Saturday, November 6, 2010

Went on a site visit to Guancaste last weekend. It was enlightening to see how different life is in more rural areas. It was good to talk to a current volunteer and get an impression of the challenges and opportunities that I may have to face in the future. I think what struck me the most was how people can adapt to technology but keep other elements, for example everyone seemed to have a TV but they still cooked on wood fires. It was also important to have something to compare life in my training communities to. Here everyone commutes to San Jose to work while the people in the town in Guanacaste still rely on fields and pastures to make a living and have a different set of economic and social issues. Guanacaste is beautiful too, a lot hotter though. I also got my first exposure to how much Costa Ricans love soccer. I heard it a million times but I didn't really believe it until my 2 hour car ride to another town, where they played and watched soccer for 6 hours, stopping only when it was too dark to see the ball.
The trip was exciting and informative. I thought that being in the campo and meeting new people would be my "welcome to costa rica," turns out my real "welcome costa rica" would be the trip back to my training community. A 6 hour return trip turned to 14 when the river flooded onto the road and the only bus leaving the site I visited decided that it wasn't up to crossing that day. After wading through the thigh high water, waiting for an hour for a bus to Santa Cruz, and waiting an another hour to get on the bus to San Jose I thought that I would at least be home in time for dinner. Only to be disappointed when a semi broke down at the entrance of bridge forcing the bus to find another way around, a detour that added 2 hours to the trip. The battery in my Ipod ran out shortly after. I got home late and tired, but not dejected or disillusioned instead proud that my spanish didn't fail me when I needed it and prouder still that when push came to shove I rolled with the punches and made it back.
I'm writing this on the 4th, exactly a month after I got on a plane to Washington and started this 2+ year adventure. I found that I've really settled into life here. Heavy rains have caused all sorts of problems in Costa Rica, the least of which are that Peace Corp training classes have been canceled for the rest of the week. While school children nationwide are probably rejoicing I found myself disappointed. I was rather looking forward to the classes, so that I could work on my Spanish, see the other volunteers, and learn more about the country. I don't think 2 years will ever stop seeming like a long time but with each day I feel more prepared, more excited, and more confident that I will be a good PCV.

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