Costa Rica Immersion A: Service Project Video

Hello All,
Below is a video blog about our service project. Hope you enjoy!

Costa Rica Immersion C: Service Project Update

Before our arrival to Las Brisas, the group spent a few days relaxing on the white sand beaches of Manuel Antonio, where we took surf lessons, played Frisbee, played games of chicken in the hotel pool, and checked out the sloths, monkeys, iguanas, hermit crabs, and parrots that have made Manuel Antonio famous. It was a great few days on the beach, although everyone seemed excited to get started on our service project and get to meet their Costa Rican families.

It is now our third day in Las Brisas, our home for the next few weeks, and the group has already impressed our local hosts (and group leaders) alike with their abundance of energy and enthusiasm for our project. As many of you saw in the last post, our project is to get as much of the foundation laid for a two-story building that will contain a kindergarten classroom, two offices, a library, and a computer room. Needless to say, this is a very large project and we are happy to have two great Nicaraguan maestros de obra (foreman), Emilio and Edwin, on the site to keep us on track, safe, and busy. The group has been incredibly self-motivating, starting work before our scheduled time the past two days!

Even through the various stomach aches, sun burns, bumps and bruises that are a normal occurrence during a program of this sort, the group has been in high spirits. Whether it is an impromptu dance-off in the rain on makeshift cinderblock stages, a wrestling match between friends, or conversations about life back home, the group has become close and seems to bond more each day.

Tonight we are going to celebrate Jake’s birthday at a roller-disco ring (yup, they actually have one close to our community!) with a homemade birthday cake, a gift, and a card from everyone, so stay tuned for more postings soon!

Until next time,

Paul and Flora

A note from each participant:

“At first, I loved softening up the grass with the pick axe and the hoe. Then I loved digging trenches with the shovel. Now, I love doing them both in the rain!”
Big Ace aka Asa Pitt

“I am having the time of my life here in Costa Rica. My host family is about as close to real family as they can get, especially since they threw me a surprise birthday party! To my family, I love you and miss you!”
Jake Grossman

“My host mom is so nice and my little brother and sister love to draw pictures for me. The food is great! My mom even gave me a cheeseburger for breakfast to make me feel more at home. I leanred to hackeysack and play chicken but I’m not very skilled at either. I miss you Mom, Dad, and Paige!”
Haley Anderson

“ED lives on.”
Alex Wenzl

“My little brother is better than me at football (soccer), and he as the most awesome computer games as well.”
Diego Lander

“The first night with my host family was kind of ackward and it made me nervous. Thankfully, on the second night we bonded talking about Chicago. Now, I really like my host family and I’m glad I was paired with them.”
Asha Ransby-Sporn

“Manuel Antonio was insane. The first day we got situated in the hotel (one of the nicest I’ve ever stayed in) it had an awesome pool with a view of the coast, and a bar where we all got pina coladas (non-alcoholic of course) and had a great time. I clmbed a few palm trees and got swarmed by monster ants. I got like ten coconuts though. The second day we surfed and that was awesome. Guru gave some great tips. But the national park was where it was at. We saw monkeys, tree frogs, and a lot of sloths, and the beach was beautiful. I’ve never seen water so clear. The group laid back and relaxed in the shade, but Flora, Diego and I went exploring along the beach. We found the rocks full of crabs running around, we saw a ton of hermit crabs brawling for this one shell, and best of all we saw a sea turtle. Flora pointed it out and Diego and I jumped in the water and swam with it. Got a few pictures too, it was awesome. Definitely an experience to go home with!”
Cameron Soltani

“Hello! I’m getting a great amount of food and I haven’t lost my common sense, DAD. Give the dogs kisses for me and I’m having an unforgettable time!”
Jackie Nelson

“I have a rather large fan club in the community. Unfortunately, they are mostly 12 year old girls.”
Jesse Jacobs

My family is pretty awesome! Bonding with my sister is cool, The service project is tough but it’s been going pretty well too. Alex and I were killing it in the trenches today, and Alex says hi to his mom.”
I love you Mom, Dad, and Alex.
Lisa Caldwell

“Hey mom. Guess what? My host family has a computer with games. Ha ha. Also, I’m not sick anymore. Costa Rican medication ain’t bad. Mmkay, bye now.”
Your (now shared) son, Ian McKenna

“Nothing beats playing futbol with a bunch of 8 year old mini David Beckhams.”
Big Ace aka Asa Pitt

“I just hit myself in the face with a shovel, but other than that I’m having the time of my life!”
Sarah Drake

“Surfing was really fun. I got lots of scraps and bruises, but it was definitely worth it. The beach was so pretty. Mom, Dad, Sophie, Shelby: Love you and miss you.”
Katie Miller

“Hey Mom and Dad- things are great. Gonna come back buff and tan!”
(PS, the horses here are better then Iago).”
Nik Rudzitis

“My favorite part so far was surfing, even though it was really challenging. I love my host family! I’ve bonded with my sister over the Jonas Brothers and David Beckham.”
Grace Clark-Mchale

“My family in Las Brisas is really awesome… They make me THREE meals a day and we never have leftovers. I have shoveled more in the past three days than I have in my entire life. I expect to be a mini-Arnold by the time I come home.”
Jennifer Konick

Discovery C is still hungry for more!!!

