Isla tortuga!

Day 133, el Sabado 24 de Noviembre 10:22

Isla Tortuga!

I can proudly say that I have been in of the paradise places our lovely earth has, Isla Tortuga. There aren´t turtles on this island though, its name comes from its shape, it looks like a turtle.

The trip to paradise started on Thursday, a normal school day. I made math exam and then take a bus to Esparza. I met up with Henry, who is leaving back to New-Zealand in 2 weeks.. So we need to chill a lot these days. We went to Puntarenas, and just chilled at the beach drinking smoothies and stuff. I went to my IEC’s house back in Esparza for dinner and to sleep. I’m very happy with my new IEC; she’s really nice and cool.

The next morning we went back to the park to meet with the others, we went with one of those over popular mini-busses, honestly Costa Ricans are addicted to those. We drove to the harbor of Puntarenas and got on our boat. We had to wait 45 minutes for some other people to arrive, a group of middle aged beer and Smirnoff drinking Costa Rican women. The boat trip itself was beautiful as well, we saw dolphins within 5 minutes and they were jumping on front of our boat, we were pretty lucky! We came past all of these beautiful islands with abandoned beaches; I will buy one of these islands one day, maybe when we’re old. The boat was supplied with some nice party music including Gan nmam style and Party Rock that made the trip even cooler. We stopped after 1 hour to do some snorkeling; there were beautiful fish in all colors and sizes, too bad that I got stung by a jellyfish after 15 minutes…

Then we arrived at the island, a small beach with a lot of palms, white sand, blue clear water and some cabins. We got some tables under some trees with a mini kitchen included. The staff made the fruits ready while we explored our little beach. After some photos and a bit of swimming we rested with the fruits, while eating the fruits we got a better fruity idea: Banana boat! Some guy took is with the banana boat, and to be honest: he is the worst banana boat driver ever. Because he was so bad we decided to make the fun ourselves and started jumping of the banana boat, doing Gan Nmam style on the banana boat and wrestling on the banana boat, the banana boat guy didn’t like that though, but: Pura Vida!

After the banana boat it was lunch time, we had some delicious fish with a salad. There were marshmallows with ‘leche condensada’; they eat so much leche condensada here that it’s horrible. It practically is just syrup like milk with a lot of sugar. We heard to there was a snake on the island which you could put around your neck and stuff, we couldn’t find it but we did find the souvenir ship which sold nice and way to expensive souvenirs. Also there were a few tropical birds, we just chilled with them a while. We spent the last 2 hours sunning on the beach and swimming a bit. At 3 o’clock it unfortunately already was time to leave the island, but the good part was that we had the beautiful boat ride again.

I took the bus from Puntarenas to Orotina together with Yukari, the Japanese girl who lives her as well. I never really talked with here so this bus ride was a good thing; I asked here a lot of questions about Japan, got to go there some day. The bus ride itself was relativity long and to full. There was an old guy screaming at the bus driver all to time to hurry up and stuff, that was pretty funny.

I did go to Taekwondo in the evening, just because I love it so much. It was a big change though, from lying and the beach to kicking around.

This morning I learned some cooking things, I learned how to make Gallo Pinto and I made a delicious soup for lunch.

Day 134, el Domingo 25 de noviembre 2012 20:31

Relaxing & partying

It was such a chill day yesterday, I loved it. I woke up around 9 ate some breakfast and then just lied and my bed and chilled. After lunch I made the tour for my parents for when they come here, that’ll be awesome as well! Then in the afternoon I slept deliciously in the hammock for a few hours, Pura Vida.

I went to Ruth’s birthday party in the evening; it actually wasn’t really a party but more like a dinner. It was Ruth, Sarah, Lea, Jadeli, Ruth’s host parents and me. We ate delicious and just chatted, in Spanish of course, it is so cool that we now speak Spanish between exchange students as well. We went to the park for a bit to pick up some more people. When we returned Ruth’s parents put up the piñata I bought and the cake was ready. Piñata are so much fun! Everybody just goes back to their little kid’s time, (well actually just the boys but still) we were all crawling over the floor grabbing candy, lovely part of the culture. Then we ate the cake, with of course Coca-Cola, people here are addicted to cola, they’ll buy a bottle for every little thing; it is always like: ‘coca coca! Yo amo el coca!’ We went back to the park after all these birthday thingies, just to chill. We waited there till 12 to sing ‘happy birthday’ to Ruth. Some idiot threw a ¼ dynamite pretty close to us; crazy homeless guy spends his begged money on fireworks, stupid. They sell fireworks here during the whole year and people really don’t know how to handle it.

