Working, Eating, Drinking in Vina with a Little Electrical Excitement

The last few days have been very busy with getting oriented at work (the PUCV - Pontifica Catholic University of Valparaiso), further settling in at home, and sightseeing with my brother, Warren.  There has been a fair amount of eating and drinking too.

The drive from our apartment to PUCV is about 20 minutes and easy (well, easy for me since Randy does the driving).  We have gotten used to our new GPS.  After struggling a few days with a Spanish language voice I managed to download an Indian (as in from India) English voice.  Don't ask me why Garmin offers that as my only on line English option but at least it is in English.  It is marginally more understandable than the Spanish. (Our Indian lady speaks very quickly.)

The building at PUCV that houses industrial engineering which is on the 5th and 6th floors (the top two floors).  The location is near the city center and the building is a re-purposed and enlarged industrial building.  Notice the lovely and large palm trees surrounding the building.

The building entrance.  Parking is beneath the building and they allocated a primo parking spot to us.

We visited the Sodimac home center store here a few times to get trash cans, a scale, a living green plant, light bulbs (more on that later), a fan and a few kitchen things.  This big chain has two stores in Vina.  We also visited all of the three larger supermarkets in Vina - the two Liders and the Jumbo.  We got an assortment of cheese, sausages, vegetable, fruit, drinks (beer, juice, soda, water), bread, jam, yogurt, and more.  I found pretty much everything I wanted except hummus.  Jimena rescued my need for daily hummus but finding the only place it could be bought locally - an "Arabian" deli in Vina.  This hole in the wall place does sell hummus and it is pretty tasty.

The iconic elephant of the Jumbo supermarket

Our apartment building.  We are on the 15th floor on the back side.  There are only two apartments per floor.

Randy in (literally) one of the small gardens of the condo complex

The funicular that goes from the condo complex (Mare Nostrum) down to Avenue Libertad which is a main road near the coast

Randy on the funicular

Alice also on the funicular with the very luxe condo complex that is near the beach behind her

An artist on the beach was carving sand sculptures.  This one was the finest of them.

Randy on the beach walk in Vina

We called the funicular to go back up - you can see how steep the hill is

Randy with his Auburn-Opelika sign on our balcony

We learned to work the washer and drier but found out the drier needs to periodically be emptied of water.  Instead of venting outside I guess it vents internally and lots of water builds up in its plastic tank.  An interesting difference from the driers we were familiar with in the U.S., Turkey and Europe.  A further excited was provided by Warren who was tasked with changing some light bulbs (there were quite a few burned out bulbs in the place).  In the half bath, Randy and Warren bought the wrong sized bulb and while trying to force fit it in, Warren blew the electric in the entire apartment.  This happened about 5:30 PM.  I called Rosa immediately who spoke (in Spanish) to the concierge.  He tried to switch the breakers he had access to without success.  He said this happened once before and the electrical company had to come out and switch the main breaker.  He called the electric company but we were not optimistic that they would arrive that evening.  In the meantime, Rosa and Jimena came to to the apartment with an electrical technician from PUCV and his son.  They confirmed that the electrical company had to reset the breaker but tried (without success) to wire us up some temporary electric.  While they worked, Rosa checked periodically with the electric company to see if their repairman was actually company.  After a few hours when people were getting ready to depart (and it was totally dark by this time except for light from the hallway to the apartment and a candle we had lit) the electric came on.  We celebrated with dinner at La Flor de Chile restaurant - an extremely popular place in Vina we had never been able to get into because it is usually crowded.  We finished dinner at midnight (there were still some people eating in the dining room by the way) and tumbled into bed.  This was some excitement we did not need and it also confirmed what we already knew - it is nearly impossible to live in a foreign country without local friends standing by to help out with such emergencies.  Thank you Rosa and Jimena!

The electrician tried to hook up some temporary power but just ended up blowing the outlet in the hallway.  Oh, well!

At La Flor de Chile, the pisco sours are served from the shaker and then the remains in the shaker are left on the table.  Nice!  Notice the very large Cristal beer Warren ordered on the table too.

Rosa looks over the drinks while Warren tries to relax from the ordeal of the electrical short in our apartment

These ladies are the best - mas mejores mujeres - Rosa y Jimena

The next day, Alice visited two port offices with Rosa and Jimena to discuss our project.  Both were interesting.  The port is the biggest business in the Valparaiso area and it is amazing how complicated the system is.  We have another port visit set up for today - to the empty container port.  This is opening up a whole new world of appealing research topics for me.

A model of the current (on right) and planned (at left) port at Valparaiso

Our first visit was with this concession who has the port area above.  This is a Spanish firm and is a relatively recent addition to the port scene in Valparaiso.

Jimena, Rosa and Diego (a master's student working on our project) at the TCVAL office

The ladies at the same office just prior to our meeting with the development manager, who hails from Spain

Alice and Pedro (Jimena's husband) at the government port offices where Pedro works

View of the main port (TPS) from the roof of the port authority building

The cranes on the landside of the TPS port

These role on rubberized wheels to move containers around

One of the main port (TPS) entries/exits

The big crane at the other port (TCVAL)

A view of the hills of Valparaiso from the roof of the port authority building - not many people get this view!

A panoramic from the same vantage point

Yesterday afternoon, to take advantage of the fabulous weather, Warren, Randy and I went to the Vina del Mar Botanical Gardens.  We had not been there before and it was well worth it.  Located at the extreme eastern part of town, it is a secluded oasis of plants, bird life and peaceful vistas.  There were not many people on this late Tuesday afternoon so we could enjoy the experience fully.  Highly recommended if you go to Vina. Afterwards, Warren and I played tennis (he crushed me easily) on the courts at the condo.  We also found out that the condo complex has a billiards room along with the tennis court, the two pools and the gym.  Pretty well equipped.  For dinner, we took Warren to Divino Pecado where we ate delicious fish (Warren), pasta (me) and beef (Randy).  Our favorite waiter, Mario, was off that night but we were well taken of.

The afternoon weather could not have been improved upon

One of the roses at the Vina Botanical Garden

A mini moai statue was very cool in the greenhouse area

Some flowers in the greenhouse

Another beautiful specimen

Otto Zoellner (there have been many Germans who settled in the Vina area) founded this botanical garden, the national botanical garden of Chile

Warren enjoyed the gardens and liked this massive tree stump

One of the cactus sections

The map of the facility - we drove between either end (the entrance with the flower gardens and greenhouse and the far end with the lagoon)

The lovely lagoon in the park

View from the more wild part of the lagoon - the lagoon area was laden with algae

A seabird (an ahinga, I think) caught a plump frog and proudly swam with it around the lagoon.  Its fellow ahinga followed closely obviously hoping for a chance to get the frog for itself

Warren walked the other way on the loop around the lagoon.  We met in the middle.

One of the splendid Chilean palm species near the lagoon

  Some desert succulents

The cactus greenhouse area

A parting photo - a pisco sour a la Mexicana - with salt on the rim.  Served at Margarita's, a Mexican restaurant we ate at in Vina.  The food was pretty good and the portions were huge.