16 Days in Nicaragua: My life as a traveller, a fugitive, and an honorary Nicaraguan

Nicaragua…god what a country! This whopper of a yarn of a tale of a legend all began with a single taxi ride.  Sure, it all started out innocently enough. Our protagonists awoke with the dimly lit crease of light coming through the window in their budget hostel dorm room.  They sauntered with bravado and enthusiasm onto the streets of San Jose, armed with nothing more than stuffed camping backpacks (known on the streets as “Tourist Beacons”), brooding confidence, a Lonely Planet guide, and unending hope.  Little did they know that ahead of them lay a path of adventure, intrigue, unsolved enigmatic mysterious quagmires, run on sentences, and the heaven-sent marriage of 1 dollar beers and 6 dollar a night hostels that would change their lives, if not forever, then at least for like a week or two. 

CHAPTER 1: Travellers

Country of origin: Costa Rica. Primary Destination: TransNica Bus Stop, San Jose. Secondary Destination: Nicaragua.  Suspects:  Caucasian American, considered unarmed and dangerously white.  Given Names: Eric “look at my biceps” Dunford and Mark “my words” Sobel.  Known aliases: DunnyBear and BearJew; White Lightning; The Lesson Planners; El Toro Empanada and The Grandma Whisperer. Ages: 23.  Sex: not until they learn how to salsa dancebetter.  Blog Entry Preference: needlessly long and noir.

It was approxametely 7 pm, E.S.T, when the duo finally crossed the border.  To lesser men, a 9 hour busride into uncharted terrain could prove terrifying if not more likely, fatal, but after months of unexpected changes in schedules, living on Tico Time, and having nothing go quite as planned, our lads simply laughed like barbaric Viking warriors in the face of such a paltry challenge.  But when they really had to pee it kind of sucked.  Anyway, arrived they did in the fine colonial shire of Granada, Nicaragua.  Accustomed only to Costa Rica, a country whose gems lay 2% in the cities and 98% in the nature far from the masses, our gents were quite taken by such a beautiful and charmed Central American metropolis.  Thus, the journey began with a pleasant surprise.  The oldest city in Central America, Granada was but a collage of tree lined squares, externally derelict but internally majestic cathedrals, and colorfully changing architecture.  However, juxtaposing all of this was the striking contrapasso of barefoot children running around the streets and returning to their houses that looked equally decrepit on the inside and out.  They soon realized the general picture one can paint of Nicaragua: in the background a soaring volcano surrounded by greenery.  In the foreground a barely clothed child either begging for money or playing in a dirty puddle.  Though the duo would surely return to the fine city of Granada later in their quest, for now further adventures lay ahead that needed immediate tending to.  First and foremost was the mystical Isla de Ometepe, where they spent their 4^th of the month of Julius.  Deep within the heart of this fine country, surrounded on all sides by the massive Lago Nicaragua is this magical island made up of two perfectly shaped volcanoes connected by a narrow isthmus.  Upon their arrival, the young sirs turned to each other and agreed instantly regarding the beauty and grandiosity of themysterious land with a hearty, “holy shit, dude!”  It was on this island that they met their first compatriots; troubadours of sorts you might say.  Following a traditional Nicaraguan feast of pizza and beer, our young squires marched through the twilight to a lovely hostel by the welcoming name of Indio Viejo (the Old Indian).  Of all the fellow wanderers they befriended, from the two German girls whose bodies only just compensated for their personalities to the fearless but awesome leader of a group of eighteen 17 year old American girls, the most remembered by the judge of time will sure be the two Brits (Nigel and Joe…and I can’t believe we actually ran into a British dude named Nigel either) and he who is simply dubbed “Predator Hair”.  Predator hair, whose real name is neither remembered nor relevant, was the well-aged proprietor of the Indio Viejo, presumably the Indio Viejo himself.  He was a man defined by the time he lacked; for shoes since 1981; to show us a cheaper room because he didn’t want to climb the stairs; and to comb his hair out of the single most transcendent dreadlock I dare say has ever blessed a person’s scalp.  Oh yes, for he nay had dreadlocks, but merely a single 7 inch wide dread lock falling just above his arse.  As legend has it, every three hundred years on the seventh day of the seventh month when the moon is at its highest, the hair comes to life and feeds upon the hair of lesser beings.  Hitherto, the young wanderers imbibed ale and rum with the other members of the house of the Indian late into the wee hours as Predator Hair simply watched and read in peace.  The next day, our heroes arose to a day where the sun shines as though it is shining for the first time…as though they are the first men ever to see it.  With the two British fellows in tow, the foursome set about to circle the islands on mighty two wheeled steeds (i.e. mopeds).  And ye, they explorethneareth and fareth, to the far shores to swim in the gloomy waters of Lago Nicaragua and enjoy the rare sunshine and skies of crystalline blue.  Oh the four men rode mightily and swiftly they did; their honored only tarnished by several groups of 12 year old school girls that laughed at them because they were riding girly motorcycles.  Indeed it was a traditional American 4^th of July; a day filled with polluting the air and trying to get to our destination faster than the British. With warm goodbyes they left the island when the sun rose in the morrow and aboard they went to a great water vessel that a man drove lying down steering with his feet.  With this, they were departed from the great island (and consequently from the fine British gents and Predator Hair as well) even faster than my writing style in this story has switched from film noir to an odyssey of yesteryear.

Upon leaving the great isle our fellows continued northerly, past the wide plains and fuming volcanoes of the South West to arrive in the great city of Leon and it is here my  friends, where are protagonists luck suddenly took an unexpected turn. Oh shit.

CHAPTER 2: Fugitives

                Now days into their journey with miles to go and further memories to make, Dunnybear and BearJew found themselves at the heart of Nicaragua; the city of Leon.  Known far and wide as the country’s epicenter of artistry and revolution, this city opened its arms to the men offering them 1 dollar dinners made for kings by night and streets lined with merchants by day.  After a relaxed first evening of billiards and glog with the local riff raff, they retired early with hopes of a full day to come…if only they knew how full it would be.  After hours of meandering through rows of merchants, getting lost in the maze of seemingly endless cathedrals, and buying Spanish versions of Kung Fu Panda for their students, the brave warriors finally set their sights on the main attraction: the Basilica de la Asuncion which of course in English translates to “Run Away Eric and Mark”…sadly the lads Spanish was lacking in fluency and foolishly they believed it to be the Basilica of the Asuncion…ha! FOOLS! After striking the palm of the gatekeeper with 2 dollars of silver, they entered to climb the stairs to the roof for a view of the city below and the country side in the distance.  And ah what a view it was!  Laughs were had and joy was flowing like a river.  But then, alas! Nay it cannot be!  As the fellows were taking pictures, down below in the town square approached a man of uniform, gesturing  “Get down gringo…I don’t wanna have to handcuff your ass!”. And oh get down they did and left to explore other regions of the roof and their asses remained uncuffed…but not for long.  Rising like a phoenix up the stairs a gentleman and lady of uniform approached the confused men and delivered the most dastardly news a man can here “follow me”.  Fearing the possible retribution of his club and firearm, the boys obeyed silently but with faces of confusion and increasing fear.  Minutes later they arrived…in Nicaraguan jail.  Milliseconds turned to seconds and seconds turned to minutes and minutes turned to about an hour…but that’s about it.  The boys awaited in their prison cell, passing time taking photos and videos of their current misfortune for the face of the book, singing sad dirges about their folly, and longingly watching the birds outside fly free from the shackles of imprisonment.  An hour or so past and the verdict came to the young sirs in the form of a man in a track suit who was apparently in the department of intelligence.  And it was now my readers that these boys learned a sobering and valuable lesson about their Spanish abilities; you don’t really know a language until you’re in a prison that only has 3 walls and on the open side a dude with a shotgun is just standing around watching you and you can understand what a cop is yelling at you about.  It had seemed that a misunderstanding of great proportion took place for the boys were simply innocently taking pictures, unawares that they were in a prohibited part of the roof.  After several bewildering exchanges with the man of the law, the boys heard the only word they needed to here “vayase!” (leave!).  In a daze and caught off guard by their sudden liberation, the boys hesitantly walked from their cell, unsure ultimately if they were actually being freed or if they were accidentally escaping from jail, for other than “vayase”, they had heard the man utter something about a supermarket, a bathroom, his country versus America, something about clothes, and something about little boys.  It was then, minutes later as the boys were struggling to comprehend their predicament that a fearful thought shot into their heads with the fury of 1000 burning suns, “Did they want us to come back??? I don’t know much about prison but I don’t think they usually tell you to go to a supermarket to buy food and go home and get your teddybear to make the stay more comfortable, but…maybe??”  With this mutual doubt and the paranoia that is only brought upon by unsure freedom, the boys made the natural choice to flee the great city of Leon and live as potential fugitives on the beach for a few days.  They arrived to their sandy paradise past dusk and toasted with a congratulatory ale to celebrate their freedom(though at the time sipped fearfully as they hoped dearly that it was not a premature celebration) and watched a lightning storm over the ocean that only Zeus himself could have conjured…ultimately the boys apprehension was undue as, of course, they were indeed set free

