World Cup Games, Mini SPIA Reunion, and English TV

First and foremost, Costa Rica won the game on Friday, and what a game it was! So much pride for a country that I love so dearly!

Secondly, Danielle came to visit this past weekend! It was so nice to have a piece of home here. I showed her around my town, my internship, introduced her to my friends, and we ventured to La Fortuna to see Volcan Arenal and take the most amazing hike up the volcano to a lake in a crater! It truly was a wonderful visit.

Now onto work: Work has been only slightly different now that Tina is back, although no less challenging I must say! The only thing that has really changed in my role is I no longer have to answer the phone as much and all of our emails are getting replied to in the afternoons instead of just the mornings. I am not upset about the phone situation, no sir! Although I still answer it about half the time still, it’s really great practice not only for business skills, but also for my Spanish skills, which continue to improve each day.  

The Hostel in La Fortuna

Living with my host family, where no English is spoken (with the exception of helping my little nine year old sister study for her English exams), is also instrumental in my language improvement. It is really nice to have them, I am so glad I opted to live with a family and not alone in an apartment. Not only do I get immersed in the town at work, but also when I go home as well. It is so very interesting to get viewpoints about Su Espacio from the families participating in hosting, as I am still in charge of delivering their money when they have a volunteer coming to stay with them. I have the awesome opportunity to sit down with each and

At the Bus Stop

every one of them and see how they are doing, how they like hosting, and how they see Su Espacio.

We have begun to prep for our two-week free English lessons that will be happening in the first two weeks of July. This is school vacation from the schools and so we at Su Espacio rent out three large classrooms located next to the church and host free English lessons. We have three groups, mostly based on age, and people have already started calling in to sign up! We are hoping to fill each of the rooms; we have eight new volunteers coming in this weekend to help so there will be plenty of teachers there! These eight are all fairly young, in between 15 and 18 years old, and since Andres is still out sick, I get his job of taking them under my wing and showing them the ropes. This consists of not only orientation, but also taking them on an “adventure tour” next week. This means that every day next week I will be in a different city with them, showing them around. Luckily I have been to most of the places I have to take them, and the places I haven’t I’ve had to research so I can answer any questions they might have. I am looking

Volcan Arenal

forward to being out of the office for the week, but not so much because I fear it might turn into a babysitting mission. Hopefully it won’t.

This internship couldn’t have fallen on a better time for me to really take on the responsibilities I was looking for coming here for the summer. I had my doubts in the beginning, because I knew that most of the roles were already covered and I really did not want to simply be stuck teaching English classes instead of helping to run the organization, but it has certainly lived up to the expectations I tried not to set. Since Andres is out it is just Tina and me running things, so I have literally been thrown into the leadership role I was searching for. It is a ton of work, and I am in bed earlier than my grandmother is, but it is worth it. The challenge I am facing now is keeping my volunteers busy and productive during the day. Since school has picked back up we are finding more people are opting out of English classes, however, we are hoping that after this two-week class series interest will peak again and we will be full for the rest of the summer!

At Baldi Hot Springs

Overall, everything is still going smoothly and I continue to learn new things about the organization, the country, and myself. I never know what sort of challenges I face when I walk to work each morning and am excited to see what the day brings. Weekends are too short, but the seem to recharge my batteries so I can’t complain that much, especially when I get visitors from back home, can’t get much better than that!

So last weekend Danielle came to visit! For those of you who don’t know, Danielle is in

SPIA with me, but on the environmental track. She arrived last Thursday and stayed through until Tuesday. Manfred and I went to pick her up at the bus stop in town and before we arrived we decided to play a little trick, harmless really, how could we resist when it was right there?! Manfred pretended to speak no English, when in reality he barely has an accent when he speaks English. I had to stop by a few host family’s homes, so on the way I was talking with Danielle in English, “Translating” to Manfred, and then talking to him in Spanish. She was convinced! I expected to keep it up for a few minutes, but he continued for about fifteen, until I headed into a host home and he was out on the street with her, where he cracked and began speaking English. It was quite funny.

