Hey guys -
Well last time I tried to update my blog I had a huge entry all written out and then the power went out at the internet cafe and I lost everything. Thats no fun. Anyway, I dont really have anything huge to report. I have just been doing more of the same thing....spanish classes and other group training. One thing that has been really nice is that the Peace Corps has started to bring more current volunteers in to talk to us at training sessions. Instead of our regular teachers teaching us these volunteers get to teach us which is much more exciting (not that the teachers arent fabulous). It is just really nice to be able to hear from people who are actually out there in communities working on projects. It is really interesting to talk to them and ask them what kinds of things they are doing and what challenges they have faced. Surprisingly, they are all very bluntly honest with things, they dont sugar coat anything because the instructors and head Peace Corps staff are around. I think this is a good sign and it is reassuring to know that volunteers dont feel like they have to try to protect us by saying that everything is perfect.
Some random thoughts....
I listen to my ipod (when it decides to work for me) on the bus rides to and from training and whenever I hear "Too Little Too Late" by JoJo I think of my roommate Emily because this was her ringtone for a log time last year in college. Emily, I will forever think of you every time I hear that song.....as well as "Say it Right" by Nelly Furtado, haha. Another song that I listen to is "All these things that I´ve Done" by The Killers. This song always makes me think of jamming out to Mr. Hand at the Brewery with the Alpha Whos (and Jeff!). I miss you guys!
Yesterday (monday) was a holiday for us and I went with three other friends to a mall in San Jose. It was the first really nice mall that I have been to since I left the states. I think the four of us were actually a but overwhelmed with all of the nice stores and food options (not just rice and beans!). We went crazy....we had burgers, and cinnabon, and ice cream, and we saw a movie, and we shopped and spent more money than we should have but it was so fun!
Right now my town is in the middle of a weeklong party called Semana Santa. It is the celebration of the saint that the town is named after "Saint Ignacio." There is food and bumper cars, and foosball, and different kinds of concerts in the central park. My family and I went to see an artist named "Tapon" perform. He is a "reggaeton" singer. For those of you who dont know what reggaeton is, its like reggae on crack. Its got more of a hip hop beat to it and its fast paced. They love it here. The concert was really cool and I think just about the entire town was there crammed into the park.
All is good, I´m loving it more every day! Thanks for all of your comments, I love reading them!
Pura Vida!
Emily
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Field Visit Number 1!
Hey Guys,
We spent the majority of this past week visiting two volunteers at their sites. We were divided into two groups of nine trainees. My group went up north and the other group went down south. The first town that we visited was very rural, as many of the CED volunteer sites are. There were probably 300 people living there. We spent our time walking around and visiting the various different projects that the volunteer has going on. The biggest project that this girl had was working with farmers who had cows and had a business making cheese. We got to see the entire process of how milk is turned into cheese. The volunteer acts as a liaison for the farmers and she goes into San Jose to talk to businesses for them and is also trying to help them with the process of getting a bigger factory.
After two days at the first site, we travelled further north to a town that is almost on the border of Nicaragua. The town is called Caño Negro and it is on a river. The town is supposedly one of the best places for bird watching because there are so many species of birds. However, if you google (or msn search….for you mom) Caño Negro I don’t think much comes up. Anyway, the volunteer works with the men who give boat tours in the river. When we were there they were in the process of building a small tourist center. The volunteer also works in the school teaching English and with women’s groups. We got to go on a boat tour of the river in Caño Negro which was a lot of fun. We saw crocodiles, turtles, birds, and some monkeys. I would definitely recommend that people who love to bird watch make a trip to this town because there is so much wildlife.