Today was a bit busier day, I went to Ruth’s house in the morning to pick up my bike, but she wasn’t there, or still sleeping. This country really misses the phenomenon called a doorbell, the people here just scream somebody’s name at the door, but I don’t really feel like doing that, just because. A read somebody’s blog about an exchange student in The Netherlands, she wrote the next: ‘The Dutch always say: ‘het is gewoon zo’ (it just is that way)’ and that is so true, I really live by these words. About living by words, the magical words ‘Pura ‘Vida’       -the slogan of Costa Rica- didn’t really get me yet. If I say them it always is a bit forced. But Pura Vida isn’t just saying the words, it is a lifestyle. And this is one of the reasons I choose Costa Rica, so I should learn more about and from this life style, to complete my goals.

Anyways, I liked the walking though. I walked through a regular Costa Rican neighborhood, colored houses, some corner stores and chickens walking on the unpaved street. Seeing that, always remembers me of being in a third world country, along with the poor people, the infinite happiness and the way people think of me. A got picked up by my host dad halfway while walking back. We went to the farm of an uncle with 2 other uncles. We fed the cows, picked mangos, lemons, oranges and star fruit and went back, I love getting a bit of this love here during my exchange. I quickly ate back home and I took a bus to Desmonte, to my uncle. I am so happy that I besides having a really nice host family also have really nice relatives. We just eat, laugh, and watch movies over there. These moments there are really important to me, I’m always so happy when I’m there, I’m always happy actually, but when being there I am extra happy. I forgot my camera, but sometimes it is good not to take pictures, if you spend all your time taking pictures then you don’t enjoy the moment. Sometimes it is better to just take a memory; memories are way more precious as pictures, just a memory for yourself, a story to be told one day.

Day 135, el Lunes 26 de Noviembre 2012 21:58

The River!

Yes! I finally went to the cool river I wrote about. I started the day being very bored, I feeling kind of down because of that. But then I called Daniela to go to the river, so we went. The river is at 4 esquinas, my old neighborhood. Her we met up, and from there we went to Daniela’s house. The river is practically in her backyard, we just had to walk like 400 meters down. I saw a beautiful bird while walking down; to bad I didn’t bring my camera.

The river was in one word amazing, in the middle of a forest there was this small river with rocks and trees on both sides softly flowing through the forest. There was a rope hanging from one of the trees, and something which could be called a pebble beach. We first made a fire on this pebble beach to make some food, I loved it to make fire again. After this little pick nick it was time to swim! I climbed up into this tree, grabbed the rope and swung like Tarzan into the river. After a few times we started doing tricks and stuff from this rope, it was awesome. We spotted one nasty and huge spider on one of the rocks, again to bad I didn’t bring my camera.

I got my Taekwondo suit in the evening, now I feel like an epic Korean warrior dude, only I black belt is missing, but I’ll have it one day. 

Baby doggies! And m current thoughts about the exchange!

Day 125, el Viernes 16 de Noviembre 2012 21:31

Movienight.

Again I was all day free again, but I did some useful things, but mostly just being ‘tranquillo’ or just plain lazy / bored.

In that perspective you could say yesterday was a better day. I went to a friend’s house with my host brother and there we ate popcorn and watched movies till late. It was pretty nice, just felt like a normal teenager again. Also it was pretty funny the sneak in through the window with my host brother at night, just like normal teenagers.

As I said, I practically did nothing today. I put up the hammock and chilled in it with a banana smoothie I made. In the night I went to Taekwondo, there were night so many people but that was really nice. The other guys of my age there have become my friends and we trained together while laughing and joking and stuff. I think sport is one of the best ways to make friends; it’s about being a team, helping each other and having some same interests. 

I make friends a bit easier here, probably just because I am interesting here and people want to know about me and my culture, the thing is that I have to stay friends when I’m not that interesting anymore.

Day 127, el Domingo 18 de Noviembre 2012 10:17

Baby dogs!!

