Here is are some things that happened to me today that I thought were really funny:

Okay, so it was cloudy and cool today so I decided to go for a walk to the beach at 8:00am. I leave my house and haven't taken 3 steps when I hear someone yelling my name. I looked and found the person near the back of my house. He's a neighbor and I know him so it's no problem. So, I ask him whats going on and he and this other guy are chasing this rooster around and they want me to help them because the rooster is on my side of the fence. I hate the chickens. They make this weird moaning sounds all of the time and they're creepy. So I find the rooster and start to chase it and notice too late that it has a rope on its foot and I only needed to step on the rope, but, it had gone to the other side of the fence.

Once I got back from my run I was in my house doing some cleaning and stepped outside for a sec and see my other neighbor running around looking really happy. He sees me and yells “Laura, we're making a ping pong table!” he was sooooooo happy. I was took, I would love to play some ping pong. So, we I yelled something like “awesome, I can't wait”!

Today is a good day!

P.S. This happened on Friday. I told Deivin about the rooster chasing and he said this "Laura, you don't have to do everything that Pena (my neighbor) says, you don't have to chase the rooster". It totally made me crack up! Love it.

The Teleton 2010

This past week Costa Rica held it's annual teleton which is a nation wide fundraiser for the children's hospital. The hospital treats the kids of Costa Rica who have suffered serious burns, who have serious diseases that would normally cost a parent millions of dollars to treat over the course of a lifetime. The kids are given all that they need through the hospital, oxygen, wheel chairs, medicine, everything. So, each year people all over CR tune in and watch the teleton and donate money. Each year the Guias y Scouts of Costa Rica hit the streets with big tin cans to raise money for the cause. I had the great pleasure this year of being able to participate in the even with my Guias y Scouts in La Palma and this will go down as one of my greatest Peace Corps moments.

When I was given 12 big cans with slots in the top and told by Ruth the area director that we needed to fill them up I was not really sure how. We put them out in the different businesses so that people could donate, but they were really empty when Anna one of the other leaders and also my host sister in law went to check on them. So, on Wednesday; Anna, Gregory, Sary and I started hitting the streets Thursday and Friday and then organized Saturday as our big day when we would go to the town center and stop cars and have the kids bang drums and blow whistles and ask for money for the teleton. It was awesome! The kids were really excited and you could see that they were really taking ownership of it. They became somewhat possessive over their "alcancia" or can and would compare with each other "mine's heavier, look Laura, mine is the heaviest". There was even a girl who was helping her grandma cook for a church activity who asked if she could come with us to raise money. By the end of the day she had joined the scouts and was really excited to have been able to raise money for the kids. So, after working all day on Saturday we opened up our cans to count and we were all really excited to be able to report that we had raised 308,000 Colones! That's like $600 which is a lot for a little town. When I reported what we had raised to Ruth the area director she was really happy and told me that there were groups that had been formed for years that didn't raise that much. I was so proud of my kids at that moment.

So, after all was counted and reported we went home to watch the rest of the teleton. Group after group was going up and showing a giant check of what they had raised and they were doing testimonials from kids who had benefited from the teleton in the past (these were seriously heart wrenching stories). I started to get a little worried that I had missed the Scouts presenting what they had raised because it was getting so late. When they presented the Scouts they brought up the head guy from San Jose and like 6 kids to present the check for all of the Scouts all over Costa Rica and the amount was 125,000,000! After they revealed the amount Anna yelled to me through our shard wall "Laura, did you hear! We did it! This is great!", I yelled back “ I know, this is so cool”. It was such a great moment to know that I was able to be apart of something really great. The next day people were telling me how good they felt about having helped and I even had a neighbor stop by and ask if they could donate more!

Here are some things I learned: People who have less almost always give more. Those cruising around in their nice cars wouldn't even stop sometimes while those on bikes with no breaks and a wooden seat would stop to give. It feels good to give, to know that you were involved in something that helped those who need it most. Get involved! Help others to help others.

