Internationally Thankful

I borrowed this idea from one of the girls on my program, who decided to put a blog-spin on the 30 days of thankful trend on facebook. It's pretty simple, because there are 30 days in November, I decided to make my own list of 30 things that I'm thankful for.  The are in no particular order and most of them are about Costa Rica.  I know if you are reading this blog, I'm thankful for you! Wishing you peace and love on this holiday!

1. All of my family at home for your international love.
2. Costa Rica, for teaching me more about myself than I ever wanted to know
3. Laura, for always putting goodbyes into perspective--it's never for real, just a "see you later"
4. Carissa, for being a role model, a best friend, AND a sister all in one. Peremptory thanks for the stats help next semester ;) 
5. My parents at home for supporting me in all my adventure, and for always including my furry friends in our skypes
6. Skype, and other technology that allows me to stay in contact with America and all the people there that I love
7. Los Aguilar, for welcoming me into their home and making me feel like a part of the family.
8. Annie, Jessie, Katie, Lauren, and Andrea--for knowing me better than I know myself sometimes.
9. Your guys' parents, for encouraging all our endeavors, and for having 5 houses where I always feel at home
10. For Animal Science 101, Livestock Production. Without you, I would never have met Elle Lynch.
11. My roommates here for thinking poop stories are just as funny as I do.
12. Fieds and Craze, for being the best first roommates a girl could ask for. 
13. The regent boys (do you guys have a new name yet?), for always knowing how to make me laugh, having beds to sleep in, and being an outlet for the products of my stress baking.
14. The staff here for being equal parts teachers and friends
15. Carlos, for being the most patient Spanish instructor I've ever met
16. Digital cameras, for allowing me to pretend to be a good photographer.
17. For mothers that send you new cameras when mermaid-ing proves to be too much for them.
18. Blankets, for their versatility--they're good for snuggling, sleeping, wearing...
19. For the knowledge that any hunger I ever experience is temporary
20. Wisconsin beer and cheese--you are going to be oh, so delicious when I return
21. My grandma's chocolate chip cookies, and for the lady that bakes you. I never realized how much I love both of you until I was 2,500 miles away from you
22. The simple joy in a mug of ice cream
23. Learning to enjoy drinking my coffee black--there's something slightly badass about answering "Black, please" when someone asks, "how do you like your coffee?"
24. Eco-friendly sweatpants
25. Harry Potter
26. Not being afraid of heights--dreams are so much better on the top bunk!
27. Sunsets
28. Wool Socks
29. The cooks here at the station, for being so good at their jobs that every meal is like Thanksgiving
• a) for undertaking the cooking of 90 lbs of turkey so that we gringos can have a "real American Thanksgiving"
30. The 22 people on this program who bring the party wherever we go

¿Usted tiene este tour sola, si?

Mi casa

As I type I’m actually living back in gringo-ville. We left our families on the 17^th and quickly took over the station once more! I love living with my friends again (it’s kind of like summer camp, and who doesn’t love summer camp?) but I really miss my family. I spent my last week riding around all of Monteverde and learning about the behind the scenes action that goes into making tourists happy. Things get really complicated when people cancel horse tours last minute—don’t ever do this if you can help it. You cause many people a great inconvenience—and money. I also got to see how tight-knit the community of Monteverde really is. One day we were supposed to take a family of 9 on a tour, and although Cristobál has 13 horses, 7 of them are off in some mystery pasture that I never got to see. In order to accommodate this family of 9, Cristobál called on cousins and friends—instantly his horse herd grew to 11. Another day, while already on a tour, Cristobál got a call saying that there was going to be another tour that afternoon. These tourists wanted to their tour at the exact time we were supposed to finish the tour we were currently leading. From horseback, Cristobál organized the gathering and saddling of his three other horses by a friend. 

That's my host dad, and the lead horse is Pamela.
That rope is connected to my HAND.

After dropping off the tired horses we had just used, we swung by this mystery friend’s house, where the 3 horses were waiting in the front yard. Cristobál tied the horses together, reins to tail, and passed the reins of the lead horse to me. Cristobál drove and from the back of the 4-wheeler I towed the horses. It was a bit like walking a dog (that was never trained by Jim Berglund) with one of those retractable leashes—your arm gets jerked all around, and you’re constantly taking in and letting out the leash, I mean, reins. Oh and the “dogs” weighs somewhere around 2,500 lbs collectively.