Woohoo, yesterday our dog delivered 5 ini-mini baby dogs! I’m not the biggest dog fan in the world, but it still is cool! We went to the pet doctor in the morning because Luna, the dog needed an operation to get the babies out. So we spent all morning in the pet shop / pet clinic. And finally after 2 hours the babies were here! One wasn’t really breathing so he needed a lot of attention. Anyways, we spent almost the whole morning taking care of these cute baby doggies. I spent the whole afternoon helping my little brother with his English homework, I got kind of bored after 2 hours because he was being very lazy but this is the best way to help out.

In the night I went to same kind a dance show which one of my friend’s mom organized, but I arrived when it ended. Luckily I met Sarah there and we went with 2 other people to Las Palmas to eat something and chill.

19:46

Today was another beautiful day. I went to the pool of Las Palmas, that was just ultimate relaxing again. I also made a friend, just to old school way like I made friends on campings during holidays; asking to play soccer. So I played soccer with this Daniel guy and my hostbro, cool to do stuff like this. My host brother left a bit earlier as me and Melissa, a niece or cousin I don’t know which of the 2 it is in English, everybody thinks I speak full English and I did improver her but sometimes I do lack some words. At 5 me and Melissa walked home from the pool, she lives a few houses next to mine. I asked her some questions about what she does; she works at her dad’s mango farm but spends most time running and tanning ( no daddy, she won’t be my girlfriend and no she is not a Costa Rican beauty sorry for ruining your fantasies <3), she also is the person who uses the most Costa Rican words I have ever met, to me she is one of the most Pura Vida people here.

Later I chilled in the hammock, just listening to music and ready exchange student blogs, from other people in Costa Rica and from people on an exchange in The Netherlands. Sometimes it is so important to take a little moment for yourself, just me and my thoughts. The blogs from the people in The Netherlands were really nice, reading about people struggling with my culture made me see how stupid some struggles are. Well actually no struggles are stupid; they are just struggles which have to be overcome. I found a really nice quote: ‘We are like big ships, it takes a lot of time to make us in the docks, but when we are ready we should be sailing on the sea on not be waiting in the docks.’ That is how I feel now, it took 17 years to make me like this, now I am sailing on the sea going through storms and sunshine and I will come back loaded with silver and stuff, like back in the ol’ days! I know I’m cant of deep now but I just love quote’s about exchange students!

I think I now reached a point that I am letting my old Dutch thoughts and costumes go, and that I am attaching to the Costa Rican way. This includes being very very ‘tranquillo’ and also not having this urge anymore to be in contact with the Netherlands every day. I do still love to skype with my parents and Whatsapp with friends though. But I try to do less with the other exchange students and more with the Costa Rican people, because I think there is some more work to do at that part of my exchange.

Beautiful beaches, nice people and rainforest made me very happy during my first 4 months here but the real happiness comes from the small things. A few weeks a my host dad gave me a small thingy for my keys, so that I won’t lose them (it now is general knowledge here that I lose everything) first I didn’t attach so much value to this gift, but lately my host mom asked how I got, and she was pretty surprised when I told her my host dad gave it to me, since he never does gifts. And today, my aunt brought me a small sloth made of clay by Indians, also for my keys. These were two little moments of happiness, moments of realization that these people care about me and if makes me feel a part of the family.

Today I also saw in myself how I changed, we arranged to meet at my house at noon, and my niece showed up at 12:40 and I didn’t even think about it, I was like yes this is normal I don’t care I didn’t bother about the waiting. Another moment was when we were playing soccer, we decided to play 1 against 1, so 1 person had to go out first, and I volunteered. I let others have fun, and enjoying doing that, something I couldn’t have done 5 months ago.

Another moment of realization today, (so many moments today!) this moments was about my family. I feel really good in my family today, first I was like: ‘yeah I’ll wash all plates’ but that isn’t fitting in, fitting in is telling your host brother that he has to do the other half. I don’t want to do all these chores so forced, I don’t want them to think I do it as I way to thank them, I do it because I am part of the family.

The thing about thanking your family is really hard, just saying thank you is not sufficient of course. But it is very difficult to show your host family how thankful you are. Especially my host family, they never asked for me they took me in during an emergency case and it should have been for just 2 weeks, but it turned out to be forever.

Right now everything is very good, close to perfect, not perfect but very close. The things which don’t make it perfect are just small but they will always be here. The thing just is that I don’t know when the next obstacle will come, but I know that it will come.

