sooo....

After a weekend with lots of excitement, I don't feel like I have any great stories from today... I could tell you about how much my students make me laugh, but I'm not sure it would have the same effect since you can't picture each individual's unique personality.

We did go to the Independence Day parade in Desamparados on Monday morning, so here's a few pics from that experience.

Kids were dressed up in the traditional costumes of Costa Rica. This boy caught me taking his picture :).
What a cutie! These outfits are sold at the Mercado Central for weeks before this celebration.
Look!! There's glockenspiels here in Costa Rica too! (I played this mallet instrument in the high school band... It's name identifies it as German :))
More percussion and glockenspiels :)

Oh, and a p.s. to my mom: Thanks for all the prayers today; it went a lot smoother than I had anticipated! Love you! :)

more weekend photos and a video!

I love photos :) and I hope you do too!

Here's the waves from this weekend. The series of three photos were taken within a few second of each other, so you can see the wave coming in and breaking.
Trish and I were diving into the waves earlier in the day and dove into one, not expecting two in a row. We surfaced, only to be surprised by the second wave. We were knocked off our feet and underwater before we knew what was happening! Still underwater, the wave pushed me to the bottom and Trish was on top of me... the waves are so strong that it dragged me against the sand... now I have "sand burn" on my knees, similar to rug burn. Trish and I were coughing and sputtering as we came up for air. Needless to say, I took a break out of the water after that experience.


I spotted a couple other people with camera equipment similar to my own this weekend :). Not a great photo, but proof that there are other photographers in Costa Rica!

A baby iguana wondering what I'm doing.
Dragonfly.
Parque Nacional.
A walking bridge.

And here's a link for viewing some of the Independence Day festivities at Sojourn. We had an assembly and a parade last Friday during school... a few things we aren't trained for while majoring in education, ha! It was a bit crazy, but lots of fun. I'm in the video... near the beginning, with my back turned to the camera while herding my students to the gym for the assembly. I'm wearing a white dress with red sash :). Just in case you're looking for me!

teaser photos from the weekend

So, it was an awesome weekend. . . among the sweaty complaints and blistered feet. Ha, you probably won't feel sorry for me once you see these photos.... :) Trish and I ready for the hike, ha. We found hibiscus flowers, so of course we put them in our hair! We are on the mountain in this photo, before hiking down to the bus stop.

We went to Parque Nacional in Manuel Antonio and had a guided tour. We hiked through at least a mile of rainforest, althought it wasn't quite as "jungley" as we expected. The trail on the way to the beach was more touristy, but the treck back was more genuine rainforest :). Here is a rainbow grasshopper. It has all the colors of the rainbow on its back!
These crabs were everywhere, but if you didn't look carefully, you might step on one! I was able to get pretty close to this one.

We saw several sloths! Crazy, huh? Our guide said they sleep for 20 hours a day and only move for 4. Sounds like a great plan to me... maybe for 2 days or so.

Bamboo is tall! We are not very tall.

Kim is thinking, "We finally made it to the beach!!" We were so sweaty and gross by this point.

I know where pet stores get their hermit crabs from! Under decomposing logs in Costa Rica.

No one told us there were raccoons in Costa Rica... but apparently they're here too. This pesky scavenger stole our chips from my backpack! He came right up to our things while we were down in the water, and when we saw what he was doing, we came sprinting up the beach... but if you've ever tried to run in sand before, you'll realize that "sprinting" is really like "jogging". ha, Needless to say, he tore the bag open before we could do anything about it.

So then I put out bait (my apple core) to try to get the raccoon back... I wanted a better photo of our burglar. But another scavenger showed up... an iguana! He seemed glad that I would share, so he posed for quite a few photos. I think I will go into animal photography someday at the rate I am going!
Do you see the crab?? He's there, I promise! He's sooo camoflauge!

Same here... these creatures are camoflauge too... can you even tell what it is?? Fruit bats!
Kim V. and waves captured in action.
My pretending to be a mermaid, ha. I don't think my gringa legs would qualify.

Kim L. loves taking her own photo, so I thought I would join in the fun :).

Alright, I'm headed to bed. It's already 11:30 here. I will post more photos tomorrow! :)

Something Else Only in Costa Rica...

Today I realized that something else only in Costa Rica is that I have to take an umbrella to go get my students from gym class. It downpoured right as I was on my way, and thank goodness I had the umbrella. My students walked quickly through the rain on the way back to our classroom. They told me the rain felt good after sweating in gym class. :)

Tomorrow is an early dismissal and then a Parent Open House. Pray that my mind and body is still functioning when the parents arrive! (I'm exhausted tonight!)

Then we have Monday off for Costa Rica's Independence Day, so we (Tricia, Kim L., Kim V., and I) are heading to Manuel Antonio on the Pacific coast. The 3.5 hour bus ride tomorrow night will be an excellent nap (hopefully). No posting until I get back Sunday night, but the photos will be great. :) I promise!