Once again I found myself using the phrase that has become a common part of my vocabulary this semester—this is not real life.

I was sitting on this

On a different horse adventure, I found myself riding with a Vietnam veteran from who was truly a global citizen (Cristobál was there too, although he kept trying to get me to guide the tours by myself--it was his favorite joke). The man’s father had worked for the US State Department, and he had spent his first 18 years of life living in 7 different countries! He spoke English and Spanish fluently, so most of the ride took place in hilarious Spanglish. He was convinced that I needed to marry his son, and both he and Cristobál found hilarity in my refusal; “Los novios son demasiado trabajo.”

Looking out over the Pacific Ocean

If I was a tour guide, all my
ponies would be pretty!

I spent my last week with the family, playing with (read: getting bossed around by) Christopher and bonding with Elieth and Katerine over Combate. Combate is my new favorite TV show—it’s like if the Real World: Road Rules and Wipe out had a baby—that would be this show. It’s hilarious and a great way to learn Spanish! I’m hoping that I get to see them this week, and maybe even go with Cristobál on a tour tomorrow. But it’s also finals week around here, and balancing my two lives here isn’t easy…the horses win every time!

The thing that really shook me about leaving is how close my semester here is to ending. I can remember so vividly the anticipation with which I looked forward to traveling here, thinking when I arrived how far off my homestay sounded. I have really grown to love this place, and all the people here. The 22 people that were complete strangers in August have become an extension of my family in a few short months, and saying goodbye to them is going to be extremely difficult. But, I’m thankful for technology. As exasperating as it can be, however detrimental to society the experts say it is, I am grateful it will enable me to stay in contact with my friends from here with ease. Even my host cousin and I are facebook friends! However, speaking of technology…

We have approximately a week left here in Monteverde, and then we hike to the Arenal Volcano, take a bus to San Jose, and go our separate ways on December 1^st. I’ll fly to Belize with my friend Hannah on the 3^rd, and I have no idea what the internet situation will be there. I’ve been told that at the Manatee Sanctuary where I’ll live there is enough to check e-mail occasionally, but probably not enough for facebook, and definitely not enough to upload blog posts and photos. There might be an internet café in town? There might be a touristy place with some wifi? But it’s the Caribbean coast, life is pretty Pura Vida, and I’m expecting little to no internet. So, this is probably the last post for awhile, but I promise to share details when I’m back in the grand ol’ U.S. of A!

This is my puppy. He's a 6-month old Boxer-Rottweiler mix. Dad
you would have been obsessed with him!

Machetes, Materia, Manigordos, oh my!

So basically my host father is a Monteverde celebrity. He knows everybody. And everybody knows him. Every single person has a “Hola Cris, Pura Vida!” for him as we drive past on the 4-wheeler. So it came as no surprise that Cristobál just happens to be bff’s with the host grandfather of one of my compañeros, Jake. This host grandfather just happens to be Maximo, the owner of Rancho San Giraldo, which just happens to be a perfect little finca in the middle of the Cloud Forest Reserve. Last weekend I jumped in the back of a pickup and went with Jake, his host mom, and his 3 host siblings out to Rancho San Giraldo. Jose Pablo is 11, Fiorella is 9, and Catalina is 7. They have been attending the Quaker School since kindergarten, so all of our conversations were in some pretty hilarious Spanglish. Not shy at all, they immediately started calling Jake and I novios, farting, and treating me like part of the family. It was great. Maximo met us at the trailhead with his own 4-wheeler and, to my delight, 3 horses! Chipopo, Materia, and Paloma took Jake, myself, and his sisters all the way to the ranch. I was already pretty much obsessed with how my life was going at this point…and then we arrived at the ranch.
 

Once upon a time, Maximo and all of his brothers all had their own little fincas in the San Giraldo Valley. Since that day, all of his brothers have sold their land to the conservationists, and their plots have grown up in to some beautiful recovering rainforest. However, Maximo said “like hell” to the conservationists, and kept his land. Mostly Maximo lives there on his own, but occasionally groups of hikers pass through, and he can play host to up to 30 people, like Eladio.

