Umbrellas, Smurfs, and Taxis

The rest of Sunday, and Monday were pretty boring here. Sunday night I just hung out with the new girls in the house and the guys. The new girls are Tina, who I introduced in the last post, Angie and Christie. Angie and Kristie are from the Detroit area, and are both about 27. They're special ed teachers, and they came down here to help in an orphanage. They were really upset at first because their placement was in a school where there weren't really any kids, and they had a huge fight with the people from Maximo which was all dramatic. In the end though, they got what they wanted and are switched to a different place. 

Monday was pretty slow, since it was Mother's day. Almost no place was open. Jackie (from Parismina) and I tried to go to this cupcake place around the corner from Maximo and it was closed. I basically ended up wandering around the mall for a bit, buying my AWESOME new umbrella, and hanging out at Maximo. My new umbrella I had to buy because it was absolutely pouring rain, and I was really cold from being soaking wet. It's a huge bright orange umbrella that could probably shelter 3 people from the rain. And it was only a grand total of $10. Then Monday night, Mario (works at Maximo) took a bunch of us to this little bar a couple blocks away to get a drink. I liked this place better than the big bars that I've been to so far, because it was smaller and you could just sit and talk. We ended up playing this really fun game that the rules are really simple, but it's really hard. They turned it into a drinking game, where each time you messed up you had to drink, but I mostly just sat back and watched as hilarity ensued. Then when we got home, Tina and Christie went to bed while Angie and I watched 27 dresses. I had rented it from the video store across the street and it needed to be returned on Tuesday.

So Tuesday, I got up, ate breakfast, went to work... Then I came back to Maximo and worked on my travel planning skills. I have now officially booked a hotel and canopy/horse tour for myself and Jackie to go on. We're leaving tomorrow to go to Arenal for a night. Arenal is this volcano that has a lot of hot springs to go to, and it's supposed to have the best ziplines. So after working on my travel agent skills, I went to lunch with Angie, Christie, and this guy Pierre from Canada (he speaks French!). We went to one of the few Italian restaurants I've seen in Costa Rica. I got an awesome caprese salad (mozerella and tomatoes with basil, I don't eat the tomatoes) and Pierre got this HUGE pizza. It was literally like 2.5 feet across. He even managed to eat all but one piece. Christie and I split the last piece of his, because it looked so yummy. Then last night I really wanted to go see a movie. So at 8:45, I worked my way down to the San Pedro Mall, bought a ticket, and saw the Smurfs. I made sure it was in English too, with Spanish subtitles. Though, when the commercials started, they were all in Spanish, so I was worried for a few minutes that the movie would be too and I wouldn't understand a thing, but when it actually started, it was in English.

After the movie, I had to take a taxi home, all by myself, since I went to the movie by myself. This wasn't really a big deal, because I took a taxi before, but never by myself. I felt really awkward because it was completely silent in the taxi the whole time. Most drivers will have the radio on or something. Anyways, I got home safe, which is always a relief, took a shower, and went to bed.

This morning, on the bus ride down to Maximo, my stomach started cramping, and I decided not to go to my project today, because I didn't want to spend the whole time in the bathroom. So I checked my email, rode the bus back home and slept for an hour. When I woke up, I walked to the laundromat to pick up my clothes (CLEAN CLOTHES!! YAY!) and got a bus back to Maximo, to write this. Now, I'm going to go grab a taxi to meet up with Ellen (Monica's friend) for lunch, and tonight I'm supposed to be going out with a bunch of people.

Pura Vida!

I know it's been a while since I posted a new blog, but that's because I've been so BUSY! Let's see, at last update, we were about to go out to Nova for Marisol's birthday. That night ended up being CRAZY! At Nova, Wednesday is ladies' night, which means that after the cover charge, ladies get free drinks with vodka until 11. I got a vodka cranberry, and didn't really like it. We danced for a little bit, but I got tired around 12:30, so I took a taxi back home with a couple of other people and ended up in bed at 1.

