the day there.

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from yesterday.

Ricardo's beautiful cactus garden and the grapevine arbor.

Sushi

Last night we made sushi.

Pueblito Los Dominicos

This is a historical church with a lot of artesan shops in Santiago. I like it. It is very shady and there are beautiful items for sale in the shop. I must add that there are also many adorable and sweet cats roaming the area along the way.

Me trying not to get tail swiped by this little darling cat. LOL

 

The above clay pots are often used to bake a traditional dish called Pastel de Choclo.

 

Helado!

Icecream

If you're ever in Santiago, Chile. I think it would be a sin to not visit the Bravissimo Gelateria!  hehehe

Armando's Mom recommended this so I got it. WOW!!!! I couldn't eat it all.

Armando and his Mom both got these:

Look at how many flavors they have of icecream!

"Once" yesterday

The evening meal in Chile is called "Once" pronounced in English like Onsay.

We had supper at Hancel y Gretel.

Chacareros

A Chilean sandwich made with steak tomato, hot peppers and green beans.

Armando has this and I tried a few bites. It was delicious! I am definitely going to get one of those sandwiches the next time we go somewhere that offers them.

I had this:

A Lucuma Milkshake and Apple Strudel.  It was very good.

Parque del Recuerdo

 

 

Yesterday, we visited Parque del Recuerdo or Remembrance Park. It is a cemetery and Park. It was so, so beautiful. Everywhere I looked were flowers, water,trees, even ducks, swans,a lake and fountain. Armando's Father and Grandmother are buried here and I think it has to be one of the most beautiful cemeteries I have ever visited.

McDonald's

I am confused with the keyboard and haven't yet figured out how to make a smiley face. I never realized how much I like to type smiley's before until NOW! I could use the keyboard on my notebook but that would be too much effort for a smileyface. Don't ya think?

So just imagine me smiling because....

I found a McDonald's tonight!!!

Here's the McDonald's nearest to Armando's Mom's home.

Look their McDonald's has a McCafe with nice chairs, coffee and desserts. Our McDonald's in Alabama doesn't have that and we also don't have strawberry sundaes! We only have caramel and chocolate sundaes.

I guess this post is no surprise to most of you. I do enjoy eating! LOL I also found Pizza Hut, Domino's Pizza and I know they have Taco bell here too.

Buenas Noches!

Good Night. It's after 1 a.m. here.

El Sanctuario de Maipú

 

 

We visited this church today. It was beautiful.

Santiago, Chile Jan 11, 2008

 

The mountains that surround Santiago. Notice the snow covered mountains toward the back.

An overlook of the city of Santiago.

Sorry the pictures did not work earlier.I made a mistake!

I just finished eating empanadas for lunch. They're delicious. They're bread filled with meat, onions, boiled egg and olives.

It's hot here today!

Written on the airplane

It's 12:50 a.m. Alabama time, 3:50 a.m. Chile time. We're about halfway there.

It was a beautiful warm sunny day when we left from Alabama. The perfect day to help our bodies transition from winter weather to the summer weather that we will meet when we reach Santiago.

Our flight from Birmingham, Alabama to Atlanta, Georgia took thirty minutes and went very smooth. We boarded the flight at Atlanta a bit late, but we were not the last people on the plane, because we forgot this time that Atlanta is an hour ahead!

I was tired and fell asleep for a little while on Armando's shoulder after we got on the plane. We are sitting in a three seat row at the back of the plane but nobody is in the third seat which is nice. You do feel the movements of the plane more on the back of the plane

We had some confusion at Atlanta airport trying to find the International terminal from where we were at, we did eventually find it! We were not the only people that had problems with that. Later, we saw some people who we had seen earlier and the lady said, We should have followed you! We went outside the airport security area and had to come back through and I had just bought some things and they took them away from me!

I will close for now and write you more when we are in Chile.

Take care of yourselves until I return!

Yep, that's me typing this message! :)

Bye for a day or so

I will meet you back here when we are in Chile. I am packing my notebook away for the trip. We should arrive January 10th in the morning, probably pretty tired after a long travel.

Relax, kick your shoes off and have a browse around at some of my old blog posts, if you want to. ;)

I'll be back!

Chochi in our suitcase

Chochi is waiting inside the suitcase. I think she wants to go to Chile with us.

I am going to miss our pets while we're away. They're so precious and lovable that a part of my heart feels sad at leaving them for a few months.

Pre-trip rambling

It is hard to believe that in two more days we will be flying to Chile to stay for a little over two months. Armando’s sister will have a baby at the end of this month. That is very exciting!

I want us both to take advantage of this trip because it is an opportunity that we may not have for a long time once we are both settled into jobs and working.

I am taking along a journal to take notes of my trip and I will be taking photographs like a madwoman! I am just now realizing how much you value photographs as time passes. They pretty much take you back to the feelings you had during the time of the photograph.

It will be summer, and I am so looking forward to seeing more of the country.

I want to share the trip by email and my blog with my family and my blogging friends. My sister already told me that I must take a lot of pictures because she is traveling to Chile vicariously through me!

We may get to travel to Argentina too, but we are not sure yet. It depends on if I have to pay $100 just to enter the country. In Chile, you have to pay $100 and I’ve paid it already the last time we went. If I have to pay $100, we won’t be going because to me, that is quite a bit of money and we could spend that money in Chile having fun instead.

I looked on the TSA website and it says that I can bring a crochet needle on the airplane. Excellent! So, I plan to bring the baby blanket along that I have been crocheting for Viviana’s baby and crochet in flight and on waits at the airport.

Note to self: Think long and hard before doing large projects in tiny crochet thread in the future. LOL

For reference, we will be staying in Santiago, Chile. See map below.

Sicko by Michael Moore

Last night we watched the movie Sicko by Michael Moore . It is a very good documentary that really brings home the point that our healthcare system in the United States needs a major makeover.

I remember being a child and shocked by some of the people who were hospitalized around the same time I was and seeing how many were being sent home when they obviously were not well enough to go home. It was not the doctor's decision, it was the Insurance company deciding that the person was ready to go home.

It makes me sad to know that many elderly people now cannot afford medications they really need. They go to the drug store and have to make a choice on what they can afford to buy this month.

In the past, my Doctor's had to threaten an insurance company with exposure to a tv show just so they would revoke a letter that  they had sent to me threatening to stop a medication I needed if I didn't pay them tons of money back, because they had made an error in approving the medication. After a few of my doctors stood up for me and mentioned the tv show, they covered me again. That's pitiful, Isn't it? People have to go to these extremes for medically necessary things. Medicine and healthcare is a need, it is not a want. There is a big difference between needs and wants.

It is heartbreaking to think of how many people suffered or died in the end because of Insurance companies and their dollar mark decisions.