Myself, Maximo, and Catalina with Rancho San Giraldo in the background

Never have I ever been so sad not to have a camera (thanks to Jake for the pictures!). Mountains of perfect trees surround his 100-some hectare finca. It’s rolling pastures host his 5 cows and 3 horses. He also has a garden with several potato-like plants, pineapple, sugar cane, some miscellaneous citrus fruits, and a chicken coop (which will be filled with chickens in the coming months…Maximo and his dog, Q, got hungry and ate all the other ones). There was a wood-burning stove in the kitchen, which always had a pot of gallo pinto on it. The living room was a giant porch with walls up to my hip, and then completely open until the ceiling.  Large rolled plastic sheets hung from the edges of the roof, and could be dropped down to form “windows” when it rained. Although there were two large bunk pressed up against the living room wall, and two more bedrooms with bunks and regular beds, Maximo told me that many groups simply rolled out the massive foam mats he kept on a top bunk, and slept in the open-air living room in a big pile. I can only imagine how much fun our group would have had!

Soon after lunch we donned our swimsuits and hiked out to a “pool” in the river that ran through the finca (did I mention that Maximo built his own hydroelectric pump and uses the pure spring water for drinking, bathing, clothes washing, and his own electricity?). However, this pool wasn’t really a pool so much as it was an area of the river where the current slowed slightly and the rocks weren’t too sharp. Much to my shock, Maximo happily threw himself off the edge of the trail and into the river. I swear, the man might be about 68, but he lives like he’s 17.  We spent a good half and hour jumping in to the river and letting the current carry us downstream, and then climbing back up again. Although the kids were wearing lifejackets, my lifeguarding face was on. Everyone got thoroughly chilled, and then we headed back to the farm, following Maximo and his ever-swinging machete.

After dinner, while Jake and I were playing some mystery card game with his siblings, Maximo pulled a stool up to the table.

“Do you two drink?” Maximo asked us in his mumbly old man Spanish. We looked at each other and slowly nodded. He raised his eyebrows, “Do you want to sleep well tonight?” Both of us nodded emphatically. Maximo smiled, pulled out a bottle of Rum, and three Dixie cups. He then proceeded to pour the three biggest traigos that I’ve ever seen in my life. Instead of registering the look on my face as shock at the magnitude of the shots, Maximo jumped up (“oh, naranjas!”), grabbed an orange from the bag we had picked that afternoon, and put a slice next to each Dixie cup. He cheers-ed Jake and I, and swallowed the entire thing in one gulp. Jake and I looked at each other, and back at our Dixie cups apprehensively.

We took our medicine, sucked every drop of juice out of those oranges, and after a few more rounds of cards, slept like babies!

The next morning we packed up our stuff after breakfast, and headed out. Catalina and I rode Paloma, Jose Pablo took “his” horse Chipopo, and Jake grabbed Materia. Riding with that little peanut made me think of all the times I rode in a saddle with you, Auntie Jean. I have met so many people that are afraid of horses because of some scarring experience when they were little, and I always feel so bad for them. I think too bad they never had someone like my Aunt Jean! I don’t think I could ever thank you enough for giving me such positive experiences with horses from a young age.