Day 130, el Miercoles 21 de Noviembre 2012 16:33

I like coffee talks.

I love taekwondo, I look forward to the practice all day, and give everything during them. The thing what motivates me is that I really see progress, and the teacher tells me that as well. But the philosophy behind it also is very interesting and nice. The only bad part is that I have to learn a lot of Korean words, and learning from Spanish to Korean is something I have never thought of, but I can do it.

Yesterday I sat with my host dad in front of the house enjoying a good cup of coffee and conversating. This is pretty Costa Rican, coffee talks in the afternoon. And I like them; it is so much better as watching television or something like that. We talked about interesting stuff and it gives me a better view in the Costa Rican life and I give my family a different view in the Dutch life.

Also there was something pretty funny and crazy yesterday night: my host brother was at his girlfriend 300 meters down the road, and then he called me to pick him up. He was afraid to walk alone after 10 P.M. the funny thing is that he actually is like 1 month older as me. But I like the fact that he calls me for it, and it kind of made me feel like a good big brother even though he is older. My host parents thought it was pretty funny as well, but then my host mom did something of what I think is way funnier; she started putting on Christmas decorations at 10:30 P.M. while we normally go to sleep at 9:30. Crazy Costa Ricans!

Today was a really nice day as well, I went to school for just hours. First there was a tourism exam and after that it appeared that we had to hand in our insect case today. Nobody had thought about so we didn’t have anything. So Chino, Hernan and I went to Chino’s house to make it. Chino has a beautiful house a bit out of Orotina. If you go out of Orotina you pretty quickly get into to pure nature. His house was really nice, it is not nice like a big villa but it fits perfectly into the nature. There is a garden with palm trees, an outside kitched and art, everywhere art. His dad is an artist; he makes beautiful sculptures and modern art. The house and garden is loaded with it.  We made this insect case out of some old wood and painted it and stuff. We also made delicious lunch and just chilled. I think the Costa Rican parents and kids are way closer to each, they trust each other more and the parents are closer to their kid’s friends. I very nice from the Ticos is that when you visit them that they will always invite you to come again, or to do something, if you are nice to them ofcourse!

I'm lazy

Day 122, el Martes 13 de Noviembre 2012 12:31

A pat on the shoulder.

It is weird how quickly your mood can change. This weekend I was so happy but then yesterday and today I feel a bit sad, without any real reason. I still am happy, but I just don’t feel it. Maybe it is because I’m just tired, or maybe because I miss traditional things with my friends at home, I don’t know. What I do know is that I will be over soon. In the weekend for sure, but probably earlier. Also it is way easier to see bad things over the good things.  

21:34

I slept in the afternoon while it was raining, one of the most delicious things to do! I woke up thinking it was Wednesday, it still is Tuesday so I kind of won myself a few hours, and here in Costa Rica every hour counts. Taekwondo was cool, I fit well in the group now and I see the other people there as my friends. The teacher as well is very nice, him giving me a pat on the shoulder can change your mood from kind of sad back to happy. Also he told me that I can go for an exam soon! Now I’m practicing English with my little hostbrother, we have been doing this all day. He has an English presentation tomorrow; I think this is one of the best ways I can help out.

Day 124, el Jeuves 15 de Noviembre 2012 16:46

Holidays, so closeee

I’m getting really lazy, I didn’t have any classes this week because my tourism teacher isn’t here and on exam days there are no exams neither. Fortunately that didn’t result in my being bored at home. Yesterday I was free all day and I chilled at Ruth’s house, we cooked something watched a movie, just chilling.

Today I did go to school; there were 2 exams, Spanish and English, the best and the worst. Sometimes I don’t like days like this and sometimes I do. I enter school at 7 and the first exam is at 9:10, the second exam is at 2:10 so there is a total of 5 hours waiting time. This drove me crazy on Tuesday, but today I liked it. It is just the tiny difference of enjoying your classmates’ craziness or being annoyed by it, sometimes I just have to have a different point of view. Something which is really important is taking initiative yourself instead of waiting on your classmates to talk to you.  

Picturesss

                                      Dinner photo from Panama, with sunburnnn

                                     School: legs up & chilling

                                     with my friend Estefania

                                     3 crazy clasmates

                                     Tourism, 60% of my schooltime here.

