Do you LOVE IT?

It's so crazy to think that we only have a few more days at the Center! With this major project that we are doing, it feels like we have hardly any time left here... which I guess is fine because I could really go for some A/C every once in a while.

Today was devoted completely to our projects. We still had class/lecture which really bugged me considering we are expected to do so much for this project. In class we did talk about our projects, but I felt like it was a waste of time that we could have been using to get more data or work on our papers. Whatever, I'm over it. There was a toucan outside of our classroom today though which was super cool! It was super loud and kept squawking the entire time haha

We went out and collected data for our project today. We went to 2 different river sites and measured the velocity of the river there (using a ping-pong ball and timing it) and we took water samples which we filtered to see all of the sediment deposits that were flowing in that section of the river. We did that twice today, and I guess it was successful-ish? For one of our readings, we got a negative answer for how much sediment we collected which obviously wasn't true since you can't lose weight... but DQ said it was ok and just laughed. Other than that, we worked on our paper for the rest of the day. We get to do it all over again tomorrow! But luckily we have no class at all so we can actually focus on our projects.

It has been really funny to watch everyone's mannerisms change the longer that we have been here. We are all starting to pick up on little things that each other does and copy them. For example, Shelly ALWAYS uses abbreviations on words and instead of asking people if they like something, she will ask "do you love it?" Weeellllllll everyone has picked up on abbreviating things and asking if people LOVE certain things. Any and every word is fair game to be abbreviated, like "sugar" becoming "sug". We constantly laugh because people do it without even meaning to now and it catches them off guard.

We are all starting to get a lot closer to each other. I still remember the first night at dinner here at the Center was relatively quiet and awkward conversations at our separate tables, but now we are all yelling and laughing across all the tables like we are a big family. It has made everything so much more fun!

Here are a few random pictures from the last few days!

Enjoy, and I miss everyone!

BEST DAY EVER!

There has been NOTHING even remotely bad about today at all. First of all, we didn't have class this morning so I skipped breakfast and got to sleep until 10:45! Definitely was a great start to the day. Then we ate lunch, and at 12 we left to go... ZIP-LINING! The place we went was in La Fortuna pretty close to the volcano that we went to the other day. In order to get there, we had to drive on the most bumpy road ever... but it was worth it. Also on the way, we stopped at a little convenient store and found the coolest hats ever! I got an orange one, Eric got a yellow one, and Jessica got a lime green one. They all had a different animal on them and said "Pura Vida" on the front of them, which is Costa Rica's famous greeting/saying. Needless to say, we wore them all day long.

The zip line went through/over the rainforest and we could see Lake Arenal the whole time. In order to get to the first zipline, we had to ride up a gondola type thing which was really fun. The guide encouraged us to stand up while we were going so that we could look through the forest for animals... but we didn't see any. When we got to the first platform, one of the workers was waiting for us with mango and pineapple juice drinks. After a short tutorial on the right/best way to zipline, we were off! We basically went on a zipline tour on a series of 7 different ziplines throughout the forest. The first one was pretty small just to get us warmed up, then the rest of the ziplines were huge and fast!!! After they strapped us in, we basically just leaned back and put our knees up and went flying. The ziplines went SO FAST and we obviously had an amazing view over the canopy of the forest with the volcano and the lake in the background. I had been looking forward to this all trip, and it definitely exceeded my expectations. It was one of the most adventurous and fun things that I have ever done, and even the people that were scared to do it at first ended up loving it. Everyone left with a smile, and we got some pretty good pictures and videos. We were technically supposed to hold on with 2 hands the whole time, so this video isn't wonderful because I had it dangling for a while, but it is still pretty cool if you turn your head to the right a little.

When we were leaving the ziplines, we saw monkeys!!!! We were driving down the road, and our driver spotted monkeys climbing around in the trees. We thought there was only one at first, but there ended up being about 5. They were obviously wild, and were climbing and jumping through the trees. It was the cherry on top of this already awesome day. They were the first wild monkeys that we had seen, and everyone had been looking for monkeys all trip long.

