'I Go to Seek a Great Perhaps'

Mi Primera Dia de Trabajo

potter42 — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:14:00 GMT

There is no WiFi in this town apparently. Just two internet places where you can pay to use a computer. That is why these blogs are all posted at the same time...

    I had my first day of work. It was good but extremely extremely dirty. Not just in the fact that I came home with many types of animal "caka" on me, but the whols place is kind of dirty. Well...primative, I s'pose. At lunch the guys we're using the benches and ash trays and such. Quite gross. It's harder to communicate at work for some reason. I haven't had much of a problem at home. But you know in the U.S. how there is that certain group of Missouri construction workers and the like that look like they are perpetually covered in dirt, wearing holey jeans and t-shirts with the arms cut off? And you can't understand when they speak and it's your native language. Yeah? Well I'm working with the Costa Rican version of those guys but it's not my native language. So, the only thing I can consistantly understand coming out of their mouths is their comments of my being either "guapa," "rica," or "bonita." It's quite interesting... They had some sort of argument of sorts about who I would work with after lunch...this guy nicknamed "Cheeky" won and I helped in feed the animals that aren't on display at the Zoo at the moment and clean their cages.

    I had cleaned cages with the owner earlier in the morning and it was gross but not too much and it was covered by trees so it wasn't burning hot. With Cheeky, however, it was disgusting. There is a room full of birds (So, like my living room...), one with some little big cats, owls, and some animal I don't remember the name of, one with monkeys, and a room with rats and mice used for feeding said cats and the snakes. The floors of every room were covered in animal shit. So somehow whilst using a powerhouse both Cheeky and myself left with at least shit water on us. Animal feeding was ok at first. Scoops of dog food like food for the mice and rats, then cutting parts of trees in the blazing sun for the animal I don't remember the name of and the monkeys. After that Cheeky opened up a hell hole of partially bad fruit literally covered in fruit flies that I had to dig through to find the ripest bananas for the animal I don't remember the name of. Along with bananas was a bucket of slightly moldy papayas that I had to cut up and put into tubed for the monkeys. I don't know if any of you have messed with a gooey papaya but it starts to resemble the look and what I imagine to be the feel of the stuff that comes out of the ceiling at the end of Poltergeist. And cutting it up didn't involve a table and knife. It involved my hand, a tube, and a long machete like blade. The inside of papayas have these nasty looking seeds that look like moldy caviar. I didn't really like papayas before this, which is good because now I certainly do not. Feeding the cats was actually quite unnerving. These cute little jaguars and leapords that I was petting then ripped heads off of mice and sucked our intestines. It was like watching a high school dissection gone awry. No es bueno parra mi.

    So I was covered in bits of moldy fruit, poop and poopy water, and enough sweat to be thoroughly disgusting. Luckily for me, I think Monday is cage cleaning day and that I will get to do some more interesting things the rest of the week. Not that this wasn't interesting, mind you. I had fun, it was just really gross. First thing upon arrival home was being laughed at for the look on my face and then taking a nice cold shower.

    I ventured into town to look for internet, a bank, and shampoo (I forgot mine in San Jose). I thought catcalls and the like in the US were bad. Here I am exotic so it's much worse. I thought it was bad in San Jose. Pero, San Jose often has travelers. Here in this little pueblo of San Carlos/La Marina I am even more "exotic" and it is much more prevelant here. Very interesting whilst walking... I don't get it. But, whatever. So this town has no WiFi. That's alright, I can deal. It is annoying, however, because on my iPhone I can use WiFi to call my family or whoever in the US for free. It's muy muy carro to call internationally so this is the best way, even if the reception sometimes sucks. I can also text through this app. So, no WiFi means no family/boyfriend contact. But I emailed at the internet place so everyone knew I was alive and I can talk to them on the weekends.

    When I got home the house was nice and lively. Patricia runs a small tienda out of their converted garage. Thinkgs like snack and drinks. So all the doors in the house are always open and people come up and buy things and the kids run between the two sections of the house. We all eat together in Patricia's side though. I think it's the one with the kitchen and washroom because the laundry and cooking are communal.