                                     eating green mango in  school with Andrecito.

                                     We made all kind of animals for the openday

                                     Our ''sea''

                                              Me and my hostmom on independence day.

                                     Jackie Chan and me, proud flagcarriers.

                                     Dancing uncles, Pura Vida.

                                      Lovely cloud forest.

Such a good weekend, so happy here!

Day 110, el Viernes 2 de Noviembre 2012 9:02

New friend in Orotina!

This is actually yesterday’s story, but I have free today so I can write now, in the morning.

First I took the bus to San José to pick up my antibiotics and then I took a bus back, within 3 hours I went to San José and back, but the bus ride was nice. Then I met up with Sarah, the new exchange student living in Orotina, but I already knew her from camp. So we walked around Orotina, and I met her family. Also we made a bank deposit for the Limon trip, soooooo excited about going on that trip. Limon is the Caribbean side of Costa Rica and it practically is a different country, the culture is different, the nature is and the language is. It’s like Friesland in the Netherlands. We are going to an amazing hotel in the middle of the jungle and close to the beach, Queen Size beds and a Jacuzzi in the room, say yeah!

Also I went to the barbershop to have my hair cut, it was incredibly long and now it is so short, but it cost €4 so that’s cool.

Today I don’t have to go to school, because my teacher is going on a trip, and that’s the only teacher I have today! J.

 Day 111, el sabado 3 de Noviembre 2012 10:29

lazyyyy

Again yesterday’s story today. Yesterday was a laaaaazy day, I was like a sloth. I think I went out of my bed 1 time until 2 in the afternoon, only to breakfast and shower. Later I went to the pet doctor with my host mom, our dog is going to have ini-mini-tiny baby dogs soon.

The best part of the day was in the afternoon, I played videogames with my 2 host brothers, and that just felt so good! It was finally doing something again like brothers, like used to play videogames with my brother at home. It made me happy. It isn’t just the beaches and rainforests that make me happy, it is also these little things.

Day 112, el Domingo 4 de Noviembre 2012 22:22

Christmas madness

Costa Ricans are craaaazy about christmas. We spent all Saturday unpacking Christmas stuff, which mostly included angels, santa’s and the birth of the baby Christ. We also put up a fake Christmas tree, and I got my own sock! `

Today we went to my uncle again, in Desmonte. First I skyped with my parents, and they will be coming in May! I’m going to make a tour for them; that will be awesome. Good practice for me if I will be studying tourism. Still didn’t figure what I want to study though. We ate loads of meat. And I made chocolate for the first time I came here! Honey truffles, they’re delicious! We went back home in the pick-up of one of my uncles, my hostbro, 2 nephews a uncle and me in the big, very cool. And for the first time I could see the beautiful star sky, there were a lot of stars, normally you can’t see them because of the clouds.

On Sundays I always appreciate my family here so much and it makes me so happy, and I know for sure I will miss everything so much!

Dia 113, el lunes 5 de noviembre 2012 22:14

Strangee day!

Yep, this was a strange day. School was normal, it was a Monday, so yeah… to be honest, Mondays here are not that bad. We always do animal stuff on Monday so today I did a presentation about insects with a classmate.  Doing a presentation is not that big of a deal like in the Netherlands, where I always stood in front of the class with a heartbeat of 200 at least.

After school I had to go to the bank to make a deposit but the bank closes at 4 and me school as well, so that isn’t good. When my host mom came home she said that she had good news with a bad part in it. She told me that she is going to buy a new house next year, but again said that there was a bad part in it. It made me very scared, because she made me think that I had to leave to house. That feeling was so weird, it was so weird because of course I felt sad, because I like this family a lot.

But it also gave me another feeling; it wasn’t happiness, or joy. It was a curious feeling, because if I would’ve had to leave this house that would’ve meant that I will have a new family in a new place. That feeling was very small, don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to leave this family and it would make me very sad if I would have to. But this feeling, it tells me something, it tells me something that I’ve figured out over the last months. Everybody seeks  change, always the same is boring. I went on an exchange for change, you go on a holiday to go away from the normal and change your life a bit. When the change is achieved, the old will be missed, but yet there’s a urge for more change. We do what we do to go through changes, to be better, or to make other things better.  I realized this by talking to some people, people in the Netherlands who want to be here, people here, who want to be in the Netherlands. Exchange students who want to live on the beach, people in the city who want the live in the mountains and vice versa. It’s all about change.

