Despite I am not very good write about any topic, I think blogs are a good way to learn english, first because we are constantly in computers, so this tool is most familiar to us, also this kind of activity is forcing us to be continue using different words in different themes, so you can learn new vocabulary every day as well as you can practice your drafting in this language (and in general too). Even it was difficult to me to be creative to write the posts , I think I have developed my skills about this, but I still have to practice a lot (a lot!!) , recently in the last posts I could write easier, but I think is only a practice thing, to get used.  Right now I don´t know what I would change about it, for example, I like the free posts, but also I like the posts which had theme because I'm not very creative person in this case. This turn me to the question: what else I would like to write about? I really don´t know!!! Maybe could be more about the career to practice about it (although it would be more difficult... so it would be little by little!!)

This year is my first year in Anthropology and I have all the introductory subject about the career. I have 6 subjects, there are Anthropology I, Archaeology I, Biology, Methodology of the Social Sciences, Phylosophy of the Social Sciences and Latinoamerican History. My favourite is the last one, Latinoamerican History, it is a lecture, the teacher talk to us about the history of the social movements in our continent from the point of view of the main actors of this, the people, how they saw the period. We started since the "independence" of the countries, or a little before of it. I really like this subject first because I like to know about the history of our continent, I like the uncommon style of Latinoamerica, and second because the teacher places most emphasis in the social movements, so is not the common point of view of the upper class we learn in school, or the commons books we read about this topic, because there are only a few people who tell the history of the other part, of the same part of the social movements

I am very lucky because I have the fortune of living in a house with a big garden, and this is one of my favourite place. I really like all the life there, the different trees, flowers, plants in general and algo the but there is one special for me and for my family and it is the "avocado pear tree" (palto). Maybe it would sound crazy, but this tree have a very important story for us, and it was planted by a very special person, so it represent a lot for us. We were very sad because since a few years ago the tree was not giving more avocados, so we thought that it was dying but today we discovered a few avocados on it, so we are very happy (: maybe it must sound a little crazy, as I said before, but it was a beautifull new for all of us today (:

I really love photography, I think everyone have a "photographer" inside that appear when we have a camera in our hands, even more nowadays that we have a lot of technology is within reach.
I think that I like so much photography because I have people close to me that are related to this activity, my brother, my sister and specially my uncle.
His name is Ricardo Chávez and he is an excellent photographer, I really like his work, so I choose one of his photographs to show you, it was one of his exposition called "Lost innocence" ("Inocencia perdida") in the Cenfoto room, of the Santiago library. The photos consist in object inside in a plastic transparent bag, like the bags that are use for investigation but it this context it talks about evidence of the childhood, of the past. I choose one of this, and you can see little shoes inside a bag, I don´t know exactly when my uncle took this photo, but the exhibition was in august, last year. I like expecially more this photo than another because it make me tenderness and also it remember myself so much younger.
So, I invite you to visit his portfolio in this website http://www.nuestramirada.org/profile/RicardoChavezChavez (how yo can see, I am a proud niece (: )

Today I'm going to talk about a very old relief printing artistic technique: xylography. I knew this technique because my sister studied art and one of her favorite technique was (and is) the xylography. This consists of  carving, with gouges, a wooden board, which will be a relief to be inked and then printed. This technique was used in our country in the very famous "Lira Popular", it was a collection of poems that talked about the reality of the  popular sectors of Chilean population during the nineteenth and early twentieth, these were hung on a string in the public squares and poems were music by singers that sang as tenths so that all people could hear what was going on.
I really like this artistic technique, and even more with the example of the Lira Popular, because I like his craft character.
 I invited you to know more about it and try to work with wood and ink, and to investigate more about the Lira Popular too, for while I'm gonna leave you an image of one of those edition. (and one of my sister work too (: ) 

Tecnhology is very useful in our life because it make easier a lot of activities we do, but I`ve got mixed feelings about it. I usually use tecnhology, but I think that I must to learn to do more things without it. I don`t know which is my favourite piece of tecnhology, but the computer is which I use most. In the past in my house we have desktop, but now we use notebooks, even though notebooks are very comfortable because it can be used in every place, I think that desktops make me work more concentrated, and I think that is because I must to be sit straight so it make me pay more attention, in contrast if I am rest in bed, situation that usually make me sleep and  dont let me move forward in what I'm doing. We get notebooks since almost 7 years, but we still have desktops. I use computers for differents things, to find information, chat with friends, send e-mails, watch videos, series and movie, etc. I use computer every day, further now that I have to do a lot of things to the university, that I have to find information, and also I have to work with classmates, but I want to reduce it!!
So many times I think What life would be like without it? and I think that it would be very interesting because it make me (and make all of us) to discover a lot of things for ourselves, because not everything would be so easy and would be so handy

The best place ever!!!!!!

Today I´m going to talk about my ideal city, or better still my ideal place, and the fact is that it really exists and it is: Rapa Nui.

I was really really fortunate because I went there two years ago with all my family. It was an incredible and magic travel, and since I went there I discovered that it is my ideal place, for many reasons.

First, because it is an island. Maybe this can be scary for some people who are afraid about the ocean, but I like the idea to be in the middle of nothing. Actually, there is a place where you can see all around the island on the top of an inactive volcano. You can realise that you are surrounded by water, unfortunately I didn´t go there, because I didn't stay there as long as I wanted to. Obviously my view is external, because the fact that Rapa Nui is an island represents complications for the people who live there, who need some things they can only find in the continent, like hospitals, so they have to travel here.

Another thing that I really love about the island, is the fact that there are not buildings with more than one floor, I really really love this!!!!  I remember I realised that the clouds moved faster there, because I never saw before so many land extension, so I could see the clouds far far away.

Returning to the first point, about the "island" fact, this makes that everybody knows each other, so everybody says hello! to everybody on the street. Even if you are a tourist because it is so small that the people know perfectly if you are a local or if you are tourist. 

To finish, and I think maybe this is the most important aspect, is the presence of "moais". Not only because of the really amazing stories about them and the incredible way that they made them (one of the most amazing places was the "cantera", the place where they carved the statues) but because of the magic environmental that it creates, I felt this place as a very very very special place.

I really love Rapa Nui

I started very recently to study anthropology, only this year , so I didn't know any important antropologist until the last week when a classmate told me about Pierre Clastres and then a teacher spoke about him in a class. He is a french antropologist and ethnographer ( although he studied philosophy ), who was interested about american antropology, under the influece of another famous antropologist, Levi Strauss.  He worked with comunities from Paraguay and Brasil, specially with guaranies  and he has a very important participation on the "French may".  His most famous publication is "The society against the government", in general he talk about the normal authonomy of the human be, so he thought, against the evolutionism, that the government is not the natural way that a population organized, or not necessarily. I found interesting his thought because he talk about the leaders of primitives societies that have prestiges, but they can't become this to power separated of the society because they have a debt with his people. I like very much this idea because is very different of the way that we live today, we live in a society that many time it seems that the people have a debt with their leaders, while it must be the opposite.

I really like music, I think this is one of the best invention ever! Usually a like "relax" music, and is important to me the rythm but also what the songs say. One of the my favorites singers is Jorge Drexler, he is from Uruguay and his music is like poetry, maybe I can called this "trova".
I like his music exactly for that, I really like the rythms that he use, I really feel his music, and also I like the lyrics, because he talk about simple things of life. A lot of his songs are my favourites, like "al otro lado del río" (because it appear in one of my favourites movies: "Diario de motocicletas" ) , "mi guitarra y vos" (because is the first that I listen of him) ,"la edad del cielo" and "noctiluca" (the last two because I like what they say and how it is said)
Because I really like his music, I have gone 3 times to see him in concerts (the last 3 years!) I think I'm a little big fan of his work!


Mi guitarra y vos- Jorge Drexler en festival Despierta  the video is from the last presentation I went!

My autobiography

My full name is María Alejandra Chávez Mallea, but everybody knows me as Ale. I was born on September 8^th, 1994, so now I am 18 years old. I was born in Santiago, Chile, and I have lived all my life in San Bernardo, in a little place called Nos, in a house that I love because I have a lot of trees and a lot of space that let me have three dogs, Snoopy, Luna and Almendra, they are pretty crazy, but I love them (I really love animals!!) .
I studied in the dowtown in a school called “Instituto Sagrado Corazón”, where all my siblings studied. Now I’m studing Anthropology at University of Chile and this is my first year.

In my family we are 6, my parents, Eduardo and Carmen, my two sisters, Mª Gabriela and Mª Belén , my brother, Eduardo, and me. I’m the youngest. 

I like to do a lot of things, sing and play the guitar, dance, draw, make handicraft with recycled materials (it supposed that i do this to sell but I'm the worst seller ever!!)  and plant in the garden. I love to travel and go for a walk outdoors!!