    After dinner Melanie and I attempted to teach eachother some songs in English. It was very confusing because she was too shy to sing alone so we finally ended up singing Disney Channel songs together in English because she watched that station and knows the songs. But we had a nice time talking about music and I hepled her with her English while she helped me with me Spanish. When we finished singing people in various parts of the house clapped. It was cute :-)

    Then Patricia came in and asked me about my family and we talked a lot about Picasso's and mi casa and my life in general. She wanted to see pictures of everybody so we spent like an hour and a half, she, Melanie, her sister, and I, going through pictures and telling stories. They were really interested. People would point out pictures while I was scrolling and ask about them. Like a picture I have from my sophmore prom after I took my hair out of the pins. My hair was everywhere. They loved it, thought it was hilarious. They looked at pictures of Picasso's, the shop, the picnic we had a year or so ago, latte art, pictures of Main St. I had my Mickeys out and told their story and showed pictures of Mickeys in various places. For those of you who don't know. When my family went to Disney World a couple years ago we didn't have the money to bring Emily. So, whilst there I bought a stuffed Mickey Mouse and wrote her name on the bottom of the foot like Andy's toys in Toy Story. For the whole trip we brought Mickey along and took pictures of "Emily" in various places, with us, with characters, etc. That way it was like she was there. Before we left I bought another and wrote my name on the bottom. Now wherever we travel the Mickeys come. If we travel seperately it's as if the other has come along and if we're together it's even better. Pretty much we're just adorable friends. Mi tica familia thinks this is wonderful and is excited about taking pictures with them.

    Patricia found out that the bank was closed when I went today so we went through my money and she traded some out for me and we went through my change and she gave me c100 coins for all of my obnoxiously small ones. And she showed me how much certain buses cost and stuff like that. It was very very nice of her. She said she can always go to the bank later, it's harder for me because I get off work at 3 and the bank closes at four.

    We got to talking about food and I asked if either Melanie or Patricia had ever had rice krispie treats. They don't have them here. So I'm making some tomorrow for everybody. "Mi casa es tambian Su casa, Ashlee," she said. I asked about marshmellows because when I went to the supermarket they only had fruit flavored ones. Ew. That's all they have here. Costa Rica doesn't do S'mores, Rice Krispie Treats, or Sweet Potatoes (what else are marshmellows used for) so marshmellows are normally used as decoration for fiestas and such, thus the need for colors. I said I didn't know about fruit rice krispies. Turns out she had a bag of mini ones so we tried some and they're barely flavored so we're gonna try it. Then Patricia left and came back with toothpicks and a lighter. She said that her family would often set marshmellows aflame and eat them. That's when I mentioned s'mores. They didn't know what they were so I showed pictures of Dave and I making s'mores at Kayaks. So the three of us sat on the bed roasting marshmellows and talking. Tomorrow, rice krispie treats and maybe s'mores.

    I'm really glad I am with a family that is interested in me and doesn't treat me like a job, which is what Naomi did. I was so upset with my first placement and this one is awesome. Patricia said that if I ever came back to Costa Rica I could stay here for a few days or I should at least come by, bring David, or Emily, or mi familia. She also gave me the house number so I could give it to the aforementioned people since there's no WiFi. She said she knows it costs a lot to call here but it's not too much on her end so I should at least have it so people could get ahold of me if they need to. Most host families don't even allow students/volunteers to use their phones. It's quite nice and helpful and loving.

    Before she went to bed, Melanie came into my room to say buenos noches and she gave me a wooden butterfly charm. Because we're friends she said :-)

Buenos noches!

Thousands of Miles from Home and I'm in the Same City

potter42 — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:12:00 GMT

I left San Jose today. For once I actually had a full conversation with Noami. It was about my directions for leaving. Lovely... I was afraid a bit that I would get lost on the way, take a wrong bus or something, but I got there just fine on my own :-) There was only one moment where I was lost. At the second bus station I went to the ticket counter, asked for the bus ticket and showed him the directions the school gave me. He told me to buy my ticket on the bus ('why have a ticket counter,' you might say. 'No se,' I would reply.) and said section 3. When I got to section 3 there were four buses and none of them had my destination on it. But apparently I looked confused and American because a nice woman came up and said she knew English and could help. She did and I got on the right bus. The whole trip was nice, actually. I took a lot of motion sickness medicine so this time I wasn't sick. As soon as we got to the mountains and I saw a rolling landscape quilted in farmland I could tell that I would be happier here.

    The bus dropped me off at the animal rescue centre. No one could get ahold of my host mom for a bit since I got in earlier than anyone thought (myself included) so I wandered the centre. It's not particularly large but it has a lot. Monkeys, birds, a lioness, 2 adult jaguars, the cutest little baby leopard, and a baby jaguar-like cat, and some other animals. It's a cute place. People we're just picking places inside and setting up picnics, there are tables in random places also. After I had walked around a bit I went back to the gift shop/food shop/entrance area and sat in there for awhile. Then the lady working was worried that I was hungry so she made me a sandwhich with her lunch stuff and some other lady came in with rice and chips for me. Everyone was very very nice, nicer than anyone has been to me so far.

