Entering La Casa Verde

Hola,

I don't have a lot of time for an entry today (first final exam for some of my students tonight!), so I thought I'd just give you a snippet of what it's like to enter my apartment on a day-to-day basis.  As you will see, the security around here is a little bit more extensive than even that in the states.  Even people walking around, both hands are on their bags at all times, and perpetual vigilance/vague distrust is the name of the game.

Anyway, starting off, here is my set of keys:

I know what you're thinking, and the answer is no.  I'm not working part-time as the warden at an all-gay Chilean prison, these are simply the number of keys I need to enter my apartment every day.

Here's the apartment.  I'm in the upper right corner of the building straight back in the picture.

First, the parking lot gate.  This is the green key:

Then we traverse the parking lot and arrive at the main door to my apartment complex, where I use the yellow key.  If I were to receive mail (hint, hint) it would be placed behind this door:

Then, we climb 4 flights to my apartment.  It looks like this:

At this point, you're probably thinking to yourself, "Well, we've already gone through 2 separate sets of locked doors, we can probably just get away with one lock on this door, right?"  Seriously?  Didn't I show you my key ring?  How could you possibly be thinking that right now?  Come on, man.  If you're not going to pay attention when you're reading my blog...  well, then please read every entry twice.

TWO MORE LOCKS.  Top (red):

And bottom (black):

And now I'm into my apartment!  Home sweet home, now I can finally rel...

Another lock????  Yes, this one is to my room.  So now, 5 locks later, I can blog to you jokers.  Seriously, if I ever lose my keys, I am unequivocally screwed.  I've been pretty paranoid about them ever since moving in.

These doves outside my window don't know how good they have it.