More Photos!

More photos, this time from Caleta San Pedro, near La Serena. A "caleta" is a place where fishermen anchor their boats when they're not in them. As always, let me know what you think in the comments below, and if you like the photos, share the post!

Photos Copiapó

In keeping with the theme I created in my last post, here are some photos from my last two trips to Copiapó, these trips, much like the one to Santiago I posted pictures of before are work related, and so most of my pictures are on the way there and back, rather than of the city itself. Remember to let me know what you think in the comments below, and if you like the post, share it!

Photos from Santiago

It's been quite a while since I've uploaded photos on this blog (or anywhere for that matter), and I think it's about time for me to share some of the best ones from my last trip to Santiago. All of these photos were taken in-between La Serena and Santiago, or in Santiago itself. Remember to let me know what you think in the comments below, and if you like them, share the post!*

Where are the English-Speaking Countryballs?

If you have no idea what a "countryball" is, you're not alone in the English-Speaking world. Countryballs have gone viral on Facebook and other social media sites in places like Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Poland, and Venezuela, and are rapidly spreading, even to places like Africa. Despite their roaring success elsewhere, Countryballs are relatively unknown in the U.S., Great Britain, and Australia, my big question is:

Why?

Old I Remember Clifford Performance

I just recently blew the dust off this old YouTube video, and was surprised to find that it had been collecting views while I ignored it, it's up to over 1600, which isn't bad for a video I never really promoted. Keep in mind that this was quite a while ago, so the quality isn't the best, but it's definitely not the worst.

1000 Views!

I just hit 1000 views, and would like to thank everyone who's taken a look at my blog over the last month since I started it back up, as well as everyone who looked at it all the way back in 2006 when I started it originally.

Thank you!

MarketGlory Review (transplanted from old blog)

I've been playing this online game for about a week now, and as far as in-browser strategy games go, it's not all that bad. The game is designed as a political and market simulator that allows you to both deposit and withdraw real cash in Euros. Now, I'm not playing this as a get rich quick scheme, nor do I think it will actually make me any real money, but it's a good way to work out your brain in your off time, and the possibility of a real profit entices you back, even if you need to play for a thousand hours to make one measely Euro.

PTC Sites (Transplanted from my other blog)

Hate to break it to all you surfers out there who want to make a quick buck off the internet, but PTC sites are a big waste of time and energy, all of them. If you want to make money off the internet, you need to have an idea, a much better idea than this blog, and definitely a much better idea than sitting around in your underwear, glancing at PTC ads for 30 seconds and making $0.0001 for doing it. If any PTC site says you're going to make much more than that, don't even bother registering, if you snoop around, you'll find that many PTC sites actually say they're going to pay you more than what they charge for ad hosting, which is a bunch of BS. These sites don't pay, and if their TOS says anything at all about paying, it's generally something like "you must invest to recieve a payout" or "payout will be made in an undisclosed amount of time, equal or less than 1000 years from the payout request date". Nobody actually reads the TOS anyway, especially not those of us who've ever been stuck in that dark, dreary place called desperation, the one that takes you to PTC sites in the first place.

Roamler App Review

You've probably seen ads for apps like this one that allow you to make money from home, or work, or the bus, or wherever, as long as you have internet, and don't mind downloading possibly malicious programs to your cellphone for pennies at a time (best done with wi-fi, here in Chile at least you would spend more on the mobile data to download the apps you would then delete than you'd make). You may have even tried a few out, upon seeing these ads again and again and again, I gave a few of them a try and found exactly what I described above, these apps have since been deleted, and if you have one, I'd recommend doing the same. (More info about why you might want to avoid most of the apps you may be paid to download here). Now, don't get me wrong, the apps themselves aren't all that bad, and unlike the PTC sites I wrote about on my other blog here, (that blog will be closed soon, I'll move the posts as soon as I get around to it) they actually will pay you for what you do, once you hit a dollar or so, which takes a while. The problem is that downloading something that's potentially malicious to a device which holds all of your personal information is usually bad news.

Roamler is different.

Creativity that never ceases to amaze me... (corrected)

After doing a bit of research (honestly mostly just reading the comments on the youtube video) I found out that the video wasn't at all made to go along with the song. Notwithstanding, it goes quite well with the meaning of the song as I interpret it, and could definitely be worse. In order to credit the original makers of the video, I've added the original (with original audio) below. It's also worth the watch, and gives a slightly different spin to what I got out of it the first time.

Lunes (monday) mi primer día en el Norte

Today we started our trip to the north, which took me all through the 3ª región, from the desert to the coast and from the far north of the región to the far south. Today we went from coquimbo (where i live) to vallenar, stopping for a few hours, and después passing through Copiapó, but not stopping until we ended up in Caldera, on the coast again, where we spent the night at a residencial where my host dad knows the owner.