    My host mom showed up shortly thereafter. Her name is Patricia. She is also very nice :-) We starting walking to her casa (it's a few blocks from the centre) when a guy pulled up in a car and gave us a ride. Turns out he is her brother-in-law. They live in a sort of duplex. Patricia in one side, her sister with her husband and two kids on the other. When we got there her cousin was also over and her sister and nieces showed up a bit later. Everyone was instantly welcoming. William (her cousin) thought that I didn't speak any Spanish and announced that I was muy muy guapa, rico. I said gracias and he was a bit embarassed I think. Lol. So they started talking a bit and asking me about myself. I told them I had had two weeks of Spanish classes and very little Spanish before that. They were all very impressed and said that I spoke more Spanish than any of the other volunteers they had had before. None of them speak much English, if any. Soon I was watching Spanish T.V. and having a beer with the guys. I've spoken more with this family in one night than I have to Noami in 2 weeks. And! It's all in Spanish, I've only had to use my dictionary once and we've understood eachother just fine. I think I'm better at Spanish then I gave myself credit. Patricia's nieces are Melanie and Emily. They're adorable. Emily is less than a year old and Melanie is probably 10 or 11, I'm not sure. Both girls have taken a liking to me and Melanie and I are having a lot of fun together.

    After lunch Patricia asked if I wanted to go into town so I could see where everything was, like internet, shops, banks, and the supermarket. So she, Melanie, and I ventured into town. Most things were closed since it's Sunday but she showed me around so I can find it when I need it and then we went grocery shopping, that is always fun. After grocery shopping she took us to get ice cream. I had some rum and raisin stuff. Es muy bueno. Earlier I had spoken with Patricia about my wanting to go to Arenal this weekend and that I was excited to see the volcano. I had seen it from a distance on the way in to town. On the way back Melanie and Patricia were in the front of the bus and I was a few seats back. At one point both os them got really excited and told me to look out the window. Guess who has a view of an actively erupting volcano from their casa. Me, that's who. And I have people who cared enough to be excited about pointing it out. There's this perpetual cloud of smoke above the volcano, it's really neat. I can also see a bunch of mountains and farmland. I love mountains, probably more than the ocean.

    When we got back Patricia and her sister made dinner and Melanie and I watched Disney Channel in Spanish. Very helpful with the learning. Everyone was very interested in my ukulele and excited about my playing while I'm here so we got to talking about music and dancing. I said that I love dancing and wanted to learn some Spanish music. So Patricia turned on the Spanish music TV and we had a living room dance party for a good hour. I was worried that I was gonna get crap when I got home for spending a month on Costa Rica and coming back neither tan nor particularly in shape. However, it is so hot here I will just sweat off a bunch of pounds and the sun will instantly burn me leaving me tan at some point. Oh my god it's hot and humid here, insanely so. We were all dripping with sweat before the dancing so after was pretty gross. I went to take a shower and found water pressure! The water doesn't get really warm when there's pressure but it's so damn hot that its ok. I am very excited about this, the shower in San Jose was merely a trickle. My hair has not felt clean since I got here. Oh, and my room doesn't look like a dungeon! I already feel more at home than I ever did in San Jose. I'm pretty excited, I think I'll do ok here. I start work tomorrow at 8 am :-)

Roller Disco and my last nights in San Jose

potter42 — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:09:00 GMT

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}

The roller disco turned out to be an awesome idea. Myself, Kira, Vicki, Lisa, Max, Florian, Julia, and two other German girls went and had a blast. They only had roller skates, not blades, so trying to stop was fun for everyone... Roller skating with a great amount of people when you don't speak the same language as the guy on the intercom can be dangerous. Apparently there's a game where when this guy blows his whistle everyone switches the direction of skating. We did not know this. So we here we are, 6+ people holding hands and skating when suddenly everyone is skating at us. Now, all of us are/were students at the Costa Rican Language Academy and are therefore at least proficient with the language. However, people speak Spanish muy muy rapido. Entonces, people who are learning can't decipher enough words to start to comprehend. Sad times.