In each of the towns we stayed with local host families which were all very friendly. For me, the highlight of the whole trip was taking a trip on horseback with my host father in Caño Negro to go see his farms. I definitely have not rode a horse in at least 10 years so at first it was a little scary, but after I got used to it it was really fun. He took me to one field where he grows corn, and then another where he has about 70 cows. On the way back to our house a huge family of monkeys came crashing past us in the trees that lined the road. They were on the hunt for mangos in the trees, which were plentiful in Caño Negro, and were delicious; I think I ate about 10 in 2 days. We stopped to look at the monkeys as they came past us and we were right at a point where the monkeys needed to make a huge jump to the next tree. Since we were right below them it looked like they were going to fall right on top of us but then instantly they would be in the next tree. The combination of being able to ride a horse, seeing the monkeys, and just the fact that my host dad for only two days cared enough to even pay any attention to me and take me somewhere made this an experience I will never forget.
Overall, the trip was awesome because we got to see exactly what kinds of places volunteers live in and what they do. It is nice to have a concrete idea of what the next two years will be like. It was interesting to observe the differences in family structure, access to resources, living quality, and climate between the communities we visited and our training communities. It was very obvious that the communities that we will be volunteering in will not be as nice or as large as the ones we are living in for training.
Since we got back from this trip we have been continuing our Spanish classes, taking trips into the next biggest city called Desamparados where both programs meet for general training, and getting to know our families better. Today a few of us are going to walk (orrrr take a taxi) to a local waterfall which should be beautiful, I’m excited to take pictures which I will try to upload as soon as I can find fast enough internet.
That’s all for now!
Pura Vida
Emily
PS – Please send me letters! My address is on the side bar to the right!
We spent the majority of this past week visiting two volunteers at their sites. We were divided into two groups of nine trainees. My group went up north and the other group went down south. The first town that we visited was very rural, as many of the CED volunteer sites are. There were probably 300 people living there. We spent our time walking around and visiting the various different projects that the volunteer has going on. The biggest project that this girl had was working with farmers who had cows and had a business making cheese. We got to see the entire process of how milk is turned into cheese. The volunteer acts as a liaison for the farmers and she goes into San Jose to talk to businesses for them and is also trying to help them with the process of getting a bigger factory.
After two days at the first site, we travelled further north to a town that is almost on the border of Nicaragua. The town is called Caño Negro and it is on a river. The town is supposedly one of the best places for bird watching because there are so many species of birds. However, if you google (or msn search….for you mom) Caño Negro I don’t think much comes up. Anyway, the volunteer works with the men who give boat tours in the river. When we were there they were in the process of building a small tourist center. The volunteer also works in the school teaching English and with women’s groups. We got to go on a boat tour of the river in Caño Negro which was a lot of fun. We saw crocodiles, turtles, birds, and some monkeys. I would definitely recommend that people who love to bird watch make a trip to this town because there is so much wildlife.
In each of the towns we stayed with local host families which were all very friendly. For me, the highlight of the whole trip was taking a trip on horseback with my host father in Caño Negro to go see his farms. I definitely have not rode a horse in at least 10 years so at first it was a little scary, but after I got used to it it was really fun. He took me to one field where he grows corn, and then another where he has about 70 cows. On the way back to our house a huge family of monkeys came crashing past us in the trees that lined the road. They were on the hunt for mangos in the trees, which were plentiful in Caño Negro, and were delicious; I think I ate about 10 in 2 days. We stopped to look at the monkeys as they came past us and we were right at a point where the monkeys needed to make a huge jump to the next tree. Since we were right below them it looked like they were going to fall right on top of us but then instantly they would be in the next tree. The combination of being able to ride a horse, seeing the monkeys, and just the fact that my host dad for only two days cared enough to even pay any attention to me and take me somewhere made this an experience I will never forget.
Overall, the trip was awesome because we got to see exactly what kinds of places volunteers live in and what they do. It is nice to have a concrete idea of what the next two years will be like. It was interesting to observe the differences in family structure, access to resources, living quality, and climate between the communities we visited and our training communities. It was very obvious that the communities that we will be volunteering in will not be as nice or as large as the ones we are living in for training.
