I just realized that sala de ventas means "salesroom." I look at these signs every day from the micro and I just now realized... I am pathetic. I also chanced on the word harto, or harta, which means "a lot or much." I thought Chileans just used "alto/a" for a lot of things. Maybe they do that too, I am not sure now because they sound so similar. It's funny how you can make the same mistakes for so long and not realize...
Another recent realization: all of the juice in my house is made from a powder that contains aspartame, which gives me headaches. I pound down probably an average of 5 10ish-ounce glasses of that every day (ok, 296ml, if that is even what I should use.) That is a lot of aspartame. For three months. Maybe this is why my body feels crappy all the time, or that I can't concentrate. I firmly believe this compound has negative effects on your brain. Yippy.
Sheridan and I videochatted last night for an hour and a half HelenKeller style, without realizing that the volume was not turned on. Probably the best video chat ever. And today Thomas el Vecino got to meet my parents over skype, which made for a good but odd German-accented English and Spanish conversation about the Amish (who I think are going to take over the world,) and that my mother's maiden name, Nothstein, literally means "emergency rocks." The family was probably named after brave men of our family who in early 1750 [north]America fought off the flaites of the day by chucking stones when they got too close. This makes me even prouder of my lineage.
This is one of the more exciting news tidbits I have. Cristian read this blog, and we were talking about me writing in Spanish. I told him I had, and he went back and read again... he had been reading my English comments and got to the Spanish part and then his mind did something really cool; it did not recognize the difference because he understands the written text of both languages equally. He didn't even realize I wrote it in Spanish, which is so cool because it means his English is really good. His mind put if all together, blended, totally bilingual but reading a non-native language while thinking in his native language, so he was reading Spanish but in English, ¿cachai? First of all, the fact that the human mind can do that is incredible. It also shows how excellent his English is, which reflects his intelligence/dedication/extra practice or something remarkable because he has never lived in an English-speaking environment. One day, maybe my mind will do this too, and I will read things in Spanish and come across English but read it in Spanish because my mind functions in Spanish, or something like that. This blows my mind. Side note: he also made a really good Pinky and the Brain reference, heard for the first time in Spanish. When I asked what are you up to tonight, he responded "trying to take over the world." I get really excited when I come across quotes and other references that I heard in Spanish and are familiar in English.
Today in m grammar class we played what is essentially "Psychiatrist." Yup, get excited. The premise is that one person leaves and everyone else decides what problem they have, then the person comes back and tries to figure out the problem. The twist to the Spanish version though is that the class gives clues through advice, which creatively utilizes various forms of the subjunctive and thus forces us to actually practice it. A truly genus idea. Jun took the cake for the best quote of the day. In one instance the hypothetical "problem" was that everyone in the class was in love with the person who had to guess their own problem (not really a problem on their part, but you get the idea.) Jun's useful tidbit was "Que rico eres!!" The entire class probably secretly wet themselves. There are absolutely no more appropriate examples of this game that I can give; this is definitely not the camp version of Psychiatrist.
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