After skating we walked around the bar streets, nothing seemed inviting so we ended up in a pizza place. Spanish food is my least favorite culture foodwise but since I am in Costa Rica I've been avoiding any other kinds of food and American snacks whilst at the supermarcado. Pero, when we end up in a pizzaria it would be rude not to share a pizza. So it doesn't count. Good pizza, it was.

When we finished eating Julia, the two other German girls, and Lisa had to leave. Max, Florian, Kira, Vicki, and I still wanted to hang out but not a one of the bars did we want to enter. It wasn't a night for the bar scene. So, Mom and Pop should be proud, we we're teenage hooligans instead. We went to the store, bought some beers, found a nice graffiti wall on an empty street and set up camp for a few hours. It was actually quite fun and probably one of our best nights. It was also our last night together :-( It's funny, I've spent the past week and a half kind of hating San Jose and now, when I've finally gotten acclimated and stopped caring about the fact that my homestay sucked and found a good group of friends, it's a bit sad to be leaving. But not sad enough to actually waste time being sad. It's mostly just the people I'll miss.

Saturday I went on a 3 part tour to Irazu Volcano, Orosi Valley, and Lankaster Gardens. I had a pretty good time. No one else from the school went, it was just me, a traveling couple, and a russian mother and daughter. Irazu volcano was rainy but we got there when the rain started so the clouds hadn't covered everything yet. The "what to bring" list mentioned a sweater but I figured I wouldn't need one and that my waterproof coat would be fine. I was wrong. The waterproof jacket was nice and helpful but it was friggin' cold up there! On the way to Lankaster Gardens we stopped by the most famous Catholic Church in Costa Rica. It was pretty... The gardens were very pretty. I got made fun of by the people on the tour because I had 3 cameras with me. But they all do different things! One is waterproof so I can take pictures when it's raining, my SLR 'cuz it's the shit, and my other one because my SLR doesn't have a macro lens. After the garden we went to lunch at a nice restaurant in the Orosi Valley. The view was breathtakingly gorgeous. I will definately post pictures from that.

I got back to San Jose pretty early, around 5. I still had to pack some stuff but I wanted to see if Max and Kira wanted to hang out that night. Vicki didn't get back until around 1am. Since we are all foreigners in this country we don't have cell phones and Kira is the only one with internet access at home and we can't really use the host family phones. So I posted on both of their Facebook walls that I was gonna be at the mall at 7 and I hoped someone would meet me there. Kira did. She had to babysit for an hour though so we went to her place. It is really nice. In the "richer" part of town in a gated community with a guard. Her host mom works in the Embassy. The English Embassy I think, even thought she's Finnish and living in Costa Rica. She's extremely nice.

Max and Florian had gone to see a movie and we met up with them afterwards. We started out at Bar Rio but it was way too crowded. None of us had been in San Jose on a Saturday night before and we were not liking it. We ended up at what we thought was just a bar with a patio but it had a room full of pool tables! So for 2 hours we played pool and had a nice time before heading home.

My volunteer work ends the Saturday after next so I will come back to San Jose that day. I'm going to try to make it into town at a reasonable time because we think that is Max and Florian's last night in town and Kira will be there and Vicki might be there as well since we both come back to Naomi's for that night before we go to the airport Sunday. Her to catch a plane back to Manchester and I to pick up David, which is very exciting. Anyway, it has the potential to be a nice reunion night :-)

El fin de mi primero dos semanas

potter42 — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 09:35:00 GMT

Hello again :-)

The second week is already coming to a close. I cannot tell if it's sudden or long coming. It's an odd feeling. In some ways I feel like I've been here for a long time. However, the fact that yesterday was my last day of classes felt kind of sudden. Oh well, the point is I've been here 2 weeks and now I'm going to Alejuela for 2 weeks.

In the last blog I mentioned the Jazz Cafe and Puerto Viejo. Jazz Cafe is supposed to be a nice place with good Spanish and local music. It was nice, I s'pose, but the band that night was playing selections from Eric Clapton's Crossroads Concert. So our night of Spanish music ended up being a bunch of English songs I hear all the time. But all in all it was an enjoyable night. Myself, Vicki, Joanne (Vickie and Joanne live in my homestay with me), and Lisa (a girl from our school) went together and some Germans from the school were at the bar so they sat with us. It was good to sort of meet new people and to axtually do something in the city.