Nothing much

I've been in San Jose for about five days and it was a really nice break. While Peace Corps volunteers don't put in a huge number of "working" hours per day (depending on who you are and where your community), we do work and feel stress all the time! I am constantly wondering if I'm doing enough, too much, should I be doing something different, etc. Also, there is a lot of stress involved in trying to work in another language and culture. Why am I saying all this? I just want to say that I really needed a break and it felt really nice to have a little mini vacation from La Palma. It's an odd feeling to really want to get out for a while, but, miss Deivin. Mostly, I wish he could travel with me! Today I went to the doctor to have my knees checked out, hopefully we get my knee pain in hand and it all goes away soon! On this trip I got to see the newest Harry Potter movie which was the best yet in my opinion and I also saw Life as We Know It, a romantic comedy. Both really good. Not much else going on, I'm ready to get back to La Palma and see how the Scouts faired this past weekend.

Okay, sorry of the absence of blogs, I don't really have a good reason, or maybe I kind of do, but mostly I was just having some motivation issues. So, I recently had a very interesting Peace Corps experience 2 weeks ago and I wanted to share. Hurricane Matthew was passing over Costa Rica and bringing lots and lots of rain. There was no wind, just a huge amount of rain. Since I'm generally clueless as to what's going on in the world on Thursday the 4th I got a call from the Peace Corps office saying that there was lots of flooding expected in my region and they wanted me to evacuate to Palmar Norte (it's around 3 hours away). I had noticed that there was a lot of rain, but in my community the river was still really low and everything looked pretty safe. But, when the Peace Corps tells you to leave, you have to leave. So, I asked Oscar the taxi driver who has been a friend of mine since I arrived in La Palma if he was interested in driving me to Palmar, he said sure. I don't think either of us had any idea that we would be leaving the safety of the peninsula for a crazy trip into one of the really affected areas. I said my goodbyes to my host family and Deivin and made sure everyone knew that no matter what, SAVE TIGRE! They all thought I was crazy, they were like “she's a cat, she can swim and climb trees, she'll be fine”. I just didn't want her to be all wet and uncomfortable, she's my baby after all. So anyway, we took off and some 3 somewhat sketchy hours of driving later arrived in Palmar where I was to meet up with another volunteer who's community was actually flooded. As Oscar was getting ready to head back we found out that we were all trapped now, all of the roads were closed, there was no possible way to get to La Palma, San Isidro, San Jose, Panama, we were stuck. Luckily for Oscar his mom lives nearby so he headed to her house. I realized right away that I wasn't in La Palma anymore. Palmar Norte has the biggest river in Costa Rica flowing right through it and it was big! The rain there was much more intense and there were dump trucks full of soaking wet people arriving all the time. All of the surrounding farms and some entire towns flooded and people had to find a place to stay and that place was Palmar Norte. Well, I ended up staying in Palmar for 4 days until I was allowed to make my way back to La Palma. I had to take 3 buses, 2 taxis and a ferry to make it back since the main road was washed away and what should have taken 3 hours took 6. Tigre and Deivin were really happy to see me and I was soooo happy to be home.

Okay, that all happened a long time ago. Here is a more recent update, I'm currently in San Jose. I was celebrating Thanksgiving with some other volunteers and an embassy family that was nice enough to invite 6 of us to eat and stay with them in their home. They were very nice and incredibly generous. If going into the foreign services didn't mean constant travel I would want to join just so I could work with the type of people that I have met at the embassy over the past year and a half. I'll be in San Jose until Tuesday or Wednesday. I needed a bit of a break from La Palma so this was a nice chance to get away.

I promise not to be so bad at blogging!

Spay and Neuter Your Pets Update

On Wednesday the 20th we had our 6th clinic. We have now spayed or neutered 81 animals! I can't believe that this project has and continues to do so well. This clinic was a little bit different for me, usually the vet brings with him a volunteer assistant who helps him with the operations, they do things like clean the blood away while he's performing the operation or they hold up an instrument that needs to be held so the vet can see better or whatever. I normally stay outside with the pet owners and charge, greet, look after the animal that just got done, etc. On Wednesday there was no assistant so I got to be the assistant. That was the first time I've ever done anything like that before. I have seen the surgeries, I've gone in while they were going on, I knew the process, but this was different. I had no idea that it was such hard work. By then end of the day I was exhausted, but I really liked it. For the next clinic we are talking about only doing street dogs. I'm not exactly sure how we are going to be able to do it, but we'll figure out a way. I know of at least 2 female dogs in the town center that we can spay and there are more all the time.