Day 114, el Martes 6 de noviembre 2012 21:54

Looking into the future.

I had a short school day of just 3 hours with 3 minutes of classes. I went back to Orotina in a car with one of my classmates; don’t think he has a driver’s license though. 

Back home I watched some stuff about the United States elections, still don’t get their voting system. In the afternoon I watched soccer, Ajax – Man City. The soccer was fun, but more fun was talking with my Dutch friends during the match, it was just like I was really there. Also I signed up for a Dutch university, the NHTV in Breda, international hotel management. I really hope I get into this university, the study looks great, business, tourism, economy, cooking and abroad studying! But only 150 people will be accepted.

In the night I hopped by my Taekwondo practice to talk with my teacher about my back. It was a nice talk, they are really nice to me and a made a few friends because of Taekwondo! Also I spoke with Fabio, my best friend here. He told me that he is changing schools to a private one; that made me sad, I will miss him in my school. But I will still see him during Taekwondo and he invited me to go watch a movie or something and that made me very happy.

And later I searched for houses with my host mom on the internet. This last week a felt a lot of bonding with my family, and I am really happy!!

Dia 116, el Miercoles 7 de noviembre 2012 22:19

Yum

School was pretty boring, what did almost nothing. But that gave me time to figure more out about the application for the university and I have some paperwork to do.

After school I went home and with my hostbrother to his girlfriend. There were also the girlfriends sister, another friend and a nephew of the girlfriend. We made brownies and pancakes and we chatted a lot, like Costa Rican teenagers! It was really nice, also because I did something with my hostbrother again. I now have more time with him since he finished his final exams.

Dia 118, el Viernes el 9 de noviembre 2012 7:27

University stuff

Gooooodmorning! I’m sitting in school now, totally forgot to write yesterday.

I spent all afternoon doing stuff to get into this university I wrote about. I wrote my motivation letter, and I signed up in Studielink. So I will soon sign up for the study for real.  Now I’m also searching for an internship somewhere, I hope I can work in the Hilton in Puntarenas for a few week so I get some more experience and enlarge my changes to get accepted in the program.

A funny fact, yesterday the ‘gossip law’ has been suspended. Apparently there was a law which forbids talking bad about people or things behind their backs. That’s an interesting law, but now it is no more.

I realized that I never took photos of my school so now I started taking some and I’ll upload those soon!

Day 118, el viernes 9 de noviembre 2012 7:17

‘La Finca’

My school keeps surprising me! Today I found out that my farm has cows! So I wanted to see them of course, like I never see cows in The Netherlands.. So I went in the afternoon during English class with the agriculture teacher on the tractor to the farm, which is a 5 minute walk away from the school. There was a whole part I have never seen before! There were like 15 cows, a cornfield and beautiful nature. We moved the cows to another field; it felt so good, walking through farmland, just like the vacations with my family in The Netherlands. After that 2 classmates came and another teacher, we walked to another field and there we planted like 50 banana plants, which were given to us by the Japanese ambassador!  Then it even got better, we decided to walk to the famous river, we everybody always is talking about but which I had never seen. This river is like paradise, the water was flowing a bit but in some spots it was still and it was a beautiful blue color. There were some teenagers in the river, I saw one of the boys diving from a rock into a light blue pool, I went crazy I wanted to go to the river so bad, to that beautiful paradise. So I asked my classmates if we could but they were like noooooh we cannot do that! I was a bit stunned, because Paradise River was so close, but they explained me that it is very dangerous. It can be raining in San Jose in then all that water will be coming down through this river with rocks and everything and I can happen every moment! But they said that in the summer holidays we will be going to this river a lot, one of my friends has a house really close to it. They told me that the summer holidays will be like this: River-Mangos-River-Eating-River-Party-Sleep-River-Mangos-River-Eating-River-Party-Sleep-Beach-River and we will do this for 7 weeks, can’t wait!

Day 121, el Lunes 12 de Noviembre 2012 14:53

Hapiness weekend!

