Finally...a real update!

I finally got this entry on the blog! The past month or so of my life:

School wise, we finished the first trimester at the end of May and no one failed my class! The 4^th grade has good days and bad days. The parents were informed of this during the report card meeting (they aren’t just acting up in English) and the general consensus of the parents was…we just don’t know what to do with our kids. So it doesn’t appear that there will be any sort of behavior changes because of punishment at home. I’m also kind of hesitant to write notes home now that my host mom informed of one kid in particular who gets beaten for every bad grade/bad behavior. It’s not so much a lack of respect for me, but fighting amongst each other. So for now, I’m just trying to keep the kids who can’t get along separated and am doing less group work and games (which is when most of the fighting occurs.)

This past week, I took this group to a Botanical Garden as part of a science program that the Ministry of Education puts on. I went because there are English components. The ministry seems to think these 4^th graders are capable of understanding Emily Dickinson poems when they can barely write a complete sentence in English. I was also supposed to be teaching words like “watershed” and “hydrology.” Besides the fact that my knowledge on hydrology is pretty limited, I just think it’s much more important to teach the kid’s words they will actually USE in conversation. So we just kind of skimmed over the science part and went back to learning names for family members and parts of the body.

My 6^th grade study group is going great…the girls are really learning a lot and I can already see that their vocabulary and grammar is better. I have no doubt that Alise, my host-cousin will pass the test to get into the bilingual high school.

Outside of school, I feel like I have found my group of friends here. All of them are significantly older or significantly younger than me but I’ve discovered it really doesn’t matter. I spend time with some of my co-workers at school (Dineth the director, Yami the cleaning lady and Liseth the cook) after school. Last weekend we all went to Dineth’s house to sing karaoke. I’ve also started going to typical Costa Rican dance classes with Isa, the Religion teacher on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It’s free and great exercise (I always leave covered in sweat) which is good since the Costa Rican diet isn’t exactly balanced.

A few weekends ago, I went to Cartago with Daniela and Albertina to see the Basilica. It’s famous for La Negrita, a black virgin that survived two earthquakes and is thought to have healing properties. Since I don’t have my new camera battery yet, I used my FlipVideo as a kind of camera. Here’s the front of the basilica.

This is Daniela, Mari (a neighbor friend) and Dilson (Mari’s grandson) during from the spring of holy water. I drank some too…in hopes that I don’t get mono like most of the rest of the volunteers. As of now, 12 out of 22 volunteers have had or currently have the virus. So far I am symptom-free…let’s hope I stay that way. The WorldTeach doctor even had to call the government to say there was an epidemic of mono because of us!

In between masses, people go up to the alter to see La Negrita…on their knees! It was a really beautiful thing to see but I would imagine your knees are pretty sore afterwards.

That’s all for now…less than two weeks and my parents and Tori come to visit. I’m looking forward to my two families meeting and being “touristy” with my (US) family.