The day didn't even end after ziplining! Right after that, we hopped back on the bus and went to a hot spring. I was just expecting a little lake type thing with a bunch of people sitting it in awkwardly staring at each other, but I was definitely wrong! The hot springs ended up being at a resort, and it was a series of pools that we could go to with varying temperatures and slides and waterfalls! It was so relaxing and fun. The slide in one of the pools was the fastest slide that I have ever been on... minus the Texas Freefall slides and bodyslides that go straight down. This slide said that it got to speeds about 45 kph. I'm not sure how fast that translates to, but it was pretty fast, to the point where at some points I wasn't even on the slide, and other points I was going so far up the side of it that I felt like I was going to go in a complete circle around the tube. We all hung out at the springs for a few hours, and ended up eating dinner there. The dinner was a buffet with pasta and chicken and a bunch of other stuff. Definitely a good break from rice and beans! And to our surprise, we had apparently already paid for the springs/dinner so we didn't have to pay when we got there, so we were all even happier.

Now we are back at the Center and having a little fiesta! All of us are sitting on one of the porches hanging out and talking. Man I sure do love Costa Rica :)

Today we presented our proposals that we worked on all day yesterday... and I totally bombed my presentation. My excuse is that because I stayed up so late last night writing my actual proposal, I didn't get a chance to practice what I was going to say. But I was also tired of doing all of this work, so I generally didn't care too much because I didn't want my proposal to get picked anyways. Thankfully it didn't. The project that I will be researching/working on for the last week here is testing to see how fast the river (Rio Chachagua) flows and how much sedimentation is moving in the stream. I'm working with my roommate Trey and another girl Shelly which will be fun. I'm excited to actually do a project where we will be going out and collecting our own data, rather than relying on just journals and other research methods. And apparently, nobody has ever done this type of research at the Soltis Center before, so we will be the first people EVER to do a study like this here! Cool!

I'm so glad that we have no more assignments to do. We basically get to make our own schedule from now on, so the whole class basically decided to take tonight off! And even better... I'm skipping breakfast tomorrow and sleeping in because we don't have class! And even better than that... WE GET TO GO ZIP-LINING TOMORROW AFTERNOON!!!!! I have been waiting to do this ever since I first saw the flyer to study abroad in Costa Rica. Tomorrow is going to be an awesome day for sure.

Oddly enough, I am sick and tired of being on my computer. I thought that when I came to Costa Rica, I would hardly use any technology and would be out of touch with "the world". But everything that we have done the last few days has required us to be on our computers all day long. That reason, along with the fact that today was a chill day with not much happening, is why this post is going to be really short. Everyone is starting to get a little restless here since we have pretty much been in the same location for a week now with no way to get out. It's not like we can just walk down the street to go to a restaurant or something... we're in the middle of a rainforest.

Assuming I don't hit a tree or something like that while zip-lining tomorrow, expect some cool pictures from tomorrow's adventures!

This is the waterfall that I wrote about a few days ago... Looking at this pic, the rock that we sat on is literally right on the other side of the falls. B-E-A-UTIFUL

As much fun as it is to hike UP a river, writing proposals are not fun at all

I apologize... this post is going to be fairly short and quick. Today we learned about our proposals for the group research projects that we will be doing for the remaining week that we have at the Soltis Center. We learned about the whole proposal process this morning (a proposal is basically a paper to convince people that your research project is a good one to participate in) and our proposals were due tonight!!! I've never written one before, hence the reason that I just now finished it at 2 in the morning, but I know that they take longer than one day to write them. Needless to say, everyone was super stressed out all day today but we all managed to throw something together to turn it. They're not going to be that great... but hey we finised. The idea that I wrote about for my proposal is to measure the soil moisture content/gradient of soil around a fern to see whether there is more moisture right at the stem of the plant, or whether there is more moisture in the soil a ways away from the plant. There were a few more variables, but that's the summary of mine. We'll see tomorrow if anyone votes for mine for one of the groups to research!