CHAPTER 3: Being an Honorary Nicaraguan.

                After a short respite from their odyssey to enjoy the Pacific sun, the dynamic duo continued even further into the depths of Nicaragua to the very rarelytouristed, mysterious Caribbean Coast.  However, it is here where ½ of this team of 2 separated and retreated back to his homeland of Costa Rica due to the arrival of his American parents.  So onward young Mark of La Esperanza went, alone and both exhilarated and scared to be travelling without his companion.  He explored this magical land in a place called Pearl Lagoon and realized that unlike the rest of Nicaragua, on this coast the language of choice was English creole and the years of sun had tinted the skin of the natives not the soft brown of the other Nicaraguans, but rather a rich and deep Caribbean black.  Though he travelled alone, he was not alone for long.  Only briefly after his isolated ventures ensued did he come upon two ladies of the American persuasion.  Both coming from Latino backgrounds they hailed from the Calif of Ornia, each a student enjoying a summer before entering undergraduate studies.  And oh the adventures the new trio had!  Going to lunch.Talking for hours on rocking chairs.Going to dinner.Drinking rum together.  Actually that was about it…so on the morrow he bid farewell to the lovely maidens and again ventured alone…but this time he was alone for even less time.  During a stroll in the afternoon sun on the one road that led through the vast savannah, he stumbled upon a gaggle of village women standing waist deep in the river washing their clothes.  Around him naked children smiled and laughed as they played in the water.  He smiled at this most foreign way of life and watched the goings on for but a short while and then continued merrily on his way…but only for about 50 feet before he was beckoned.  Behind him a booming voice called, “hey brodah why you do walk alone we make walk togederman!”.  And if he had a nickel for every time he was walking in a savannah and a black guy screamed that to him he thought to himself…and abandoning his travelling instincts that are guided by American cynicism, he turned on his heel and back he went to join this jovial and friendly fellow for a lovely stroll.  This stroll with this random fellow, Sir Rudolph, ended up leading to quite an unexpected gift indeed.  Further abandoning his instincts, our solo protagonist chose to trust his new friend and accepted an invitation into his domicile for an afternoon meal and good conversation in his village by the name of Raiti-Pura (in Miskito that means “above the grave”).  The food and conversation eventually bled into the night and a smorgasbord of insanely fresh fish, coconut bread, cassava, breadfruit, and coconut milk ensued like that which he had never dared dream.  The next day, at the request of his new Nicaraguan family, young Sobel bid ado to his hostel and again traversed the single savannah road with all his belongings to stay with his new friends.  He went with an open mind, but still on his guard and what followed can only be described as generosity beyond generosity.  He slept like a prince in a private bedroom and ate like a emperor for 2 ½ days with his new family.  Though they had barely a coin to spare, one lightbulb in the house, and an outhouse with no running water, they refused any payment other than his company and his friendship.  He learned that they were of the Miskito people, an indigenous tribe that is the second largest in all of Latin America, second to the Mayans.  He learned their ways and how to say such fantastical things as “How are you?”, “Are we going fishing tomorrow?”, and “Shall we drink alcohol now?” in their beautiful Miskito tongue.  He went crab fishing in a dugout canoe and bathed in the lagoon.  He sat on a dock with an elder and sipped rum from the bottle as he was regaled with the people’s history.  After 3 days of not opening his wallet or his guidebook, he, with a reluctant sigh and a pout finally left their house to return to hisTico homeland, but only after promising them that he would return and be their white gringo honorary black Caribbean son and brother again.  Behold, a mere 22 hours later riding upon the finest school busses, 8 of which he had no seat for, he finally saw the church steeple of La Esperanza on the horizon, and knew, with a smile and a sense of surrealism, that he was home.  And so my readers, this story ends not with a prison cell or an ill-fated call to the American embassy, but rather with a belly full of Caribbean delicacy, warm memories of the extraordinary generosity that can be found from impoverished strangers, and the general satisfaction of a wonderful trip.  What a country indeed!

Teaching is sort of like...

…eating a jawbreaker.  Wait wait, hear me out.  You start out full of hope and excitement, looking forward to the long journey ahead, but then after hours and hours of work it seems like you have made zero progress.  It started out so sweet and new and full of color, but now at times it just seems bland and monotonous.  But then, wait!  Could it be that you have finally broken through??? Nope, false alarm. Just another unforeseen layer to work on.  And also, much like when you are bored with a jawbreaker, when you get fed up with a student you put it in a plastic bag and shove it in the refrigerator. Right???  Well, today was one of those days (with my kids not with jawbreakers…I don’t think they sell jawbreakers in Costa Rica unless they are plantain flavored), where my kids had the miraculous ability that only kids seemto have of taking me on an emotional rollercoaster ride from average, down to depressed, and up to euphoric all in about 12 minutes.

