What are you doing here?

Now. I like to make fun of things here. It ought to be noted, though, that I like to make fun of things no matter where I am. It's affectionate. If it wasn't, I wouldn't be scrambling around with potentially three jobs in an effort to secure a visa for next year.

As such, I have trouble understanding the number of people here who seem absolutely baffled by my presence. To begin with, Chilenos are usually confused by it, which in turn confuses me.

"What are you doing here?" they inevitably ask me, once we've spelled my name a few times and they've given up and started calling me Marilyn. I explain my various situations here, work and all.

They look at me as if I have not understood. "Yes," they say patiently, "but how did you end up here?" This one is a bit trickier. In fact, I made my decision to come to Chile in less than 3 days from initial impulse to visa application. However, there are many plausible explanations for how I ended up with that particular gun in my hand, all of which seem entirely possible to me. So I pick one out and throw it on the table.

Then I receive a lecture. This is a terrible country to learn Spanish in, they tell me. They tell me about all of the slang. They tell me how quickly they talk. They tell me about shortening words. This is all done in said 'terrible Spanish,' but it doesn't seem to make a difference that I am able to understand their lecture. They tell me to go to Peru, Cuba, Bolivia, Columbia, somewhere else where apparently the Spanish is easier to learn. Then, depending on the particular Chileno, they'll add in another theme. Some recent ones: Valparaiso is run down and dangerous; I should not be so far from my family; there is no sense of history here; and, my favorite, Chilenos as a whole are degrading into an anarchic mess of non-chivalrous pricks (this particular person has clearly not been to Boston, nor, for that matter, are they aware that I can't take chivalry).

I attempt a defense of myself, of Chile, of the right of women to get on an elevator last if they'd like. My conversation partner considers me, and then asks, "How long are you planning to stay here?"

"A few years. I don't know. Until I speak Spanish."

Shock. Concern. Disbelief. Then.....a spark of understanding. "Do you have a pololo (boyfriend)?" they ask.

No. No pololo.

At that point they simply stare at me as if I were absolutely out of my mind.

This is the cookie-cutter conversation. There are various personalizations in any given interaction, but every single Chileno who pursues this line of questioning hits on those essential points, and reacts as described. It is a truly out-there phenomenon. Why is it that this entire country seems to find it implausible that someone might choose to live here? Are they trying to get rid of me? Is this a wide-spread inferiority complex? I have no idea. You tell me.

However, even more bizarre to me is when this conversation occurs with a fellow ex-pat. This is less common, but happens more often than one might expect. And while Chilenos will conduct the interrogation with a sense of wonder and bafflement, other foreigners conduct it with bile. Have I noticed how disorganized they are here? Doesn't the difficulty of finding work bother me? Isn't Santiago intolerable? Isn't Valparaiso provincial? Am I aware that I have planted myself in a racist, disorderly, chauvinistic, crime-ridden country with absolutely not one bottle of decent hot sauce to be had?!?!

And then....a glimmer of possible understanding: "Do you have a pololo?"

No. No pololo.

Well, in that case, don't I find the dating scene intolerable?

Whoa. Deep breath, fellow foreigners. I am confused by the Chilenos who manage to be simultaneously proud of their country and yet flabbergasted that I want to live here. I am even more confused, however, by ex-pats who are here voluntarily and yet seem to absolutely hate it. What on earth are they doing here if they don't like it? I can share in many of the gripes (in the sort of way that you tease your friends, however)--but in any event I deal with the little annoyances because I like it here. As mentioned, if I didn't, I would go home, or more likely somewhere else. It is one thing to be really and truly irritated with one's home country but live there nonetheless. I've been there. But why would you stay someplace when it drives you mad when at any time you choose you can get on a plane and say chau for the last time?

Furthermore, am I seriously the only gringa who has ever decided to stay in Chile for reasons other than pololodom? This simply cannot be true.

Anyhow. I like it here. I love this city. Why am I here? Well, to pull one out of the air, because this is a photolog of my "commute" yesterday: