Progress (with Spanish) can look like...

When we moved into our house, I said to Alicia, in all sincerity, "I wonder when the Cafe Recreo opens on Saturdays...I'm going to walk up and see what their hours are."

And when I realized what I had said, I had to chuckle. 

Business hours are not posted anywhere. It's not possible to walk by a closed store (or cafe, or restaurant, or pharmacy, or bank, or post office, or you name it) and find out when they will be open next. (Unless it's Starbucks).  Most chains seem to keep regular open business hours (so regular that major department stores didn't even close on Easter Sunday morning), but the smaller businesses seem to open when they're ready, and close when they're ready. One of my regular cafes, for example, closes "a las 9:00 o 9:30, más o menos." My neighborhood botillería might be open one Sunday afternoon, but closed the following Sunday afternoon. Chile doesn't officially siesta, but my neighborhood fruterias do. They seem to close for the afternoon and re-open sometime...at night...after I get home from work. 

So, when I went in search of a bike to rent, I decided to simply show up outside the rental office I had spotted the previous weekend and see if they were open. They weren't, and no hours were posted.

Hours? No.
Phone number? Yes.

I dialed the number, and it wasn't until the phone was ringing that I thought "huh. I should probably think about what I'm going to say," and it wasn't until well after I hung up that I realized it was the first time I didn't hesitate to talk to someone over the phone in Spanish. 

Day 61: Progress can look like not being afraid of the phone.