The next morning, I did a stupid thing and didn't wake up, since I forgot to set my alarm the night before. So I missed work (I swear, completely unintentionally) and ended up just going down to Maximo and hanging out for a bit before walking down to the mall. I really wanted to have some home food for lunch, so I broke down and got McDonalds. It tasted like home and was the most amazing thing ever. I wanted to go see a movie after that (Los Pitifulos or The Smurfs in English) but there wasn't an english showing until 9:30. All the movies are either dubbed in Spanish, which would mean I don't understand anything, or in English with Spanish subtitles. So I didn't end up going to my movie and just wandered back home to do laundry. Overall I had a lazy day. That night Eric and Sumar were going out, and at first I was planning on going with them, but by the time they were leaving, I was already settled down with Marisol, a tub of ice cream, and a chick flick. So that night, I chose sleep over partying.

Friday, I was able to get up for breakfast and make it to my project. I only had to watch the kids for about 20 minutes though, and then it was bible story time. I really didn't understand anything. All the kids were sitting around a table, and I sat there to make sure they behaved and paid attention, but I was totally lost. There was a woman telling a story and essential giving sort of a Sunday school lesson. I already get lost when it comes to religious stuff in English, make it in Spanish and I just zoned out. Then after bible story time they all decided to watch Rio the movie. It was, of course, in Spanish, but it was animated so I sort of was able to follow it. Then about half an hour into the movie, I had to leave so I could make the but to Puerto Viejo.

So I rode the bus home really fast, packed my stuff, and caught a taxi to the bus station. I had an adventure trying to buy my ticket, because each of the like 6 ticket windows had a sign that said Puerto Viejo, but apparently there are TWO Puerto Viejos; one on the coast and one on a river. So I had to find the right window to buy my ticket, and by that time all the seats on the bus I wanted to take were sold, so I ended up with a standing room ticket. It wasn't too bad, though. I ended up sitting on the floor in the spot usually reserved for handicap people with a wheelchair. It was a 5 hour bus ride to Puerto Viejo, then Marta met me at the bus stop. Marta was one of the people working on the turtle project in Parismina. Most of the people from Parismina were there, and we all piled into two cars and drove to Manzanillo, another little coastal town. We found a hotel for the night, and went out to dinner where I got ceviche and french fries which were delish!

On Saturday, we all woke up and walked down to the dive shop were we got snorkels and fins for our trip. Then it was a half an hour boat ride to the snorkeling site. At our first stop, a few of us jumped in the water, and we decided that the current was too strong, so back in the boat and on to another spot. Here, the current wasn't as strong, but there wasn't really much to see, and the water was kinda opaque. It's the equivalent of winter here right now, which is really just the rainy season, which means that all the water is churned up and you can't really see anything. Since that was kind of disappointing also, we ended up going just back to the beach my the town and snorkeling there. There was actually something to see, and I got a couple of pictures of some pretty neat fish, but of course the water had stuff floating in it, so the pictures didn't end up very good. (my camera is dead right now, so I can't upload pictures, but I will tomorrow once my camera is charged)

Then, lucky me, I didn't end up having to ride the bus back to San Jose. Kristie (one of the volunteers from Parismina) and her fiance had a rental car, and they were driving back to San Jose anyways, so they gave me a ride. I got back around 11:30, took a shower, and went to bed. This morning, there was a new girl moved in, Tina. She's from New Jersey and is going to be here for two weeks. She taking the bed in the same room as mine, so no more room to my self :( ...JK.  There isn't any work today, because it's Sunday, or tomorrow, because it's Mother's Day in Costa Rica, and I don't really have any plans. I might finally go see the Smurfs down at the mall, and I want to go visit the Art Market in downtown San Jose. Other than that, it's just relaxing and catching up on sleep.

Bungeeeeeeeee!

That's right! I went bungee jumping! It started Monday night, when one of the other girls at my homestay told me she was going bungee jumping the next day and, of course, I wanted to go too. So when we got to Maximo the next day, I signed up. It was $65 for transportation from Maximo, the jump, a t-shirt, and a video. So at 1:00, the guy came and picked us up. Mercedes and I to jump, and Marisol and Crystal to watch. It was about a 45 minute ride out to the place, which was absolutely beautiful by the way. The the two of us had to basically sign our lives away. I thought it was curious that there was only one sheet of paper for bungee jumping when there were like 5 for skydiving. Anyways, I made sure to go to the bathroom before we went out on the bridge. There was another group that was going to do it, so we watched a couple of them do it first. This made me a little more confident, since none of them died. Then it was my turn. Mercedes and I had flipped a coin so that I had to go first. I got all strapped in and worked my way to the edge of the platform, and chickened out. They kept telling me not to look down, but I had to get my toes right on the edge, so I kept looking at my feet to make sure I wasn't stepping over the edge, and that meant that I looked down, so I ended up chickening out and making Mercedes go first.

