Counting down to Finals

These last few weeks after my fall break away have been interesting. Lots of work has been done and of course with it being the end of the semester the work is basically coming out of my ears! haha. I've done a few things these last few weekends but nothing extremely interesting. I have some pics that I'll put up later. This weekend we went to Arenal which I had already gone to when my family was here but I really like that area so I had a good time going back. This weekend after about 10 changes we are going to the beach, and getting a lot of work done while sunbathing :).

I only have 3 weeks it's nuts that time has flown by sooooo fast!!!

I applied for Teach for America which is something I have been looking at for a long time and have advanced to the next round, so here in a few weeks I find out if I move on to the final round. Wish me luck and keep your fingers crossed!!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Coral

Guatemala and Honduras Photos

Guatemala and Honduras

Where to begin! Guatemala was in my opinion the best vacation of my life. I took a tour with Mundo Guatemala, which for anyone who has contemplated a trip you should all check into this company I was extremely well taken care of and everything was absolutely wonderful. But on with the details, I arrived on Saturday and immediately transferred to Antigua, the original colonial capital of Guatemala and the headquarters when Central America was its own unit during Spanish rule. I arrived late afternoon so I just went to my beautiful hotel and prepared to leave bright and early for Chichicastenango.

Chichicastenango is the world famous Indigenous market in Guatemala. It is the largest market in all of Central America, and while it was spectacular I had suspected many bargains and a huge variety but I found that later in the week was when I actually found more authentic items and better deals, but that does not take away from the fact that it was still extremely interesting to see this market and explore and buy a few souvenirs. After spending the day at the market I took a shuttle to Panahachel, the largest town that surrounds the world famous Lake Atitlan, which is currently being voting on as one of the finalists for the top 7 natural wonders of the world that gives you some idea as to how impressive this place was. I stayed there over night and the next day took a lake tour and visited the surrounding villages, each with their own flair and characteristics. The lake is surrounded by three volcanoes and tons of high mountain tops it is just absolutely breathtaking. I visited San Pedro, San Antonio Palpao and Santiago Atitlan around the lake. Santiago is known for its artist and their paintings, and since going to Paris and studying art I kind of have a fascination for local painting so of course I definitely bought myself one here. San Antonio is like looking at a Latin American version of the Italy or Greece Cliffside with all the houses with a stunning cathedral right in the middle of the town. San Pedro is a very hippie new age oriented place, really different as you tend to not see new age/hippie go hand in hand with traditional Latin culture. I absolutely loved the boat tour it was great.
The next day I was back in Antigua and had the day off from my tour so I actually went with Elizabeth Bell, the owner of Antigua Tours, on one of her tours of the city and in the afternoon a tour of the architectural and art history of the surrounding small indigenous villages. Both of the tours were fantastic and worth every penny I got to learn so much about the city, its history, its people past and present and just really see the city through the eyes of a local expert which was incredible. At the end of the second tour I got to visit a very cool fair trade style co-op run by 12 indigenous families with all their textiles, these were some of the best artist in the country and I got to learn the different techniques and how the styles give you insight into the class structure and community dynamics within these communities just based on this workmanship, really interesting and I bought a beautiful door hanger with the national bird the Quetzal really pretty.
Over night I took the bus to Flores to go see Tikal, the largest Mayan ruins, the following day. It was one of the most mysterious and fascinating places I’ve ever seen. I think after visiting Stonehenge in England I have a connection with ruins and I definitely had the same feeling here. It was like I could close my eyes and just see the Mayans running around or holding rituals, really bizarre but absolutely incredible; I even got to climb some of the ruins. I came back on the overnight bus again to Antigua. The next day was another free day in Antigua so I relaxed and did my work so I wouldn’t have to do it the rest of the time when I was enjoying myself. Antigua is an incredible city; I honestly think I could stay there for much more than a few days. It is similar to Grenada in Nicaragua but nowhere near the same level of poverty, it has definitely prospered the only problem now is its becoming too touristy, that’s the opinion I kept hearing from the locals but despite all that I loved the city and would have really liked to explore more.
Bright and early the next day I was off to Honduras to visit Copan. Copan are the most well preserved ruins in the entire Mesoamerica region, you can still see some of the colors on the hieroglyphics. Copan is nowhere near as large as Tikal but its known for its incredible preservation, and that is no joke it’s incredible how well preserved all the designs still are, and like I said you can even still make out some of the colors on the statues. I stayed in Copan over night and the location in Honduras in extremely rustic but very peaceful. The hotel was incredible so when I wasn’t at the ruins I got to enjoy the beautiful scenery from the hotel into the country and the mountains. Let’s just say me and the hammock had a good time that evening relaxing.
Well that’s the short and sweet version of my stories from Guatemala I hope you enjoy the photographs of this incredible country, I know I sure enjoyed visited this incredibly beautiful country with its extremely friendly colorful people.


