26.11.01 - 5:34 p.m.

The lonely planet guide to Santiago is a piece of shite!! Wayne Bernhardson, if I ever see you on the street I´m going to kick your gringo ass! I'm so tired of going to places listed in the guidebook, only to find that they are closed or nonexistent or in a totally different place than where it says on the map. Here´s an actual quote from the book´s credits:

"Lead cartographer Chris Gillis drew and corrected the maps with little fuss. He reported to senior cartographer Tracey "T-Rock" Croom, while Guphy and Connie "Pugs" Lock lended a cartographic helping hand with map editing."

Generally speaking, it is unwise to trust maps that have been edited by people named "T-Rock" and "Pugs".

In other news, my spanish is coming along. Classes are mostly conversational, but sometimes we read dialogs. My favorite type of dialog is the one where a married couple is fighting. Here´s one we read today:

żOtra vez has dejado los cacharros sin fregar? (You didn´t wash the dishes AGAIN?)

żYa estamos? żes que nos tenemos que pelear todos los dias? (This again? Why do we have to fight every day?)

Es que no te soporto. (Because I can´t stand you.)

My birthday is this Thursday. Julie & I are going to the Harry Potter movie (which I suspect will be much improved in Spanish) & then the drinking commences. Not so different from any other day, then... Friday is our last day of class, then we hit the road. We bought our tickets to Peru & the far south, only Buenos Aires remains. If I die in the wild, I demand to be preserved as a mummy and displayed in the precolombian museum of art. Thank you in advance for your assistance in this matter. TA