                Physically, my classroom has a lot of strange juxtapositions.  The school itself is 66 years old and it doesn’t look like much has changed exteriorly since it was constructed.  From the outside, my classroom looks like a tiny little green house…possibly even a large playhouse you would expect to find in a backyard.   I think the outside is misleading though, as the inside is really quaint…except for the 17 computers lining the walls.  I don’t have enough desks some days for my students and we are definitely not even close to breaking free from the clutches of the blackboard era and storming into the 21^st centuries with whiteboards, but from an incredible donation, we have tons of computers with internet  AND built in English learning programs.  At first I felt almost overwhelmed by the technology and resources available to me to teach.  For a fleeting moment I even felt a little less useful and borderline pointless in the school since they had English learning programs on the computers to use, but I convinced myself that a real person is more useful…gosh I hope its true!  Anyway, the deal I set up with the kids is that if they are good during the week, we can use the computers on Friday, which naturally led to the students making the sad but true point that we almost NEVER have school Friday, so I told them whatever day of the week happens to be the last day of the week (which is unfortunately more often than not, Wednesday), we will use the computers.  Now, I thought this was pretty fair!  And the kids seemed to really like it and accept it...for a bit.  After all, if you give a 1^st grader a cookie, he’s gonna want a glass of milk.  So today all of my 1^st and 2^nd graders literally through a tantrum in the first 5 minutes of class because they wanted to use the computers and I told them that a) it’s only Tuesday and we never use them on Tuesday and b) we need to practice because they know they have a test on Thursday.  Nothing.  They were not having it.  And I was really surprised because I absolutely love these kids and honestly, most of the time they are twice as mature and patient as the 3^rd and 4^th graders who raise my blood pressure every class.  So after many minutes of trying to explain why we weren’t going to use the comps todayand them just not understanding or accepting, I eventually teacher stared all of them and did the whole waiting in silence with a serious “I’m not mad, just disappointed” face until they all stopped talking.  As a tiny backtrack I start every class by asking them “how are you” and all of my students were sad because we weren’t using computers.  Okay, and we’re back to me teacher staring and them listening.  So two of my awesome 2^nd graders, Brandon and Lauren (such tico names right? Though they are pronounced “Brahn-done” and “Lah-oo-ren”) kept telling me they were happy now, I think because they felt guilty, and I told them all that I was sad because they weren’t listening and because there was no respect in the classroom today.  So Lauren and Brandon starting rallying the other kids by asking them, “How are you?” and everyone would say “I’m happy” and then they all started chanting it.  Lauren then said what I think is the cutest thing I have ever heard: pero teacher, siustedestafeliz, estoyfeliz.  Pero, cuandoustedestatriste, estoytristetambien (but teacher, if you are happy, I am happy.  But when you are sad, I am sad too).  So now I have a classroom of kids looking at me like guilty little puppies and I am thinking to myself “What the hell happened? Are these the same kids that were just yelling and calling me mean 2 minutes before”.  And before I could even go to Lauren and profess my undying admiration for her, ALL of my students jumped out of their chairs and literally tackled me to the ground in a group hug and wouldn’t get off of me until I told them I felt happier.  I quite literally could not stay mad at them.  Maybe the love and respect of a 6 year old is superficial and fickle because all I really need to do is high five them for them to think I’m Jesus, but this was the first time any of my students really showed outward care for me.  Since I have been here, I have been so busy trying to care for all of my students and even though it has been hard at times, I have perfected over the years  the skill of convincing the outside world I am totally fine when inside I am exploding (a skill I am trying to get rid of because its ultimately dishonest and unhealthy).  There have definitely been times here when I have felt alone and like there is nobody I could really go to who will understand my troubles.  I realized that this time in class was really the first time I had just let down my guard and let myself show my students how I was actually feeling instead of forcing a smile and just continuing with class and it was overwhelming to realize that the care is reciprocal.  Now, maybe they just felt guilty because they knew my sadness stemmed from being mad at them, but I would like to think they just genuinely want to see teacher happy.  Again, maybe the emotions of kids are too fickle to put a lot of stock in, but its classes like that that make this often thankless job completely worth doing.

"Exercising" in La Esperanza

            So in the months in between graduating from U of R and coming to Costa Rica, I was in by far the best shape of my life.  I started running, trained for a half marathon, and for the first time in my life was really starting to embrace a daily active and healthy lifestyle…I credit most of this to my temporary move to San Diego to live with Rina for 4 months prior to leaving the States.  I think when one moves to southern California, a once dormant gene that was simply waiting in a state of cryostasis maintained by several consecutive Northeast Winters is awakened.  I call this gene the Crunchy Granola Gene (or CGG as it will be called in scientific journals years from now) , whereas upon its infusion into the once hermit-like East Coasters bloodstream,  waking up at 5 am to go for a 7 mile run seems like a fantastic idea and delicious Philly Cheesesteaks are replaced with foods with the word “Power” in the name (Powerade, Powerbar, Powershakes, Powerwaffles, Powercheeseburgers, Powerbeersetc…).  So, even upon my departure from California, remnants of CGG were still pulsating in my veins, and producedlike a little voice in my head saying things like “Oh man look at that steep mountain…I bet I should climb it barefoot!” and “Oh look mud!  I bet I should walk in that barefoot!” and “Oh look my shoes!...Fuck you shoes!”.  The moral of the story is that since being in La Esperanza, I have been trying to combat the 6 meals and 4-5 cups of coffee I drink everyday by going on runs, which is usually met with strange looks from the locals as I gallop awkwardly up the coffee hills in the rain.  Today however, I had an especially Tico style run that I want to share.  I usually go on the same 3-4 mile round trip run from my house to the edge of town where the dirt road meets the paved road and back.  Even though it’s a short run, its so hilly that I am usually pretty spent when I get back.  Since I haven’t gone on a run or really moved more than 1 mph since Rina and I climbed Cerro Chirripo 2 weeks ago (stories of her visit here to come in the next post!!), I decided to get back into the habit and go for a run today to get my butt back in shape.  Since there was no school today (which is not at all rare these days:-/), I woke up around 8 and off I went!  I made it abouutttt 2 km until I made the fatal mistake of saying hi as I passed by my host mom’s cousin’s house (this is only a fatal mistake in terms of the continuity of a run, but always great when in the mood for some good conversation and a cafecito).  This naturally led to a tour of her beautiful house, an introduction to her 2 cows, 24 chickens, 6 huge pigs, and 28 weeee little 4 day old piglets.  This was followed by her showing me baby pictures of all her kids and then giving me coffeand  5 of her homemade sweet breads (she makes breads and sells them to the local towns as her business).  After about 2 hours visiting, off I went again!...for about 1 km.  Then I, truly not learning from my previous mistake, said hello to all the folks (5 of them) working at the trapiche as I past (the trapiche is the little sugar cane mill in town) which of course led to a 30 minute stay while eating hot sugar cane off a piece of wood and drinking aguadulce, which is a sweet hot drink made from the cane.  Finally, with a very full stomach, I ran the remaining 2km home or so.  So to sum up….3 1/2 hour run. 3 miles covered. Breakfast, a snack and desert.  This about sums up my level of activity here!  I think it is these type of unexpected morning that I will really miss when I go back in the states.  I have become SO accustomed to the hospitality, the friendliness, and the nosiness of people here that I don’t notice it at all anymore until I really and think about it.  I literally cannot walk anywhere in town without everyone I pass asking me where I am going and why, even if I am only walking to the school, which is about 60 feet from my house.  I think when I go back to the states, I will be very confused when nobody stops me as I walk around the streets of Philly just to ask me why I am there, where I am going, and if I have a novia (girlfriend).  I have also become used to running into a familiar face in the street meaning at the very least a halt in forward momentum to have a short conversation and running past a familiar house unexpectedly guarantees a tour, coffee, and more often than not, a full meal.  So, when I come home 100 pounds heavier but tell you that I ran every day, now you will understand the mystery.  Puravida.