Since our last opportunity to access the world’s web our group of 22 has thrived and asked for more and more from each stop along Costa Rica’s Pacific coast and west facing slopes.

Students, leaders and chauffeur (Erick) alike have enjoyed so many things traveling in this remarkable land of “pure life” or “pura vida”.  Rich markets have allowed us to shop and learn much about fresh and seasonal foods (fruits, vegetables, fish, etc). Such mouth watering meals and roadside snacks from such exotic fruits and finger foods remind us of how these are only available during such travel experiences and are little known in our home communities.

Our last day at Manuel Antonio (only a day after our last blog) we enjoyed the beach and bartering with artists and street vendors for a fair price (for both sides) for gifts to take back home and souvenirs to remind us of our time in Costa Rica.

On Monday we arrived to our host village of Herradura where the cool night of the Costa Rican highland was warmed by young brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers waiting for us in the heart of our new home village. Each Tico and Tica and each gringito y gringita nervously waited to see who they would share a week of food, conversation, music and dance, games, early rooster’s ‘qui-qui-ri-qui’ (or cock-a-doodle-doo depending on if you’ve found your inner latina/o) and early evenings bedtimes from both mental and physical exhaustion. all could barely believe that this week of home stay, service (building a community stage and painting the town church and 5on5 soccer field in Herradura’s ‘Salon’) and appreciation for simple pleasures would pass so fast.

A week of fantastic food, hard yet mysteriously rewarding work, hikes, games, dances and more can easily be summed up by a few quotes in Walking Tree journals from the days in Herradura.

“Sin Duda, this is the best comida I have ever ate in my life, because it is 100% local, fresh, organic and homemade.”        -Elliot Mammet

“We returned to the work site to talk with the others and a small group of us decided to hike up to see the waterfall.  Of course, I had to bring some tamales for us to enjoy.  The waterfall was pretty cool but my favorite part was the trek back to our houses in the always present Costa Rican rain storm.  By the time I returned home I was drenched. I ate a few more tamales and played some guitar for my brother and then I was off to bed to rest up for another long day.” Pura Vida   – Billy Weir

“People are already planning their return trip to the village. Speaking from my experience in the village, these people are the kindest, hardest working and most understanding/open people I’ve ever encountered.  My ability to speak and understand Spanish may not have been the best, but that didn’t stop my family from trying to know me.  I’ve learned so much from these people in only a week.  I feel incredibly grateful that I had the opportunity to spend the past week in one of the most gorgeous locations I have ever seen with the most compassionate people I have ever met.”                           -Laura Leonard

Leaving Herradura was a combined feeling of achievement with our community service goals, hastened goodbyes to our host families and friends, and curiosity for what would come next.

For our last stop before heading home, an old friend of Walking Tree hosted our stay at Pura Suerte, an organic farm in which our group stayed in jungalow accomodations, learned about the reforestation of what was pasture land for several decades and virgin rainforest for thousands of years before that.  Wrapping up the two week trip in this environment was especially rewarding as we felt we were continuing with our mission of culturally and environmentally stimulating/sustainable travel.  A visit to Nauyaca waterfall and many fun games filled our afternoons and evenings when we weren’t taking farm tours, eating “jungle fusion” food grown right around us, listening to howler monkeys and cicadas, and taking in all the hightened sences brought on from the joungle.

Alas, tommorow we wake up to shuttle to our airport and say our goodbyes.  Our wanderlust comes to an end for now and all of us look forward to more opportunities to see the world through such unused lenses as that which we’ve put on over the last two weeks.  Thanks for reading and keep in touch!

Costa Rica Immersion C: Surfing and Service Project

Greetings All!

I am writing this from Zarcero, a town about 30 minutes away from our host village, Las Brisas. We arrived here last night, and everything is off to a great start! I will post morte on the beach, surf lessons, the national park, as well as our first night in the village, but I wanted to get these pictures and video posted from Justin and Guru up on the site tonight so that you could all see what we accomplished in just one morning. Check it out!

Costa Rica Explorer: Down to the Wire

We are working hard to get our wall done before Friday´s Fiesta de Despedida.  We did however find some time to celebrate Imani´s birthday, check out a cool culebra (snake), and learn some cumbia to show off at our good bye party. 

We are all enjoying seeing the final results of our hard work.  Who knew how many steps went into building a wall!  We can´t believe two weeks have already flown by!  Next time we write we´ll all be relaxing at the beach. 

 Hasta pronto!!