We played Jenga that Danielle had brought with Johanna and ate pineapple pizza and headed to bed early, we were heading to La Fortuna early the next morning. It was raining the who way there and continued to do so when we got there. We wanted to take an “adventure tour,” but after we talked to the woman at the front desk of our hostel we decided to go to Baldi Hot Springs instead. It was a solid

Hiking with Danielle and Sophie

choice! It was a little overpriced, but the water was so warm and it was sprinkling for the rest of the evening so it was nice to just sit in the warm water and relax. It was set up in 27 pools, the hottest pools were at the top and the “coolest” were at the bottom. Right in the middle there were water slides which of course we took advantage of. After spending a fair few hours in the hot springs we headed to dinner, which was an amazing buffet. We “carb loaded,” or that’s the excuse we used to eat as much pasta and dessert as we could fit, and then headed back to relax for the rest of the evening. We met this really nice girl from England who was in our hostel room named Sophie and invited her to go hiking with us the next day. She was planning n heading to Nicaragua, but decided to come hiking with us instead.

 

Climbing Down to the Lake

We started our hike at 9 the next morning and let me tell you, it was the most difficult, strenuous, hot, sweaty, exhausting, yet beautiful and satisfying hike I have ever been on. The trek was so difficult, nearly all vertical and so muddy, and through the rainforest. I do have to say, though, that the hike was gorgeous. Photos don’t do it any justice. It was straight out of Jurassic Park, with the leaves dripping water, hanging low, moss everywhere, birds and insects were the only sounds around, just absolutely stunning. So We hiked straight up for about two and a half hours, I don’t think I’ve ever sweat so much, and then had to hike down an even steeper trail for about a hundred meters to the lake. Unfortunately, it is the rainy season and so the lake was covered in fog, but it was still a nice place to relax and recover for the trek back.

Baldi Hot Springs

We ran into this nice family from Florida on the way up and spent a bit of time with them at the lake. The mom wouldn’t stop complaining, though, so we headed back. After that we were absolutely dead and spent the rest of the afternoon in the hammocks!

Sophie headed out early the next day and Danielle and I spent the morning shopping and relaxing and then bussed it back into town. We finally made it, after a brief spell of being lost in a horrible part of San Jose, at night of course, around 11 o’clock and crashed. The next day it was back to the grind for me. Monday brings orientation so Danielle came on tour with us and then out to the coffee farm where I was dropping off a few volunteers. She stayed for the tour and then spent the afternoon in the Internet café while I worked. It was a super long day, carting around new volunteers to their projects, delivering money to host families, holding down the fort at Su Espacio, playing host to a guy from the IFRE office in Texas, running to and from home for food, the whole nine yards. I was exhausted by the time I went to get Danielle so we just headed home and hung out until bed. We were up at 5 to get her

Sights on the Hike

in a taxi and then I went running. It is so lovely and cool here in the morning, and so many people wake up early to see it I really enjoy it. Usually, though, I am way too tired to get up that early!

So it was a pretty typical week, lots of work, hardly any play because I’m too tired by the time work gets out at 7, but it went quickly and here I am, Friday evening, after a full day of relaxation at home. I had the house to myself today so I slept in, and then watched Costa Rica win against Italy in the World Cup game. I was reading outside when it clouded over and began to storm like no other. It’s the rainy season and we are in the midst of it now so the storms come fast and they are ferocious! The clouds before they move in, though, are absolutely stunning. I wanted to stay out on my front stoop to watch it, but had to move into the doorway becaseu the wind was blowing the huge drops my way! I watched the storm play out and then moved inside for a bit. Well, longer than a bit, it’s around 8:30 now and I’m in the same spot. I am thinking I might just head to bed, although I’d like to wait for the fam bam to get back from San Jose before I do. I do have an early morning tomorrow so

I guess I’ll see if I start falling asleep on the couch or not. Anyways, I am headed to Playa Jaco tomorrow for the day with two other volunteers so that should be fun! We will see if we get to and from there without getting lost. Highly unlikely, but possible.

Bud, this is for you: What Would You Do? Is on TV as I am writing this! Of course I am watching it, I think I always will whenever I come across it on TV (when I have a TV that is)! I found it in my search to find a channel in English. I do love watching Latin TV, but once in a while I just want to zone out and I only can when I am watching an English channel because I don’t have to constantly be translating in my head! EVEN THE COMMERICALS ARE IN ENGLISH WOO! There is a surprising amount on tonight; I have already found around six, which is five more than usual. 

Today, my life is just Shelby.