Enjoy!

Spanish Accents

Ok so I'm not quiet sure why but everyone here seems to think I'm from a completely different place when they hear me speak Spanish. I've had people tell me my Puerto Rican accent is so obvious, which I think is hillarious since I haven't even lived there. I'm also had people think I'm Cuban, or South American, and the most hilarious one was today in a cab when the guy thought I was from Russia or Ukraine can someone please explain that to me!!! I don't really get it, but it's been interesting to see how complete strangers take you just by the way you speak. Well that's my rant of the week. I leave for Guatemala on Saturday and I can't wait, there will tons of photos when I get back.

Hope you are all enjoying them and that everyone is doing well.

Coral

Nicaragua

Well the group just got back from our visa trip to Nicaragua where we went to Granada and San Juan del Sur. Granada is their original colonial capital and has a large contrast between the original building and how they are kept up compared to the more recent buildings and how they are not very well kept. There is a lot more poverty in Nicaragua as well. From the minute you cross the border you have tons of people either begging for money, food, or trying to get you to buy their products. Even the animals are malnourished and is definately a sight that is difficult to forget. Even with all the poverty that was making us feel helpless because we knew if we helped one all of them would want our money or food or whatever we could give, it was very difficult not to help these people. We did though on our last day before we went to San Juan del Sur gave our leftovers from dinner the night before the homeless kids that are always in the main plaza. People really like and take pride in where they are from and don't mind talking to you about the issues, however politics is completely out of the question they steer away from this topic as quickly as possible, you can tell that there is still resentment from their history that keeps them for being too open so they censor their comments as if to not offend the government. We got to visit the beautiful craft town right outside the main area in Granada and were able to attempt at making pottery on a manual machine, well that was most definately interesting! We also got to see the beautiful viewpoint overseeing the huge volcano and Lake Nicaragua which is stunning. We also got to go to the market, where I as usual went crazy, markets are my weakness when I travel because I love getting unique gifts for family and friends. I got some beautiful things for ridiculously cheap so I was able to get a lot more for my buck in Nicaragua then in Costa Rica. I know this next week in the Guatemalan market it will be the same! When we went to San Juan del Sur we really just relaxed until we headed back to the bus the next day as we were all exhausted from a very long ride and day in Granada.

Nicaragua was difinately interesting and different I hope you enjoy the pictures of their nature and the beautiful colonial side of Granada.

Nicaragua Pictures

Ohh Political Science

So I'm not usually a fan of politic science class wise, most definately into politics but all the theory nonsense is just not practical for my life. SO LET ME TELL YOU what a DIFFERENCE a political science in Costa Rica is like. Can we say field trip (s)!!!!! I have officially been on four seperate field trips with my class to Congress, Tribunal Election Council, Foreign Affairs and tomorrow the Presidency. And yeah I'm getting a grade for this is that not amazing. I'm actually getting to visit and talk to people that are involved with the issues we discuss in class and they are all so willing to help and get connected with students. It's just been really interesting to get to meet people working in this field in another country it's really quite cool. I didn't think I had mentioned these before so I just thought I'd share. Political science isn't the only class I've had various field trips in my GST with Dr.Weston has also had several as well as class outside, even my Spanish class got to go on one yesterday.

