'I Go to Seek a Great Perhaps'

    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 :-)