Idiots Abroad: The Chilean Edition: Home is where the skateboarding dog is

After 3 weeks in Chile, we'd like to kick off our blog with the following invaluable life lessons we've learned thus far.

Life Lesson 1: Organisation and preparation is a waste of time.

Thanks to our careful planning and coordination (as per usual), for no particular reason we embarked upon the journey from Heathrow to Santiago on separate flights, airlines and well, weeks. After 24 hours door-to-door travelling from Portsmouth to the hostel, and an entire seven days of separation, no one was more surprised than ourselves when we arrived safely with all luggage in tow.

Descent into Santiago

With no place to live, we booked into Castillo Surfista for the next 2 weeks. Some people might try to tell you that choosing a hostel in the middle of South America requires thorough research, prioritising factors such as personal safety, cleanliness etc. Those same people may also try and tell you that choosing a hostel based solely on its skateboarding dog is a rash decision. On both accounts, those people would be wrong.

Shout out to our main man Duke

Life Lesson 2: Life favours the lazy and unambitious

After exhaustively trawling through flat-share websites for days, we were on the verge of losing all hope of finding anywhere half-decent to live. Case in point, crazy landlady in the following link:

https://twitter.com/AmeliaT94/status/490417866651750400

We pretty much gave up and spent our time lying in beds on Facebook, and thanks to this we saw the advertisement for the apartment we are currently sitting in, the moment it was posted to our newsfeed. Thus bringing us to our second life lesson. Go-getters: 0. Elle and Amelia: 1.

Leaving the comfort of the hostel for our Parque Bustamante apartment and its panoramic views of the local skate park/drug den/mating ground, we were excited (socially anxious) about meeting our new housemates. Upon arrival, we discovered we were not the only young couple living the dream under this roof. Elle and I would be living with a Chilean couple and a German couple, and for the first week we'd be sharing a cosy bed together. Such jokes often made to us, it was nice to truly live up to the expectations. Ah to be young, in love and abroad.

View from the apartment

Life Lesson 3: Chileans are the ultimate example of life lesson 1

At the risk of stereotyping, the Chilean race is lax, unsystematic and unpunctual. When your crazy tour guide landlord promises to bring you essentials such as bed sheets and a key the following day, expect him approximately one week later with no key, the wrong bedding in one hand, and a bottle of Pisco (local Chilean liquor) for Monday night shots in the other.

That said, once you adapt to the chaos, the people here are unbelievably friendly and helpful. After two days Elle received an invitation to a Chilean wedding, not to mention countless BBQs and parties. The city itself is also really cool, with a permanent view of the Andes almost anywhere you go (see edgy year abroad pics below).

Sadly our three weeks of doing sod all have come to an end as our university semester starts this week. Commence future blog posts about failed social interactions in an educational environment.

Disclaimer: we accept no responsibility for any mishaps that occur from following these life lessons.