Friday morning myself, Vicki, Kira, Lisa, Ivonne, and Keyo (all girls from school) left for Puerto Viejo. The bus ride through the mountains was quite pretty, from what little I saw. Motion sickness set in pretty quick with a Tico bus driver on curvy roads so I spent as much as I could asleep. 4 hours later we arrived and checked into Hotel Pura Vida. It's a small quaint hotel with a hammock clad commons area and friendly staff. Quite a nice play to stay. I spent an awful lot of down time in said hammocks and ended up buying one to take home.

After we got our stuff in the rooms we walked around the village a bit. We found a place to rent bikes for the day and decided that could be a good way to see the area and go to prettier, more secluded beaches. The bike ride was wonderful, I haven't spent that long on a bike in years, I will have to do that more when I get home. Costa Rica is a rainy country in general and as the dry seasons ends in April and the rainy season begins in May its been a toss up as to the weather. That being said, you can pretty much guarantee rain year round on the Caribbean coast. So, when it started to rain really hard we pulled into a little restaraunt for tacos and drinks. As the rain subsided we started riding again and eventually found a nice beach spot. I haven't been in the ocean since I was really little. It's a lot different than the rivers and lakes of Missouri, I enjoyed it very much. It was awesome riding our bikes onto the sand.

After the first beach we rode a bit more to another one and swam some more. This beach had less coral than the first so we could go out further and the sand was finer. We wanted to go a bit further and make it to this beach that was supposed to be "the pretty one" but the bikes had to be back by 7 so we rode just a bit further and found a cocao farm that advertised tours. So we locked our bikes together and hiked up this huge hill to get to the office. At the top we found out that the tour was about 3 hours long and we couldn't do it :-( But there was a bright side! We bought some chocolate that was made on sight (ginger and chocolate for me. Muy bueno.) as well as roasted cocao beans. Those were interesting, I've never had anything like them. Good, but one could only eat maybe 2 or 3 in a sitting. On the way back to the village we stopped at another place for happy hour and had Pina Coladas whilst caught in the rain. This whole being able to drink in Costa Rica thing has been really nice. It opens up more options for places to go and things to do. Stupid U.S. drinking laws...but that's another story.

The bike ride lasted 5 or 6 hours. My bum was super sore for the next few days...it was worth it though. Back at the hotel we all showered and let me tell you, I could have stayed in that shower for days. It had consistant hot water and...wait for it...pressure! Water pressure is not something we get at our homestays. Or, rather, not mine and Vicki's, I don't about all of them. Over the course of the weekend I showered 6 times. All showered and dressed up (thank you Mom and Emily for putting my wrap skirt/dress with my clothes to pack, it has come in handy) we hit the main street in search of good food and local reggae (the caribbean loves their reggae. Reggae and marijuana...). Apparently finding music sung in Spanish is a feat in Costa Rica. Who woulda thought? Lots of Bob Marley (which is at least reggae) and American radio. I heard "Save Tonight" twice that night...The main street is pretty nice place. By nice I mean endearing. It's a dirt road with handmade shacks lining it where vendors set up shop and restaurants. Most of the vendors are the same, Costa Rican memorabilia, handmade jewelry, marijuana accessories, etc.

Saturday morning Vicki, Lisa, and I went out to breakfast at a place around the corner called "Bread and Chocolate." It was an adorable cafe with a good vibe and food from scratch. I had oat pancakes with pure honey instead of syrup and they were amazing, I've never had anything like them. The coffee came to the table in a personal french press for each one of us. Very nice. After breakfast we headed to Cahuita (the next village over and home of the Cahuita National Park) while the other girls stayed in town and went to the beach. Cahuita was kind of a smaller and quieter version of Puerto Viejo, charming. It was raining again ( I have yet to be able to take out my good camera :-( Luckily I do have a waterproof one as well) but that's just something that happens and we weren't going to let it keep us indoors. So we went to the park, it's mostly just a trail about 6 feet into the jungle from the beach. When the rain let up just a bit we found a quite spot of the beach and decided to take a swim. I don't know how many of you have swam in the ocean while its raining but it's quite lovely. There were a lot of waves, enough to have fun with them yet not enough to be too dangerous. It was awesome just floating in the ocean with the rain sprinkling around you feeling the pull of the waves. There's something freeing about just letting the waves carry you in and out to sea. We tried body surfing for a bit. That was, I'm sure, entertaining for anyone watching but did not go so well in terms of follow through. It was more like we were attacking the waves. Lol. But it was really fun and very tranquil. Anyone who knows me knows that it's hard for me to feel any sort of tranquility but in the sea at that time I managed to do so.