A Day in the Life

The conclusion of week two was just as eventful, if not more so, than week one, but somehow less chaotic. I am finally in the “groove” of work and can answer almost any question that gets thrown my way, what a relief since I am still the only one there sometimes! Answering the phone is coming with

more ease and I have been going to all of our project sites one by one; I have seen almost all of them and have had the pleasure of getting to know the people running those sites a bit better. A lot of what I do is hands-on work with the volunteers, which is a great break from answering the phones.

I figure now is as good a time as any to lay out a typical day at Su Espacio. I will take a Monday as an example because they are usually our most eventful (if not eventful then definitely active) days:

I arrive at work every day at 7:30 and I always find Tina checking emails. I have started to respond to a few of them on my own, however many emails that are coming in right now are from previous conversations between the applicant and Tina, so I leave most of those for her and mostly stick to the new inquiries. After all the emails are checked and responded to, I send out the confirmation paperwork for all of the new applications we receive from our partner programs, which can range from one to four or five a day. This process entails gathering all the applicant information (dates, project interest and information, level of Spanish, special needs or dietary requests, etc.), so we can start to get them paired with a project and a host family. After I fill in all the corresponding information I send them the contract with everything filled out so they can review and sign it and we can get the actual process of placing them started.

Around 8 o’clock the new volunteers arrive. The first week we had two, last week we had eight, and this week we have five, so the numbers fluctuate from week to week. Once everyone has arrived I take them outside and start the “orientation.” This entails me covering topics of safety in the town, host family etiquette, cultural norms, food culture, how to get a cell phone, where to get internet, what to

wear, what you can and can’t eat and drink, how to stay and travel safe, basically how to live in Costa Rica. After I cover more than you ever need to know about this place I take them all out on a tour of the town. I show them where everything important is (the bank, the grocery store, the post office, restaurants, the market, etc.), and then we end at the bus station. We end here because after the tour I have to take everyone to his or her project sites! This is a long process when there are more than a few new volunteers. For example today I had to show a volunteer (and by show I mean take her) to the coffee farm that she will be working at. We took the 9 o’clock bus and got there around 9:30, and didn’t return until noon because there was no earlier bus to return to town! But others usually take around a half an hour to an hour max. At sites I need to give the donation money to the coordinator and get the receipt for our records. I make sure that the volunteer knows what time to get there and act as translator for any questions the volunteer has for the coordinator.

After I make sure everyone has gotten to their sites, the donation money is delivered, and everyone knows where they need to be and at what time I head home for lunch and then back to Su Espacio to

Making Fajitas in the Hostel

pick up the host family money. Then I make the rounds around town delivering all the money to all the host moms (which includes filling them in on what is happening with Tina’s husband, how I am liking Atenas, where I am going to travel to etc. etc.), and when I finally finish with the rounds I head back to the community center (maybe around 3ish). I then man the desk, which includes organizing volunteer schedules, updating the blog/website/Facebook, answering questions for people coming in, taking payments and making receipts for all of the different classes we offer, and am always answering the phone (much to my dismay). Depending on the day I might teach an English class as well.

Around 5 it starts to wind down; we usually have our last English class ending and the volunteers pile into the center for their Spanish class. I take this time to organize behind he desk, make a list for the next day, and to check my email and perhaps write a letter home or start a blog post. Around 6 I usually complete all of this and can take a breath to collect my thoughts and then wait for Spanish class to conclude before I lock up and head home at 7. 

The rest of the week looks very similar except with less carting around volunteers and more work in the center, but you get the gist of it. It is hard work, especially because I am doing most of what Tina and her husband do together but I am on my own, but I love every minute of it and I don’t think I have learned so much in so little time ever before. It is only the beginning of week three and I can only imagine what the rest of the summer will look like!

Also, I just have to note that my little nine year old host sister is sitting at the table next to me eating a midnight snack of tortilla chips slathered (and I do not use that word lightly) with mayonnaise and ketchup. She just informed me that it is even better with tuna on it. I have to say, there is never a dull moment. Welcome to my life.

She has moved on now to wrapping a towel around her head and feeling her way around the house

Street Puppy Love, Look at that Smile!

instead of seeing. And I repeat, never a dull moment. I’ll give her credit, she is pro at entertaining herself!

