Another 3 Weeks Gone

I believe it was three weeks ago that I went to my little tica sister's First Communion. It was very cool and interesting. There were like 20 little girls in white long dresses, they all looked like flower girls. The service was very long and of course I did not understand it all but it was very moving. I never realized how Catholics were about first communion, I even went with wet hair because I woke up late and I felt like everyone was looking at me. Anyway it was still good. After the service we went back to the house where 30 or 40 people came over and we had a gourmet cooked meal by a chef (and he cooked me some special tofu, veggies and mashed potatoes) it was beyond delicious. I also had a long talk in Spanish with an elderly woman from Hondorus. It was interesting. Oh and this was on Saturday.



The next day I think, I went to Isla Tortuga with our group and it was really fun. We road a huge boat there that had a "hot tub" which was really a rectanglur hole with cold water in it that splashed everyone around it like crazy. It was rather amusing though. When we reached the small island, I realized on a lawn chair the whole time, took a few naps and did some homework. It was wonderful. I go to also pet a pig that was basically a dog, or at least it acted like one. Then we all got fed really delicious food and we chilled some more on the beach. When we returned on the boat two nice looking ticos actually carried me on board, it was nice to say the least. Then we sailed home and saw the sun set, it was completely gorgeous.

The next weekend I just chilled at home because we had a long weekend. I got to read, relax, get ahead in homework and chill around San Jose. I went to this bagel shop one day, practically read all day and ate some wonderful soup and had some coffee. It was a much needed break. I also went to a really great restaurant with some friends called Cafe Mundo that had some really tasty bread with olive oil and pasta. Then the next day I went out with my tica extended family for my tica aunt's 30th birthday party where I also had some tasty pasta. We had all a lot of fun on this day too.

Then my tica mother and I made an appointment to get my cast off for Monday but we decided that I should just get it off at the emergency that day so I could have more fun on the weekend. So my tica aunt took me to the emergency room where there was yet another orthopedic doctor (i've had three) and I got an x-ray and apparently everything was all good so I got it taken off. Just to warn you if you ever have a cast it is Extremely tickilish when you get it taken off. They have a cast cutter (its not sharp) it just vibrates and when it touchs your skin it is unbearably tickily. And when you doctor does not understand English and you do not know the word for ticklish it can be quite a hilarious situation. But anyway I got it off and it was disgustingly gross, it was covered with dry skin, swollen, smelly and hairy which is not a good combination. But once i cleaned it is was alright, even though the doctor said it will continue to hurt for the next couple of days and keep getting swollen by 2 weeks I should be in fine form.

So on Friday we left for Jaco beach for halloween (I was a forest ranger). We said in a very small hostel with an abundance of people (a mix-up that would take way too long to explain) so our non-heavy drinkers room there were six beds and we had 12 or 13 people including two guys. It was quite an intersting two nights. There was actually less people the first night and so it was not that bad. But after our wonderful relaxing day on the beach, in the water and wonderful food ( i even had a delicious soy burger!) and coffee, we had a night fool of crazy drunk people. Also the crazy german owners of our hostel had like a sixth sense or something and always knew when our bathroom door inside of our room was open (for some reason we had to keep it closed). They keyed into our room three times in those 2 nights to come close the door and we still do not know how they knew it was open, we hoped that there were no cameras. Anyway at one point in the night a friend of our friend's angrily knocked on our door because he couldnt find his passport and he just knew we had it. He tried to push into our room multiple times and it was a bit scary. Then somehow people got locked out of the hostel and others got locked in because there was no key to a certain door, so some people climbed down from roof (which is four floors up). While someone else tore down the owner's room next to ours and then drilled it back together. Because apparently there was just a drill there. It was really scary and hard to sleep and we at many points in our trip were scared for our lives. But we ended up ok in the end and we just got out as early as we could this morning. And today we went to really nice church service through some people that some of our friends knew and it was really nice. Some of the starters of the church were actually from Lexington, South Carolina interesting enough. It was a rather small but very nice and much needed church service that was both in English and Spanish. Then we all took a bus home and everything is fine and dandy now. Needless to say it was quite an interesting weekend.