This weekend was 100% pure happiness. Frida came to Orotina on Saturday morning, her host family had something in San José, so she came to chill hereJ. We went to Jaco after we had breakfast and after she had met my family. It is always good to be at Jaco, and with your best friend it is even better! We swam, we lay in the sun, and we talked. That’s a thing I really started to like while being here, just talk. Talk about serious things, funny things, creepy things, everything!! We had lunch at a soda, and it was my first time, I don’t know why because food at sodas is so cheap and so good! We were back at Oro around 6, I took a shower and got ready for the radio interview with The Netherlands. We had dinner after the interview and then we went to the supermarket and the park until 10. Later we tried to watch a movie but that didn’t work out since we fell asleep within 20 minutes.

On Sunday we woke up a bit later, which was a good thing. We went to Las Palmas with my host brother and a cousin, Las Palmas is great and I don’t know why I had never been there. It’s a hotel with a pool, a restaurant and a soccer field, the whole day for just €2,50!! This was very relaxed, just chilling by the pool all day; it felt soooo much like a holiday! We went back home at 4 and arrived just in time for the rain. And after that we went into Orotina again for a while. We were home alone when we came back, and that made me feel kind of special because it felt so much like home. We had a really good conversation, which is something I was sometimes. We heated up some spaghetti for dinner; I dropped the spaghetti twice, great great.  Then my host family came home and we just talked about a lot of stuff and that made me so happy as well, Frida was really a guest in my house and my family and they are so nice! In the evening we watched a movie, Frida, my host brother and me that also felt so natural! My host mom bought popcorn for us, and that also made me so happy, I am just so happy I can’t describe it!

Today Frida left early in the morning, it wasn’t really sad or something like that, we had a great weekend and we can happily look back to it. I don’t have school this week on Monday, Wednesday, or Friday so I could go back to sleep and for the first time I slept until 11 which was really good. Now I am just being really lazy and not doing anything, which also is good sometimes.

Day 103, el jeuves 25 de octubre 2012 21:25

Friend visit!

There were just classes in the morning, so I had the afternoon free. I spent my afternoon in my internetcafe, and I studied! Tomorrow I have an exam about insects. I went running to Ruth’s house later in the afternoon. There we just chilled. I ate dinner with her and her parents, they are really really nice and they told me I can always come there! We ate ‘perro calientes’ which means hot dog, and they were delicious hotdogs!

There not so much happening right now, just being relaxed and not doing so much right now. I’m really happy I went to Ruth today, I had something to do. I prefer Monday, Tuesday, and Friday because then I have Taekwondo! I didn’t get any email back about my waterpolo practices, so I doubt if I can go Saturday but I really hope I can!

Oh, and tomorrow there’s another exchange student coming to Orotina! It is Sarah from Switzerland, cool! J

Day 104, Friday 26^th of octuber.

Season change

 I started the day with failing my tourism exam about insects, but in return I get 100% in English exam.  Furthermore we made a small beach inside our tourism classroom for the openday next week. I think it looks pretty nice, gotta bring my photocamara on that day.

In the evening there was a Taekwondo meeting for all the parents and we just talked about the sport, and that there isn’t a lot of money etc. this made me decide that if I will be rich that I will donate money to this Taekwondo academy, promise made.

And this week I realized that the seasons are changing, the rain isn´t that heavy anymore and it is more like in the Netherlands, soft rain all day. When I come back from school it was raining really soft and the sun was shining really hard, I was walking through the park and it was just an amazing feeling, the hot sun with the nice rain and the sun shining through the palms and the rain being very visible. Really cool.

Dia 105, el domingo 28 de octubre 2012 18:30

Sleepover!

Yesterday I had an old school sleepover! I went to Esparza in the morning with bus. Romeyn picked me up from the park, we bought some ice coffee and we walked to josh’s house. Josh is a friend of Romeyn, he’s half from the USA, and half tico. I met josh’s mom and some other people. They made a pumpkin pie and I don’t say no to that, obviously. We just chilled a bit, we helped putting on some curtains and later we made milkshakes.  In the night we ordered pizza, watched a movie and just chilled. It was really nice to do something like this again!

