how to fry an egg
I bet you think you know how to fry an egg. I bet you crack the egg into a bowl with a fork, beat it and beat it, making a funny gravity-defying whorl in the bowl until you dump it into the ready-and-waiting pan, with melted butter. Then you stirra-stirra-stirra until...
Vocabulary, ACHS and doing the Macarena
There have been times when I've realized that I know a word in Spanish, without remembering ever having learned it. The word huelga (strike) comes to mind, about which I had this realization standing in a railroad station in northeastern Spain, hoping to catch a train...
Tseelay vs Sheelay
Before we moved to Chile, my ex and met with a Chilena who runs a summer program at one of the best law schools in Santiago. I forget exactly what our connection was with her, except that when people found out we were going to Chile they crawled out of the woodwork...
Sports fans!
On August 22nd, 2004, I was on a group mountain bike ride up at Huinganal, an open hilly plain with bouncy terrain in the eastern sector of Santiago, up through the comuna (district) called La Dehesa. There were about fifteen of us, with a wide range of types of...
The Gear Report (second installation): Shebeest
When you're riding from the capital to the coast, a distance of about 75 miles, over the coastal range, and strung out over an entire night, replete with near-accidents, sidelong looks of pity at those whose bikes or quads couldn't make it up the dreaded Cuesta Zapata...
Rice is a vegetable product and beware the pecan weevils!
A clipboard-wielding woman accosted me this morning between Interpol and the luggage pickup in the Santiago airport. "Do you have any peanuts, almonds, food of vegetable origin?" she asked. In English and in Spanish, a little mantra: maní, almendras, peanuts, almonds?...
Walk like a Neoyorquina
Walking around Manhattan, as I have been for the last couple of days, has been incredible. First of all, it's kind of my home and not my home. It's been a constant in my life for as long as I can remember, as a child hunting down (then) elusive recipe ingredients with...
Cuchillo de palo
At the risk of making that Meatloaf song run through your head, I will report that it was long ago and far away when I was cycling through Quebrada Macul in Peñalolén, Santiago (please don't try this alone) with a bike mechanic friend when I heard a...
And now, one for the Spanish speakers!
Santiago has more than its fair share of stray dogs. There are stray dogs who have houses (on the street), who are fed kibble, or cut up hotdogs and other leftovers by passersby, neighbors and even the police. Cute ones with short legs, and lopey ones who limp around...
The photographic junta
This is certainly related to the chip-changing post of the other day, which stirred more emotion than I was expecting. Everyone's saying, yes! the chip! the chip! And I'm thinking, barbecue-flavored? Because I've already gone onto another topic. Because this is the...