So as for this past weekend there is really not that much to share besides I had an awesome time in Montezuma because literally all I did was relax. Straight up switched between sitting on the beach in the sun and laying in a hammock in the shade. I did hike to a waterfall, which was awesome. I also did almost put my hand right on top of a scorpion, so there’s that. But I didn’t and everything is peachy keen. I went with another volunteer Matt who is just absolutely hilarious! He was an awesome travel buddy; we took the ferry over and had a couple pretty long bus rides, including the one on the way back where we didn’t even get a seat! (Which is fine, I made a new friend, Kate, and taught her the card game that Will taught me last weekend so that was fun). We played that game a lot this weekend, on the beach, in the hostel, everywhere. We also made fajitas on Saturday night and they were LEGIT.

We did miss the bus on the way there. Once we got to San Jose the first cab driver we took had no idea where to drop us off and so we ended up at the bus station that sends busses to the Caribbean side only. So we took another cab to the correct bus station (the one I though we had to go to, so nice to know that I do remember how to get around that place), but we missed the bus by fifteen minutes. We had to pay another cab driver five times as much as we should have for him to race to meet the bus at one of its stops so we could continue onto Punterenas, then to the Ferry, then another hour and a half bus ride where we transferred one more time and then finally made it to Montezuma. We met up with Annick, a girl I had met last weekend in Manuel Antonio and we also ran into Sam, the awesome guy we met in Manuel Antonio who reminded me of my friend Mike from home, at the bus stop on our way to Montezuma! It was a lot of hanging out and it was awesome! On Sunday I sunbathed for a bit and then spent some quality time in the hammock. I also spent a fair amount of time with the beach dogs too, which was great! They were all so friendly and loved to be pet and they all had such awesome personalities! I think I might start a #DogsOfCostaRica Insta like Hannah’s #CatsOfOrono and upload pics of all the dogs I come across on my travels; I think that might be a fun idea. I also did not make it out unscathed, that makes two weekends for two for getting injured. I was almost to the other side of the river hopping from slippery rock to slippery rock coming back from the waterfall and I was maybe a foot away from stepping onto the back when I lost my footing and fell right into the water, slamming

Making New Friends on the Bus Floor! 

my right knee onto the rocks below the surface. It only bled a little but MAN did that hurt, and still does. The damage is minimal, though, no broken bones and no sprains. I’ll take it. Going to try to break the cycle next weekend, but we will see. Just another day in the life of an adventurer I suppose.

Something that is worth sharing, though, is on our way home we finally made it back to San Jose around 9 o’clock and we asked this taxi driver for a ride to the next terminal and he said a fair price so we headed towards the line of red taxis. As we walked closer we saw this unmarked van standing in the midst of the red government run taxis and we just looked at each other, stopped next to the van (the cab driver was opening the door for us to get in) and Matt goes “ummmmmm yeahhhh, so I think we are going to go take a red taxi instead,” looks at me, I nod, and we bolted. Classic San Jose. We made it just fine though and I was barely in the house for five minutes before I was fast asleep!

It was a wonderfully uneventful weekend and that’s exactly what I was looking for. It was awesome to get to know Matt better because we will be working together for eight more weeks, it makes actually working way better when you are friends with the people there! When it got stressful today we could just laugh about the van or about something else that happened. What a time.

Back to the grind for a few more days then Danielle arrives on Thursday and we head out to La Fortuna on Friday morning! The adventure continues!

Alright, time to work on a Narnia puzzle with the little sis. We have to spend at least, I would say, a solid three to four hours together every evening doing various activities. We do anything from watching the Disney channel, to playing cards (she kicks my ass at War), to playing the Wii (she rocks at them all, I am not too bad at ping pong, but she usually wins), to looking at photos of each other’s family, to her sitting at the table with me while I write (she is doing that now while starting the puzzle), to just running around like a loony, which is always entertaining. She is so spunky whenever she wind a hand, or gets a point, or fits a piece of the puzzle together she shouts something along the line of “SOY LA MEJOR” or runs throughout the house shouting about how she is the best. It. Is. Hilarious! She is a peach and I adore her, so off to puzzle land I go.

Today, my life is just Shelby. 

Stand-In Director

The plants are larger than life here! 