Yeah basically I just absolutely love studying abroad, I mean I love being at Elon and that's a huge difference from most colleges but having these experiences abroad has by far been my favorite thing about Elon, and this one is most definately not an exception.

Hope you are enjoying the pictures and this week there will be many more from Nicaragua.

Hope everyone is doing well!

New way to see pictures

Well I finally figured out how to get my pictures in slideshow format onto the blog, so below are all the different pictures from the semester and where they were taken. It rotates but if you want to see then in full size all you have to do is click the screen. Hope you enjoy!

Monteverde Pictures

Manuel Antonio Pictures

Paragliding Photos

Poas and La Paz Photos

San Jose and Cartago Pictures

San Ramon

Ziplinning

Fantastic Weekend and Countdown for Nicaragua

Well this past weekend I got to go see Juanes in concert on Thursday night and it was AMAZING! It was my first concert which made it even better. The opening band was a local band and they were ok but the real show was definately Juanes, and in proper Costa Rica fashion it started raining of course the minute Juanes came on stage. But it actually made it even better, the atmosphere was just so much more personal and fun the whole group had a blast, and the Professor and his family went too so we all had a good time. Friday four of us headed to Caldera to the beach and on Saturday Jose took us all paragliding and everyone had a great time. Sunday the group had a trip and we went to Cartago to visit the ruins and the basilica, we also went to a traditional farmers market which was massive, and we went to a gorgeous viewpoint and the first church in Costa Rica both in the Orosi valley. This week is kind of nuts for all of us since we go on our visa trip to renew our visas this weekend to Nicaragua and next week I leave Saturday for Guatemala for my fall break and then it's already November!!! ahhh I'm so not excited about that I'm having a great time and really do not want to go home anytime soon. So because the rest of this month is kind of full we have tons of work due this week so we are all pretty  busy. 

Well I'm sure I'll have exciting stories after our visit to Nicaragua so stay tuned for that.

And as always check the picture link

www.picasaweb.google.com/luvlatindance

Extremely busy weekend

Ok well last week wasn't too exciting so I'm going to tell you guys about the insanely busy upcoming weekend. Well Vanessa as you think I'm just having entirely too much fun this is really going to make you mad. Well I'm going to a Juanes concert, the beach, paragliding, and Cartago yes that's all the same weekend. But don't be confused I am taking class, 5 of them actually so I'm busy all week long with class but the weekends are our stress relief of the week. I hope everyone is doing well and I will have a lot of pictures after this weekend. 

Monteverde

Well this past weekend we went to Monteverde as a group, Monteverde is much colder then San Jose but a really nice temperature. We took a really long hike Saturday and Sunday did the skywalk, some of the others did the zipline but since I had already done that I decided to try something different. Something really interesting I got to do when we got there on Friday was visit two alternative schools, the Monteverde Cloud Forest School, and the Quaker Friends School. I'm really interested in alternative educational systems and other countries systems so this was definately what I enjoyed the most of my weekend, my professor, his wife, and Scott and I went and did this when we first arrived. There are some pictures that you all can see, but because of the crummy weather we didn't see any animals but there are still some nice pictures you all can see. This weekend is still up in the air, the rest of the group is in an environmental studies class but since I'm doing an internship I'm not in that class, well they have a field trip this weekend, so I may or may not go out of town so we'll see. I can't believe it's almost October time is absolutely flying, we have to do our visa trip and we are going to Nicaragua and then for fall break I'm heading to Guatemala and Honduras hopefully and I'm really excited about this!!