On a personal note, last weekend I made a big batch of beans. I have got so many, it's incredible. For two dollars you can eat for weeks! It's an experiment, I think next time I might just make half a bag and then wait a few weeks for the other half but beans are a super food. I've actually been making Gallo Pinto lately and liking it! I'm turning tica. Sadly, Deivin doesn't like beans and is not so into the change. You can't win them all I guess.

Scouts update!

We have been meeting with the kids for about 3 or 4 weeks now and things have been going really well. 2 weekends ago we made tamales (their different from what we see in the states) and went around with the kids to sell them for a fundraiser. It went really well and we were able to raise enough money to buy uniforms. When I say buy uniforms know that it's also different from what you are thinking. In CR it's still really common for people to have their cloths made for them by a taylor. It's usually cheaper and then you get a custom fit. My host mom makes most of the uniforms for the schools and will probably make most of the uniforms for the Scouts. So, our plan is to buy a bunch of cloth and then people can either make the uniforms for their kids of have them made by someone. Also, we are thinking of taking the kids on their first ever camping trip in a couple of months. I'm going to see if I can get some grant money to finance us buying some tents, sleeping bags, etc. so that we can take the trip and have them for the future. We live at the entrance of one of the most famous parks in CR, but the majority of people in La Palma have never been to the park, hopefully we can change that for the scouts.

In other news, my english is horrible! Every time I re-read a blog post or my facebook status update I notice that I'm making all the mistakes that my students are making. I think it's getting worse and worse. I'm not really sure how to stop this free fall. I'm always reading and I watch some tv and movies in english, but it's no use! So, if you read this and think, wow, she is really bad at English, know that I was better before!

We want you to give a talk to the kids...

On Tuesday night I was hanging out in my house with Deivin when my host mom told me that my neighbor wanted to talk to me. I told her I'd give her a call. So, I call and she tells me that she wants me to go with her and the women's environmental group that I've been working with to the high school to pick up trash. I'm not that into picking up trash. I firmly believe in protecting the environment, recycling, reducing consumption of toxic chemicals, etc, but I'm just not that into trash pick up. But, I wasn't doing anything else so said sure, I'd love to go. I arrive at my neighbors house the next day and she tell me, "We want you to talk to the kids". I kind of sat there for a second thinking, hmmm, about what? Then I said out loud, what do you want me to talk to them about? She tells me to talk to them about anything. Them my mind kicks into over drive thinking about all of the possible things I could say to these kids; Finish school, it's really important, wait to have babies, you can love a baby the same in 5 years as you could in 9 months, Go to university, it will open up doors for you, etc. I sat there thinking for a while and reviewing my vocabulary to make sure I knew how to say everything (I did!). So, finally my host dad comes to pick us up and take us to the high school and we end up with 15 or so kids in a room and it's all really informal and she introduces me to talk. This is not my first time talking in front of people in Spanish, but the result is always the same. I totally forget how to talk and suddenly I'm saying things like "castrating dogs is also environmental". I totally forget what I was going to say and just start talking about random things. This time, I gave a replica speech of the one I had given the previous week to my scouts on how it's good to help others. Yes, this is a good thing to talk about, but it was more than just a little out of context. Here is an environmental group in the school that wants to help clean up trash and I'm telling them about castrating animals and helping others. I saw in the middle of the speech that I had taken a really bad left turn so I tried to save it by relating both subjects to picking up trash. I somehow think they were on to me. So are the adventures of a Peace Corps volunteer. We always end up in really strange situations that we are not really prepared for and just wing it and hope nobody can tell.

In other news, for those of you who don't know, I now have internet in my house!!!! I have 24/7 internet and am really happy about it. This should mean more blogs and sadly, it means that I spend a ton of time on facebook. I'm trying to keep it in check.