Man alive it feels so strange and yet wonderful to be doing this again! I am not entirely certain where to start this time around, but I promise that THIS time, I will actually post at least one blog per week.
For those of you who do not know, I am currently in San Jose, Costa Rica doing volunteer work with an organization called Maximo Nivel. Instead of teaching English, however, I will be doing construction work. When I told my family this was my plan for the summer over Sunday Dinner my Uncle Greg had the same reaction most of you are probably having right now, “You? Doing construction? Do you even know how to use a hammer?” I will be the first to admit, manual labor is not typically my cup of tea, but seeing as this is the third summer I have spent volunteering, I wanted to do something a little more hands on. And amazingly, I have been here for just over a week and I have managed to not majorly injure myself or any of the other people I am working with.
But I am getting ahead of myself. In addition to doing something vastly different from anything I’ve ever done before, I am here with the wonderful Jillian Marie Wheeler who, incidentally, is teaching English to the future generations of Costa Rica. In fact, she is keeping a blog of our trip as well and if you are interested in seeing her take on everything, just check out the “Random Word Vomit” link under the “Other blogs you ought to consider” heading.
And now that all of the housecleaning is out of the way, it’s time to get down to business. The flight here was pretty uneventful, save only the minor setback we experienced with Jillian’s camera/packing and the amazing game we devised to pass the time during our 8 hour layover in Denver. The object of this game is to get people to wave back at you as you stand on the moving walk way while waving at the people standing at various gates. We even provided commentary on our performance and noticed trends among those who were flying to certain places. Even with a nap, our game, and exploring the other two concourses of the Denver airport we still had close to four hours to burn so we had dinner at Panda Express while watching The Devil Wears Prada and attempted productivity which resulted in a lot of silly picture taking.
Our little set up in the food court. I'm pretty sure were were openly judged by a few people while everyone else was just jealous that we got to have dinner and a movie.
Jillian with Lexi and all of her blue colored items.
Yeah... it was a really long layover.
Anyway, a few hours later we boarded our plane and five hours after that we arrived in San Jose, Costa Rica. After getting our bags from baggage claim (which took forever by the way), we headed out of the terminal and were met by a short Costa Rican woman holding a sign with mine and Jillian’s names on it. There was one other name and it’s owner came along shortly after us and she actually turned out to be one of Jillian’s roommate.
After a very twisty and turny drive from the airport, we arrived at my homestay first. My host mom greeted us right at the front door with a big smile and a hug. I could tell right then that I was going to like her a lot. After I got my bags settled in my room, I headed over to where Jillian and Breena would be living. Luckily we are less than two minutes away from each other, so that will make doing things together a whole lot easier. Once I was back at my house, I had a delicious breakfast and then went to my room to unpack. I got about half way through before I passed out on the bed.
When I finally came to, my host father told me that Jillian had stopped by to check in on me so I headed over to her place and she, Breena and I took a little walk around our neighborhood before I had to go to orientation. My host mom actually showed me how to take the bus there and when she dropped me off at the Maximo Nivel Volunteer Center, she told me it was my responsibility to make it home, unless I wanted her to wait with me. I told her she could go and that I promised to be back soon.
Orientation lasted a good long time and included a walking tour. I even got to meet some of the people I would be working with this week in construction. After nearly three hours though, I was exhausted again and ended up taking the bus straight home. Then a quick dinner and it was back to my room to finish unpacking after which I again crashed on the bed.
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