It did nothing but continue to rain harder so we headed back to Puerto Viejo and hung about in the hammocks for a few hours. The commons/lobby of the hotel is outdoors but covered by a clear plastic ceiling so we could just lay there in a hammock and listen to the rain and feel the breeze and that rainy feeling of the air. That was also quite a tranquil time. There are two guys who sit on the side of the road by a coconut tree and pick coconuts, cut the tops off, and stick straws in them for people. That was pretty awesome. We met up with the others around 7 and went out for dinner at a place called Cafe Loco. There was supposed to be good live music and Lonely Planet rated their food pretty high. The music...that wa interesting. This guy looked like Enrique Englesias' less cute brother and sounded like the guy you would wake up to naked on the end of your bed with a guitar badly serenading you. Everything he played sounded like he was trying to come on to somebody. It was actually quite funny and uncomfortable. He played a lot of Beatles and other random songs that I hear all of the time. So much for live Spanish music. Lol. I started feeling ill at dinner and by the time the food came I couldn't smell my tacos without wanting to vomit. Luckily two of the girls didn't think they were hungry so they hadn't ordered food and they ate mine. The waitress was very nice and brought me some toast and coffee, that I could eat. When you're sick (or, at least, when I'm sick) the last thing you want to eat is any Spanish based food. That makes Costa Rica a bad place for me to be sick. I went home that night and wnt to sleep pretty quickly. When I woke up I felt like shit and Vicki was throwing up in the bathroom. We were supposed to go on a canopy tour that morning but the combination of the sideways pounding rain, my pounding headache, and Vicki and I's pounding stomachs, we had to skip the tour :-( Checkout was at 11am and our bus didn't leave until 4. The lady working at the hotel was extremely nice and helpful and let Vicki and I keep the room for free until it was time to leave so we could sleep.

I was feeling pretty bad for the next few days and, to be honest, I still don't feel all right. I think maybe drinking the water in Puerto Viejo was a bad idea. In San Jose it's fine, or at least mostly fine, but in a small dirty village on the Caribbean coast its not quite as pure. But, it took me a little over a week to need immodium in Central America so I feel I've done well. Lol.

When we got back to the house we found Natalie. She spent two weeks at our homestay (in my current room, actually) before doing some volunteer work in Monteverde and now she's back for a few weeks to work with a local school. She is extremely nice and reminds me quite a bit of Carol Kane. Kind of awesome.

Monday after school Vicki, Max, his friend Florian, and I explored the city a bit, headed to the city center where the craft market it and the...city hub, I guess. It was alright, still my least favorite in terms of cities I've been to. There's just something about San Jose about which I am not a fan.

Tuesday was mi diecinueve cumpleanos. When I got to breakfast Vicki had a birthday card for me. I felt loved. And during class our professora, Karla, surprised me with a cake complete with candles. I had happy birthday sung to me in 4 languages, German, Finnish, Spanish, and English! It was awesome and really really sweet of her. When we got home from school we found Noami in the kitchen baking a cake from scratch for dinner, complete with homemade whipped cream. A lot of work went into this cream, people were passing it around and shaking it for a good hour. The cake was some sort of banana thing and was really good. I'm glad it's not like "cake" cake. I don't like birthday cake...but this cake was good :-) People from school wanted to take me out for my birthday so after dinner Vicki and I met Max, Florian, and Kira at Mall San Pedro and walked to a local bar street. We ended up in a place called Caccio's. It was an interesting place, for sure. Their sign said 'Por un Mundo SIN reaggaton' and had a picture of 2 stick figures grinding circled with a line through it. It was on their shirts too...Also, beer there came in litres. Gone, it would seem, are the days of 'It comes in pints?!' Althought, I s'pose a pint to a hobbit would be much like a litre to a non 3 foot tall person. Nobody needs to drink beers by the litre. Except apparently customers of that bar. Max and Florian are German and naturally had 2 each. I had wine and a Sex on the Beach. Good thing about birthdays: you don't have to pay for anything. I am too cheap to be an alcoholic, definately.

Wednesday after school Vicki and I went to the bookstore at the mall. I got something cool for Pop that I can't mention on here, a traditional Costa Rican cookbook, and "The Best of Spanish Pop 1999." Should be interesting. We then met up with Natalie and Joanne at a coffeehouse in said mall and had pretty lovely lattes. Vicki went home to pack after that (we both are repacking so we can leave one of each of our suitcases at school rather than bring it to our placements.) while Natalie, Joanne, and I went to see a movie. We saw "Date Night" and it was a lot funnier than any of us thought it would be. It was a nice night all in all.