1000 Apologies for the 2 Month Hiatus, But I'm Here Now To Share With You Stories of Latest!

Oh what’s up June!  Where the hell did you come from??  I was just hanging out with January a few days ago it seems and now you show up all unannounced…sneaking up from out of nowhere and what not! You should be ashamed, June…ashamed!  Speaking of shame…this posts idiomabroma:

My Tico friend asked me the other day what my last name is.  I told him and he immediately went wide eyed and starting laughing hysterically.  Okay, fine buddy, I guess “Sobel” is pretty gringo sounding but I didn’t realize I made such a hilarious joke.  After he finally got his composure, he asked me to say it again.  Apparently, I really need to work on my annunciation in this country.  Sobel = the proud and dignified surname of my family crest and ancestry.  Sobo =” I masturbate”.  PERFECT!  Now when people ask me my last name, I pronounce each syllable with such over-the-top distinction for clarity that people are probably thinking I am having a stroke, but better they think I am having one “stroke” than several…if you know what I mean.

So I have been in La Esperanza for 4 months and Costa Rica in general for 5…insanity.  I really apologize for the 2 month lag in blogging…every time recently that I have sat down to write, I became overwhelmed with how much time has passed and all of the things that have happened and wouldn’t know how to start, so I would put it off, which just perpetuated my problem as more time passed.  I also have to admit, part of the reason that I haven’t been blogging as much recently is that I think I have been in somewhat of an existential dilemma regarding the microcosmic experience that is living in a new country for one year.  I think sometime in May, I hit the inevitable point where the novelty of almost all things had started to wear off.  At first, simply the mere act of speaking Spanish, even if only to disgrace my last name and ask my 12 year olds when the twins were due, was enough to make my day.  However, as the weeks past and turned into months, the uneven ratio of Awesome Spanish Conversation: Moments I Stared in Silence asPeople Around Me Discussed Things I Couldn’t Understand and I Would Occasionally Here My Name Mentioned Followed By Laughter (especially when my host mom talks because I can still sadly, barely understand anything she says), really started to get to me.  However, I think I am starting to feel more on the upswing in terms of attitude and ability regarding my Spanish now and the frustration has more just become a change in mindset.  I have started to learn the invaluable art of being content merely listening to and watching my environment without the constant feeling that I need to be outwardly engaging in it all the time.  Thus, the part of me that admittedly loves talking and never shuts the hell up often finds itself…shutting the hell up.  So, in this new spirit and also for the sake of continued blog entries, instead of a long and drawn out summary of vaguely descriptive memories and no-longer-relevant issues/mentalities of the past 2 months, I will sum it all up with this It’s The End of the World As We Know It/We Didn’t Start The Fire style rhyme scheme to bring everything up to the present.

Brother’s wedding, table setting, much romancing, Ticodancing, who came here? Former volunteer! Drinking lots of beer.

April starts, sun departs, town is quiet, rice/beans diet, Easter celebration, Panama vacation, better sanitation but tourism invasion, returning home=accidental illegal immigration, hop back on bus, passport stamps a must, make it back, sleep all week we lacked, but fun times had by all (two of us)!

Here comes May? What the hay?! It seems I got here yesterday!WorldTeachmidservice in San Jose, volunteers reunite yay!, shared stories we’ve had along the way, and then from the great U. S of A a friend flew down here just to play, his name Dan Israel a chap from school, “porque no?” was our only rule! A weekend spent with French girls by the beach, by Monday La Esperanza I’d reached, thenGave a test, some tried their best, some others less, Some kids need a kick in the butt, and some days I feel  quite in a rutt, Goddamnit kid I know you think you’re soooo cool and fine, but ultimately listen buddy…you’re 9…on the other hand I feel so lucky, with my 1^st graders cuter than a baby ducky, and some older ones making me notes and cards, protecting me like miniature bodyguards, some love to learn, some LOVE to annoy, some are so sincere and others just coy, some days I feel great, and others like sighing, okay sighing sounds manlier but truthfully..it’s closer to crying, so for those who say those who can’t do choose to teach, come over here so I can kick you hard in the ass (that doesn’t rhyme, it just needs to be said)…sooooo then I found a local waterfall, the hikes a pain but worth it all, built a ladder and set up my hammock, the jungle is my panoramic, bought a machete, though I’m probably not ready, destroyed the forest, a choice the poorest, found out messing with the wrong tree, leads to the WORST case of poison ivy, went to the Doc to fix my ills, to me he gave a lot of pills, antibiotics and benadryls, and two shots in my tush added to my bills

And now I lay in my warm cama on a cold “winter” night darker than Obama, I cannot sleep, not a wink or a peep, maybe take some benadryl??? Well, after all I have a heep!  Though it probably won’t work, I’m too excitied for manana, for in the afternoon comes my hermana!  It’s been too long since I have seen’a, but by 3pm tomorrow I’ll be with Rina!  For 10 days she will grace my presence, with her big bright smile and effervescence, though I’m excited as can be, I think my students are more excited than me, We’ve lots of plans and adventures to come, and I promise I won’t be a lazy bum, so more blogs coming soon, this time I swear, unless we’re eaten by a bear, but since no bear’s dwell in this land, I believe a new entry is shortly at hand, so goodnight for now till the next idiomabroma, time to drift off into an 8 hour coma.

Okay, admittedly it definitely got a little more “Twas the Night Before Christmas” with a little bit of Doctor Seuss towards the end there, but…I tried.  So, Merry Thursday to all and to all a goodnight!:-)

The kids got really excited to make cards for Rina's arrival (it's so adorable!) and th 3rd and 4th graders really wanted me to write something on the board in English they could copy so they could show off their English (/not have to think as hard)...so I just couldn't help myself to such a golden opportunity for them to show off...this card is compliments of my favorite 4th grader, Yinia:

Still Truckin Along and Slowly Forgetting English!

New tradition: I will start all of my blog entries with one new story of how my complete lack of mastery of Spanish has gotten me into trouble and I will call these fables, "Idioma Bromas" which means "Language Jokes"...because sometimes I just have to laugh...and also it rhymes!

This weeks Idioma Broma:

Last week in my 5th/6th grade class we started talking about boyfriends and girlfriends (always a dangerous topic) and the focus momentarily turned to my student Rebeca and her boytoy Raul.  I asked her if she was embarrased and we would change the subject and she didn't know the word embarrased so I wrote it on the bored and she gasped and laughed at me while waving her arms and saying, "no no no no!!".  You know what though, if I was a native Spanish speaker who spoke very little English,, I would think embarrased was English for "embarazado" too.  Incidentally, embarazado is actually Spanish for pregnant. Accidentally ask my 12 year old student if she is pregnant in the middle of class...check!

Now onto the update and goodness gracious it has been too long since I have written!  Thus, this blog might end up being longer than Moby Dick, Gone With the Wind, The Torah, and OJ Simpson's List of Regrets combined and I apologize in advance.

 So lots to catch up on and in the words of one of my first graders when he realized he left his pencils at home, "hijo de putica!".....where to start!  Hijo de putica = son of a bitch...actually techincally "puta" is bitch..."putica" is a bitchlette, or a small bitch to the lay person. "putica" (n): a bitch of deficient physical stature; etymological origin- Danny Devito.  At least when my 6 year old adorable students curse, their cursing is small and adorable too!  Don't worry...as a blossoming teacher and important role model I gave him the appropriate punishent for his vulgar transgression...I giggled at his cuteness and only gave him 3 hugs that day.  I think he learned his lesson.

