Long time.. long post

This week went by pretty fast.. since I didn't post anything all week, this post is probably going to be gigantic.

Monday was cool.. I got to sleep in, had my language class, and then chilled.

On Tuesday we talked about women in the church/bible and had a lady speak to us defending a more 'feminist' perspective from within the Bible. I'm pretty used to this since I go to a Wesleyan school where people are pretty gung ho for women in ministry but I think there were some people that weren't as comfortable. She seemed to go a little bit far on the pendulum for my taste but I suppose when you only have an hour or so to try to change people's minds, you can't hold back.

On Wednesday I got to help lead a 'praise and worship' time with other students. We did a song in Spanish and I got to play guitar which I'm kind of deprived of while I'm here.. win win.

On Thursday our talk was on drugs. We had a younger Costa Rican guy come in and talk to use about the drug war in Latin America/Costa Rica and why eventually, all drugs should be legalized. I had to address drugs my freshman year of college so I already was on the same page as this guy in terms of thoughts towards legalization.. however, he had some interesting perspective on the "War on Drugs" and pretty much did a good job of showing how much of a sham and disaster it has been for all parties involved minus drug lords themselves maybe...

On Friday I got to sleep in again, had a test in the Spanish class which went decent, and then chilled hardcore.

On Saturday I stayed in bed for a while and attempted to have some personal spiritual time and thought. Later I met up with some students and we went downtown with the intent of probably going to the mall. While we were on our way to the mall I saw a dirty looking dude sifting through a trashcan in the middle of the avenue (a pedestrian road with shops/stores for like 12 blocks). As we were walking by I saw him pull out what looked like a mint chocolate chip drink, and without any hesitation, he sipped up the small amount that was left through the straw that was left inside. It was an incredibly small moment, and I'm sure that this happens all around the world and even in Indy, but for some reason it stuck with me and struck me as really sad. It was sad that he was hungry/thirsty enough that he felt the need to dig through trash, it was sad that people constantly throw out unfinished food/drink, and its sad that people like him do exist all over the world, and are often seen as subhuman. Sometimes I'm a real Debbie downer..

Anyway, we went to the mall and kinda walked around. They got some food and I got a mango/banana/strawberry smoothie that was super tasty and then we went back home. Not too eventful but better than staying in the house all day, right?

Today I woke up kinda early and met up with another student near LASP to wait for a van/bus to pick us up. I didn't really know what I had signed myself up for other than that we were going to a finca (farm) and there was going to be a pool.. and like 5 or 6 other friends were going to be there. After waiting kind of a while, a minibus shows up and we get on. I saw familiar faces at the back of the van (other students) surrounded by a lot of unfamiliar tico faces.. and instead of going to the back, I got told I could sit up front right behind the passenger seat but pretty much entirely disconnected from the other seats :p. We picked up some other ticos/ticas and after like 45 minutes (I didn't talk to anyone the whole time.. I'm such an extrovert) we got to a property. The property was up a hill in a neighborhood and nothing like a farm I'd imagine. There was a big open semi-outdoor picnic/meeting room where we put our stuff, a rectangle pool (not to be confused with circle ones) and on the property there were also a lot of coffee plants, I think? We threw the frisbee around and even tried some ultimate frisbee although we didn't have very much open area, played some UNO (for some reason, people here LOVE uno... hah!), and I played monkey in the middle with a soccer ball with some tico dudes for a while. After getting sweaty, I went to get into the pool. I jumped in and within 2 minutes I was sitting on the side because it wasn't heated at all and I wasn't about to continue inflicting that sort of torture on myself. At one point later in the day while a lot of people were playing uno and I was sitting outside next to some of the other students, I tried interacting with this little girl who was sitting a few feet away to my right. After I gave her a rock as gift and she pushed it to the ground and started giggling, it started a 30~ minute fun time session with rocks as the main toy. Worth noting: little kids are hard to understand, especially when they speak another language than English. So that was fun.

Oh, also, some of the men that were there had gotten some sugar cane for us and cut it into pieces for us to chew. I'd never done that before but it was actually pretty cool. You just kinda chew and suck on this wood textured stuff and you taste sugary goodness.

That's all I can think of for now. Thanks for reading. Next weekend we are going to the province of Limón. It's supposed to have really strong Carribean influences and a food they call "rice and beans" (they say the english words.. haha). I'm excited to go there.. and word on the street is that there are sloths in Limón as well so maybe I can make some new friends while I'm there.