Blackouts, Trapiche, and a Site visit.

Right now I am in Guanacaste, a region in Costa Rica, at an internet cafe writing this blog. I dont have much time but wanted to get a quick blog in before I meet the volunteer I am going to be staying with for the next 4 days. I am right now visiting,by myself, another volunteer at his site to live with him and ask him all these different questions about being a volunteer. I took a rediculous long bus ride to get here and it is scorching hot outside and I am grateful to be indoors where it is only slightly a few degrees cooler. Anyways this should be a great trip and I hear he has a rediculous river near his site where he hangs out alot, so it should be alot of fun. He also went to the University of Michigan so we have alot in common, that being extremely smart, incredibly handsome, and just being generally amazing. Haha.

When I write these blogs it is just soo hard to remember what I have done in the past days. As I have written before my days are really long and everyday I am doing something different, new, and exciting all the time it is hard to remember things. Either that or I am losing my memory at an extremely fast rate. Anyways a couple of days ago we went to a ¨Trapiche¨ for 5 hour long class activity. A ¨Trapiche¨is a mill of sorts which extracts the sugar ¨juice¨from the raw sugar cane. They then take that juice and boil it for like 5 hours and then pour it into molds and then let it dry and then eat it. It is a pretty interesting process to see but It was difficult to be there for so long becuase one can pretty much get the jist of how it works after being there for only 15 minutes. During one of our breaks we all went to the river and just hung out for like an hour as the sugar juice was bubbling away. So basically that day we all just hung out and did nothing, which was pretty cool.

The next day I went with my language class to the colegio (high school) and we spoke to the english teachers which we will be working with in teaching an english class. On the monday after next I will be teaching 2 (40) minute enlglish classes with my other volunteer friend Jenn. We will be teaching sports and past times. It should be pretty interesting. Then later that day my friends Bre and Marcela were going to come over to my house and watch a movie that afternoon but once one of them arrived I realized I had no power in my house all afternoon. Basically there was a country wide blackout that entire afternoon. So we didnt end up watching the movie we just hung out on my awesome deck on top of the mountain overooking this valley and talked and listened to music. Then Bill and Byron came over and played their guitars. Then 5 more volunteers came to my house and before I knew it I had like 9 volunteers at my house. My host parents came back to see me and all of my friends hanging out on the deck and they were happy to see them all again, almost all of them went to my birthday bash a couple weeks back. Anyways my parents needed to leave to go to San Jose to visit my host nephew at the hospital. So that meant I had the whole house to myself with all of my friends. So as one can expect we had to thrown a party. My host parents invited everyone to stay while they were leaving so It was totally fine in having everyone there. My host parents left and then I went with my host brother to get beer,chips, and 7 boxes of macaroni and cheese. All in all we had a really fun night at my house on top of the mountain listening to music, drinking beers, eating macaroni and cheese and of course having an insane dance party. Then later that night the party came to a halt at around 9 oclock the power went out again. At that point it was pitch black dark and there was no power in all of Costa Rica. It was really cool looking from my deck into the valley and only seeing the glow of lightening bugs in distance flickering on and off. It was a pretty cool experience. So then we all just listened to music, hung out on my deck, and watched the lightening bug light show in the valley. Awesome night.

Last night I went to the ¨Hippy¨bar near my training community with 7 other volunteers. It was the same bar I went to before for the live classsic rock show. It was a really good time with plenty of Imperial and Bamboo to be had by all. Also they have AMAZING pizza and we made sure to order 3 Large Everything pizzas throughout the night. It was an awesome time. It is especially beautiful because the bar is on this hill which has a large porche and an amazing view of San Jose. Great times.

Now here I am in Guanacaste starting my trip to visit Ben, the peace corps volunteer from michigan, and checking out his site. It is crazy because a) by this time next week I will find out my actual site, and b) by this time this week I will be chilling with all of the other volunteers at a private beach house which we will have rented for the night. I am super excited.

Anyways I hope all is well at home and abroad, and for those of you sending me emails and facebook messages keep the coming it is great to hear from you.

Much love and Respect,

Rudy