After an hour or so Materia was getting real feisty, the path was clear, so Jake gave Materia a little more rein. That was the only signal the little horse needed to take off! They went flying down the path and disappeared. Not 15 seconds later I heard a “oh SHIT!” coming from up the trail. I immediately pictured Jake thrown from his horse, dangling in a tree by his backpack strap (pretty sure that worst-case-scenario imagery came from you Mother dear…)
I nudged Paloma into a trot and called for Jake. No response. Obviously that sent the Joan-imagination in me into overdrive. Just as I was about to call out again, Jake and Materia came around the corner at a gallop, fully intact. But before I could breathe a sigh of relief, Materia put on the brakes and Jake…well Jake didn’t. He went over Materia’s head and on to the ground. Not fazed in the slightest, Jake brushed himself off, “I saw a jaguar! I saw one I swear!” Materia shook her head at him and trotted away. I barely understood Jake’s story (he was speaking Spanglish, for the benefit of his siblings) but apparently he and Materia had been going along at a nice clip, when all of a sudden a jaguar crossed their path! This was the point at which Jake had yelled. Then Materia had wheeled around and took off back towards our group. After calming down Catalina, who was then convinced that we were all going to get eaten by the jaguar, we began started again. Jake took off at a jog, hoping to catch up with Materia. Luckily for him, Maximo had taken his 4-wheeler on some unknown back road, and was waiting just up the trail with Materia. Maximo was convinced that it couldn’t have been a jaguar—there isn’t enough preserved land at Rancho an Giraldo to make up one male jaguar’s territory—and told us it was probably a manigordo. Catalina scrambled down from Paloma and situated herself on the 4-wheeler, convinced that she was safer on a machine, and we all continued our walk out of the woods.

When I got dropped off at my house my host family just laughed. I imagine I was a pretty comical sight covered in mud and bug spray! My host mom passed me a towel and teasingly made a face, which I’m pretty sure is “get yourself in the shower pronto” in any language.  After a life changing shower, I told my family all about the jaguar/manigordo. They seemed skeptical, but that may have been because of my translation skills…

Little of This, a Little of That

So after a week of living with my host family, Halloween arrived. Our academic director, Alan is in a locally famous band here called Chanchos de Monte and the Chanchos always put on a Halloween show! All of us reunited at our beloved station, pulled together some costumes, and headed to the local gringo bar—La Taberna—for a night of hilarity. 

The next day I spent watching Halloween movies on TV and bonding with my host cousin Katerine over boys. Man that girl has some man drama! I learned from here that Costa Rican boys are “different” than American boys, “they’ll fall in love with you at night, and never call you in the morning.” I tried to explain that boys are like that everywhere, but it didn’t really translate—she has a very high opinion of you American boys. The movies we watched were from the US and not actually about Halloween, like that 4^th or 5^th version of Bring It On with Hayden Panetierre and Rihanna. I hadn’t ever really given the movie much thought, until my host mom and cousin were like “are girls in the U.S. really like that? With the cheerleaders and sex and stuff?” I think I managed to salvage the reputation of American girls everywhere and tell my family that the Bring It On series is not a fair representation, but who knows. My conversational Spanish is coming a long nicely, but my please-don’t-judge-Americans-by-Hollywood-standards translation has a long way to go…

On Monday I had another day of class. Due to difficulties at the breakfast table (at first I thought that watching TV and eating was just a difficult activity for a 5yr old…sound familiar Dad? But it turns out Chris is just superb at stalling) we were running late, so the 4-wheeler ride was nuts. I thought we were going to tip over at least 5 times. Thankfully, Cristobál had the steering under control (don’t worry Mom, he’s an excellent driver), so I arrived at Ecotourism Day with my classmates safe and sound. After a quick (read: excruciatingly long) lecture, we headed out in the community to learn from a business owner, a farmer, and some park rangers, about their perspectives on how the boom in tourism has affected life in Monteverde. We also got to talk to Kathy’s (our mom of sorts while we’re here) mother, Mary Rockwell, about her experiences in Monteverde. Man, she is the coolest lady! As a freshly married 18 year old Quaker girl, she, her husband, and a group of about 40 other Quakers decided to leave the United States to escape the then peace time draft (they left “while all that Vietnam business was still brewing”) and because they felt it unjust that so much of their tax money was supporting the military. Ranging from 2 to 60 years old, the group decided to settle in the military-free country of Costa Rica. They spent the first year living “here, there, and yonder” around San Jose, searching for a place to begin dairy farming. After about a year, and then approximately 3-4months pregnant, Mary and the group moved out to the yet-to-be-settled land that they would call Monteverde (literally “green mountain”). Moving their precious few belongings out to “clear off out the way” (read: Monteverde) by ox cart, over rocky trails and “roads” of mud up to their knees, the group slowly settled in. Truly a modern pioneer, this woman is amazing (Ellie you would have been obsessed with her, minus the whole pacifist thing). She started raising her family (which grew to 8 children) in a tent, helped found this place where I now live, and brought a new industry—dairy—to a land formerly without any real source of income. She seemed happy that the tourism industry had brought a greater success to the Cheese Factory, but fondly reminisced on the days when crime and drugs were non-existent here, and family was truly the most important thing.

