Return to Life in Monteverde

Life in monteverde, where to begin?? Well, after Rachel´s birthday time has started to fly by and we are now in the panicked stage of our trip in which we are trying to do and see as much as possible (while spending as little as possible). We made it through our first week back without spending a scent and found that life was still pretty amazing. There are so many fun things to do that really we are hardly ever bored. One day we decided to try and walk to the waterfalls in the small town of san luis which consists of a few small fincas (farms). Our friend Milton who is our boss/leader/amazing friend at the school lives on a farm out there and he invited us to his house for a visit and lunch. Milton has made our trip so so much more exciting and makes everyday of work fun with his crazy jokes (bromas) and hilarious pronunciation of english words like Wheelbarrow. His friend Eduardo is my neighbor and favorite Tico. He dances and signs while he works and always makes sure we are not working too hard. He says its best to work with Despacio and take our time to enjoy life in costa rica. We enjoy taking this advice every day. With Eduardo Coffee break is always ten minutes longer and work never feels like work at all. Today, I discoverd a tarantula crawling around on the ground and eduardo decided to pick it up. Then, to my complete amazement rachel held out her hand and said she wanted to hold it too. I grabbed the camera and made sure to get a picture of rachel and her first tarantula. Then the tarantula worked its way up rachels arm and started pulling out its huge red fangs. While rachel was standing there with the tarantula, Eduardo told me quietly that tarantula bites hurt at least ten times as much as a wasp sting. This one was only a baby but im sure its bite would have hurt a ton. Anways back to the story: just as it was about to bite rachel on the arm (tarantulas move slow) Eduardo stepped in and gently knocked it off without hurting rachel or the tarantula.

Anyways, back to the visit to Miltons farm. After walking for about 12 kilometers we reached Miltons farm only to find out that he was at work at the school. Sad that we had missed him, we looked around and then headed to the waterfalls that were rumored to be about 2 kilometers down some road. Later we found out that Milton had arrived at home only 10 minutes after we had left. After wandering down the road we found a river that supposedly could be followed for a couple of kilometers in order to reach the waterfalls. The real entrance to the waterfalls was a small farm up the road that charged 8 dollars a person. Too poor to pay, we bravely treked down a trail to the base of the river. A few interns had told us that if we just followed the river all the way to the waterfall we could make it in about an hour for free. (rivers in costa rica are public property so it was ok to walk up). The interns however had done this hike weeks before when the weather had been a bit dryer and so we found ourselves at the base of a massive river that would not have been safe to hike. Sadly, we walked home.

The next day, a group of new volunteers arrived from a private school in the states called Mercersburg. After working for the school for about a month, Milton and Eduardo got us to help lead the new volunteers in their work. This turned out to be not so much fun at all because the volunteers talk constantly about school and colllege. Two things rachel and I do not want to talk about on our trip.....

Rachel got a new volunteer from the group of 16 mercersburg sophomores and juniors called James. He doesnt speak a word of spanish but is getting along well with the family. Since his arrival, Rachel has felt like things with the family have definitely gotten better. She can´t tell if it´s his lack of spanish, or the fact that he´s only here for one week so the family wants him to experience family life here as quick as possible, but her family has been doing more together and opening up much more to rachel. and they play spoons here!

OH! and we made the final decision to leave a bit early. Our final day of work at the school is going to be next Thursday. We chose this date because although everyday of work is fun and exciting we have too many places that we want to go on opposite sides of the country. Really we are only missing 3 days of school because friday is a holiday. This gives us the whole weekend which is really needed to get from one side of the country to the other. Our time has really been the perfect amount because we are going to be sad about leaving but excited about traveling and going home.

ciao ciao

Lou
(with a little bit of rach)