¿Camping?

[So the picture here is entirely irrelevant, I just like it. It was on the wall in the radio station that I talked about in my last post. I guess in some way, the poster is somewhat related to what I'm writing about, but we'll see how it turns out.]

Unfortunately, preparing for a camping trip here in Chile (or at least in Santiago) isn't quite as easy as making the hop over to LL Bean or, in Asheville, as dropping by Diamond Brand, Black Dome, or even Mast General Store to pick up a large spoon to cook with or a canister of white gas. "Outdoors" stores here are "[insert a general topic] and Camping". "Deportes y Camping" [Sports and Camping] or "Armería y Camping" [Firearms and Camping]. In the last 5 hours, I've been in 2 fishing stores, 2 firearms stores, and a host of general athletics stores only to realize that the stoves and faded sleeping bags stuffed into the corners of their displays are the only "camping" equipment that they carried.

That said, walking back from the grocery store, where I managed to find a spatula and the ingredients to make brownies for my host mom's birthday tomorrow (she's been asking me to make them ever since I got here), I was thoroughly frustrated. The display in a pharmacy caught my eye - kitchenware - so I slowed my angry power-walk a little, went inside, and headed toward the back, where I managed to find absolutely nothing that I needed. It was only about 5 minutes after I had left the store when I realized the ridiculousness of what I had been doing and started to laugh: there I was, a pale, crazy-haired gringo (I hadn't showered yet) in the kitchenware section of this cramped pharmacy towering about a foot (at least) over clustered chilean women who were just trying to buy some silverware or pick out a good kitchen set while I was scrambling through every corner trying to find a large spoon, with my backpack, heavy with the brownie-fixins, swinging around and probably connecting with a few unfortunate ladies.

So, now that I'm happy again and laughing at myself, I'm going to put off working on my independent study project and go rummage through a bunch of shady auto-parts stores to try to find some white gas for my camp stove.