Yali

by Rachel Craddock

Left to right to center: Anna, Yali, Neely, and me

Yali is the host mom of one of our friends from another study abroad program, Delaney. We ran into Delaney in the metro after Spanish our first Thursday here, and she invited us for tea. We ended up staying for once (11 in Spanish), which is like a tea time for Chileans (the name is possibly derived from British elevenses). It's usually around 8pm and involves tea or coffee and various desserts, but Yali does super once. We had a feast that night, and we got to practice our Spanish! Yali also told Neely and me almost right away that she would be our host mom, too, since we aren't staying with families... so we've taken her up on that: since our first night at Yali's house, Neely and I have been back several times—and recently we've started bringing our friends with us because they want to meet Yali for themselves. All of the beautiful places we've gone to aside, once with Yali and friends has been my favorite thing about being in Santiago.