Oh, and we received the first box of books!! :) My students were so excited today about all the new books! :) Thanks to everyone who has donated books, money, and time to my book project.

Much love!

Character Building

We seem to be having some difficulties sharing in 4th grade... so we're going to have many opportunities over the next few days :). We'll see how that goes...

A couple of my girls also seem to be very critical of others. We'll be working on this as well.

Funny how the things my students need to work on are the things I also need to work on.

I think I'm turning into a football coach. My classroom windows open right across the hall from the library, so I think (actually, I'm pretty sure) that anyone in the library can hear me teaching at all times. I have this loud teacher voice... I kind of bark, ha. I vary the volume to keep student's attention; however, when I'm barking, I'm barking... if you were to sit in the library, you would know what I mean.

I was teaching the history lesson today about the Vikings and explorers who discovered America before Columbus, and I got all excited and really animated and acted like a Viking with a good pirate accent... "Ya know, I'm pretty surrrrrre that the Vikings werrrrrre what we callllll .... (dramatic pause) PIRATES!" Just then I looked down in the library, and some of the high schoolers were cracking up, looking right up at me.

All for the expense of teaching. My current character building: not caring what other's think, no matter what. My students are loving it. I haven't decided how I feel about it yet.

Only in Costa Rica (or at least not in the States!)

Only in Costa Rica does a teacher have to remind her students not to flush their toilet paper. "Throw it in the wastebasket by the toilet so the pipes will not be clogged!!" I think I've said this too many times already.

Only in Costa Rica are there several minor earthquakes per day. With a bookshelf connected to the wall, my students put a marker standing on its end on the top shelf. Every time it fell to the floor, the students would yell "Earthquake!"

Only in Costa Rica are thunderstorms every afternoon. On a regular basis, I find myself competing for my students' attention with the noise of thunder and the light show of lightning.

Only in Costa Rica do ants get to your food before you do. I ate most of my lunch and then set it down to help a student... next thing I know, there's ants thoroughly mixed in with my gallo pinto. Bummer.

Only in Costa Rica do taxi drivers not let on that they know English until you arrive at the destination. And of course, Trish and I have made fools out of ourselves by commenting (in English) about the driver's race car steering wheel (no kidding, this one drove like he was in the Indy 500!). Then to discover that he understood every word we said.

Only in Costa Rica are you excited (like me :)) to go to the Post Office and have an entire interaction in Spanish, completely understood. I bought stamps and asked where to put my letters. The clerk asked what I was doing in Costa Rica and I told her about teaching and where I was from. Ha, such an accomplishment!

Only in Costa Rica does the city wake up completely at sunrise around 5:30 am. No kidding. The trucks and taxis are already honking.

Well, maybe all these things aren't only in Costa Rica... but they're certainly only in my Costa Rica experiences :).

Puntarenes y Mis Amigos Ticos

Whew! This was quite the weekend of experiencing Costa Rican life in its truest form. I was able to join my friends Ale and Priscilla to visit her family in Puntarenes. I met Ale and Priscilla in March 2006 when I came with the Judson mission project. I stayed with Ale's family while we were working in Lourdes, and he thought an American boy was coming to stay with him, but obviously I'm a girl. He called his girlfriend Priscilla and said "What do I do with this girl??" so Pri came over and practiced her English. :) ha, that was two years ago, and we would have never guessed we would be spending a weekend together!

We went to the beach :) of course and ate lots of good tico food. Gallo pinto and arroz con leche are two of my new favorites. I will learn how to make it Mom and I will teach you when I am home again! :) Scripture is everywhere, even on the grocery store!
A puffer fish... poor guy.
Pri likes to take photos like me, so she always wanted to take photos of me. :) I didn't complain!
Pri & Ale are always being funny. They are good together.
At the beach! Debbie, Valeria, Tati, me. I think this was my first time ever at the Pacific Ocean!! (Correct me if I'm wrong, Mom!)
Lots of fishermen at the dock!
Debbie and Valeria on the dock. They are very beautiful girls.
I tried this drink ... gazoricados (something like that...) con dos leches. It was almost too sweet for me, can you imagine that??
Pri & Ale & me. I'm glad I could join them this weekend!

Donya Yanette's home. It is open air, very simple.

The view from the front living area. Beautiful, huh??

Donya Yanette. She is an amazing cook and hostess. She asked if I would take her photo, and I of course was honored!

The nice light from the window next to my bed.

Coral on the rocks. Tati was catching tiny crabs, but they all got away before I could take a picture.
Hey look!! A banana boat! It only cost a mil ($2) to ride. I wanted to, but I couldn't convince the other girls.
There are birds in Costa Rica :).

at the beach, looking cool. Ale, Tatiana, Valeria, me!, Debbie.

Then the car broke down... twice. All I knew was that smoke = not good.

So while the car was broken down, I took some good photos of the landscape. Muy bonita montanas!!
and then I figured out how to blur the background with moving cars... a great breakthrough in my photography career, ha!