I’m not sure how many years back, but the community of Cañitas raised money and put in a synthetic soccer field around the bend from my house. My family doesn’t go much, but it seems like somebody in everyone else’s host family is involved in La Sintética. My friend Laura’s host mom is on a team with all her sisters in a local women’s league, so last Wednesday, Laura organized a scrimmage between the two teams. It was so much fun! On the way to the field I ran in to my cousin, who was on her way to a salsa/merengue class and asked if she wanted to come. Immediately she abandoned all thoughts of dance class, and headed to the field with us (Laura I think you’d like her a lot). Team Gringa (plus Katy) looked pretty comical playing in hiking boots, but I think we did pretty well! I’m not sure if anyone kept score, but I think we gave Team Tica a run for their money! That night Katy invited me to go to her English night course, which I happily attended on Thursday.

Taught by a retired Chicago banker with pretty much no Spanish knowledge (he’s now a peace corps volunteer) the class was really eye opening, and kind of frustrating. It was fascinating to watch other people learn a language that I am so comfortable with, and so fun to see how happy they were when something “clicked.” Unfortunately, the teacher was teaching these poor Costa Ricans to speak English with a silly Chicagoan accent (sorry Craze, Kate, Pauline…and any others I may have just offended) and he had no understanding of how to dissect a language to teach it to others. He focused his class on pronunciation, and completely neglected to explain possessives, basic sentence structure, and a bunch of other things he seemed to assume that his students knew. I didn’t share any of my opinions with Katy, and she still attends the weekly class, but we have our own lessons after dinner. The whole family gets involved, and we trade Spanish vocabulary for English conjugations and sentence structure. Last night, amid much laughter, we had a crucial lesson: Words with which You Need to be Careful. One of my professors taught us the Spanish half of this lesson after a little guaro in Peñas Blancas, so I just taught the English half to my family. We practiced “beach” and “sheet,” as well as “ship” and “fork” (If you can think of any others, let me know!)

Friday was another long day of class, followed by a dinner at our director Alan’s house. Burgers were flying off the grill, the cooler was stocked, and chips and salsa were passed around. Alan has two white west highland white terrier puppies, whom with I immediately bonded, and all of us dog lovers got our snuggle fill. 

At some point in the night, long after the food was demolished, we were all lounging on Alan’s wrap around porch and somehow it became story time. Story time quickly evolved (devolved?) in to poop story-sharing time, and we howled with laughter as the story topping ensued. Constipation was out done by diarrhea, which was put to shame by traveler’s diarrhea. I almost won with my pooping in the woods story, but was out shone by a truly (bowel) moving tale…one which I am not allowed to share here. After all, what happens on Alan’s porch stays on Alan’s porch.

Full House

Currently, I am living with my homestay family. Yesterday was our week-aversay of living together! My host father, Cristobál, is a horseback riding tour guide, my mother, Elieth is a stay at home mom. I also have a 5yr old brother named Christopher, and a 19yr old cousin named Katerine. They are wonderful people who have opened their home to me, and truly make me feel like part of the family (okay, I still kind of feel like a guest, but the other morning I got to help cook a little!). The coffee is so good here that I take it black, and every morning Cristobál asks “quiere azúcar?” and every time I say no he shakes his head a little.

“Cafecito para Chris, cafecito para mi, y café sin azúcar para Emilia…(smiling) guácala.” Coffee for Chris, coffee for me, and coffee without sugar for Emily…Yuck. Yes, you read that correctly, my 5yr old brother drinks coffee every morning. I can only think of his poor kindergarten teachers… Katerine and Elieth are quiet, but seem to share a bond like sisters rather than aunt and niece (dear CJ and Laura, I miss you). The girls and I talk about boys and our families, and this weekend we watched Sleepy Hallow with Johnny Depp (in Spanish) on TV…just in case you were wondering, yes Johnny Depp’s attractiveness is international—Katy and Elieth love him.

