On Monday, we decided to go downtown to the Parque Nacional and found that it was a cute little park with a bridge over a little stream and a small island in the middle that had picnic tables on it. It was a really cute place. While there, a group of high schoolers video-interviewed us on our view of Costa Rica and the politics here. We didn't know much about the political situation, but we got to share our opinion. In return, they allowed me to video tape them for a linguistics project I'll be doing this fall at Cleveland State.
I stayed up late that night doing all of my homework that I would have to do the next 2 days because Tuesday was my 24th birthday!
My friend Robin, who turned 24 a week before me, and I were planning on being as childish as possible on our birthdays so we planned on going to the roller skating rink to have our birthday parties. However, the rink was closed until 7 that night since kids are in school (it's 'winter' here). Instead, we decided to go play at the playground at my house on the swings, see-saw, monkey bars and we tried to find a 4-leaf-clover, but didn't have any success. Later on, we went out to celebrate at a restaurant, but it wasn't as fun as acting like a kid.
Some photos of my house and house family at dinner.
On Wednesday, I had tests in both of my classes but they were relatively easy. I got A's on both for final grades of A's in both Literature and Linguistics.
Today, I had to give presentations in each class which went pretty well. We were let out early to get ready for the ceremony, and we decided to go eat at a Peruvian restaurant. Before we left our school building, there was an earthquake. I was on the 4th floor sitting in the hallway and it felt like someone was shaking the building. I looked out the window, and it looked like the building was swaying in reference to everything else. The ground was vibrating underneath of us. Some of the professors came out of their classrooms, and seeing that we were foreigners, asked us if we were okay and if this was our first earthquake. I said that it was my first, and he congratulated me, which was funny, but it was still scary to have the whole building shake. As a result, the traffic lights went out on the main roads that we had to cross to get to the restaurant. But, there is no "treat intersections as a 4-way-stop" rule here for when the lights go out, it's just a free-for-all with cars honking and dodging each other. It was an adventure to cross the 6-lane main road to go eat! But here I am still alive to tell the tale.
The restaurant was really cute and had great food. I had tomato soup, lomo saltado, which is a dish Kevin's mom always makes me, chicha, pudding and ceviche. Luckily, by the time we were going back home, the lights started working again and we could be safer.
I got dressed in a new dress I bought here and then went back to the university for the award ceremony. They called our names and gave us certificates. Afterwards, we had a dinner with the whole group where some funny things happened.
First, my friend Robin was dared to toast the whole room of people, and there must have been 100 of us in the program. She tapped her class with her knife and lifted it and just said "a toast" while everyone stared at her and then she added "congratulations". It was hilarious, I was dying at how awkward it was.
Then, we were the last table to get dessert and I saw that it was 3 leches cake and I really wanted more than 1 piece. I decided that I would hide my dish under the table so that I would be served twice, but I started eating the cake while it was on my lap. The cake lady was on her way back to the table to bring more cake and my friend Judy yelled at me to stop chewing so that I wouldn't give away my cake situation. I stopped chewing and held my breath real quick, but I found the situation so hilarious that I busted out laughing and spit cake all over Judy and my friend Ashley's faces. It was gross, but so funny I almost peed. It was all worth it in the end, though, because I did get my second piece of cake.
In class and with my certificate
Afterwards, we went out to sing karaoke at a place near campus to celebrate the end of classes with our professors. All of the singers were really good, but I figured that there would be some silly people, like me, who sing just to be funny. I chose a song by Calle 13 called "No hay nadie como tu" as a song to rap to in Spanish and my friends said they would dance in the background. I did the song and sounded horrible not only because I'm tone deaf, but because I was trying to dance at the same time too but was running out of breath to sing. Needless to say, I ended up being the only horribly silly one that night while everyone else was really good at singing. My friends video taped me though and said that I was their favorite. Sorry for making your ears bleed, San José.
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