Hope everyone is doing well,

Coral

Paragliding, Juanes, IMAS internship, and Español x2

Well the end of last week and my weekend were quiet interesting. After I wrote the last post I went to my semester internship for the first time. I work at IMAS- Instituto Mixto de Ayuda Social, which is basically the government run HUGE social services department. They do all sorts of work basically all the work that you think of a social worker doing except this is on a regional and national scale. I work at the national headquarters in San Jose and basically help out with whatever projects are at hand that week. My focus is within the educational programs and more specifically their ADVANCEMOS program for kids ages 7-21. That was an interesting experience because from the beginning my internship experience here has been a bit of a run around and this is actually the second location where I was sent to as my original internship ended up falling through. It is also really interesting switching from a working mindset in English to one in Spanish, even for me who comes from a Spanish speaking family this transition has most definately been an interesting and challenging experience so far. I literally had more literature to read as "homework" for my internship then my other four classes combined this past weekend. But even though it is tedious it is really interesting to see how this style of company works in another country.

I also found out that day before my classes and internship that the group was going to a Juanes concert, I am beyond excited about this as I've never been to a concert and my first one happens to be an extremely popular Latin artist right now. I am sooooooooo excited so that is in two weeks and I'm really looking forward to it.

Over the weekend I went back to San Ramon, which I've come to feel is my home away from home. I live with a local family here in San Jose and have classes and work in the city but being able to leave the city and enjoy some time with other friends has been a great stress reliever and lets me just get away every once in a while. Well Jose, a friend I visited who I've already mentioned is a paragliding pilot well I got the opportunity to do this again this past weekend and to just enjoy that gorgeous view from where the flights take off, if you don't know what I'm talking about go check out some of the pictures.

Because of some switching around on hours with the internship I'm getting to take a second more focused Spanish class by myself with a professor so I actually get to work on what I really need which is writing and literature in Spanish. Well I had this class today for the first time and I absolutely love it, my instructor is great and I get to work with a lot of interesting material so it's actually great to just have a one-on-one class instead of dredful thinking you are the only one with an instructor, but I really like it and am looking forward to that class.

Well this weekend the group is off to Monteverde, which is supposed to be one of the most beautiful places in Costa Rica so I'm really excited and am sure I'll have some great pictures from that too, we are all also doing the ziplinning again so that should be fun. I'll write about that next week.

Hope everyone is doing well.

Rambling Man on Bus, Monkeys, Lizards, and Beaches

So as you can see it's been another busy week here in San Jose. About mid-week last week I was taking the bus home from downtown and at the next stop everyone got on and off and sat down, and then all of a sudden this man just decides to talk about his school in natural medicine and about different plants that heal, well I'm interested in that but everyone just completely ignored the guy, so imagine this man talked for a good 20 minutes and no one was listening, it was quiet sad but apparently they are used to it because nothing seemed to bother them. I was thinking to myself I'm in London and Paris again in the subway where no one speaks and when they do they look at you like you are nuts, apparently that is the way of life on public transportation in other countries.

This past weekend the group got to go to Manuel Antonio, which on the Pacific side and supposed to be one of the nicest beaches in Costa Rica. Well I've got to say I'm still in love with our beaches in Costa Rica but Manuel Antonio beach was nice, and it was nice to go to the Pacific which I had never been to. Manuel Antonio is really known for its national park more then its beaches so we started out early last Saturday and hiked through the park I got to see monkeys, lizards, sloths, frogs, spiders and a whole lot more extremely close and personal, forget the zoo you should just come hike the park ( and it's much much cheaper). I really enjoyed the park and the beaches but I would have to say the park was better in my opinion then the beach.

This weekend is a long weekend as it is Independence Weekend here in Costa Rica and I was originally planning on going to Panama but unfortunately I wasn't allowed to go, so hopefully near the end I will at least get to go down to the canal and a border city that is supposed to be stunning. Our plans changed way too many times to count in the last week so after everything was said and done I'm heading back to my mountain retreat in San Ramon and hopefully going paragliding again. I've heard about some interesting traditions about independence day so it should be interesting and I'm sure I'll have stories about that next week.

