Monday, April 11, 2011
Things have been pretty crazy since coming back from Nicaragua. I started and finished a new class called IDS 301, which stands for Interdisciplinary Studies. We studied Latin American culture and civilization, so it was really similar to my Spanish 419 class. The main difference is that this class was taught in English, and all of the readings were in English too. We’re learning about the governments of each country in Central America, and a little bit about this history of each country. It’s been really interesting! Learning about all of these countries just makes me want to travel and see the things there for myself. I don’t really remember when events happened throughout these last three weeks or so, so I’m sorry if this blog jumps around a little bit.
The Central America Study Program (CASP) students came to Costa Rica after I got back from Nicaragua! They are traveling around all five of the Central American countries this semester and are spending about a month in each one. Two of my best friends Brea and Megan are on that trip, and it was wonderful to see them! The first night they were at the campus, I took a taxi up to Monte de la Cruz and spent the night with Brea and Megan. We made s’mores over a fire in the main building on campus out of cookies, marshmallows and Nutella.
Me and Megan with our s'mores
Brea and me in Heredia
While CASP was here, we went to Heredia together a few times to celebrate a few birthdays of other students on the trip, which was a lot of fun. The last Friday night that they were in town, I went to Heredia with my friends Derek, Amy, Aaron, other Amy, Bree, Nick, Sarah, Danica and Britta. We went to dinner at a hole in the wall Lebanese restaurant, but the food was SO good. We had falafels, which are deep fried garbanzo bean patty sort of things. Then we walked to the National University (UNA) in Heredia. There was a free outdoor concert going on, so we went to watch. We ended up staying for over 2 hours, and spent most of that time near the front of the crowd dancing with everyone else that was there. It was SO much fun! I don’t know who the band was that was playing, but they were incredible. They had two acoustic guitar players, a main singer, a drummer, a saxophone player and a trumpet player. It was seriously one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to. Near the end of the concert, Stephen and Lars, two of my friends who are also on the CASP trip, showed up and danced with us for awhile. We met up with the rest of the CASP group after the concert and hung out for awhile, and were all exhausted after the concert was over.
Amy, Danica, Bree, Nick and I at the concert in Heredia
One Saturday I went to San Jose with Hollie, Anne and Thom, an exchange student from Holland who is living at the same host house as Hollie is. We went to the center of town where there was a little market where vendors were selling items they had made. I bought a ring that a woman made out of glass for $2. Score. Hollie bought some handmade chocolate that she said was delicious. We’ve all been having chocolate cravings here, because it’s hard to find it! Only certain stores carry chocolate bars, and we are slowly learning where those stores are. While we were in the center of town we saw a large crowd gathered around, so we went to go check it out. As it turns out, they were crowded around listening to a Christian rapper, who was surprisingly good. We stayed and listened for awhile. There was an old lady in the crowd who was dancing like CRAZY to the music; it was so funny to watch her.
A table of handmade chocolates in San Jose
Lindy was in the States for a week of my IDS class, so we had guest speakers. One day a lady came in and spoke to us about human trafficking throughout the Central American region, and worldwide as well. She works at an organization in San Jose that helps women reintegrate themselves into “normal” life after being prostitutes. She talked to us about how the women are tricked into getting involved in the human trafficking industry by being tricked. I never realized how large of an organization human trafficking is before hearing her speak. Men and women set up what looks like a job opportunity with a modeling agency to attract young, attractive girls. They pay all of their fees to get them across borders to other countries, including the United States. Once they arrive in the new country, the organization tell the girls what their fate is, and tell them that they owe them tens of thousands of dollars for all of their trouble in getting them across borders. They threaten the girls that they will hurt someone in their family if they try to escape. We watched the first half hour or so of a movie that explains the process much better than I can. One thing that really stood out to me in the movie was when a man said, “You can only sell drugs for a high price one time, but a human can be sold over and over again, every day.” The movie is called Human Trafficking, and it’s on YouTube. It’s a 3 hour long movie, but I really recommend it to anyone who is interested in the topic of human trafficking. It’s a pretty graphic movie, but the woman who spoke to us in class said it is a very accurate representation of human trafficking.
Another speaker that came to our class was a woman who is an elected official in San Rafael, the town that I live in. She is in charge of road conditions and other issues in the city. She was probably one of the most biased speakers I’ve ever heard, it was pretty funny to hear her talk about her party versus the other party.