            Chris is thrilled that I’m not a vegetarian (Madeline, their last student was and so they ate a lot of fish…Chris does not like fish). And Cristobál takes me on every tour with him. I’m going on one this afternoon actually! The little girl inside of me that still asks Santa for a pony has never been happier (seriously, you can ask Santa).

            Also, my family doesn’t have a car—instead we have a 4-wheeler! So every weekday morning I jump on the back and go with Cristobál to drop Chris off at the Quaker School, and then he takes me up the mountain to the biological station. It’s a pretty sweet deal. Except that Chris likes to drive…yes the 5yr old operates the steering, gas and brakes, and yells “cambia papi, cambia!” when he wants his dad to shift gears. At first it was terrifying, but the little guy is actually a pretty good driver. So now I just hang on and enjoy the ride!

          My family has been incredibly patient with my intermediate Spanish, and it has been a joy living with them. Although my strict feeding schedule has been severely interrupted, I really really like living here. 

Brotanks and Bocas

I am wearing my Imperial
brotank

When I was little I often found myself awake at the crack of dawn, snuggling between my sleeping parents with the instructions to “wait for playtime at least until the clock says “seven zero zero.” All of the pretending to be a mermaid and childish wonder from the day before must have stirred my inner seven year old, so on the morning of October 15^th, I found myself awake about an hour and a half earlier than necessary. Also, it might have just been that my inner badger knew that I was Saturday and therefore a game day. Who knows really, but never the less, I was awake. I ungracefully untangled myself from my mosquito net, careful not to wake my roommates, slipped on my brotank, and headed outside.

Other than that first day of crisp fall air, there is absolutely nothing better than morning salty breezes. I found a fishnet hammock between two postcard-perfect palms by our cabaña, and settled in to watch the beginnings of the day. 

Down the sandy road I could smell breakfast getting started by Yoany, the lady who, with her husband, owned the restaurant/bar where we ate all our meals. They had been hosting CIEE groups like ours for 15 years! The bay stretched out along my right side, the blue waters turning turquoise as the sun got higher in the sky. 

Talamanca Mountain Range--looks
like Alaska, right??

Framed by perfect blue mountains, the scene looked straight out of a “Come visit Alaska!” commercial. There was a little rasta boat bobbing just over my right shoulder, and to my left white sand formed the front yards of the little cabañas where my friends were still sound asleep. It amazes me how over the course of a couple months, this group of 21 complete strangers has truly come to feel like not only friends, but also family. We have shared every meal, every waking moment together, and I’m still not sick of them (how many families can say that?). Although we’ve never really put roots down anywhere, in fact on this 2^nd field trip I never slept in the same bed for more than three nights, wherever I am with this group feels like a home. Eladio’s tiny little barn, the station in Monteverde, wherever we’re based takes on the role of “home” when our group fills it up.

I could keep going, but at this point in my journal the sentimental musings end. All that is written is “SAND FLEAS!” in a hasty script. With that mental trigger I can remember my horror at realizing that the little buggers were devouring the skin exposed on my hip, where my brotank had ridden up when I laid in the hammock. At that point I remember flipping myself out of the hammock (always the picture of grace) and sprinting down the road to where I could smell coffee.

Later that morning, some of us climbed back on the boats for more snorkeling. Others headed down to Bocas del Toro, the commercialized “spring break-esque” side of our island (us snorkelers were to join them later). It was some of the most beautiful snorkeling of my life. 

The sand was still settling from the rainstorm the night before, so from the surface where I was floating the coral all seemed subdued. However, I got my mermaid on and spent the morning diving down for closer looks. It’s amazing how many little fish live in the nooks and crannies of the coral, which itself is a living thing! I saw dozens of parrotfish, a couple Dory’s (Nemo was nowhere to be found), many jelly fish, and hundreds of other creatures that I don’t know the names of. Reefs are truly teeming with life and beauty!

Near lunchtime we all piled back into our boats, myself resuming my princess position on the prow once again, and we jetted off to Bocas del Toro. I’m sure the place transforms in to a hoppin’ party zone, but while we were there, in the revealing light of day the place just looked like a dirty tourist trap. It was filled with crummy hostels and hotels, it’s docks crowded with sketchy looking bars. Most places were under construction, leading to piles of scraps and who knows what in the streets. Our group picked our way around, shopping a little at the stands and finding our own lunch. Before I knew it, brotanks were everywhere. 