Then finally, I had to do it. I honestly considered just not doing it, but I would have still had to pay half of the money, so I figured I might as well just get it over with. I looked up not down as I inched my way to the edge and held onto the guy and told him to tell me when to stop. Then everyone counted down from 5, and I jumped. It was seriously the scariest thing I have ever done in my entire life; even scarier than skydiving. I think the difference is that when you skydive, you're strapped to another guy who knows what he's doing, and he controls when you go. All you have to do is sit there and let it happen, whereas with bungee jumping, you have to be the one to jump. I don't even remember the initial fall. I felt it in my back a little bit with the bungee first caught me, and that got me worried. My biggest fear going in wasn't really the height so much as getting whiplash or something else that was a lasting hurt. After that first tug though, my back felt fine. So then I swung back and forth a couple times. When I finally slowed down and was waiting for them to lower the rope to haul me back up, all I could do was hang there and stare at the ground. I almost felt like I was going to be sick, and when I tried looking up for the rope, I got really dizzy. So I just concentrated hard on the ground and not throwing up. Eventually, the rope reached me and I had to do like a mini sit-up in midair to attach the hook to my harness. When they flipped me back upright, I was so relieved because I finally didn't feel like I was going to be sick anymore. It took the entire drive back to the city for my heart to calm down and for me to stop shaking. Then this morning my abs are really sore from curling up in midair.

Last night, the girls wanted me to come out with them, but I didn't really feel like going out with all the loud music and dancing, so I made Marisol and the guys walk down to the market with me to get some milk and snacks. The guys ended up catching a bus from there to go see a movie, and Marisol and I took a taxi back to the house. We felt kind of silly taking a taxi for that short of a distance, and the meter didn't even go up from the initial charge. But my way of thinking is I would rather spend the dollar for the taxi ride back than risk getting robbed on the walk back in the dark. So when I got back, I warmed up a cup of milk, opened my bag of fake cheetos (they don't have real ones here) and read my book while watching the girls get ready. Once they left around 9:15, I laid down and read my book until I fell asleep.

I don't know if I just didn't sleep well or what, but when I woke up this morning, I felt like crap. My theory is that I was just suffering from a lack of sleep and dehydration, so I went down to breakfast, but then called Maximo to let them know that I wouldn't be going into work today. Then back upstairs and sleep for me. When I woke up again it was 10:45, so I got up, took a shower and rode the bus down to Maximo. Now I'm here waiting for the girls to show up so we can go get lunch at the sushi restaurant up the street, then mani/pedis. Today is Marisol's 20th birthday, so tonight we're all going out to this club called Nova to celebrate. It should be a good time, and a lot of people are going. I even heard a couple of people from Maximo who don't know Marisol saying that everyone is going out to Nova tonight to celebrate someone's birthday.

Mi Primer Fin de Semana

I have now had my very first weekend in Costa Rica, in which I was free to do whatever I wanted. It started out with arriving back in the city from Parismina and having the girls at the house tell me that I was coming out with them that night. So we went out to a couple bars, and ended up having to walk around a bunch because one of the girls we were with had a bad copy of her passport as her i.d. so not a lot of bars would let her in. We ended up at this one called Xscape which was pretty fun. I had a tequila sunrise, which was super yummy and not at all strong. We danced for a little bit, but I got pretty tired since I'd been up early traveling back to the city from Parismina.

Saturday we decided that we wanted to go to Jaco for the weekend.  All five of us caught the 12:30 bus to Jaco, then Holly and I decided to find a hotel and spend the night, while Marisol, Mercedes, and Krista were going to head back to the city that same night. So Holly and I wandered around until we found a good price for a hotel. It was $46 dollars for the night, and we split it. There was even a TV with english channels. Then we wandered around again asking at all the tour places for a tour to the Isle de Tortuga for the next day. Almost all of the companies don't have any boats heading out to the island on sundays, but we did find one. It was an all day trip that included breakfast, lunch, snorkeling, and a bus back to San Jose.