On Wednesday night we had a Star Wars movie night. Nearly all of the students studying in Costa Rica with me this semester stayed on campus after class. The boys cooked an awesome dinner of Spaghetti and sandwiches (random?) for everyone. Then we all got dressed up as a Star Wars character of our choice. Several of the girls dressed up as Princess Leia and some of the boys were Luke Skywalker and Han Solo. I decided to step out of the box a little bit with my character. Yes. I was Chewbacca. I made my hair into an afro and used bronzer to turn my face orange. I jokingly said that this was the color I wanted to be by the time I left Costa Rica.. little did I know that that would come back and bite me a few days later.. We watched Episode IV in one of the dorm rooms, and then went to bed. The next morning the boys cooked breakfast for everyone- French toast and crepes. Again, it was delicious!
Chewy and Princess Leia
The whole crew
Chef Ziah and chef Derek
Me, Alexandria, Bree, Amelia and Sarah enjoying our breakfast
Danica and I enjoying the awesome weather! I got a horrible sunburn that day..
Our friend Aaron made us some strawberries with dulce de leche and milk on them
The last week of IDS we spent time talking about American involvement in Latin American countries. I was shocked to learn some of the information that Lindy taught us. I could seriously sit and listen to him talk forever. He is such a fount of knowledge. He has an answer for every question we have for him. One thing I found particularly interesting was the time in history when the United States wanted to declare war on Iraq. The United Nations Security Council is responsible for maintaining peace and security between countries. It is made up of 15 representatives from around the world. Five of these representatives are permanent members- The US, the UK, China, Russia, and France. The other 10 members are temporary, and rotate every two years. In order to declare war on a country, one has to get a 9/15 majority vote from the Security Council. As it turns out, during the time when George Bush wanted to declare war on Iraq, Mexico and Chile were late to the meeting of the Security Council. The vote was 8/13 without these two representatives. Relations between the US and Chile were strained because. Chile denied Bush’s bribe, mostly due to the fact that the US overthrew Allende in 1973 and put Pinochet into power, who then killed thousands of people (it's a really interesting story, I recommend you look it up) so it was up to Mexico to allow the United States to declare war on Iraq. Bush told Mexico that he would grant citizenship to all of the illegal Mexican immigrants in the United States if Mexico voted “yes.” Mexico turned down his offer, but before the UN could officially turn down the request for the Unites States to declare war on Iraq, the US removed its request and declared war on Iraq anyway. I feel like I should have learned about events such as these a long time ago.
We took our IDS final on Friday April 1st. Thursday night, I spent the night on campus with Bree, Alexandria and Danica to study. We started out having really great intentions to study, really, we did. But then we decided to do an Insanity work out, and then Alexandria and I discovered that there are fireflies on campus at night, so of course we had to chase some. Then we decided to build a fire in our dorm room, which required gathering wood and supplies. And then when we started to become a little bit productive, Britney Spears just HAD to come on in the music mix, so we had to stop for a dance party, etc. It was a great night really, and we actually got things accomplished after we procrastinated for several hours!
Alexandria, me, Danica and Bree
The awesome fire in our room
On Saturday our whole group went to a canopy rainforest in Barva, which is about a 20 minute bus ride from San Rafael. We arrived at the canopy place and got strapped into our harnesses and helmets. We then took a short bus ride to the top of the mountain, where our guide Arturo gave us a brief zip lining lesson and a little bit of history about the rainforest. Some of the trees have been growing for hundreds of years. It was really interesting to hear him explain about the different levels of the vegetation in the rainforest. The first line we zipped across was fairly short and slow, and was mostly to get us accustomed to how to ride each line. We walked along a wooden path from line to line, and were able to see the forest around us. I was surprised at how dense the vegetation was. The next few lines got longer and faster. The last line we zipped across was really high up, and was over a river. The scenery was breathtaking, I wish I could have taken pictures while I was on the line, but I was moving too fast. We zipped across eight lines in total. On one of the lines, my friend Anne spun around in circles and lost her shoe in the valley below. It was funny to watch her walk around for the rest of the day with only one shoe.
Me and Hollie waiting to zip
Everything was so green!
Nick found a friend
Off I go!