So to back up a ways, about 3 weeks ago was the annual festival in La Esperanza.  Apparently every year the town has a 3 day weekend festival to raise money to buy something new for the town.  At first I was skeptical of the potential economic catch-22 situation of the only visitors to the festival being the people from La Esperanza, as the notion of people outside our coffee-laiden borders even knowing of our existence baffles me.  Though I am definitely starting to love the town and gain a sense of belonging and pride/possessiveness of my mountain shire, by comparison in terms of national intrigue and notoriety, if Costa Rica represented the whole world, La Esperanza would be Canada...yeah that's right Canadians, I said it!!!  However, the community was superb in getting the word out and throughout the 3 days, I reckon hundreds of people from nearby communities came to fiestar.  I was actually amazed by the transformation that occurred from the people in the community working together.  The different duties were all delogated 2 weeks before the festival (which should have been planned months before as they kept telling me, but hey...tico tiempo) and the "downtown" La Esperanza, formerly and usually comprised of a small field, a church, my school, and the giant corrugated-tin town salon was tranformed into a respectable festival with horse riding in the field, food and drink vendors in the school, and a bar and dancefloor with DJ in the town salon.  My part in the weekend was twofold.  At first I really didn't care what I did and just volunteered to help where needed because I was just excited to be involved and act as a part of the community to any degree, but all things considered, I think I had a pretty sweet gig as 1) the Co-founder, Vice President, and Ambassador of Condomant Management and Selection at Nito and Teacher Mark's hambuerguesa shack and 2) the part of "Priest Rosenbergstein" in a skit presented to the whole town.  So, to start with my entrepeunerial endeavors.  Basically, Nito (Erick my host brother) and I set up a makeshift hamburger stand by the church and made and sold them for all willing customers.  Now, I'm no mathmetician, but at 1000 colones a hamburger (about 2 dollars), I think we probably made about 11 million American dollars.  Seriously, those hamburgers were selling like hotcakes!  (ironically and paradoxically, the hotcakes at the stand down the road were only selling like hamburgers).  There really isn't too much to say about 2 days spent assisting with and often running a hamburger stand, but it did feel really cool to be integrated into such a huge community event and made me feel much more like a part of the town as oppossed to just a visitor.  So, on to my more interesting obligation as the honorable Priest Rosenbergstein (I chose the name...nobody else understood the irony, but I thought it was funny...I guess that joke was just for me).  Anyhoo, Nito, Marielos (she is the women in town I am tutoring in English and teaching her the diva songs...she is also the mom of 2 of my awesome awesome students...she's pretty incredible), another student's mom, and two of my 6th graders put on a little skit for the town.  Since I could barely understand what the hell was going on in the storyline since it was all in Spanish, it was pretty interesting having to be a part of the storyline, especially since we had no script and I had to improv in Spanish.  As an aside, I am feeling like my Spanish is hitting a plateau these days so I really hope with further practice and immersion, I will keep improving, but lately it has been a little frustrating.  Anyway, back to the play...though the 3 scenes preceding my debut still remain somewhat of a mystery to me,  all I know is that I was playing a Priest who was marrying 2 people together.  This involved me wearing a scarf and a tablecloth Nito turned into a tunic and singing a beautifully loud and obnoxious falsetto version of Ave Maria.  I didn't really know what to say since I wasn't very familiar with the functions and rituals of a Costa Rican wedding (though now I am!...story to come...no, I'm not married), so after joining them together, I pretended to throw holy water on them, then crossed myself and said "En el nombre del Padre, de La Madre, y Tio Jorge, ahorrita ustedes son juntos en amor y vida por siempre", which translates into "In the name of the father, the mother, and Uncle George, you are now joined together in love and life forever"...despite my fear that this would send me back to America, if not directly to hell, my friends loved when I did this jokingly during our rehearsal and really wanted me to do it during the performance, so I decided what better way to demonstrate my cultural senstivity and get into the good graces of the community by mocking their religion and their language simultaneously!  Luckily, everyone had a good sense of humor and seemed to really love the little skit (which Nito and Marielos did an awesome job creating) and people in town called me "Padre" and came up to me and asked me to sing ave maria and forgive them of their sins for 2 weeks afterwards. hahahah.  Que es mi vida???

Speaking of Marielos and diva songs, our intercambio has been going great!  We have been meeting every Wednesday afternoon for English lessons and it brings me simultaneous pride and equal shame that I was able to translate Celine Dion songs for her.  This past Wednesday I walked to her house instead of the usual of her coming here (mostly because I wanted to hang out with her kids who are some of my favorite students) and after an hour or so of English lessons, she brought out the guitar to start teaching me.  It will be a very interesting process of trying to learn a new instrument in a new language, but I am really excited that we seem to have started a Wednesday tradition.  As bad as I am at planning and as much as I do most things last minute or spontaneously, I am also a creature of habit and feel much more at home in a place when I get into a routine.  My daily school schedule of 7am-12pm has been great in terms of free time and in terms of making me feel like I am making most of the days here, but having so much free time has its ups and downs and it feels good to at least have Wednesdays to look forward to as being a full day.  I'm also going to start tutoring one of the high school kids in town as there is no English teacher for his grade in the school.  He lives about a 30 minute walk from me and it will become a nice little excursion I have to make every Thursday and it will be good practice because I am planning on starting adult classes after school for the community soon.  With all this said however, I am trying really dilligently to not do what I will refer to as "pulling a college", whereas I do what I did in college; fill my schedule up with as much as I possibly can in order to feel more productive and carpe-diemesque, and then in return feel resentful that I have no freetime for myself and activities I should be doing just for sheer enjoyment begin to feel like a chore.  Thus far, my life consisting of teaching until noon, reading, and then walking around for most of the day until I find people to hang out with/talk to/feed me has worked in favor of maintaining a purposeful, but ultimately simple life.  Just as my appetite and physiological need for caffeine has increased an absurd amount, my perspective of a "good time" has decreased in its complexity...i.e. the other day I spent an hour throwing rocks at a tree with a 6 year old and then found a stick and cut it into a spear with a machete and practiced throwing it at a banana tree for another hour and considered this a red letter day!  I know it is often hard to pick up on sarcasm when reading something because there isn't any inflection, so to clear it up if there is any confusion, I was in no way being sarcastic.  If I can walk around town and find people to take me in for a cafecito, some 7 year olds to play soccer with, and walk down interesting new path to walk down, I consider the day a success and go to bed feeling like I milked something new out of my time here.  In fact, the charm of living in a small town and never making set plans to see people has kind of made me forget that in the United States that isn't often how things go.  I think it will be a shock to my system when I go home and instead of people inviting me in when I show up at a strangers door unexpectadly, they will call the cops.  Preemptive apologies to the many people at home who get annoyed with my habit of not making plans far ahead of time...being here has made me even worse.  However, excluding my time in school where it seems nothing can be planned for or counted on, some of the most exciting and unusual experiences I have had here I found simply by walking around and stumbling into a new circumstance, i.e. playing a soccer game at sunset against some of my kids and their parents, watching and helping in the process of cooking a pig (from the pig-pen to my stomach...yikes...I think the sound the poor little guy made when they killed it will haunt my dreams for eternity), and sitting around a giant stove outdoor stove to cook sugarcane while sipping contrabanda (which is essentially home-brewed moonshine that some of the locals make) with some farmers.  In terms of drinking, I essentially haven't at all, in La Esperanza as I've been really worried about making a bad impression and wouldn't want to look irresponsible to the community, especially my kids parents, but as it was one of my student's parents who offered me the poison, I decided it was a moment not worth passing up.  I realize that most of this entry is not really updates on events and experiences as much as just me rambling about my state of mind, but I think this slowed down life has given me more time to simply think and read and explore than I have had in a long long time.