And as usual I am uploading pictures as we speak and you can you go check them out at

http://picasaweb.google.com/LuvLatinDance

Hope you enjoy!

WII FIT, "usted, vos" and catering mom

As you can see this past week has also been quiet interesting. My Tica sister, Gabby has a WII and the FIT to go along with it. Well let's just say that she is completely kicking my butt at any game we try but the FIT was the most humorous of them all. Me and Gabby are now having competitions with the FIT so everytime she beats me she laughs and so now its a competition so any time I beat her it is the same way, so you can just imagine miss competitive having her sister beating her is not a fun thing so we've turned it into a friendly little competition ( you really have to visualize us falling over doing yoga and the hulahoop it's quiet funny).

The next random comments are the differences between the formality spoken here and what I've been used to speaking in Spanish. Everyone calls everyone else usted it is never the informal (friends/family) version of tu, even my Tica mom calls her daughter usted, I thought that was so odd. They had told me that they use usted here more but I didn't realize it was even going to be spoken between family members and close friends, vos goes along with that. I was always told not to learn to vosotros form of verbs because that is only used in Spain and you can get around without using that, well my teachers were definately wrong people are always calling me vos or usted instead of tu it's truly quiet odd when you are not used to hearing or using that form.

My Tica mom has been given the honorary title of caterer. She does not own her own catering business but she might as well have one, it doesn't matter what kind of occasion is going on she is always the one asked to cook. So she has been up several days really early or cooking through the afternoon for an event that she is in charge of. It's quiet nice to have the best cook as your host mom, and for all of you that know how picky I am should be happy to know that I have tried pretty much everything they have given me.

The rest of the group got here last Thursday and Friday we had orientation. Saturday we went and visited Poas volcano and La Paz waterfalls, I had already been there with my family but La Paz has been my favorite place so I had no problem going again and I had a great time. After we got back to San Jose I took the bus to San Ramon where we stayed when my family was here as they had there yearly festival yesterday. I got to see the festival which was a little disappointing but me and Jose Eduardo were laughing so much at it that it was still a good time. Our family friend Delia was also here so I had dinner with her and Jose before returning to San Jose. This week will be my first full week of classes and this weekend we will be going on another excursion.

I hope you are all enjoying the pictures and I will be posting some new ones in the next few days. Here is the link once again.

http://picasaweb.google.com/LuvLatinDance

Hilarious Cultural Differences

So I thought everyone would get a kick out of some of these differences. First and foremost this is definitely not a country where they dislike Americans, the day I got here we went to lunch as my parents were on the next flight and they immediately gave me an English menu, I don't know what on earth made them think I didn't speak Spanish but whatever I didn't take it to heart I can tell they just try to make visitors feel at home. Driving is hilarious here, for any of you who have visited a Latin American country before know we all tend to be quiet crazy drivers, forget common sense, but the roads are much better here then I imagined, except in San Jose it is nuts here in San Jose especially in downtown people are all over the streets that the cars can barely get through they even had to make part of the street a pedestrian zone. Distance between major points really isn't all that much but since you are driving up and down mountains it takes quiet a while to get to things. Something I found really interesting were the pulperias, they are street side convenience stores and social outlets for people. I haven't seen them in San Jose but once you get out of city limits they are everywhere. Each area I have visited has had its own unique character and that's what makes then a like and different from one another. Forget stress, people here don't even know what that is, everyone is so laid back always its unbelievable, that spirit catches on and I know I've already noticed that I take time and look at the scenery or just let outside and enjoy the breeze, it is pretty darn amazing. Hopefully this stress free zone will last when classes start on Monday. The university system here is also really interesting there is practically no such thing as a four year college everything is set up like career schools no basics only what you want to study. You can even get a law degree in two years after high school it's actually the shortest program of all and many people go that route, so if you ever get in trouble here there are more then enough lawyers to go around. Ever with what for us might seem like a lack of education because of its career specific approach people here are always on top of national and international news. I even had a run for my money the other day with Jose Eduardo talking about Latin American politics which is my specialty and not his. To go along with the crazy driving is the street system there is no such thing as a street name here and all directions are given to you by landmarks and number of blocks in whichever direction, it is completely confusing to get around so at least I don't have to drive I just have to figure out the bus system. Every place I have been to seems to have beautiful landscaping around their homes and the birds are always in the yard singing, we even have a pair that comes and takes a bath in the bird bath in the backyard. There are no sidewalks here or hardly any and even if you take public transportation you still usually have to walk for a little while to your destination, I really don't like walking on the edge of the street but you really have no choose. This past weekend when I went paragliding I noticed that there are a ton of expatriots that live here, they are everywhere , I've even asked some of them what the process of moving to another country was like, they all seem to say that to Costa Rica it's extremely easy. Even though my ear has already switched to hearing Spanish all the time it's funny when you hear English because it sounds so out of place.