So a van picked us up from the hotel at 7 in the morning and drove us to Puntalena where we had breakfast at a little restaurant place, included in the tour, then we all hopped on a boat for an hour and a half to the island. It was pretty fun, kind of like when my family went on that snorkeling tour in Aruba, with nets you could lay on over the water. Once we reached the island, we immediately got on a smaller boat to take us to the snorkeling site that was really close, so we snorkeled around for a bit. There wasn't much to see, but there were some fish, and I found a little hermit crab. About 2/3 of the way through the time allotted to snorkeling, I got stung. I assume it was a jelly fish, since I wasn't anywhere near any plants or rocks at the time. Basically it felt like my entire left leg was suddenly on fire, and I swam as fast as I could back to the boat. On the boat, the guide had some vinegar for me to put on my leg, but it didn't help much. Slowly over time, the stinging has gone down, but it's still pretty tender.

So after snorkeling, it was lunch time. We had a small dish of ceviche for an appetizer, curry chicken, rice, and veggies for the main course, and a sort of piña colada cake for dessert. It was a lot of food and I couldn't eat it all. During lunch, the local wild pig came around. I swear that pig thought it was a dog. When the kids that were on the tour ran after it, it just rolled over to be petted. After lunch, we had about 45 minutes to just relax on the beach, so I walked over to the little gift shop and bought a couple small things. I barely made it back in time for the banana boat! which was ok, and kind of short. Then we had another 20-30 minutes to hang out before the boat back to the mainland. Then on a bus back to San Jose, and a taxi ride back to the house, a late dinner, and bed.

This morning, I woke up at the customary 6:30 for breakfast at 7. A surprise was waiting at breakfast. The night before, two guys had moved into the house. Their names are Eric, and some Indian name I don't remember. Breakfast was the usual egg, rice, and beans, then off to Maximo to get placed into my new project.

Now, I'm working at a day care center. It's called Rayito la Luz. It takes three buses to get there. First, there's the cedros bus that brings me down by the Maximo office and one of the main bus stops which costs me 215 colones. Then, I take the L2 bus which costs 280 colones down to the GreenMart. Then I walk two blocks to the next bus station and take the last one which costs 230 colones. The way back is basically the reverse. So in total, it costs be 725 colones one way, which is about a dollar and a half, so it is going to cost be almost 3 dollars to get to and from my project every day. At the project, the kids are really nice though. There are 6 volunteers there, and about 20-25 kids that we basically just babysit. My hours are from 9-12. As soon as I walked in, the kids were just jumping all over me. They're really energetic, and I'm going to need coffee from now on to keep up with them.

The women who runs the day care has a really interesting story. She doesn't speak any english but I was told the story by the woman from Maximo who took me down there. The woman who owns and runs the day care originally started it in her house, and kept taking more and more kids. Eventually, her husband got so fed up with there being so many kids running around that he gave her an ultimatum; either he goes, or the kids do. She chose the kids, so her husband left, and she still runs the daycare. No longer out of her own home though. Now, there is a really nice facility with a kitchen and a small yard for the kids to play around in.

Fotos

Some of the pictures I've taken so far:

the street outside my house in San Jose

enjoying a delicious coconut Popsicle on the very hot bus.

this fruit is delicious and I still don't know it's name

taxi boat into Parismina

mi abuelo on San Jose feeding his canaries

baby canaries

the church in Parismina

the tiny snake I saw in Parismina

Shift schedule in Parismina

TURTLE EGG!

the view from the hatchery in Parismina

Parismina beach

the only place to swim that's a 1.5 mile walk from Parismina

I FINALLY got my pina colada

some really good Fish Tostido (sp?) from a peruvian restaurant

I went to Machu Picchu! :)

