Everyday is a Bio-Blitz

So in addition to learning all about cafe yesterday, we also went to Poas Volcano and La Paz waterfalls and gardens.  The crater of Poas is 2574 meters above sea level (over 8000 feet!) and is in the tropical cloud forest (our guide very strongly stressed to us that jungles do not exist, there are different types of tropical forests).  We drove to the top and just had to walk about 15 minutes from the parkinglot.  Its one of the largest craters in the world (1 mile across).We were really lucky because only about 20% of tourists actually get to see the crater becuase it is often blocked by cloud cover.

The crater of Poas

Our timing was really just right becuase about 15 minutes after we got there, the clouds started to move in and you couldn't see anything.







Next we hiked over to the lagoon, which was so blue and beautiful.



Me and the lagoon.

We were really up in the clouds! Another view from the crater.

We then went to La Paz to see some waterfalls and lots of birds, butterflies, monkeys and jungle cats (the best part!).  We saw tucans, parrots, hummingbirds, a few different small monkeys, lots of butterflies, and ocelots, jaguars, and pumas!

Parrots!

Just a little friend we found.

The largest waterfall - about 120 feet!

Our guide told us there were tucans and three-cans...I only saw a tucan.



I want one.

I'm so glad that I was able to go on the day trip becuase I'd been pretty sick the day before. It was such a beautiful day of expolring and being reminded of God's amazing creativity!

If only I liked cafe...

We went to a coffee plantation today and learned all about cafe.  Here's how its made:
Step 1:

Grow coffee!
















Step 2:

Pick the coffee!

We were told that Costa Ricans don't like to pick coffee, so its mostly Nicaraguans who pick it. A person makes $20 a day picking coffee, and a good picker picks and fills about 10 of those baskets!

This is what a bean looks like when its ready to be picked.

Step 3:

Dry the coffee!

The coffee is dried by the sun. It is moved like this every 45 minutes for 5-6 hours (I think - I'm trying to remember all this information).

Dried coffee beans.

Step 4:

Roast the dried beans.

Ya esta!

I'm sure the coffee here is really good - but it all tastes like coffee to me (so not very good).

Domingo

After we got back from the beach we still had plenty to do on Sunday.  We went to a pentecostal church in our neighborhood which was very charismatic.  The worship was awesome - I love worshiping in Spanish and remembering that God understands every language.  One of the students told me that he didn't know exactly what he was singing, but he knew that God did.  We left the service early - after two hours...

Alexa and I at church.

The ruins at Cartago.

Then we got on a little tour bus and headed to Cartago, the original capital of Costa Rica.  We stopped to see the ruins of the church there.  The church had been badly damaged by an earthquake, rebuilt and then damaged again by another earthquake.  After the second earthquake the people just gave up on it and didn't bother fixing it again.  Unfortunately, it was closed so we couldn't see the inside at all, but the outside was still pretty cool.

Inside the manstion turned restaurant.

Next we headed to a coffee plantation for lunch.  The mansion of the plantation had been turned into a restaurant and was very pretty.  They also serve coffee flavored flan - which was ok (I'm not a huge flan fan) - and coffee grown at the plantation.  I tried a cup, but I still like the smell much better than the taste.

The cathedral in Cartago.

Last, we stopped at the Catholic cathdral in Cartago.  The cathedral is home of la Negrita - a small stone carving that is said to have healing powers.  There were cases of little charms that people had brought as a testament to being healed - lots of little silver legs, arms, eyes, etc.  The legend says that la Negrita was found by a little girl, and the girl tired to take her home, only to find she had disappeared and returned to the same spot where she'd originally found the statue.  After this happened a couple more times, they decided to build the cathedral in this spot.

Vamos a la playa!

We just got back from a short trip to the beach - Punta Leona - on the Pacific Coast. We took a private tour bus there, stopping to walk across a bridge and check out some cocodrillos.  This wasn't at all dangerous...we walked along this narrow sidewalk trying to avoid falling into the traffic or into the river with the crocodiles.  There were no casualities, for the record.  We arrived at the beach/resort Friday morning and had all day at the beach.  We played in the salty water, swam in the pools, and lounged on the sand.  We originally went to the playa blanca, only to discover this wasn't the beach Senor K had been telling us to go to, so we had a little adventure walking over to the other one during high tide.  It was great just relaxing and gettng out of the city to see the beautiful country.  Everything was so green! And it was super humid and hot.

Los cocodrillos en el rio.

On our way to the beach.

Treking to the playa blanca - we walked about 2K and sweated off all of our sunscreen.

La playa blanca.

Sunset at the main beach - unfortunately it was a little cloudy.

Typical Tico

It hasn't rained a lot since we arrived, but it has been quite a bit today...we got stuck at Pollo a la Lena eating churros.



I ate this for lunch today at La Cuchara de mi Abuela. Typical tico cuisine: rice, beans, meat...all for 2,000 colones!