When we woke up I had to hurry a bit to get the bus at 9 back to Orotina. That hurry was for nothing, I was told there was a bus at 9, and if not it would come at 9:30 for sure. The bus for 9:30 didn’t come, so I asked in a pulparia at what time a bus will come for sure, this would be at 10:30, that bus didn’t come either. When another bus passed I asked what time the bus to Orotina passes, it was 12:30, I didn’t have any other option so accepted it, and waited. The weird, or good thing is, that I didn’t get grumpy because of it. In the Netherlands I would have gone crazy for sure. But I just kept a big smile on my face, as most of the time here by the way, and I talked with other people at the bus stop. I was very relieved when the bus finally came, and I slept the whole ride so that wasn’t that bad.

When I got home I quick took a shower and went to my grandmother’s house for her birthday. I was afraid that my host family would be mad at me for being late, but they weren’t. They understood it! We had a typical Costa Rican party, first a big plate with rice, beans, salad and chicken and later cake and coffee. It was nice and I met some more family members.

Now I’m watching Avatar in Spanish, and I understand everything!

Day 106, el lunes 29 de octubre 2012 22:27

No inspiration,

I don’t really have inspiration nor energy to write something. It was an open day today at school, so we finished up our classroom and it looked pretty good, the sea and ach were nice. Then I had a math exam and later some small kids went to see our school. That wasn’t that interesting as I thought it would be, don’t know why I thought that. So after the lunch we could home.

I’m dying to get in contact with Sarah, the new girl in Orotina, but the other school has holiday so they are always busy. Then that made me a bit jealous, but then I talked with somebody and realized being jealous is the worst thing I can do. Just got to appreciate what I have, and that is a lot.

                                                                                                          

Day 107, el Martes 30 de octubre 2012 21:45

The quote of the day.

 I wanted to blog about this for a long time but I just kept forgetting it. Everyday a teacher writes the ‘quote of the day’ on the blackboard. Today it was ‘Traducir palabras a acciones’

This means, change words into action. Every day there is a quote like this. I think this shows a part of the difference between Dutch teachers and Costa Rican teachers. In The Netherlands the teacher’s job is to educate their students about their subject. In Costa Rica, the teachers really are mentors, and because of that the students treat them better as well. Of course this is for the majority of teachers, and not all of them.

Today I met Sarah and Ruth real quick in Orotina, good to see them again. I dropped out of Taekwondo practice because my back thingy exploded; a lot of blood was the consequence. I really hope that they will fix it tomorrow.

Day 108, el miercoles 31 de octubre 2012 22:07

Costa Rican surgery.

This definitely was the most painful day of my time in Costa Rica, well actually of all my life. I took a bus to San Jose at 8:30 and arrived exactly 1 hour later. I was going to be picked up at 10:30 so I decided to go to the foodcourt which I know was nearby. There I got the best iced cappuccino I ever had, so I’ll go back there sometime. At 10:30 Carolina picked me up and took me to the doctor. When it was my turn I first answered all the regular questions like do you take any medicine and stuff. But then the real part was about the happen, I took my shirt of and turned around. ( in this sentence the context is important :p ) I had to lie down on a doctor chair / table no idea how that should be called. The doctor examined it for a few seconds, and said that it might be a parasite, so then I got a bit scared. She told me what she was going to do and started the surgery.

First she burn froze the thingy, that was extremely cold but bearable.  Then the painful part came, she had to cut it off with I knife which had electricity flowing through it the close my veins by burning them. I didn’t get any anesthesia so I felt everything, it hurt really bad, and there was a lot of blood coming out of my back. This took like 10 minutes, and then it came off! She put the thing in a later jar, and cleaned and up and the surgery was done! She explained to me that there were bad cells in my system who wanted to leave, and they wanted to leave through my back. I forgot the name of it though. I realized that it was a good decision to go to this doctor and not to the clinic in Orotina, she is a specialist and helped me pretty good, and since I have unlimited medical expenses…. J

Carolina and I went to the lab afterwards to bring the thingy there for examination, so I was actually walking through the main street of San José with the just cut off part of my back. After lab back to the doctor to pick up our bags and afterwards we went to a Greek fast-food place to get lunch and it was very good! Then we went to the office to do the paperwork, the office is pretty cool! and after a hour or 2 it was all done and I went home with bus, unfortunately I forgot my medicine at the office so I will be going back tomorrow to pick these up… clever…

The best part about this day is that I was talking with Carolina a lot about all kind of things about the exchange and stuff. That helped me with understanding how EF works, and other parts of being on an exchange year. Also she answered some questions I was walking around with.

In the end, it is a good day to remember!