Some words I've found hilarious are below

here they call a giant cookie an ear (in Spanish), the first day they asked me if I wanted an ear I looked at them like they were speaking gibberish

perro is what they said for hot dog

palomitas which for our family is a type of bird here they say that for popcorn

I went to the movies with my Tica family yesterday and we saw the mummy I was thinking it was going to be in English with Spanish subtitles but no it was all in Spanish it's hilarious to watch Brandon Fracher speaking Spanish (clearly he isn't talking in Spanish but it's still amusing)

The malls here are also different from ours outside of city limits they call mall what we would say is just a shopping center, but here in San Jose the mall is 4 stories. You can seriously find everything under the sun at the mall it's truly one stop shopping, there are even groceries inside the malls.

I also think it's funny that we all pretty much know that us Latinos do not understand the concept of being on time, well here they call things that you have to be at on time as "tiempo Americano"- American time. However I find it funny that food here is always served at least in this house at the same time everyday no exceptions.

These are some of things I've noticed that are different and amusing, I hope you enjoyed some of the random word chooses they make that I think are funny.

Bienvenidos a Costa Rica

Well I've officially now been in Costa Rica for about two weeks. My family was here for the first week and a half and now they are back home and I am now with my new Tica family in San Jose, Costa Rica. I'll be referring to my adopted family for the semester as my Tica family as here in Costa Rica they call themselves the ticos just so everyone can be on the same wavelength. In two weeks sooo much has happened. My family and I stayed in San Ramon with family friends for these first two weeks I was here before my classes started here in San Jose. San Ramon is this absolutely gorgeous town located in central Costa Rica in the mountains it is absolutely breathtaking at any hour of the day, whether the sun is rising multiply shades of blue at 5:30 or going down with pinks, blues, and yellows in the evening it is just beautiful. The sun goes down here no later then 6pm and the rosters keep waking me up at 5:30-6am which has definitely been an adjustment but one that I've seemed to made very easily takes to the colors outside you get tired early since it gets dark so early and you wake up early because the sun is out so early. Costa Rica has shades of colors that you didn't even know existed, even with my new really good camera I bought to bring there are not enough shades of blue and green to show all the shades from when you see it in person, but it still takes incredible photographs and really lets you see the true beauty of Costa Rica. When we went to explore other areas we first visited Arenal volcano which is west of San Ramon, it was absolutely incredible to see a volcano so up close and person it is just something completely out of this world. On our way to Arenal about half way between San Ramon and Arenal is San Lorenzo which is known to be the best place to go ziplinning in Costa Rica, amazing!!! Everyone should do this at this once in their life it is just beautiful and an incredible adrenaline rush. We also visited Zarcero which is known for its beautiful gardens and topiaries in their town center which is directly in front of this beautiful church that has really unique architecture, it is just a gorgeous place to see even when it is raining like it was when we got there. After Zarcero that day we also visited Sarchi. Sarchi is the artist capital of Costa Rica, they are known for their wood furniture and crafts, it is incredible what they can make out of wood it is just out of this world. They make all sorts of crafts with the about 10 different styles of wood found here, I even bought jewelry made of it, and you all know I'm not a jewelry person that's how beautiful it was. We also went and visited the Poas volcano and La Paz waterfall gardens. Poas unfortunately was completely invisible the day we went but we got just a brief glimpse and even that was breathtaking. From there we went to close by La Paz waterfalls and gardens. This place has been one