This is my house! The walk to the front door is just through the brick pillars. The window on the front goes to my room.



Gringos

We had our first class this morning. My professor is Esteban Piedra and he couldn't look less Costa Rican. He is a red-headed, tall, bearded man.  But he is very funny and I am anticipating a lot of fun with him in class.

Cheap restaurants are called Sodas.

After class we went out for lunch at El Caracol.  We all ordered casados, which was a full plate of either fish or meat with rice, beans, Costa Rican coleslaw, and some type of salsa on the side.  It also came with a fresh fruit drink (of some kind of fruit - I'm quickly realizing that I need to review my food vocabulary).  All for 2200 colones (~ $4).

Then we took a quick tour of San Jose.  We stopped at a market, walked by some museums - one of which we'll be going to tomorrow - and we walked through a few parks, churches and the national theater. We definitley stood out as tourists - just by the size of our group.
San Jose is quite different from a European city and cars do not stop here - we've been very seriously warned about crossing the street. Well, my only homework for the night is to talk with ticos, so I'll do that while I have dinner with my family shortly.

A very important Catholic church.

Walking through San Jose.

Traveling with Ticos

Travels went well! We all made it to San Jose around 9pm local time Monday night. 

Here's a portion of the group that flew from Buffalo to Newark.

The flight was pretty uneventful except for a brief interaction I had with the elderly tico (Costa Rican) couple sitting next to me.  I looked over at one point to see the man watching a movie on the TV screen on the back of the seat in front of him, but he was just watching - he had no head phones in.  So I asked him, "Senor, quiere oirlo?" and offered him the free head phones I had found on my seat when I boarded.  He tried to say something back to me in English, but I couldn't understand his accent, so he asked if I understood espanol, and told me that he had seen them on his seat but thought they were "dulces" (candy).

We left the airport and met our host families at the school.  I'm living with Don Jose and Dona Susanna who have three kids: Carolina (and her daughter Jimena), Andres, and Gloriana.  When Susanna and Andres picked me up, I got in the car and Bruno Mars was playing...American culture is just inescapable.

Mi cuarto.

I am really enjoying being back in a hispanic country! And its been really fun noting the differences between Costa Rica and Espana.  For example, this morning I actually had a meal for breakfast instead of toast.  I had a very typical dish called gallo pinto, which is rice, beans, and chiles (or something delicious) and some scrambled eggs.  It was muy rico!

Flight Plan

3 bags for 3 months.

So here's the schedule for the day:

I'm meeting Professor K at 10:15 am in the Buffalo airport along with some other Houghton students. We are flying out at 12:26 pm for Newark, where we will meet all the other students in the group except one who is meeting us in San Jose. Our flight departs from Newark at 5:25 pm and is scheduled to arrive in San Jose, Costa Rica at 8:30 pm (San Jose time, which is 2 hours behind EST).  So its looking like a solid 12 hours of traveling for today, but this is nothing compared to my flight itinerary from Quito back to Buffalo at the end of July...

Ready, set, go!

Five days until take off. It doesn't seem possible, and yet I've been anticipating this time for months. I started making travel plans for this summer as soon as I got back to Houghton in the fall. I immediately started asking professors for suggestions for internships - or really any opportunities abroad. For a long time it didn't seem that much was working out. I actually had an offer to go to Paraguay and teach at a school for the summer, but after some skype interviews and really slow facebook correspondence, details weren't coming together. So not knowing what would work out, I looked into the Mayterm course in Costa Rica - this would at least guarantee some time in a Spanish speaking country and I could be reassured that Spain wasn't my only study abroad experience ever. My wonderful parents said yes to Costa Rica and that became the first plan. After that decision, some doors opened for me to volunteer in Ecuador - the first being to volunteer at an international school's summer ESL camp. It turns out that I will actually have my own class in which I will be teaching English as a foreign language. I will also be volunteering with MAP International, a health development organization, in Quito. The details of this are still unknown to me, but that isn't unusual for me.

As I write this post I'm reminded of a similar post I wrote before going to Sevilla. In a way, I find myself in a similar situation; I had no idea what lied ahead for my semester in Spain - as I really don't know much of what is to come now. I was given an opportunity, to which I boldly said "Yes!" and really had to exercise my trust in God's plans and his promise to go on ahead of us (Psalm 23). I started praying for His will in attempting to figure out these plans almost a year ago. I decided I would have surgery done on my foot last summer, when I didn't have any plans and was working and staying home, in the hopes the He would do something big with this summer. He has prepared the way for everything to work out this summer, and I know He has prepared me for this next adventure.

It's still sinking in that a week from now I'll be in San Jose. I have a lot of packing to do - which will be last-minute as always (but that's how I prefer it to be). I'm very excited to travel again and to be immersed in new Spanish-speaking cultures. I'm anticipating a lot of growth, personally and in my relationships. I can't predict what's to come, but I eagerly await the experiences the next 3 months will bring.