Mind you, there is nothing slowed down or simple about teaching in the school.  Everyday is 5 hours of me being on my toes and constantly changing my ideas that don't work, lessons that struggle, and miscommunications that occur.  Honestly, I think I could put this all down to one things, which is completey and utterly my fault; my lesson plans are usually no longer than about 3 words.  Being here has confirmed what I already knew about my ability to plan ahead and go into a situation involving being in front of people with a well organized script...I don't.  Sometimes this works out great and awesome lessons seem to just fall out of my butt, but at other times, my mentality of "so I wonder how I am going to teach today! Guess I will find out!" gives me some consternation and too often I realize a better method to teach something I just taught immediately after I finish...it's sort of like when somebody gets at you with a really really good insult and you realize exactly what you SHOULD have said like 10 seconds after you throw out a really lame comback.  I guess I just miss improv and am componsating by improvising my job as I go!  Such is the life of a teacher who is still learning the ropes I suppose.  A friend of mine (shout out!) who did WorldTeach in the Marshall Islands a few years ago summed up teaching perfectly as feeling "all powerful while simultaneously completely inadequate".  Some days I leave school feeling a natural high for hours because of much I love the kids and how much they seemed to learn, and more importantly, seemed to like learning that day.  Other days I walk home with my tail between my legs after a day of awkward lessons and struggling to keep the kids engaged feeling like I failed them as a teacher.  I am giving the 3rd-6th graders their first test next week, which I almost feel guilty about doing to them hahaha...I think after my many years conditioned as a camp counselor where my primary objective was the kid's happiness and entertainment, the transition into a primary objective of focus and learning has been a clunky one for me, but I think I am starting to find a good balance of dancing around the room like a clown and actually imparting useful knowledge.  I think ultimately, what I care more about in this year is not how much they learn from me, but how much they learn to like learning from me.  Given that 3 out of my total 7 6th graders aren't planning on going onto high school after this year, if I can't inspire them to change their minds, I at least hope I will plant some sort of interest in the younger kids so that number will be smaller by the time their class reaches 6th grade.  Upon reading this, I realize I sound just like a cliche after school special or an aspiring combination of Coach Carter and Mr. Feeny, but in reality, I am still just trying to really find my feet as an educator.

Wow, okay, MUCH more to share, but for now I think I will post this while it is still a semi-reasonable length to read, but I PROMISE to update more in a few days with stories of my brothers wedding which was two weeks ago and my visit south to Bella Vista, Costa Rica to visit my friend at her site, and the new antics of Nito and my family drama.  Stay tuned and thanks so much for reading!!

Re-orienting after Orientation and Life in La Esperanza!

Ay dios mio...where to begin???  Sorry it has been a while since my last post! Life this past month has been quite a lot of ups, downs, lefts, rights, and, in the case of teaching, many circles in that I go and I go and I go and find that I end up...where I started.  So we've all been in situations, specifically new microcosmic circumstances, where our perception of time seems to work differently, right?  You know, where something feels like it was 12 minutes ago and 6 months ago simultaneously?  That is how everything here feels.  Possibly to blame is operating on "Tico Time" (if a Tico tells you they will be there at 5:00 pm, expect them in July).  Since punctuality has never ever been my strong suit...or really even my suit at all, this works perfectly for me!  Only now am I realizing that I've never aaaaaaaactually been late for a single thing in my life...I've just been been in the wrong country and America has just been too early! Oh silly silly America!  So I only bring this up as a preface for the inevitable disjointedness of the rest of this post...I will try to keep things in order, but I feel a bit like my Zayde (in that I remember what I wore my first day here, but I can't remember what I ate for breakfast this morning...or what I am wearing right now for that matter!  But if I had to guess, I'd probably say it was rice/beans and chalk dust, respectively. For my Zayde, it was probably cheerios/bananas and creme, and skechers with black socks, shorts, a white v-neck undershirt, and a salmon colored blazer) :-) :-)

                So, I'll start in the very beginning. For it's a very good place to start!  In Engish we begin with ABC, but in Spanish we begin with...Ahhhh Beh Ceh.  Sorry, already getting ahead of myself!  So, to backtrack a weebit (for inquiring minds, a weebit is the offspring of a weezle and a rabbit), I am IN LA ESPERANZA!! I've been here for about 2 weeks now, and like I said, everything still feels so foreign to me while I simultaneously feel like I've been here forever.  Throughout orientation, I had many conversations with fellow volunteers where we would, in words but not yet really in terms of actual internal acceptance, acknowledge the fullness of the committment we were all making for a year and would remind ourselves that though it felt incredibly immediate and important at the time, orientation was but the tip of this iceberg.  Though the orientation was merely the pregame for the English-Teaching fiesta, it went down smooth and got me just the right amount of drunk on Costa Rica.  I especially had to remind myself of the impermanance of orientation during the many times that I just wanted it to end so I could stop feeling the anxiety of anticipating my time in La Esperanza and just be experiencing it.  However, with the retrospect of being here in weelil' La Esperanza (a weelil' is the offspring of a weezle and Lil' Wayne)for 2 weeks, I am actually very glad that I had those first 3 weeks in Orosi.  It was a great opportunity to meet some really quality people...unfortunately I have realized in this retrospective contemplation, though I knew it before, that my host family in Orosi was not part of those quality people.  It became disappointingly obvious to me by the end of orientation that they were clearly only hosting me for the money that they received from WorldTeach for doing so.  I was the umpteenth volunteer they had housed in the past 8 years and they really didn't seem interested to get to know me at all.  They didn't come to a single family/volunteer activity that we had UNTIL the last one, where they sat in the back and didn't speak to anyone and stayed only long enough to get their check and leave to go home without saying goodbye to me.  I don't know why, but while I was actually in Orosi, none of this really bothered me at all...I just saw it as unimportant because it was temporary and it gave me an opportunity to get to know other peoples families and spend more time exploring because they never really cared where I was or when/if I would be back...it was kind of like a really nice bed and breakfast that gave me gallopinto everyday!  And hey, I'm in Costa Rica! It's going to take more than that to get me down!  However, for some reason (I think the way they acted at the final activity, really cementing my suspicions about their disinterest in me...not dislike, just complete indifference), and in retrospect, I'm disappointed...not mad just disappointed (oh my god, I really must be a teacher for using that phrase).   It is good to be in La Esperanza and though I am still feeling out my entire family (and by entire family, I mean the whole town...it is 200 people and ONE big extended family....all of my students are cousins!...I think all of the couples might be too....yikes?), I feel much more welcome and everyday I feel a little bit luckier to call this place my home for a year.

                So orientation ended on February 1st, but we didn't  need to be to our sites until February 10 for the start of class.  Naturally, to unwind and relax from the 8 hour days of meeting after meeting, Spanish lessons, and general cultural confusion, 4 friends and I decided to climb the tallest mountain in Costa Rica! It was SO COOL!  Up until about 2 years ago, the tallest thing I'd ever really climbed was Griffin Pahl in order to see the stage on D Day at U of R.  The 5 of us (my friends Eric, Kai, Megan, and Ross) set out to San Gerardo de Rivas which is the town at the base of Cerro Chirripo, the tallest mountain CR and the 5th tallest mountain in Latin America.  San Gerardo de Rivas happens to be Eric's placement, so we were all able to stay in his house...and by house I mean mystical wooden shire where dreams come true and everything is Disney animated.  Picture soon to be included!