The past three weeks (sorry ive been busy)

I actually did go Bungee Jumping three weeks ago and it was amazing. I was pretty darn scared before i went on the platform but when I stood up there it wasn't that bad. You literally get up there and imediately the guy is like 5,4,3,2,1 go and I was just like OK, not even thinking. Then on the way down I was like, holly moley I just jumped off a bridge with a mere rope attached to me (which is why I made a scream of fright) then when the rope caught I realized that I was ok and it was rather peacefull after that (which is why i screamed of glee). I suggest you do it sometime, I could do it over and over again, it is ten times more fun that any roller coaster.

A couple of days after bungee jumping, I decided that I should go play soccer because I hadn't yet. And even though on the way down there I seriously thought I don't know if I should do this I have a bad feeling, I played anyway. Oh I should also mention we were playing on concrete and I was wearing shoes but not tennis shoes, which also added to my uneasiness. We started to play and a couple minutes in I was trying to block Danyelle from passing and I slipped on my right leg and my left ankle rolled the wrong way. We all thought it was a sprain and because I could walk on it and I just got a ride home. Then it swelled up rather badly so I went to the hospital, got an x-ray and was told I fractured the little circular bone on the outside of your ankle and I would in a cast for 6 weeks (i was not excited at all). Then I waited for an hour while the doctor was in surgey and then received my cast and crutchs. I will never ever make fun of people with crutchs, they serioulsy aren't fun. Yes they may build your muscles in the arms but they are still not fun. Oh and i might as well tell you now that early this week I went to a different doctor to get my cast changed like other doctor had wanted. However, this doctor didnt want to change, but I told him that I honeslty do not think i can walk up 3 flights of stairs everyday for another month and take a shower with a plastic bag over my foot. He felt bad so he said even though they hardly ever do this in Costa Rica he would give me a cast that I could get wet (except in salt water), a heel so I walk on the cast and cane (and i was delighted).

Moving on to more exciting things, the weekend after getting my crutchs we went to Montezuma which is a very small beach town with waterfalls nearby. Our hotel was literally right on the beach and all of the restaurants were on two streets it was lovely. I layed out, read a book, talked to random people about my cast as they told me their life stories, saw an orange and black squirrel, watch a guy get coconuts from a tree, tried coconut juice and went to a bar with everyone, it was great. One time I was actually walking to one of the restaurants and these two random guys that I didnt know were like hey you did that playing soccer and I turned around looking confused and said yes. They said word gets around there fast, and everyone knew my story and everything, it was a bit weird.

When we came back to San Jose the rest of the people who were studying abroad finally came (like 50 people or so in all). We started our new spanish classes and electives. Now i'm in Advanced Spanish 1 and Intercultural Communications (with Joaquin who is awesome, he is a mixture of my two favorite teachers of all time: Mr. Moseley and Mr. Griffin). Advanced Spanish is good besides the fact that our teacher grades strictly.

Last weekend we went to Puerto Viejo for snorkeling and the beach. It was similar to Montezuma, they are both very beautiful but some of the beachs in Puerto Viejo are black because volcanoes which is quite interesting. In Puerto Viejo I obviously could not go snorkeling but I still rode on the boat, got lots of sun, watched everyone snorkel, saw the reefs and fish from the boat . I also got to read a lot more in Puerto Viejo ( and thanks to Colleen i started a new book called the Eight by Katherine Neville- if you books like Angels and Demons read it! its awesome) and ate a lot of delicious food including: penne tomato pasta, veggie bruschetta, a vegan burger, a veggie chalupa, and lots of delicious rice and beans of course. Oh also the power went out in the whole town of Puerto Viejo for like 2 hours or so and it was a bit scary. This also happened in Montezuma but it was only for a minute. Anyways you could barely see anything and it was weird.