Classes at CRLA have been going really well. Julia switched classes so it became just 4 of us and we all get along very well. El clase es muy divertido. We're also learning pretty well and generally at the same pace. Since Max is the only boy, and he's German, the poor guy gets picked on a lot by us girls, teacher included. It's kind of sad that it's over actually. But we had a nice little graduation ceremony complete with certificates and cake. After classes Vicki, Joanne, Ivonne, Kira, Lisa, Max, Florian, Natalie, and I went to Bar Rio to hang out for a couple of hours and have drinks and spend the little time we had left together. When we got home Joanne, Vicki, and I ventured the Mas o Menos, the local supermarcado. I enjoy grocery stores in the US and they're extra fun in another country. Althoughht it's odd, some things are so much cheaper in Costa Rica (movies are $3 on an expensive night, $10 for the VIP theatre with table service), most things cost about the same, and some things are downright expensive. $8 for shaving cream! Crazyness... Joanne left at 5 this morning so we sat up and talked for bit after the store. She's gonna spend the next few days traveling on her own before heading back to the UK.

This morning Vicki and I took a tour of the Cafe Britt coffee plantation and roastery. There were two tour option, the regular 1.5 hour tour, and a 4 hour Coffee Lover's tour. We planned on the latter but found out that you had to have 4 people minimum. I was pretty annoyed at first because the 4 hour tour had a coffee cupping session while the 1.5 tour had only a cupping demonstration. However, luckily for me, I was the one who demonstrated. So, I found the tour quite enjoyable and got a free coffee pickers hat for volunteering for the cupping (that sounds inappropriate). There was a lunch buffet option which Vicki and I hadn't signed up for but when we got to the end of the tour in the coffee shop/gift shop/restaurant, one of the waiters got us in. It was a really nice buffet. The whole place had a good, chill vibe, so sitting and eating and wandering the gift shop wondering how the hell we were gonna get all the coffee and stuff we bought home was really nice.

Tomorrow I am going on a 3 part day tour to the Irazu volcano, Orosi Valley, and the Lankaster Gardens. Hopefully it is sunny long enough for me to get my camera out and take some good pictures, the place looks gorgeous. After that, my first 2 weeks come to a close and I move camp to the San Carlos in the Alejuela province of Costa Rica to begin my volunteer work at the La Marina Zoo/Animal Rescue Centre. It will be nice to be in a new area, I think. I don't really like San Jose. A few things I do like though are all the different colors of houses and buildings, and the fact that we're totally surrounded by mountains.

Tonight some of us from school are going to try to find the local roller disco. Should prove to be an interesting night.

I have no idea what kind of internet access, if any, I'll have after today. So, hablar tu lluego! (I'm sure I butchered that grammatically...)

First Few Days

potter42 — Thu, 8 Apr 2010 16:20:00 GMT

Hola! It's my fourth day in Costa Rica and it's about time for me to update the people who want updating. Over the past few days I've been wavering between treating this as a sort of "Oh look what a great time Ashlee is having" blog or "the truth of the matter blog." I've decided on the latter. Not that I am not having a good time, mind you. As many of you know, I was supposed to spend 4 weeks on an animal reserve in Alejuela but my travel company can't do their job and realized they booked me incorrectly so I am attending the Costa Rican Language Academy in San Pedro for 2 weeks before spending 2 weeks on the reserve. It is good that I am taking the Spanish school, however, because I've found that I am much better at speaking Spanish when the person doesn't respond with it as their first language. It's quite intimidating.

The first 3 nights and 2 days were quite terrible, to be honest. I haven't had much information from Real Gap (the company with whom I booked). To say I got sufficient information would be generous. So when I got to the airport I was just hoping that someone was actually there to pick me up. Luckily there was, but no one spoke English. Vickie, who is now my housemate, was on the same connecting flight with me and therefore arrived at the same time. I think that was good for both of us, we both booked through Real Gap and while, I've learned from much discussion, my experience has been far worse than hers, she hadn't had much to go on either. She is nice, we've gotten along well and spent most of our time together. She's 31 and from London (I do love British accents). So, while someone had retrieved me from the airport I still had no idea what my program was, who I was staying with, how I was doing anything, or if I had a place to live after the 2 weeks of school. I was feeling a bit stressed to say the least. When we finally got to our homestay we learned that our host mom spoke no English at all and when we were given our rooms I somehow ended up with the smallest and darkest room in la casa. I don't need much in a room but that night it felt like an extra punch, like a prison cell.