                It was a 2 day hike up to the summit at 3820 meters (12520 feet...on a clear day you can actually see the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Ocean at the same time...unfortunately we got beautiful clear skies over our heads but clouds in the distance so the views were spectacular, but ocean-free).  We hiked about 17k the first day and then woke up at 2:30 am to climb the remaining 5k to watch the sunrise...and it was COLD, but unreal...there are pictures on the picasa website, but justice is not done).  Also in true Mark Sobel camping/hiking style, we had not even close to enough food and way too much water.  So, after about 27 total miles with 35 pound packs on, a total of about 10000 feet of altitude gained and then lost in just over 24 hours, 4 days in a row of getting up before 4:30 am, and a hillarious shortage of food, we made it back to Eric's magical cottage content and satisfyingly exhausted.  Believe it or not, it really was exactly the adventure and escape into nature that I needed to recharge in preparation for a year of struggling to do things like competently teach the ABCs.

                Speaking of ABCs, teaching a new language while really focusing on learning a new one has its interesting little quarks.  In some ways, Spanish and English really aren't so different...like when I don't know a word, I kind of just turn it into an English cognate and 9/10 out of 10, it actually works!  Sometimes the old joke of just adding an "o" to the end actually works!  However, sometimes it realllllly doesn't.  For instance, in Orosi, I was talking to the my friends parents and wanted to share with them my excitement to be here in Costa Rica.  Soy tan....hmmmm...how do you say excited in Spanish I thought??? (for those of you fluent in Spanish, you probably see where this is going...).  Hmmmm...car in Costa Rican Spanish is carro and telephone is telefono....I bet excited is excitado!  So, proudly and with full confidence I turned to my friend's host parents and said with a big smile, "Soy tan excitado a ensenar los ninos de Costa Rica!".  Funny thing about the word excited...it's the 1/10 where guessing isn't a good idea.  Excited in Spanish = emocionado.  Excitado in English = aroused.  Goal of my year in Costa Rica #8279: accidentally convince a local family that I am a sex offender. CHECK!  Other interesting linguistic quarks:

1) Como se llama (if the ll is said like a "y", which is the correct way to say it) = What is your name?...Como se llama (if the ll is said like a regular L in English) = How are you licked?

2) When people speak with a thick accent here it is very hard to distinguish between a few letters.  V's sound just like B's and R's sound just like D's.  Partly to try to sound less gringo, but mostly because I just do it subconsciously, I find myself trying to mimic the accent.  Interesting thing about the difference between R's and D's..."Cuando tengo duda" = When I have doubt.  "Cuando tengo dura" = When I am getting hard.  Goal of my year in Costa Rica #8294: No seriously, REALLY accidentally convince the locals I am a sex offender. Check and CHECK!

3) Cono.  Sounds like a harmless word right? Well it is!  It's what you put ice cream in! Coño. Sounds harmless right? Well, it isn't!  It's a very very naughty way to refer to a part of the female anatomy. Goal of my year in Costa Rica #6549: Freak out the ice cream man at the local street festival.  CHECK CHECK AND CHECK!

                Honestly though, I am actually really proud of how my Spanish has been coming along and these little conversational snafus are about 5% embarrasing and 95% hillarious.  However, I feel like I am reaching a plateau  Spanish ability.  I would say very confidentally that at this point I am fully conversational, but it seems like the jump from "getting by" to eventual fluency is in the grammar that I just don't know how to use and apply.  I hope that I will keep improving by talking to everything here that moves and is willing to speak to me and that by the end of the year I will really be able to consider myself bilingual, as that really is one of my big goals here:-).

                So far in my community, I feel like I can subdivide my existence into 2 categories: School and Family.

School: I have always known that I love working with kids, but being here is really solidifying my feelings of "at-home-ness" that I feel leading a group of children.  This is probably because I am just a big kid myself.  Because I am really just a 7 year old trapped in a 23 year old body, my biggest worry about having to teach was not losing respect of the kids by being a goofball and a softy...i.e. my teacher stare pictures.  Refreshingly and surprisingly though, I have found that with these kids, I have found a good balance of being strict with the important things when I need to be and relating to the kids and making them laugh and have fun while learning.  Honestly, I think this is much more a testament to my kid's desire to learn than it is my competency thus far to teach.  Especially my first week, I had great classes where I would feel all-powerful and brilliantly creative, immediately followed by a class where I would feel inadequate, borderline overwhelmed, and very self-conscious of how completely all over the place I think I must have appeared in front of the kids.  However, no matter the circumstance, my kids seemed to be along with the ride with me the whole way.  They are hardly little angels, because kids will be kids and there is no such thing as a quiet 1st grade class, but I have been blown away by how attentive they are and how much respect they seem to give me just because I am the teacher.  I really can't tell if it is because I have somehow earned there respect in only one week, but it seems to me they have a real desire to learn English and actually want to be in school, though there reasons are sometimes pretty funny. One of my sixth graders wants to learn English so she can grow up to be either a nun, a misionary, or a gynecologist.  Ahh, the holy trinity! The Father, the Nun, and the Hole-y Spirit.  In total I have 22 students and am teaching 1st-6th grade.  Because the school is so small, I teach 1st and 2nd grade separately for 40 minutes each but then teach 3rd and 4th grade together for 80 minutes and 5th and 6th grade together for 80 minutes (it is a 2 room school and the only other teacher is the headmaster...fortunately though I get the other room and it feels really good to have my own turf to teach in).  I have decided to do my classes "immersion style" which means they are entirely in English.  As my kids don't know English (yet!), you could imagine this is difficult, but I have improv to thank for my charades and miming abilities.  To explain Valentines Day I put on a little 3 character show where I played a girl, a boy, and cupid and then fell in love...with myself.  It was met with rave revues.

                 Though there have been obvious expected little behavior issues and confusions, I really couldn't have asked for better behavior from my little weeones (yeah that's right, my students are the offspring of a weezle and a Formula One racecar).  However, the double edged sword of this is that if they don't seem to be getting a new concept at all, I really have only myself to blame.  Though this has definitely led to a few fleeting moments of nervousness and self-doubt, I am glad it is this way, as I would rather the failure be in my approach than in their motivation, as I can change my approach much more easily.  All in all, I love my kids and a few already own my heart because of how almost intolerably cute they are.  Oooo! I almost forgot!  So two of my student's (brother and sister) mom is a singer and she organized and directed a small choir of 12 students last year.  I haven't heard them sing, but apparently they are really really good...so good in fact that they went to a national competition last year and WON!  Now, I know you are probably thinking, "Oh silly silly Mark, you must be confused.  That's just the plot to Sister Act II".  Well, right you are! But, this is real!  And as a prize, they won a ridiculously nice brand new yahama keyboard.  Alexis, the school director, asked me if I could play and when I told him "mas or menos" and kind of shrugged my shoulders, he started to beem.  Apparently nobody in the town has any idea how to play so this beautiful brand new instrument has just been sitting in gaining dust in the closet.  We broke it out and my classroom is now the proud new owner of a piano!!  I have already used it in lessons and the kids love it and I am so psyched!  I also talked to the choir director (my student's mom) and we seem to have very similar personalities and I think we hit it off.  We were discussing a lot of plans (in Spanish! because she knows no English) for the choir this year and I want to put on some type of show/play/presentation/cough...a cappella group cough...for the kids to present to the community and she is all on board to help me out!  We also worked up a deal that she will teach me some guitar if I help her with the pronunciation of English music.  My first assigntment is to teach her the correct pronunciation and meaning of the lyrics to "I Can't Live if Living is Without You", "And I Will Always Love You", and "My Heart Will Go on".  Worldteach forgot to include "how to teach early 90's Diva love ballads to a middle aged woman" in their teaching manual so I'm gonna have to wing this one.  But moral of the story: I have a piano in my classroom (no indoor bathrooms and 2 cinder blocks as a goal for their soccer field, but a piano), and an ally with the town choir director = AWESOME!

