Work

Just having finished my Bachelor's degree at university, I wanted to do something different for a change. So I came to Antofagasta to teach English to interested individuals and groups alike. At least that was the original intention, with the social crisis breaking out roughly a month after my arrival, it got a bit more difficult to find new classes/hold the current ones. I was surprised to find that the general English knowledge of Chileans seems to be rather basic. Learning Spanish was, therefore, a necessity for my teaching and a big challenge for me personally, especially due to their innate way of conversing that is truly hard to follow for beginners. Nevertheless was it always interesting to find new ways to explain certain aspects of the English language to my pupils, as well as holding conversations about current events with them. Experiencing how so many different people think and learn was very interesting to me, I was particularly happy when they'd prepared some phrase from an earlier class/by themselves to surprise me in the next lesson.

Experience

I was able to live together with two cousins of my employer, which I was truly grateful for. Having them around to help me in my early days and struggles adjusting to this new culture was invaluable to me. They treated me like part of the family and I was able to join them for various trips, vacations, family gatherings and asados (bbq's) which were particularly awesome. As my working schedule was quite irregular, with some classes being in the early morning and others late at night, I'd gotten my own set of keys and could come and go whenever I pleased. The food may be a bit of a shock to vegans/vegetarians, as there is usually a lot of meat involved, which is relatively cheap compared to other food. I generally tried to taste as many new things as I could and ended up having had prietas, guatita, michelada, pastel de choclo, empanadas of all sorts and many more. Most of these I really liked and would recommend giving it a try ;).

Discover

The teaching in itself was already quite challenging as my Spanish knowledge was very limited and many of my pupils hadn't learned any other foreign language before, therefore being unused to the process of actively acquiring a new language. What truly left an impression on me were the protests though. No matter where it was omnipresent that people desired a change and were willing to go to great lengths to achieve this. Mostly, this only ended in utter chaos. I think I can really count myself lucky, being from a country which doesn't have these problems currently/anymore and believe it should be our responsibility to aid others by being a guidance/help them overcome those chaotic times with truly democratic means. Also, education plays an important part, even just a bit of English knowledge, as it opens up new information with borders beyond the South-American continent, which may be interesting for people to study. Having this in mind made me feel like my work might be a bit more useful than anticipated, even if just for a few individuals.