Santiago

I am racking my brain about where to start. Santiago de Chile is set in a valley surrounded by snow-capped peaks. It is magnificent. Our entire time there we kept saying, "We really like this city!" The picture is taken from a cable car as we rode up a hill of some sort - Santa Lucia,or Santa Something . It had a fabulous view and a big statue of Mary at the top.
The conference, put on by Women of the Harvest, was refreshing and encouraging. Our speaker was a former missionary kid, as well as a missionary herself with her husband and kids for 17 years in Colombia. We were encouraged so much by her honesty and energy. It was also a joy to meet other women serving in South America. I loved my small group. We had all countries, all ages, all types of work represented. It was just so encouraging to be able to talk with other women who are experiencing similar struggles and to be able to not only be encouraged by them, but to be able to encourage them as well. Our struggles are not only normal, but universal to the missionary life.
We did manage to find time to play in between sessions. Here is Allen and Jami looking like movie stars on the streets of Santiago. We managed to get some shopping in, even though the money was weird. Allen is holding up a $1000 bill - that's 1000 pesos, about the equivalent of $2 of American money. We could not get used to this. A coke and a water cost me $1500. A taxi was $3000 and I bought a shirt for $14,000. And a painting for $10, 000. It was freaky, but we soon learned to do the conversion quickly - take away the zeros and multiply by two. That's your U.S. equivalent, more or less.
Our final day was spent out at the vineyard of Concha y Torro. I don't know if this brand of wine is available in the U.S. - I imagine it is since they are 4th in the world - but if it is, I highly recommend their Cabernet Savignon, or even better their Trio Cabernet, blending their cabernet savignon, a shiraz and a cabernet franc. (I don't know what any of that means, except that I like it.)

The grounds of the vineyard were lovely and the wines were superb. Next time you head to Chile, you must make a stop.

I have one more funny story to share, but that will be next post.