Family:  So I didn't include community as a 3rd category of my life.  That's because family and community are synonymous.  As I said before, the town of La Esperanza is about 200 people who are all from ONE family.  Both my host mother and host father have 13 siblings each and all of my students are brothers, sisters, and cousins.  As expected, nothing is really what I expected it to be (if that makes sense).  Though I tried really hard to come into this experience with zero expectations, the reality is that I think it is an impossible ambition to have zero expectations when knowing you are going into the unknown.  For me, at least, it is.  In the same vein, anyone who claims to be doing something like this for entirely altruistic reasons is lying to themselves.  Though my primary purpose for being here is really starting to focus on teaching and connecting to the community, when I applied for this program and up until recently my reasons were, admittedly, more self-serving in my quest for a life/perspective-changing experience and a desire to experience a minimalist lifestyle for the sake of fulfilling my romanticized preconceived notion of what "roughing it" really is and experiencing how much of the world lives.  I wanted something new and different to open my mind and broaden my understanding of the world, but paradoxically, I wanted that new and different to fulfill notions and images I already had in my mind.  As I am really really trying to let go of my expectations, I am realizing that it is of course easy to desire a life devoid of any Western and modern convenivent with the pretense of only a year of committment as a taste of this different, harder life, knowing that my life full of advantages that have been given to me by a combination of a very loving family and luck, awaits me when I want it.  The reality is, my life here is not fulfillling those "desired challenges", i.e. living with no electricity, learning to hunt my food, sleeping in a hut, having no phone or internet, etc...These are the challenges I was "hoping for", which is why I was disappointed to discover that I would be living in a new house with most modern conveniences and two of my host brothers not only speak English, but have lived for several years in the States (in New Yar-zee of course) .  The challenges I have been met with were unforseen ones, which is almost redundant to say because almost nothing that is fully expected is as hard as those things one is completely unprepared for.  One of my biggest challenges so far has been an overwhelming feeling of living in the former volunteers shadow.  She was the very first volunteer in the town (prior to her, there had never been ANY English instruction in La Esperanza).  As the second volunteer, they only have her as a comparison, and from what it sounds like, she did an absolutely incredible job assimiliating with the community and was a damn good teacher to boot.  I suppose I didn't expect to have to prove myself so much trying to create my own identity in the town, but I am very hopeful that in time, things will change and in time I won't just be confusing people as to why someone has replaced the other English teacher.  Another unexpected difficulty has been with the family.  There seems to be a lot of tension between my two host brothers and somehow I feel like I have found myself in the middle of them venting to me about the other.  Perhaps this is just very salient today because yesterday was quite a fiasco...one brother got drunk and got into a fight at a town fiesta that we were at.  The other was beyond wasted and tried to get involved too, but this got the other brother mad.  After the fight, we went home to find that my sisters house, which is right down the hill from the family's house where I am staying, was broken into and someone stole her TV and DVD by breaking in a window and going out the front door.  Just as we were going back to the house, we noticed a scratch in the car which seems to have been done by somebody keying the car earlier that day.  Needless to say, going to bed last night felt great if only to end yesterday and start today anew, but family tensions are feeling pretty thick and I don't know what role, if any, I should be playing in helping out.  Along with this, I can't understand a single word my host mother says because she breaks the sound barrier with her Spanish and my host father is a very somber gent who doesn't really talk to anyone.  Challenge numero tres has come with trying to understand the social hierarchy going on in this town.  The community is completely sustained by coffee farming and right now is the peak of the harvest season.  For the 4 or so months of summer, which is when the coffee is ready, Nicaraguans and Panamanian immigrants come to the town to work in the fields as the pickers.  As such, alongside the 200 permanent residents of the town, there are tons of foreign workers here just for a few months and there seems to be an unspoken class system which is making me uncomfortable.  All of my students, except for one who is a Panamanian Indian (she's an awesome 2nd grader name Johanna who wakes up at 5 am every morning to walk the hour to school everyday), are Ticos who come from familys that at the very least have semi-decent houses to live in.  However, everyday I see little immigrant children walking around with no shoes on gathering firewood because the shacks that they live in during the harvest have no electricity.  It just doesn't quite feel right that these kids aren't getting any education and I am here with the purpose to teach in a rural disadvantaged community and those who seem most disadvantaged are getting nothing.  I really really want to offer free tutoring so I can get to know the kids and at least give them a few weeks or months of school before they go back to Nicaragua and Panama, but I am not so sure of the social implications, if any, i.e. if this would possibly insult the immigrants or confuse the Ticos or whatnot, but something just seems amiss given the reason an English teacher is placed here in the first place.  I am going to talk to my host family tomorrow to try to figure out the best way to go about offering some type of tutoring and how to get the word out, as many of them don't even speak Spanish, but only apparently something called dialecto, which is a native Panamanian language.

Holy Moley I wrote a lot!  To sum up, I am still getting used to being in such a tiny town teaching in such a tiny school and also being tall and surrounded by such tiny people! (my host brothers are 5'7" and 5'4"...I think it's because, no joke, Ticos start drinking coffee around the age of 1).  Basically, everything is just tiny but I am embracing this tiny world as much as I can and am feeling a little bit more comfortable in it everyday and ojala (hopefully), this tiny place likes me even though I'm big and white (though one of my 6th graders didn't believe I was really from the U.S. because "my skin is too dark"...I think she glasses, but I took the compliment!).  So much love to all of you back stateside and I send you abrazos y besos galore! Paz, amor, arroz, y frijoles!

Stories and updates of my past few weeks AND my first few days (and first day of school! yeehaw!) in La Esperanza to come really soon (I promise), but for now enjoy some photos!!!

My classroom! She's a sight for sore eyes...if you look closely you will notice a broken window...that's because the degree of learning that occurs here is so intense that it actually shatters glass

My b-e-a-utiful lil' classroom! There are 17 computers in the classroom which were donated last year.  They don't get internet but I think it's pretty amazing to have them.

So I've been working on my "teacher stare" (the power bestowed upon all great teachers to command total silence, fear, respect, and attention from a misbehaving student simply by looking at them with ferocity). Please vote on which one you think is best so I can work on it to use in class. Above is: Teacher Stare A

Teacher Stare B

Teacher Stare C

Teacher Stare D

Me and 2 of my 6th grade students in Orosi during orientation...hahaha and Paul in the bottom right corner (he's another volunteer, not a 6th grader with a Pituitary Gland disorder) 

Marshmallow Time with Emmy, my freaking adorable 3 year old host niece!!...she's so cute it's actually overwhelming, but don't let her devilishly cute eyes and smile fool you...her terrible 2's haven't received the memo that she is 3 now...

****** Here is the link to LOTS of pictures!! I only labeled some because there are so many, but the first bunch are from my first day of school (hooray!), the middle lot are from my climb/hike up Cerro Chirripo (at 12,520 feet, it's the highest point in Costa Rica...more details to come!), and the final bunch are from my first few days in La Esperanza...the dude with the mullet underneath the antlers is one of my host brothers, Erick...he's an absurd human so naturally, we get along great!*******

https://picasaweb.google.com/105476874015526122953/MemoirsDelGringo#