Whirlwind week

It all started last Saturday, when Ines and I were invited to the birthday celebration of Gilberth, the treasurer of FUDEBIOL. There was some mention of some animal he had killed earlier that week that we would be eating, but I didn't catch the details. The party was held under a gazebo in the gardens of the biological reserve, which was pretty idyllic. There was lots of meat and guarro, Costa Ricans' signature homemade alcohol. Trying to be open minded and blend in, I tried a little bit of everything. It was not until about halfway through the meal that I found out I was either eating goat or sheep. I'm still unclear on the details, but I figure it's probably better that way.

Sunday I went on a hike with the scouts and their fathers to a Christ statue with awesome views of the whole valley. Followed by a feast of more meat (this time I was promised it was cow) and cake at my host grandparents' house. Sunday afternoon I went to mass in Quebradas at 4pm with about 150 other community members. I had met the priest earlier last week and asked if I could make an announcement at the end of mass about English classes I was going to start teaching, so after much kneeling and mouthing words to prayers I didn't know, the priest made an announcement that he wanted to welcome a new member to the community, and that in our discussion earlier in the week he had found out I was Jewish, which he thought was wonderful because the Jews are considered the older brother of the Catholics. Wow, what an introduction. I was pretty nervous to get up in front of so many new people and speak Spanish, so I kept it brief but people were very receptive and a few came up to me after to ask questions about the class. Sunday night was the community Fathers' Day dinner in the Salon Comunal. One of the women's groups did all the cooking, and only dads were invited to sit and eat. About 40 dads showed up and all sat together and then there was a live band and dancing and games and prizes, and I was pretty impressed with how much everyone participated and appeared to have a genuinely good time. It's pretty cool being in a small, tight-knit community where everyone knows each other and feels comfortable being silly around each other.

The work week entailed more painting and many meetings. Tuesday night I went to the local development association's meeting with a bunch of people that talked super fast and switched topics every other sentence, so it was a little confusing. Wednesday I did a FODA analysis with AQUA, the artesan group in Quebradas, which was more successful than the ones we tried during training in that people showed up and participated. The big challenge with all these groups that I'm meeting is that they seem to genuinely want to work with me and develop new projects, but nobody has any time. These groups are voluntary and generally not people's first priority, because they also have families and other jobs. I am the only one who is a full time volunteer and have all the time in the world to dedicate to these projects, but I can't do it alone. I also went and visited a recycling center that was started by a woman in her house a few years ago and now is the main recycling center in San Isidro and has two other employees and a bunch of trash to sort. Recycling seems like an easy and obvious project to start, because people in Quebradas are very environmentally conscious, but of course nothing is easy as it seems. Thursday was my informational meeting for my English class. It was pouring rain, and I was really nervous no one would show up, but there ended up being a big turnout, and lots of people also said they had friends who couldn't make it but were interested in the class. So now the problem is figuring out how to accommodate everyone but still have a small enough group to be effective. But anyways I was excited that there is so much interest and I think it will be a good first project for me to do on my own and get to know more people.

After all this action, combined with inhaling paint fumes all week and stark weather changes from super hot in the mornings to cold and rainy in the afternoons, I started feeling a little sick yesterday and spent most of the afternoon sleeping, which is what I plan on continuing to do for the rest of the weekend. When my head is congested and I can hardly swallow, the last thing my brain wants to do is think in Spanish, so I'm going to try to lay low until I feel better. It's tough because I feel like I always have to be on when I'm walking around in the community, making an effort to say hi and meet people and smile at everyone, and it can get exhausting! Also my host mom made yucca bread and pineapple cake yesterday, so I think I'll be just fine staying inside and snacking on those for the rest of the weekend...