Blog syllabus

Post 6: The Monsters of my Childhood.

I have strongly kept in my mind stories where the devil would take the sinners souls to hell, or disfiguring witches would cast spells of misfortune upon the locals or crop-fields. I remember actions that adults used to take to protect themselves from the devil, such as burning sugar on coal hot cinders, I remember them praying and begging God for protection and lots of other litlle nasty details that would scare the hell out of me, and wouldn't let me be at ease. Furthermore, when I saw the adults doing so, knowing that even the people who was suppossed to protect me from those frightening monsters couldn't protect themselves, I got totally anguished.

 During my childhood I was immerse in a very superstitious environment. Back in the south of Chile, the stories about witches, devilish creatures and monsters are very common and they are also a typical topic of the late night conversations.

I was a very brave child, though, when faced with movie monsters, things changed a bit. I still remember clrealy having been up all night, scared that some of the scariest monsters from the movies would come up the window and try to eat me.

The monster that took over my nightmares was Mr. Freddy Krugger. I used to feel really afraid of the way this character took over his victims, and just the thought of him comming into my dreams to torture me during my sleep, would prevent me and my parents along, from having a good night sleep.

Even though movie monsters were scary, the stories I used to hear about mithologic beings, deities, and situations in which the image of the catholic devil would appear, resulted even sacarier than any other fear I had.


 Now that I am stepping on my 30's, I look back and have a totally different perspective of all these stories; now I consider them to be a real important part of our national folclore and identity, and guess what, instead of running away from those legends and stories, I love reading and learning them, so as to have a deeper glance into my national identity.

Catching up with the entries #1

HI GUYS, TODAY WE ARE CATCHING UP WITH THE ENTRIES.



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The story of a picture                         

This might look a bit naive but , let me tell you, it is alcohol!, it was taken at a pub in Paris, in a bar accross from Place Vendome. I was with friends and we wanted to see the non-romantic and alternative side of the city.

This picture is a portrait  in memory my best holiday ever, and even though I haven’t had many superb holidays, because most of time I prefer visiting my family more tan anything else, I have had some memorable ones.

It was the year 2008, if I don’t remember incorrectly; and I was under big stress because I had had several problems at my job. Anyway, to make a long story short, I dropped by the place I used to work for and they told me: “here you are”… it was a NICE, FAT Christmas bonus.

That day, I was with a friend of mine who was leaving on a tour that same afternoon, and after hearing that I had received my present, she shouted at me, from the entrance: “Man!!!! Let’s go together!!!”….

Two hours later, we were travelling around 2 countries, we meant to tour as much as posible, getting to see idilic landscapes and also, both being teachers, we wanted to share with the locals and not visiting the typical touristic places.

The toured over Amsterdam (red district and all), Brussels (nice beer!) and finally Paris, where the picture was taken.  we spent nearly 3 weeks travelling, and from that improvised adventure, there are many stories we can tell, and another thousand anecdotes, I cannot let you know in this blog entry’s extension.