Post 9: Long live the ceviche!!!!

Hello again. This time I want to tell you about one of my favorite foods: Peruvian food. In Chile, it became fashionable 10 years ago, and today it is very common to have a Peruvian restaurant close to home. Thanks to the increase in migration we have had the chance to enjoy this wonderful meal as much as we want.

My favorite is the ceviche, it is fresh, healthy and delicious if you also accompany it with an ice white wine. Our country has the advantage of having a great variety of fish and seafood, and that allows us to create a great variety of ceviches.

My favorite Peruvian restaurant is called "La Esquina Limeña" and is in Ñuñoa, its prices are very convenient, and it is delicious, also the "pisco sour", haha.

I leave a picture of the ceviche prepared in that restaurant.

But I must say that Peruvian food is something that I usually cook. Most of the time, when I have time, I cook typical Chilean food, I love the "charquicán" and the "cazuela". But since I never have time to cook during the week, my lunches are usually leftovers of food that I prepared on the weekend or that I bought the night before, sometimes, when my pocket allows it, I buy food at the same university or with My friends ordered Thai food, sushi or Arabic food (our recent discovery).

Post 8: Social Memory and political violence

This semester I had an elective about collective memory and political violence. Isabel Piper was my teacher in this matter. She has a long history of research in this field and it was very enriching to work under her guidance. The students had to prepare the exposition of a text on social memory each week, each one presented between 2 and 3 texts. This allowed for a fairly updated review of this subject, in addition to reviewing the main and traditional exponents.
The course was very interesting for me and I learned a lot about the different ways of understanding memory and the epistemological basis of each theoretical proposal. Particularly, I am interested in approaching memory in terms of social action, that is, memory as an action that has concrete effects on people's lives, in the way of producing the world, creating the past and enabling certain futures. At that point it is important to mention Felix Vásquez, who in 2001 published the book "Memory as social action", where he exposes the main background to come to conceptualize memory as action and social construction. The contributions of Tomás Ibáñez are also significant. Critical social psychology and social constructionism are the area and the epistemological basis, respectively. The subject is of all my interest because my doctoral research deals precisely with the memory of older women regarding the gender violence they have experienced. In this sense, the theme addressed in the memory course has been a contribution to deepen the concept of collective and social memory.

Post 7: Latin Rock!!!!

Hi all, today I want to talk about Latin rock, especially the Argentine and Chilean, is one of the favorite types of music.

I grew up in a town isolated from the musical news, everything came later, so around 14 I started listening to Soda Estereo and Los Prisioneros. I must admit that Soda Estereo has been my favorite band for years !!! Soda Stereo was formed in Buenos Aires in 1982; the vocalist and guitarist was Gustavo Cerati, "Zeta" played the bass and Charly Alberti the drums, loved Charly Alberti, while my friends sighed for Gustavo, I filled the walls of my piece with photos of the group (actually from several groups) and of Charly in particular. Soda Estereo has undoubtedly been one of the most influential and important Ibero-American bands of all time and they became a legend of Latin music and I still listen to them today.

I never went to a Soda concert but to another Argentine artist of my favorites who is Fito Paez, actually I've been to two of his concerts, the last one I went to was last year at Movistar Arenas, in Santiago, and many years ago I went to the Sausalito Stadium where he also played.

Within Chilean Rock, obviously, Los Prisioneros are my favorite band, not only because of their vocalizations but also because of their political and social criticism. Years ago, in 2001, and after 12 years apart, the band played at the National Stadium, that concert was unforgettable, I remember that it had hurt my hand and it was with surgical stitches and a lot of pain but I forgot everything, singing, dancing and jumping like never before! I think that the enthusiasm and the hope that they would meet again was shared by all of us who went to the stadium that time.

Post 5: My last travel to Carretera Austral

This is a photo of my last travel to Carretera Austral, in summer of this year. I think that place is so beautiful. I don't remember where exactly that place is, but I know that it's name is "Cascada de la Virgen". I don't like that name but I love that place!!! It's so magic, and calm... except for tourists. They are a plague. Yes, I know, I'm a tourist but one who hates those of her kind. I always try to go where there are not many people.

This photo was taken for my husband,He is very good amatur photographer. If you see, there are not people there!!! He took this photo in the precise moment.

You can see these lovely place where the waterfall feeds the small river, and that surrounding vegetation is shocking when you're there. I love the south of Chile, and its landscapes, that is the reason because I like this photo. 

A one more thing, I think that I look very cute and my face reflects the tranquility of the place.

  

Post 6: My respect to Simone de Beauvoir

Simone de Beauvoir was a strong french feminist woman. Her life was a long life, because she lived until 78 years old. She was born in Paris, in 1908 and died in 1986. She was a writer of different styles, like novels, essays and academic papers. In her novel called “Memorias de una joven formal” you can see that she was part of a very conservative family, and she had a very strict education. Maybe, her family and teachers was the perfect influence for her to develop such contradictory and countercultural ideas.

She was an important woman not only in the feminist struggle but also in the philosophy. The most important book that she wrote is “The Sencond Sex”, it’s a foundational stone of the current feminism. In this book she said that the gender is a cultural construction. This central idea in the feminism can be reflected in the most famous phrase of the author: "You are not born a woman, you become one".

I think that she was a woman ahead of her time. De Beauvoir, is symbol of fight for women's rights and she have my respect and admiration.

post 4: Easter Island, a dream come true.

Hello everyone, This time I want to talk about the dream of a very special person to me.  My father was the most kind, tender and understanding person I knew. He was my example of sacrifice, the sense of responsibility and self-improvement. He worked 46 years in a factory and when he turned 40 he could choose to travel to Brazil, the Caribbean or Easter Island. Well, we went to Easter Island.

My dad, my brother and I were very excited to travel. When we got there, they welcomed us with flower necklaces and Polynesian dances.

Easter Island is located on the Pacific, at 3700 kms from the city of Caldera.

The island has beautiful landscapes and is in itself a tourist attraction, the volcanoes, the moais and the Anakena beach, make it a heavenly place.

We went to visit several formerly sacred places, and others where the traditional competition called "Tangata Manu" or "ritual bird man" was prepared. I remember being surprised when we were told that the ancients used to cross the crater of the volcano with large quantities of bananas as a way to acquire strength and endurance.

Like us, you can go to know the "Moais factory", a hill full of Moais, some unfinished or destroyed by some fall. It is still a mystery how from that hill the ancients managed to take each moai to places as far away as on the seashore.

But, not everything is so wonderful on the island. While most of its people are very friendly, we meet people who were rude unnecessarily. Also, it's a pretty expensive place. I think those are things that I would change, in order to facilitate access and make the trip an absolutely dreamed experience.

But our experience, despite the bad time, was unforgettable. My father was happy, and that is the most important thing for me. Easter Island gave us beautiful memories that will continue in my memory.

post 3: My precious (like the ring for Gollum)

I think that I´m not a good modern person. Ussually, I don´t value the technology like other people around me. But I´m very sure that my favorite piece of technology is my notebook, yes!, more that my cell phone. I have almost all my academic life in that device. Ussually, I work preparing the classes, answering questions from my students or some request from some work's partner; until I do therapy online. Also, normally, use that to entertainment: I play games, I keep in touch with friends through facebook, and when I have some time, I see movies. I think that I use my computer around 5 hours every day, maybe  more.
I like it because it`s very useful to me, to work, study, have fun, comunicate or evade me if I had a bad day. My life would be very complicated without my notebook, and I would feel like to be in the stone`s age.