Sarah, Aki, Julia, Hannah, Caitlin, and Logan--all sporting
the brotank.

Almost all the boys in our group and several of the girls had purchased their own, proclaiming Panama’s finest brews from their chests. We wound our way through the sandy streets, waving at the old rasta men trying to sell us weed and found our teachers in the central park (read construction zone). They escorted us to a local religious shrine—a little spring coming from the mouth of a cave. Nodding at the statue of the Virgin Mary, we all passed into the cave. Apparently, Jesus really like bats because in the cave were hundreds of them! We learned all about Phyllostomus discolor and Artebeus jamaicensis while dodging falling guano. Stumbling and feeling our way through the darkness we ended up in the stream (read: water and guano soup) up to our waists. Fleeting light came when our resident bat expert, Dr. Richard Lavall would briefly shine his flashlight up at the harems of bats. Soaking wet up to our waists we emerged from the caves, piled into some taxis, and headed back to our pristine Bocas del Drago.

That day was actually our academic director, Alan’s, birthday! Since he became director of this program 20 some years ago, he has celebrated every birthday on the beach with CIEE groups. We were honored to share his 52^nd birthday with him, him and the best seafood dinner I’ve ever eaten—lobster tails, shrimp sautéed with vegetables, and a mix of calamari and who knows what. Yes Dad, I sampled all of it (and liked pretty much everything!). Once we had all eaten our fill (and then some) the beer and rum started flowing. I cashed in on my prizes from the dares in Tirimbina, and we began to play our favorite card game—Wizard. All of a sudden there was a calypso band setting up, and we ended up dancing long in to the night, wading in the ocean every time the band took a “smoke” break (and being a band of rasta men, those breaks were frequent). In the morning we packed up our belongings, said goodbye to our precious cabañas, and boarded the bus for San Jose.

The bridge connecting the
2 countries

We made it across the border and to San Jose without much fuss, and spent the night in the Hotel Balmoral, where we had all spent our first two days of the semester back in August. How different everything seemed now that we all knew each other! We spent time recalling our first impressions of each other, wandering around the city, and catching up with our families on the lobby computers. Now that we weren’t so focused on meeting each other, we really got to absorb the city as we walked around finding food. Hannah, Julia and got empanadas and churros from a street vendor and returned to the Balmoral, enjoying long hot showers, watching Law and Order reruns (in English!) and falling asleep early. Hannah and I tried to make superbed again, but sadly the Balmoral had chosen furniture that made this impossible.

In the morning we went out in San Jose again, wandering around buying souvenirs, trying to find a place to pierce Hannah’s nose, and practicing our Spanish. Pretty soon 1pm rolled around and we boarded our bus for Monteverde. Although we never found a place to pierce Hannah’s nose, I did find a ring to replace the cartilage piercing I’d lost in the ocean. There’s no chance this thing will fall out of my ear because it requires the use of pliers to clamp it shut! Being a resourceful group, and one liking immediate gratification, I borrowed a pocketknife with a pliers attachment from one of the boys, and Hannah set to work getting the ring in my ear…on the moving bus. 

When the rocking of the bus proved too much for Hannah, Jake jumped in to help. Brandon tried, our TA’s Maricela and Moncho gave their best shot, but nobody could compete with the swaying of the bus. So I sat with the ring halfway through my ear all the way to Monteverde. After many other shenanigans involving the ring, finally my friends Logan and Maddy were able to clamp it shut.

Q: how many college students does it take to put in a cartilage earring?

A: approximately 12.

Never have I ever been so grateful that I’d remembered to q-tip my ears the night before!

Our next days in Monteverde passed quickly with class and Spanish lessons every day. We studied all the things we’d learned on the field trip late into the night, and before we knew it, the exam arrived. After an excruciating morning of testing, we realized the truth—we were about to be separated from each other! Throughout the afternoon we packed up our belongings, spent the night celebrating the end of our exam, and prepared to move in with our homestay families the next morning.