among other places, Quintero, Antofagasta, and San Bernardo. In 1962, she moved with her family to the United States, where her father was assigned to the military mission at the Chilean Embassy in Washington D.C. Her family lived for almost two years in Bethesda, Maryland, where she attended Western Junior High School and learned to speak English fluently. Returning to Chile in 1964, she graduated in 1969 from Liceo Nº 1 Javiera Carrera, a prestigious girls' public high school, finishing near the top of her class. There she was class president, a member of the choir and volleyball teams, and part of a theater group and a band, "Las Clap Clap," which she co-founded and which toured around several school festivals. In 1970, after obtaining a relatively high score on the university admission test, she entered medical school at the University of Chile, where she was selected in the 113th position (out of 160 admitted applicants). She originally intended to study sociology or economics, but was prevailed upon by her father to study medicine instead. She has said she opted for medicine because it was 'a concrete way of helping people cope with pain' and 'a way to contribute to improve health in Chile.' Detention and exile Facing growing food shortages, the government of Salvador Allende placed Bachelet's father in charge of the Food Distribution Office. When General Augusto Pinochet suddenly came to power via the 11 September 1973 coup d'état, Bachelet's father was detained at the Air War Academy on charges of treason. Following months of daily torture at Santiago's Public Prison, he suffered a cardiac arrest that resulted in his death on 12 March 1974. In early January 1975, Bachelet and her mother were detained at their apartment by two DINA agents, who blindfolded them and drove them to Villa Grimaldi, a notorious secret detention center in Santiago, where they were separated and subjected to interrogation and torture. In 2013, Bachelet revealed she had been interrogated by DINA chief Manuel Contreras there. Some days later, Bachelet was transferred to Cuatro Álamos ("Four Poplars") detention center, where she was held until the end of January. Thanks to the assistance of Roberto Kozak, Bachelet was able to go into exile in Australia, where her older brother, Alberto, had moved in 1969. Of her torture, Bachelet said, in 2004, that "it was nothing in comparison to what others suffered". She was