The next morning Naomi (my host mom) took Vicki and I to school so we knew which buses to use. I have never been so terrified as the first time I was on the road during the day. They have little to no road rules. People drive on both sides, squeeze in between eachother, and somehow don't crash. There aren't really stop signs here, a few exist but I have yet to see someone use them. And I have only seen 2 stop lights. Mi professora says lights have 3 speeds: Green=fast, yellow=super fast, and red=not quite as fast. It's true. There's a new game we have, its called "try to cross the street without dying." I could never drive here, that is for sure. Not surprisingly, the number 1 cause of death in Costa Rica is car accidents.

When we got to school we had an orientation and were put into small classes. Luckily Vickie and I were put in the same class. There are 3 others, Max, Julia, and Kira. Max and Julia are from Germany and Kira is from Finland. So everyone but myself has cool accents. I have decided that Spanish sounds ridiculous with an America accent, but I suppose everyone thinks that really. I have found, unfortunately, that while I know a lot of Spanish and can read it and write it and speak fluent Spanglish, I cannot seem to have a conversation with a Spanish speaking person. Everyone pronounces things differently or uses different words for things because thyere are very few rules in the Costa Rican language so understaning, especialy with such rapid speaking, has been very difficult. We end school at 3 and there are some afternoon classes or whatever after that so we end around 5. The first 2 days we went home straight afterwards, quite depressing. Just sitting in my little prison at 5:30 at night with little to do but sleep, edit pictures, and feel homesick (which is not a feeling I'm used to (no offense to home)). I can honestly say that this month I will be sleeping alone more than I have in probably 3 years. Usually either HD or David is in my bed. So sleeping is lonely :( I don't really like San Jose, it's not why I came to Costa Rica. I came to get into the wild, take pictures, and rough it for a bit I s'pose. Not be in a mostly dirty too crowded city where I can go to the mall and get quiznos and McDonalds.

Tuesday night Vickie and I got to know another girl in our house, Joanna. She's 45, English, did 2 weeks of CRLA and is now working in child care. Speaking all together for a good 2 hours was really helpful to all of us I think. Yesterday went a lot better. Class was enjoyable, we learned a lot about eachothers cultures, way too much about the sexuality of Costa Ricans, and generally just tried to speak to eachother in Spanish a lot. A group of us from school booked a trip to Puerto Viejo for this weekend. We're staying at Hotel Pura Vida for 2 nights and generally enjoying the caribbean. Planning trips has been difficult, there's so much to do. And Vickie and I still don't know where we're living after the school and how/when we are getting there. We've been emailing Real Gap but neither of us have gotten a response yet. The trouble is we don't know how much time we have for tours and such. If we leave next Saturday that knocks off time so we don't want to spend 3 days in Puerto Viejo this weekend, we would rather spend 2 days and do a day trip Sunday. We just don't know yet. It's very frustrating not knowing what's going on at all.

After school yesterday Vickie, Joanna, and I went to Mall San Pedro and saw "Wolfman" with Spanish subtitles. It was quite educational I think. On the way home we stopped by el supermarcado by la casa. I like supermarkets in general and it was quite fun to peruse one in a different country. We got some Spanish chocolate, fruit, and I bought my first legal beer (21 is a simply ridiculous law...). The fruit here has actually been quite fun. For breakfast each morning Naomi cuts up fresh fruit for us (she has a mango tree, so that is extra fresh) and makes fresh homemade fruit juice. So each morning we get to kind of guess what we're drinking anf try to pick out the fruit components. This morning we had watermelon juice!

Tonight Vickie, myself, and whoever else ends up coming, are going to a bar called Jazz Cafe. We hear it's supposed to have good music and drinks. Sounds quite nice. And at 5 en la manana on Friday we catch a bus to Puerto Viejo to spend the weekend on the beach :-)

So, while this has so far been far different from what I was expecting and from what I wanted, it has time to get better. I'm just trying to make the best of what I've been given and I definately have some back up on the complaint to Real Gap I will be making when I get back. Any one of the problems I have would be grounds for a real issue, the culmination of the stuff thet have done wrong in relation to my trip and our correspondence will result in much...feedback from me. But it will all work out I'm sure. The Costa Rican Language Academy seems really helpful so far. It seems that, really, they do most of the work and Real Gap acts as a sort of booking agency rather than the volunteer organization they advertise themselves as being. Money suckers. Next time, I book this on my own, no company.