of my biggest highlights so far, incredible. The waterfalls are the last thing you see there are multiply exhibits before you start the hike down through the waterfalls. There is an aviary exhibit with all sorts of exotic birds from all over Costa Rica, there is also a monkey exhibit, a stunning butterfly exhibit, and a hummingbird garden. It was just sooo beautiful and that was all before you saw the incredible waterfalls. By far my favorite touristy place in Costa Rica. We went to see my Tica family while my family was here so they could meet them before they left, so that day with the wonderful help of our escort Jose we went to San Jose meet them, saw the Pre-Columbian and the gold museum and the national theatre. From San Jose on the way home we went to Cartago. Cartago also has its own personal flavor, it is known for the ruins of an old church and their Basilica de la Virgen de los Angeles, this was a really interesting cathedral because it was only gray and white on the outside but very colorful on the inside it was really a unique sight to see, but I'm a personal fan of ruins so I absolutely loved those. Those were all the major sights that we saw around the country while my family was here, but we also explored San Ramon where we stayed and got to meet friends of our family friend who we had gone to visit. After my parents left this past weekend me and Jose Edwardo went paragliding. Jose Edwardo is a personal friend of our family friend who invited us to their house in San Ramon, he has just been absolutely wonderful and has really helped my family and I find our way around Costa Rica. Well he is a licensed paragliding pilot and he goes every weekend to Punta Cana about an hour outside of San Ramon to go paragliding. He even owns his own business doing this on the weekends, I will be posted his info later as I don't have it near me but if you ever come to Costa Rica it is by far one of the coolest experiences I have had while here and I highly recommend it and Jose Edward is a great pilot I really felt completely safe flying all over. You really truly feel like you are flying, well yeah I know you basically are, but still it is just incredible to fly over the ocean, mountains, trees, and other landscapes of Costa Rica. I went both this past Saturday and Sunday and it was just an incredible experience. I also got to finally go to the beach after flying on Sunday so that was a great way to end my time in San Ramon. Today I came back to San Jose and have moved in with my host family for the semester. We all get along really great and we have a ton in common so that makes it a really easy adjustment. The house also has three mascots, they have a rabbit and a small parrot, but they also have a beautiful visiting hummingbird set that comes the backyard all the time. As you can tell I'm really enjoying my time in Costa Rica, I just may never go back home :), jk Eddie I promise I will be at your meets :) . I am uploading some photos while we speak and will finish tomorrow. I am posting all of them and them separate folders that are listed as my favorites, for those of you who don't have time to see them all go there and if you love them and want to see more feel free to check out the rest. Here is the link again for the photos

http://picasaweb.google.com/LuvLatinDance

Hope you enjoy them!

Coral :)

Update from junior year

Junior year was quick and long at the same time. I took full loads both semesters so that I could graduate early in December. My junior year took me on another adventure to Nashville, New Orleans, Mrytle Beach, and home for the first long period of time since the beginning of my college. This year I had two internships, one with the local school district next to my university, and this summer in the language and translation department of a hospital. While I know that's a short and sweet review it wasn't really a year based on fun it was far more academic I did have plenty of new places to see and a few really wonderful nights out with my friends. Feel free to see some of those pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/LuvLatinDance

I am now leaving this weekend for Costa Rica where I will spend the next 5 months. Check back at the blog and the picture link as I will be posted quite a bit about my new adventures.