My room in San Jose

I'm a Wimp

Remember how I said it's so hot and humid in Parismina? Well it's so hot that it's making me feel sick, and I'm not able to sleep. So I'm going to be a wimp and go back to San Jose tomorrow morning. I've enjoyed the little time I've spent here, but I think I'll be better able to enjoy myself in a city that I'm am actually physically comfortable in.
At least I got to see a turtle. That's right, I saw a turtle. On my first shift which was midnight to four in the morning tuesday night, we saw a green turtle laying her eggs. It was really kind of beautiful. We were about 45 minutes into our walk, and we saw turtle tracks, I was really confused at first, because our guides only spoke spanish. I noticed though when we approached a turtle. She was about a third of the way through laying her eggs when we found her, so we sat and waited for her to be done. It took about a hour for the whole proccess. When she was done laying her eggs, She started to dig, and dig, and dig, and dig. Seriously, most of the proccess was digging. We were sitting behind the turtle, but when she started throwing sand we had to move for fear of getting hit in the eye. She was really strong and was throwing sand like 5 feet behind her. So she dug for about 45 minutes while slowly mobbing forward, so by the time she started back to the ocean, there was still a big whole where she had been, but almost a mountain of sand where the eggs were. We marked their locatino with a stick when she started covering them so we would be able to find them easily. When she started for the water, she moved surprisingly quickly. I had to courage to run up and touch her shell once before she reached the water. Then we watched our guides dig up the eggs she had just laid and put them in a grocery bag. When we got back to the hatchery, we waited while they buried the eggs in a protected area.
So that was the biggest adventure of this trip. Tomorrow I'm escaping to the relative coolness of San Jose where I have yet to plan what I'm going to do. Maybe I'll see if there are any volunteer opportunities in the city that appeal to me. If not, I can just travel around and be a tourist for the two weeks until I go home.

There's No Such Thing as Dry in Parismina

So I've officially made it to my project site. It's this tiny town called Parismina. There's only about 600 people in the town, and almost none of them speak english. My host family speaks absolutely NO english, which so far has made it really hard to communicate. I've already been bitten by mosquitos about 5 times, and they itch just the same as idaho mosquito bites
The bus ride here was really long. The first leg wasn't too bad, there was air conditioning, and after the first half hour or so, I took a dramamine so I passed out. When we got to Seguirres, we had to walk two blocks down the street to find the next bus. It was a sort of local bus, so there wasn't any air conditioning, and I had to squeeze my bag between my legs. I wanted to die from the heat, so I bought this ice pop thing from a guy that was selling them on the bus. It was amazing. The only way I can think to describe it is that they took the insides of a coconut (milk, meat, and bits of shell) and froze it in a long skinny bag. When we got off the bus, we had to wait for a water taxi to take us to Parismina. That trip was pretty fun with the breeze and the water. When I was shown into my host families house, and to my room, I had to sit for a minute and recover. As dry and cool as I thought San Pedro was, so hot and humid Parismina is. It's even more hot and humid than I thought Costa Rica was going to be.
Besides the heat, it's a pretty cool town with more bars than stores or schools. I swear more that fifty percent of their income must come from the sale of alcohol.
After orientation and the town tour I am now settling down for a nap. My first shift of beach walking starts at midnight tonight and goes until 4 in the morning. My sleep schedule is going to suffer severely from this trip. I am pretty excited about free time though. There are supposed to be some pretty cool places near here to go scuba diving. Also, there's a nature reserve where there are jaguars and monkey and animals galore. I'll deffinitely be using one of my free days to visit there. We get one free day off a week, which isn't much, but we only have about 6 hours of work for every 24 hour period.
The one thing about this town that I don't like is it's lack of connection. My international cell phone that I brought is absolutely useless, as there's no service, and I'm going to have to beg some locals to let me use their internet to post this blog. My own host family doesn't have internet, and I doubt they even have a phone. One of the other volunteers' family has WiFi though, so hopefully I'll be able to use it. Otherwise, I'll just keep stocking up blogs and post them all at once when I get back to San Jose three weeks from noww.

Big City Jitters

Since I've arrived in Costa Rica, there have been two main emotions running through me; excitement and fear. Excitement because, HELLO! I'M IN COSTA RICA! and it's super exciting. There are so many people and so many things to do and places to eat. I feel like even if I were to stay in this beautiful city of San Pedro/San Jose for all three of my weeks I would not get to see even a fraction of everything I want to see. Alas, I only get until tomorrow when I am to be shipped off to the coast to do my turtle work, which I'm sure will be a whole different experience.  I'm going to miss out on tons of places that I want to go see and eat and drink and just experience Costa Riccan city life.