A= Coquimbo

B= Vallenar

C= Copiapó

D= Caldera

Martes (tuesday) en el Norte

Today we went from Caldera up north to Diego de Almagro, and on the way back we stopped in Chañaral, sorry about the lack of and the poor quality of today's fotos, my camera was in macro mode in the morning, and after i figured out it was in macro mode, it started running out of bateries. Diego de Almagro is a little mining town, of about 1500 people, which I fell in love with, its nice and quiet. Chañaral used to be a big port, but for the last 20 years or so, ships have been stopping in other, bigger, easier to access ports, and Chañaral has fallen into disarray since then, although i dont have fotos, Chañaral is full of old buildings that havent been kept up very well, which are interesting, but sad, because you can see that they were beautiful at one time.

A= Chañaral

B= Caldera

c= Diego de Almagro

Miércoles (wednesday) en el Norte

Today we got up nice and early, and went to Copiapó, the biggest city in the 3ª región where I spent all day exploring and taking pictures. We stayed the 2 nights in Copiapó at the house of a friend of my host dad's, she was pretty cool xD

A= Caldera

B= Copiapó

Jueves (thursday) en el Norte

Today we stayed in copiapó most of the day, but after lunch we made a side trip to Tierra Amarilla and Los Loros, little farming towns to the south, down the valley made by the Copiapó river. That night, we went to the house of a friend of my host dad's, and had a great party, with chinese take out, and kareoke (which was horrible, but fun)we got back to the house where we were staying around 4 in the morning.

B= Tierra Amarilla

C= Los Loros

D= Copiapó

Viernes (friday) en el Norte

Today we got up (a little late after last night's party) and hit the road, stopping again in vallenar for a little while, and eating lunch in the same place as lunes. After, we went to the town of Huasco, about an hour away, on the coast, which didnt have too much, but i met some cool people there. After Huasco, we started back on the way home, and arrived home around 22:30.

A= Copiapó

C= Huasco

D= Vallenar

E= Coquimbo

new pics (parties)

been a while xD

wow, its ben a while since i last put something up... I'm doing great, I've been on summer break since late december, and will be till early march. I'm having a great time here, we opened up the hardware store the other day, and it's going well, people keep telling us that we needed one in my barrio. the fotos i put up recently are from 2 parties i had ( a bbq and a b day party) last night and the night before, and there are a few fotos from the orientation in december (with me and some friends up on stage, and playing psychic) as always, theres alot to tell but i have no clue what to wright, send me a comment, and i'm sure ill think of more.

--dave

some pics from las compañias, sindempart, and the new floor i helped put in in the backyard..

wow, havent posted anything for a while.....

wow, I've been in school, and doing things on the weekends, and so I've absolutely forgotten to post anything on the blog >>.<< School gets out for summer break next friday, until march (summer break. I've also recently started rugby, with 2 practices a week; although the ball looks a little like the one for football, the games are completely different. I dont have anything special planned this summer, but I've started looking into a few trips I can make relatively cheaply to cities where there are other exchange students, or extended host family that would have me over for a little while. I'm going to a Rotary orientation in 9 days (December 13th) in Villa Alemana (a 45 minute plane ride to Santiago, followed by about an hour in car) where i will take a Spanish proficiency test, and the people who fail the test will be sent back to their host countries. I'm not too worried about the test, a friend i got in touch with back in Febuary when I was picked for Chile by Rotary sent me an example of how the test is going to be, and i scored 100%. You're probably wondering why I havent gotten any pictures up lately, and I was really surprised looking at the last thing I posted that I didnt put anything up when my camera got stolen while I was out on a walk a few blocks from my house, but nothing happened to me so its no cause to worry really. I'll steal a few pictures off of some friend's facebooks and go ahead and stick em up on here. Leave me some comments, I'd be happy to answer any questions about well, whatever you'd wanna ask :P

-Dave

¡TEXTO!

wow, I just realized ive been putting up pictures, but not words, so here goes.
Im doing great.. y have been pretty busy at school here lately, Ive finished my 1st full novel in spanish, and took a test on it. that excited me alot. Ive found out im not able to go to the south in the summer with rotary, but ive got alot of things to do here in La Serena all summer hahaah Im having bilingual dreams, and now thinking exclusivley in spanish, but not dreaming completely in it yet. My grades have been good, but my worst class is language, we cover literary epochs, which ive never had in a class before, sometimes i go to other courses and help the english teacher with her harder classes, which is fun, but a pain at the same time haha XD well, im not too sure what all to write about... haha leave a comment if you have any questions, and ill probably think of more to write...

-Dave