What an exciting week and a half it’s been! The director’s husband of the organization I am interning for has been very ill and went into exploratory surgery on Friday in an attempt to correct an old surgery that was causing complications. Because of this, the director has been absent since then. She comes in the morning to answer a few emails and to teach a dance class and then leaves me in charge. Being thrown into the mix on my second day (last Tuesday), has been ad adventure to say the least. In no way was I prepared for the responsibility that came with being the director, but I think it has been going well and I am finally getting the hang of it. My Spanish is coming back with much more fluency which is great because I am the only one answering the phone and giving people information about the classes offered, prices, times, etc. This week I am on my own again, her husband is still sick and also her

Lazy Saturday Afternoon

family is visiting from the states and so she will be out for most of the week.

Yesterday was the most hectic day by far. We had eight new volunteers come and every single one needed an orientation, a tour of the town, and then they needed to be shown how to get to their projects (as in I had to take each one of them to every corner of the town and beyond via bus, taxi, and foot), and on top of all that I also had to deliver donation money to five organizations as well as three host families. It was crazy! And not to mention it is in the high eighties and so humid you could almost see the droplets hanging in the air! It has been a fantastic experience so far; I do have to say I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I wanted to come to see if I had what it takes and wanted to run my own organization, and I am absolutely loving every minute of it!  Tina (the director) is gone again for most of today so I am finishing up delivering money to projects and making sure the phone gets answered, the peace is kept at Su Espacio, and all the volunteers are happy and at their projects.

View from Our Hike

I have gotten more out of this internship in the short week and two days that I’ve been here than I though I would in three months. I can only imagine what it has to bring for the rest of the summer! I am looking forward to my Spanish improving even more and becoming more comfortable finding the projects and introducing volunteers. Practice makes perfect and what better way to learn than to just be thrown into the mix! We shall see what this week brings!

So Manuel Antonio was interesting. I had an absolute blast and I can’t wait to go back again and again. The only downside was this creeper would NOT leave me the hell alone! I introduced myself to be nice and then he followed me around like an annoying little puppy for the rest of the evening until I caught a taxi while he wasn’t looking and went back to my hostel. Besides that, though, we spent a ton of time at the beach, I signed up for surfing lessons but then while learning how to break dance on the beach I broke one of my toes and then while playing beach volleyball I burst a blood vessel in my wrist, which swelled up like an egg, and not my whole wrist and most of my hand is black and blue. So surfing is going to have to wait until I go back, hopefully in early July! We got to explore the beach, which I have been to twice before so it

Manuel Antonio Sunset

was wonderful to go back and have the familiar sights. My friend Alex, who was a volunteer at Su Espacio for a week and is not teaching English at an elementary school, had just spent three weeks in Quepos, which is the town that is right beside Manuel Antonio, so she was so familiar with the area! We got to go meet her host family (who had the cutest puppies on the entire planet), and then headed to the beach for most of the weekend. We went out in Quepos, but that’s when that creeper was following me so I didn’t stay out long and just headed back with my friend Will to play cards with a kid named Sam that we had met (who is an EXACT replica of my friend Mike Knowles, WEIRD!).  Will and I went to the park on Sunday morning and then spent the day at the beach that the park trail spits out of. We got to see a bunch of really cool spiders, bats, a sloth, capuchin monkeys, raccoons, spider monkeys, and we heard the howler monkeys in the distance. It was a lovely walk and the nap on the beach was beyond wonderful! I seriously can’t wait to return in a few weeks!

I am thoroughly enjoying my time here, although I can hardly wait until Muna and Tori get here; Muna is coming in three short weeks and Tori in four and a half! I love my new friends and family but it is

Intern and Volunteers Weekend at Manuel Antonio!

just not the same. I am super excited to share the country with them and to continue the adventure. I can only imagine the shenanigans that will follow. Anyways, this upcoming weekend I am trying to go to Montezuma, which is another beach town, in a frivolous attempt to get rid of this pasty white completion. Also because I love the ocean and I actually haven’t been there before so that should be an adventure. I met a few people in Manuel Antonio who are headed there this weekend so hopefully I can meet up with them there! That’s the plan anyways.

Plant that plays dead when you touch it! 

Alright, well back to work I go, lots to do as I am still the only one here, but I am sure the rest of this week and this weekend will prove to be very eventful!

¡Hasta luego!

Today, my life is just Shelby.