¿Tu tienes mucha suerte, eh?

says my friend Eduardo after I finished telling him about my week. Translation for the non spanish speakers out there: "Your'e really lucky, huh?" No kidding!

Kicked the sickness finally and when I felt like myself again on Tuesday I decided it was time to start looking for a job here. I start my internship at NESsT tomorrow (whoo!) and will be in the office 3 days/20 hours a week, which thankfully leaves me time to "work" in the traditional sense - bringin' home the "tocino" ie. bacon . I had been asking around since I arrived more than a month ago and everyone insisted the only thing I could really do easily would be either teaching english or translating documents from spanish to english. Blah.

I thought: If those jobs are blah I should find the opposite of blah and do it. So I did.

I spent hours on the internet, translated my resume, wrote a couple blurbs about my interests and experience in spanish and english and sent it off to 5 of the best adventure companies that guide throughout Chile but are based in Santiago. Within 10 minutes I received my first phone call asking for an interview from Santiago Adventures and the next afternoon an email response from Southworld Adventours. I had two interviews and by Friday was offered positions as a trekking and adventure guide with both companies. Whoa huh. They were each are hiring a couple guides for the season and I guess with the combination of my experience, that I can speak English and Spanish, fateful timing and a little bit of *luck* I slipped right in.
Each company caters to a bit of a different client - the first is owned by a Vermonter who sold everything and moved to Chile 3 years ago to do this and puts together higher end trips for foreigners. The second is run by a group of young(ish) Chileans who have traveled all over the world, cater to a crowd of "independent" travelers, and emphasize sustainable tourism.

The best part is the pay is pretty good, the work is relatively flexible and I'm going to be able to really get to know some incredible areas of Chile doing all the things I've been dying to do since I got here, (backpacking, hiking, visiting hidden hot springs, kayaking, white water rafting, climbing, exploring) while being plugged right in to a network of people that are as content as I am to spend days running around in the mountains. AND getting paid to do it. This is not Blah.

I started yesteday with an all day scouting trip up to El Morado National Park with another new guide and the owner of SA. I was offered a spot for next weekend on a three day trip to Reserva Nacional Siete Tazas which is about 4 hours south of the city with SWA. Siete Tazas is named for a section of seven waterfalls and their corresponding cups (tazas) that the River Claro has carved out of the basalt rock. Its sits at the start of the Southern (Patagonian) region of Chile and is famous for serious whitewater and is supposed to have a substantial population of pumas and mountain monkeys. How cool is that? Pumas! The ironic thing is I've been trying to figure out how I could get to Siete Tazas but was discouraged because it is hard to reach without your own transportation and it would have been an expensive trip. So when Franklin in the Southworld office asked if I would be interested in going as an assitant guide - all of my expenses covered - I calmy said sure I could go, and tried not to let my smile betray me because inside I was jumping up and down.

Off to bed to rest for my first official day of NESsTERdom with dreams of mountains and mountain monkeys.