Like I said I received my cane and new cast this week which is ten times easier to walk up stairs with and less tiring period. Although this weekend everyone went to see the Volcano Arenal and the hot springs there and I couldn't go (its hard to explain why I could last weekend but not this weekend so just know that i couldn't) so I'm staying home and chilling. On Friday night my little tico brothers and sisters made me vegan pizza and we watched Nanny McPhee in Spanish, it was great. They also thought I was sad that I could'nt go to the volcano so they all talked about how it wasnt that great, that it was dangerous, that it rains a lot and that its really cold up there so the people that went are probably going to catch a cold. It was the cutest thing ever. Yesterday, I slept in, relaxed and read on our terrace that has a beautiful view, watched Jimmy Neutron in Spanish with the kids and watched some Friends - it was an awesome day. And today I got to sleep in again, read, helped my tica sister with her homework and now we are all about to go see Tinkerbell 2 in spanish at the movies and I'm not even that sad that I couldnt go with everyone. Plus im going to see it later so it's all good!

First Two Weeks in Costa Rica

Ok ok maybe I was freaking out a little too much before I came to Costa Rica but now everything is great. An update on the things I was worried about: my cat is doing much much better and is now able to go outside, I got into a high intermediate spanish class which is equal to a advanced class in America so I´m happy, my teacher did not mind that I had to leave to go to my sister´s wedding and all of the stuff I packed was sufficient so no more worries!

Let´s see what has happened so far: the first day we took a tour of downtown San Jose which is like a mile away so not too far and it´s super cool. The main street is a pedestrain walking street and sometimes it´s really busy but it is always nice to see the hustle and bustle of a city. We also got to see our cool house that has like five levels, a library, a patio, multi-colored lamps and furniture, a cute dining room and kitchen area, it is really nice and honestly looks like a real world house.

On Wednesday the power was out in our building so we got to take a tour of the RAINFOREST! It was amazing. We went to this gorgeous resort that had tons of animals like snakes, different monkeys, toucans, hummingbirds, cougars, butterflys, sloths, frogs and more. Most of the places you could just walk around with the animals surrounding you and you could touch and hold them (obviously not the monkeys, or the cougars or anything) but it was still awesome. I got to hold and feed a toucan and it was completely adorable and I got to hold hands with a monkey but then he jingled his stuff in my face so that was a little weird lol. Me and two other girls also played tug of war with a stick and the cougar- that was interesting and there is a video on facebook of that. After we ate an amazing buffet of food and looked at the animals we went to two HUGE waterfalls that were just incredibly gorgeous and trust me I will upload pictures soon.
Oh my goodness, it´s hard to describe how amazing and beautiful everything was on that day but I guess pictures will help.

Extremely early in the morning at 4 am on thursday I went to the airport and flew to new jersey and then to london. The interesting thing about that trip was that I saw a little costa rican boy in the airport do all of the motions to thriller and sing all of the words correctly by heart it was so cute. Also on my flight to london from New Jersey, in case you didn´t read my status from before, Beyonce´s parents rode on my flight which was crazy weird. I overheard the flight attendants talking and they kept talking about Beyonce and i was just like ok whatever they must like her. then low and behold I´m in line and here comes her parents in the First class line (of course) and really late, and I was like wow holy moly they fly continental weird. Then I got onto the plane and she was right next to me talking on her phone- it was cool. Then when I got to london i had a miny heart attack when i realized i couldnt change my costa rican money into euros, thank goodness for credit card cash advances though.

OK so anyway about the wedding. Everything was wonderful and beautiful, it was a super long day but it was well worth it. I actually a little surprised because i thought i was to ball my eyes out at the wedding but i didnt actually cry until the reception. I couldnt help but cry when Alexis gave a speech about Eugenia and our family : im getting teary eyed just thinking about it. The wedding was in a cute circular church that was just perfect. Then after there was a mini reception with finger food and drinks (apparently they do it like that in England) and then the reception was a couple hours later and it was in the beautiful town hall. It had lovely high ceilings, and wonderful decorations (i´ll put pictures up soon). There was a string quartet that played classical and other songs and Eugenia and Alexis danced the waltz I think as there first dance (they learned it from youtube lol). I don´t know what else to say other than it was just lovely and perfect. OH and Alexis didnt tell Eugenia where they were going on their honeymoon until the day of to surprise her but we now know that they are going to Salzburg, Austria and Germany because that´s where they filmed the Sound of Music. And if you know our family that movie is like a HUGE deal, we watch it pretty much ever year and it used to be both of our favorite movies. Oh and Alexis has never seen it and I told him one time that to be apart of our family he has to see it - it´s like a pre-requisite. Omg it´s just sooo cute.