Since we got back from this trip we have been continuing our Spanish classes, taking trips into the next biggest city called Desamparados where both programs meet for general training, and getting to know our families better. Today a few of us are going to walk (orrrr take a taxi) to a local waterfall which should be beautiful, I’m excited to take pictures which I will try to upload as soon as I can find fast enough internet.
That’s all for now!
Pura Vida
Emily
PS – Please send me letters! My address is on the side bar to the right!
Monday, July 9, 2007
Hey Guys! Man, this first week of training has gone by so fast! On Saturday I went with two other trainees who live in my community to visit a goat farm. The spanish word for Goat is cabra....please integrate this word into your next conversation about animals, haha. Anyway, about the goat farm, one of the trainees in my town lives with a woman who works there so she gave us the grand tour. We got to attempt to milk a goat, which was not successful for me, I guess I just dont have the magic touch. The women who work at the farm sell goats milk, cheese, and yogurt to people in the local communities. It was very interesting and I took some pictures which I will upload soon!
Yesterday I went with my host mom and my 5 year old sister Fiorella to church. It was really interesting to go and just observe, and the church is really beautiful. Later on in the day I went with my host mom, dad, and brother to a quinceanera. This is a birthday party that girls have when they turn 15. Its a HUGE deal here and families go all out for it. So we went, and it was fun, and there was a lot of food, and a piñata, and cake, and my host dad taught me how to dance the cumbia. ayayay!
More to come soon!
Pura Vida!
Emily
Yesterday I went with my host mom and my 5 year old sister Fiorella to church. It was really interesting to go and just observe, and the church is really beautiful. Later on in the day I went with my host mom, dad, and brother to a quinceanera. This is a birthday party that girls have when they turn 15. Its a HUGE deal here and families go all out for it. So we went, and it was fun, and there was a lot of food, and a piñata, and cake, and my host dad taught me how to dance the cumbia. ayayay!
More to come soon!
Pura Vida!
Emily
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Rice n Beansssss
Hola! Sorry it has taken me this long to post something. I´ll start at the beginning...
On June 25th all of the costa rica volunteers flew to miami for two days of ¨staging¨ where we completed paperwork etc. It was fun but we were all just anticipating our arrival in Costa Rica.
On June 27th we all flew to San Jose and took a bus to a mountain retrat about an hour away from the airport. We stayed here for four days and participated in various activities to get to know eachother better and to introduce us to the basic things we will be doing. We also took our last hot showers for possibly two years. There are 18 volunteers working in community and economic development aka CED formerly known as micro enterprise development. There are also 17 volunteers that will be working in the children and yougth development aka CYD.
On July 1st we all left the mountain retreat and were dropped off in various communities about an hour drive outside of San Jose. I dont think i can say the name of the town that I am in for privacy reasons....sorry about that. Anway, I am with 5 other guys that are in the CED program and that are at about the same level of spanish as me and we all live really close to eachother in the community.
My family is awesome! My host mom´s name is Blanca and she is a housewife, my dad is Jimmy and he is an auto inspector. My brother who is 13 is Jimmy Henry which I misunderstood at first and thought was Jimmy Hendrix because its pronounced kind of like that. Haha, anyway, I have a 16 year old sister named Fiola and a 5 year old sister named Fiorella. Fiorella is so cute and she follows me around everywhere. Unfortunately I cant understand a word she says so most of the time I just end up smiling and nodding and laughing. I bought two coloring books before I left the states and gave them to the kids when I arrived. Fiorella has had one of the books, hello kitty themed, attached at her hip since I gave it to her.
Most of the food we have been eating is what I expected. For breakfast we have rice and beans and maybe a fried egg, for lunch there is rice and beans again with platanos which is a variety of banana that is fried and is really quite tasty. Then for dinner.....more rice and beans! I have also had arroz con pollo once which is rice with chicken and that was good too.
4 days a week we have spanish class from 8am to 12pm and then 1pm to about 230. It is pretty intensive and the teacher only speaks in spanish but does a really good job of making sure we can understand her. Once a week we have to take a bus to another town where all the trainees from both the CED and CYF program meet and we receive lessons together. The bus ride is about an hour from my community and costs the equivalent of about 70 cents one way. The buses are really crowded and the roads are really windy because we are up in the mountains so if you arent feeling well before you get on the bus then your in trouble for sure.
