The end

So I guess this will probably be my last blog... it's a weird feeling to be leaving my final host family tomorrow... Even though I've been looking forward to coming home, I know that I will forever miss this country and my time in it.

Anyways.. to recap the past week!

On Thursday we mostly spent our time caring for the oxen. In the morning Felipe and I fed the pig and gathered some zacate from the hill/plot of land near where we found the snake. After feeding them we spent a lot of time cleaning up around the corral. There was a thick layer of mushed down old reeds and leaves and stuff like that. After we were done cleaning, Felipe began working on a little canal for water during the rain so that it doesn't pool into the corral nor ruin the roads by creating big cracks and stuff. During this time a university student and his father showed up because the student is doing a project for his class and needed to set stuff up on the farm. The dad at first mistook me for a Costa Rican until he spoke to me and I didn't understand what he was saying. Oh well. During lunch a little itty bitty red ant bit my hand and seriously for 2 days it was a little bump and itched... I can't imagine getting bit by a ton of them.

This is the kind of stuff I was cleaning up- they were all matted down and covering everything

Felipe carrying freshly cut zacate down to the corral

My favorite animal I got to become friends with in Costa Rica. I don't remember his name but I fed him a lot and he started to let me pet him while he'd eat... a good lookin ox if I do say so myself!

On Friday I went with Oscar to work taking down some kind of chicken-wire fencing around this storage building. During the work Oscar took down the "bee" hive and got some honeycomb for us to eat. I put bee in quotes because they weren't honeybees- they were some different type of bug that doesn't even have stingers (I think they can bite though). I had never eaten raw honey but it was pretty dang good... and who would have thought that bee's wax was actually the consistency of wax?! I spent the rest of the working day helping make more water canal things in the dirt road and went back in the evening to help out as well.

the hive thing

up close

On Saturday I got to sleep in a little bit. Diego (the son of a farmer friend?) and Felipe woke up super early and went all the way down the mountain to bring up heavy wood towards the top. They lead the oxen down as well to be with the others. I fed the pig and then met up with them (probably at about the halfway point of the mountain) and carried the wood with them. We would take 1 thing of wood on our backs for about a minute or two and drop it off with others and then go back for another. There weren't that many but they were super heavy, especially walking uphill with them. I was with them for a few hours before Felipe was satisfied enough to say that we would do the rest tomorrow.

The wood payload where we left it for the next day

Felipe and Diego resting before making our way back up

That evening I went with Felipe to a gathering of local oxen farmers, 2 of which also have trapiches to harvest sugar cane. It was a little uncomfortable and I didn't really move from where I sat down because I didn't know anyone and it being a Spanish social setting made that even harder. I had a good time though and it was nice to just experience it.

So this was in the house... Felipe said he put on his pants one time and one stung him on his thigh- I have since been paranoid. I didn't even know scorpions existed here! However, Costa Rican scorpion venom isn't very dangerous to humans.. it just hurts.

On Sunday Felipe told me to rest since it was a Sunday- during the morning my host brother-in-law was visiting and used his 4 wheeler to move the wood the rest of the way to the house with Felipe. I literally chilled the whole day and worked a little on my essay.

This is how they make coffee in Costa Rica traditionally. It's a sack that they put the coffee in and then pour hot water in. It doesn't seem all that special to me but ticos will tell you they can taste the difference so I guess I trust their opinion.

On Monday Felipe had to go to a funeral and told me to just work on my essay due Thursday. I fed the pig in the morning and took a bunch of pictures to show my path... and I finished my essay. That's abut it.

A walk through from the corral to the house (52 photos)
I wanted to make a slide show but I couldn't really think of a time effective way to do that online so I just made a public facebook album instead.

On Tuesday I fed the pig and worked on the water canals more with Felipe. I also spent a part of the day cutting up brush that was eventually burned in a small fire. I was expecting to go back out in the afternoon but no one came and got me :p...

And finally, today, we spent the morning removing all of these old zacate reeds and burning them in a big fire. It was toughish work moving the reeds because they were all interwoven but we got it done and by the afternoon the hillside was pretty 'clean'. After a lunch break with Felipe, we worked on some final water canals around the storage shed because there is a ton of erosion occurring on the flat area it sits on and he is trying to avoid that as much as he can.

bringing the trash down to burn

Starting the fire. I was pretty sure that it was going to set the whole hillside on fire...

                                 

Okay, it was definitely close to setting the whole hillside on fire but Oscar kept a good enough eye on it and we had some water that we could use when we needed.

While I was raking to clear the path for digging the canals this guy ran out.. I think he's a baby tarantula? I wasn't a big fan :p

After three and a half months, I miss a lot of things and people from the United States for sure. Life here hasn't been as comfortable and hasn't always been as entertaining (without video games and close friends) but in all, is has been incredibly valuable to me. I'm so thankful for the time I've had here and I like I said, I'm definitely going to miss this place.

Tomorrow morning I leave with Felipe to go 'to town' to catch the bus to San Jose. I hope to meet up with some of the other students that will be taking that bus route so that I don't have to travel alone and then get a taxi or something dumb. Thursday and Friday will be days of reintegration and probably a lot of reminiscing/story telling with the other students before we leave for the airport on Saturday in the pura mañana (my flight leaves at 6:35..)!

Thanks for reading and/or keeping up with the blog... hope to see you all soon!