I went over to my friend Alexandria’s house later that day to spend the night. Her host mom’s name is Maragrita, and she’s a fun lady to talk to. Her house is incredible! The entrance opens up to two living rooms, one to the left and one to the right. The living room to the right leads into the kitchen. If you continue through the main entrance hallway, the house turns around a corner to Alexandria’s room and Margarita’s room. Then there is a covered walkway that goes outside and is lined with plants on both sides. Alexandria says she likes to go on the walkway when it rains because the water spills off the covered part of the walkway onto the plants along the sides. The walkway leads to the second house, which has a family room with a big screen tv and the bedrooms of Alexandria’s three sisters. Each of the four bedrooms has its own bathroom with a sink, toilet and shower. The house has a total of six bathrooms; imagine cleaning those all the time! Margarita has a little Benji looking dog named Britney, named after Britney Spears. I’m still in awe of their house just thinking about it. Alexandria, Bree and I stayed up and watched My Best Friend’s Wedding, and slept on an air mattress in the second house.
We woke up early on Sunday morning and went to the beach in Jaco again with Hollie, Thom, Anne, Rachel, Rachel, Danica, Britta, and Aaron. It was such a beautiful day! We took a bus from San Rafael to Heredia, then from Heredia to San Jose, then took a two hour bus ride from San Jose to Jaco. I put sunscreen on before I left the house, and again when I got to the beach. We swam in the ocean for quite awhile, and enjoyed the shade and the sunshine. We were all sitting in the shade at one point, when we looked over at a tree and saw a HUGE iguana climbing up the trunk. I wish I could have gotten my camera out in time to take a picture. As the day went on, the tide came in and the waves got stronger and stronger. There was a large rock in the surf that the waves had brought in, and Rachel and Danica were sitting on it. I joined them in the sand just in time for a giant wave to come up, knocking both Rachel and Danica off the rock and sending me spinning across the sand. Let me tell you, sand burns do not feel good. We took the 4:00 bus back to San Jose, then took a bus from San Jose into Heredia and back home.
Off to the beach at 5:00 in the morning
Footprints in the sand
On Tuesday night, I went to the Saprisa soccer game against Salt Lake at the stadium in Tibas. My friend Amelia and I went into Heredia that afternoon and bought jerseys for the game. Later that evening we met up with our friend Nick in parquet central in San Rafael and waited for Lara, Emily, Jim and Adam to come pick us up. While we were waiting, two older men in Saprisa jerseys showed up at the park, so we had Nick take our picture with them. The stadium was huge, and when the game started nearly every seat was packed. There’s actually a gang called the Saprissistas who go to every single game and have chants and stuff, and they were there making a ton of noise. It reminded me a lot of the student section at a high school football game. Imagine 500 people dressed in purple, white and orange all jumping around and chanting the same cheers. There was even a drum set in the bleachers, and a few people with trumpets. Yep, that’s the Saprissista gang.
Amelia and I with our fellow Saprissa fans in San Rafael
Our seats were right on the field, next to one of the goals. The fans around us were very.. passionate. They were jumping out of their seats and screaming things in Spanish that I don’t care to repeat. Basically, Saprissa and Salt Lake were playing the second game of a two game series. During the first game, which was at Salt Lake, Salt Lake won 2-0. Last night, Saprissa scored 2 goals and Salt Lake scored one, but they technically lost the tournament because since Salt Lake was away, their goal counted for 2 points. The final score for the tournament was 4-2. Confusing, right?
Emily, Nick, Adam, me, Amelia and Lara at the soccer game!
Awesome seats right on the field!
The rest of that week was such a blur, but one memory really sticks out in my mind. Justin, who is 3 and is the younger of Jenni Hoslinger’s two sons, was coloring a paper airplane with me at one of the tables in the rotunda one morning. He decided it would be a police plane, so he asked, “Lauren, how do you say police in Spanish? So I told him, “Policia.” Then he asked, “How do you say police officer?” So I said, “Policia.” Then Justin said, “Well I know another way to say it, and that’s police Navidad.” I laughed SO hard.. what a sweet kid.. He thought the phrase “Feliz Navidad” meaning “Merry Christmas,” was, “Police Navidad.” I absolutely love having those boys around.
Photos from the last few weeks:
A sunset on my walk home from the bus stop
Sarah found a massive beetle outside of the front door
Huge.
Me and my host sister Yara who is 12. She's working on a school project where each person in her class has to make an egg look like a person and take care of it for the rest of the month.
Yara's eggs.
Another beautiful sunset. The sun was so huge!!
A dragonfly that I found in class.
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