The town that I live in is bigger than most of the other training communities but I have not been able to tell how many people live here yet. This time of year is called the rainy season because it rains for about an hour every day. The day starts out sunny and hot, then at some point it cools down and rains, and then it gets sunny and hot again. Two days ago, the 6 of us were at the soccer field chalenging some local kids to a game of futbol, by the way they kicked our asses and were probably no more than 12 years old. Anyway, while we were playing the clouds started to roll in and since we are at such a high elevation being in the mountains, the clounds came in like fog.
I am having a really awesome time here so far! I will try to keep the updates coming but the internet here is not great so we will see.....
I hope everyone is doing well! Keep me updated on things that are going on in the US and what you guys are up to!
Much love!
Emily
On June 25th all of the costa rica volunteers flew to miami for two days of ¨staging¨ where we completed paperwork etc. It was fun but we were all just anticipating our arrival in Costa Rica.
On June 27th we all flew to San Jose and took a bus to a mountain retrat about an hour away from the airport. We stayed here for four days and participated in various activities to get to know eachother better and to introduce us to the basic things we will be doing. We also took our last hot showers for possibly two years. There are 18 volunteers working in community and economic development aka CED formerly known as micro enterprise development. There are also 17 volunteers that will be working in the children and yougth development aka CYD.
On July 1st we all left the mountain retreat and were dropped off in various communities about an hour drive outside of San Jose. I dont think i can say the name of the town that I am in for privacy reasons....sorry about that. Anway, I am with 5 other guys that are in the CED program and that are at about the same level of spanish as me and we all live really close to eachother in the community.
My family is awesome! My host mom´s name is Blanca and she is a housewife, my dad is Jimmy and he is an auto inspector. My brother who is 13 is Jimmy Henry which I misunderstood at first and thought was Jimmy Hendrix because its pronounced kind of like that. Haha, anyway, I have a 16 year old sister named Fiola and a 5 year old sister named Fiorella. Fiorella is so cute and she follows me around everywhere. Unfortunately I cant understand a word she says so most of the time I just end up smiling and nodding and laughing. I bought two coloring books before I left the states and gave them to the kids when I arrived. Fiorella has had one of the books, hello kitty themed, attached at her hip since I gave it to her.
Most of the food we have been eating is what I expected. For breakfast we have rice and beans and maybe a fried egg, for lunch there is rice and beans again with platanos which is a variety of banana that is fried and is really quite tasty. Then for dinner.....more rice and beans! I have also had arroz con pollo once which is rice with chicken and that was good too.
4 days a week we have spanish class from 8am to 12pm and then 1pm to about 230. It is pretty intensive and the teacher only speaks in spanish but does a really good job of making sure we can understand her. Once a week we have to take a bus to another town where all the trainees from both the CED and CYF program meet and we receive lessons together. The bus ride is about an hour from my community and costs the equivalent of about 70 cents one way. The buses are really crowded and the roads are really windy because we are up in the mountains so if you arent feeling well before you get on the bus then your in trouble for sure.
The town that I live in is bigger than most of the other training communities but I have not been able to tell how many people live here yet. This time of year is called the rainy season because it rains for about an hour every day. The day starts out sunny and hot, then at some point it cools down and rains, and then it gets sunny and hot again. Two days ago, the 6 of us were at the soccer field chalenging some local kids to a game of futbol, by the way they kicked our asses and were probably no more than 12 years old. Anyway, while we were playing the clouds started to roll in and since we are at such a high elevation being in the mountains, the clounds came in like fog.
I am having a really awesome time here so far! I will try to keep the updates coming but the internet here is not great so we will see.....
I hope everyone is doing well! Keep me updated on things that are going on in the US and what you guys are up to!
Much love!
Emily
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