And back to Costa Rica: now Im back at school and things are going well. We sometimes have A LOT of homework for one night but that happens to everyone so I cant complain. I´m still not very comfortable speaking in front of the class in Spanish but Im getting so that´s good. Oh and most importantly this weekend we are going to the BEACH! It´s called Manuel Antonio and you can walk around with monkeys and sometimes they steal your stuff out your backpack (which is bad but a little funny too). I´m super excited and some of us are supposed to be going Bungee Jumping soon which I am STOKED about, omg I can´t wait. Ahhh I love Costa Rica.

p.s I miss everyone back at home and wish you were here with me!

8 days

I have merely eight days until I leave for Costa Rica, and I have to say that I am nothing short of freaking out. I suppose it's normal to freak out about moving to another country for four months to study abroad, nonetheless I would simply rather not have this feeling. I hope that I'm just making myself go crazy and that there really is nothing to worry about. Although lately, I have had a lot to worry about and each day that goes by simply kicks my stress level up one more notch.

Here is a list of what has been bothering me lately (not including the normal anxieties that people feel of studying abroad in a foreign country):

• One of my outdoor cats Benedick recently broke his hip and has to be kept inside. This was worrisome in and of itself but then we found out that the medicine he's on gives him uncontrollable Montezuma's revenge which he invariably leaves little bits around the house. This wouldn't be so bad if we could confine him in a cage (like the vet ordered) or a room with no carpet. However, when we tried this he began to fling himself against walls thus being counterproductive to his recovery. Therefore, my family was forced to let him roam around the house while keeping a close eye on him but needless to say they are not thrilled. *On a side note his Montezuma's revenge has become so uncontrollable lately that just an hour ago I was holding him and he left me a present on my lap (which has never happened before).
• I took a preliminary exam not too long ago to see what level of Spanish classes I can take while I am studying in Costa Rica. We were told many times that most people do not feel that they do well on this written exam so I was extremely nervous before the exam. Basically, there are six levels of Spanish classes: low basic, high basic, low intermediate...until high advanced and there were six sections to this exam. In order to take the next section you had to get 75% right and answer within 10 minutes. I made it to the last section so I was ecstatic and I wanted to see my scores immediately but they never showed up on the website. Apparently, there were a whole bunch of IT problems with the exam and with the University and so now we must retake the exam when we get there along with the already scheduled oral interview. Oh and did I mention that I am horrible with interviews and that I was already freaking out enough about the interview, now I have to worry about retaking this exam. And now I'm wondering if I only made it to each level because of the IT problems.
• My sister is getting married in England about a week after I arrive in Costa Rica. Obviously this is a huge deal and I booked my flight a long time ago but unfortunately the only one that was reasonable and didn't have a million stops was on a Thursday. And as luck would have it classes go through friday in Costa Rica meaning I would miss two days of classes. Now this doesn't seem like a big deal but IT IS. I checked the attendance policy and apparently you are only allowed one, yes ONE unexcused absence per class and two unexcused absences means FAILURE. Now I dont know if you know this or not but I can not fail a class... I just can't and failure really is not an option in family... it just isnt. Now I know that my sister's wedding COULD be considered an excused absence but that whole could part is really really worrying me beyond belief.
• I am trying to bring as little as possible with me to Costa Rica because everyone says you'll feel better with the less you bring because it's less you'll have to carry. Well that is way easier said than done but in order to help me bring less, I am only bringing a large traveler's backpack (like the ones people use to backpack across Europe) and a small carry on. Recently though I did a dry run with just my clothes and shoes and they filled practically all of my bag. Now i'm worried that i'm either making a dumb decision by only using this backpack or that i'm simply bringing too many clothes and shoes. It's not helping that I know that if I forget something really important I can't just turn around and go home and get it.

Whew that feels great to get that off of my chest, I feel much better. Honestly though disregarding these issues I am extremely excited about studying abroad and living in Costa Rica for four months.