But there is also the fear.  Earlier today, I was very thirsty, but I didn't have any colones to buy a water bottle. I looked up online where a bank was, and it was only around the corner from the Maximo Nivel office where I'm hanging out all day. Yet, I was scared out of my wits to walk even that far by myself to change some money. So I put up with my thirst until my roomies got out of their orientation and they came with me. I found out about 20 minutes later that I could have simply asked at the desk at Maximo and they would change some money for me which made me feel pretty stupid. But the fear. I've never before been in a place where I didn't feel comfortable at least walking down the block by myself. I'm sure I'm just paranoid, but it seems as though every person who looks at me just knows that I'm not local. I'm afraid someone is going to come up and rip my backpack off and take off down the street. Maybe it's just that I'm not used to big cities, or maybe it's the fact that I understand about 1 out of every 30 words I hear, but something just makes me uncomfortable. Possibly the driving.

Oh the driving... It is my opinion that every driver on the streets of Costa Rica operates on the following mentality:
speed limit?...pshh
lanes?....pshh
pedestrians?...pshh 
stop signs?...pshh
stop lights?...meh, ok, but I'm going to get as close to the car in front of me as I can so I can zoom off as soon as the light turns green.
It is extremely terrifying. This morning on the bus, I could have sworn we were going to hit something about every 20 feet or so. The only thing I can say it that I give props to anyone brave enough to drive in Costa Rica, and I tip my hat to all the locals who somehow manage to drive like a maniac and never hit anything.

Bienvenidos a Costa Rica!

Hola! Technically this is my second day in Costa Rica, but seeing as all I did yesterday was sleep and eat, I'm counting today as my first.  Flying into Costa Rica was super exciting, and even though it was dark what I could see through the open window (I had an aisle seat so the view wasn't that good) was absolutely gorgeous. There was a lightening storm over the volcano that looked amazing. Since I was only in the second row of the plane I was one of the first ones off, and my bag came pretty fast, so I was the first through customs. They had a security guard escort us through the terminal all the way to customs.

taxis outside the airport

When I came out of the airport, I learned that I apparently can't see. I missed the sign with my name on it and had a few minutes of panicking, especially since I couldn't figure out how to call a Costa Rican phone number. Then, while I was attempting to ask a taxi driver how to dial a phone number, ALBERTO came up to me and asked "Maximo Nivel" to which I replied YES! Maximo Nivel is the local volunteer program that I'm working with. I figured out pretty quick that Alberto didn't speak a word of English, but I understood his "tres mas" to mean that we had to wait for a few more people. We finally found said people (they missed the name sign too) and loaded up on a bus with a new guy (this one spoke English pretty well). We drove around and dropped the other people off at their host families, and I found out I was last, which scared me at first, but the I was really grateful for being last because it meant the driver guy was invited inside for breakfast and he was able to translate for me. My host family doesn't speak any English except for the son Herrson (hair-sone) who knows about as much English as I do Spanish. After the meal however, my translator left, and I escaped up to the room I had been given and passed out.
At about 10, Herrson came up and invited me to church with them, which I politely declined and went back to sleep. About 12, I woke up to the sound of lunch being made, so I went downstairs. This was when I met the man who I think is the abuelo (grandfather) of the family. The food wasn't quite ready yet, so he took me in the back room and showed me his birds.  The mad raises canaries and he was feeding the little baby chicks. They were so adorable. He showed me some that were 15 days old, then pulled out some 8 day old chicks, finally some eggs. There was a whole menagerie of canaries.

After an amazing lunch of chicken soup and rice and beans, I went back upstairs (where I don't have to struggle to understand what the family is saying) and fell back asleep. I didn't get much sleep last night since I was on a plane and had major adrenaline in me. When next I woke up, dinner was ready. So I went downstairs and was relieved to find that there were four other girls that had arrived while I was asleep, all of which spoke English. There is Orla from Texas, Mercedes, Crystal, and Marisol from L.A., and Holly who is originally from Japan, but also from Texas. So I got to speak English a bit.  After dinner, I went upstairs and passed the time chatting with the girls from L.A. until it was time for bed.

This morning, I decided to take a shower, and let me tell you, I am sincerely missing water pressure. With the shower in the apartment thing, the more pressure you use, the colder the water, so I turned my water down until it was nice and hot, but it didn't have much pressure. So then breakfast was egg, rice, beans, and fried plantanos. Since the L.A. girls and I were new to Costa Rica, Marina (host mom) took us on the bus to the Maximo Nivel office. So here I am taking full advantage of the access to a computer and the internet and waiting for my orientation to start at 4:00.