In between that, 7 of us went on a hike in one of the rivers that runs on the property! Two of the people  wanted to use the river for their proposals, so Dr. Quiring (everyone is starting to call him DQ which has been pretty humorous) took a few of us to go check it out. My project obviously had nothing to do with the river, but I wanted to go on an adventure... so I did just that! We all wore rain boots since we knew that we would be getting soaked, but before we started on our hike, we had a little fun. I had my rubber boots on and I was laying on my stomach on the tile floor in the main/living area of the Center. I wasn't even thinking about striking a pose, but I was laying with my knees bent and my feet in the air and I had my chin rested on my hand, so it looked like I was modeling. Someone took a picture of me laying like that with my boots, and that started a chain of events with all of us guys that had the boots on. We ended up all doing different poses to make a "calendar", and even DQ posed with his boots and his walking stick! I don't have the pictures of it yet, but they will come soon. The hike in the river was so much fun. We all tried to stay on the rocks or in the shallow water so that we wouldn't get wet, but by the end we were wading in water that was a little less than waist deep. Trey (one of my roommates) ended up falling 3 times and landed straight on his butt every single time. Thankfully he didn't get hurt, but all of us were cracking up.

A couple last quick facts for the day:
1. WE DIDN'T HAVE RICE OR BEANS WITH DINNER!!!!!!!! First time since we've been here that that has happened.
2. We saw a cockroach that was probably about 4 or 5 inches long
3. The number of bugs here still amazes me
4. I am going to sleep now. Byeeeeeeeee!

Oh hot dam

IT WAS SO STINKIN HOT TODAY! I don't know why they call this the rainforest... it has hardly rained since we have been here at all. Before we came, we were told that it would rain for a few hours every single day. We have barely gotten a few TOTAL hours of rain with all of hte days added up! The rain usually cools it down and helps to get rid of some of the humidity, but since it hasnt rained it has just been miserable without air conditioning. Today we actually had a few hours of free time after lunch so that we could nap/relax, but there was no way that I could sleep because of how much I was sweating.

This morning though, we went to a hydroelectric dam that is pretty close to the Soltis Center. We got to put on some hard hats and wear ear plugs and walk through the control center which contained all of the turbines and generators that controlled the dam. The tour was pretty cool since we got to see all of the inside things that controlled the whole dam. Then we took our bus and actually went to the dam which was really cool! We got to stand on a little platform that overlooked the entire river. Apparently the dam provides electricity to 15,000 homes in the area... and it is only running 8 hours a day for 15 days out of the month. All of the other times it is closed for maintenance or to conserve even more energy.

Ever since I've been here (minus day 1... I think) I have taken a picture of the meal that I have eaten that day. Mainly to prove to people that we literally eat rice and beans with almost every single meal, but also just to remember all the crazy things that we eat. Like for dinner tonight, our main course was some mixture of eggs with green beans. I have no clue how they made it, but it looked like they somehow implanted the green beans into a huge circle of egg. I don't know where they get the creativity for some of our dishes. Hopefully at the end of the trip I can make a slideshow of every meal that I've eaten here! Being abroad has also made me wish that I kept up with learning Spanish. It would be so cool to be able to speak the language and understand everyone because only 1 of the kids with me knows Spanish, so everyone turns to him to ask him how to say things.

Even with all the hot, humid weather we've been having and all of the crazy long assignments we've had to do, I wouldn't trade this experience for anything! It hasn't even been a full week yet and I'm already having the time of my life :)

Today we got to collect some more data! This morning, we split into groups of 4 and went on a new trail in the rainforest! This one wasn't as long, but the place where my group collected our data we had to walk through grass that was up to about my chest. That wasn't all too fun, but (here comes my nerdy side talking) we collected soil moisture content of a 5x5 meter area. After we were done collecting data, we came back and worked on another assignment all day long.

Tonight has been fun though! Since we finished early, we have had some free time. Right now I'm sitting outside with 4 other people. We are looking down the sidewalk from our bungalos which overlooks all the lights from the city. I'm not sure what city it is... but seeing all the lights at a distance is really cool. It feels amazing outside tonight too because it's finally not too humid for once. And there are so many stars! This is the first night that this many stars have been out and they are EVERYWHERE! I'm so glad that we finished early tonight so that we could have this free time. We are taking pictures leaving the shutter open for a long time so that we can draw things in the picture with a lazer pointer haha

Aside from Costa Rica... today has been another reminder as to why Fish Camp is one of the most important things to me. I was able to talk to a lot of people from Camp Edwards today and also a couple from Camp Allen. It was so nice to catch up with everyone that I got to talk to! Fish Camp has been the thing that has impacted my college experience the most up to this point, and seeing how much everyone cares about me and how close I am to them makes me love the organization even more. I can truly say that my best friends have come from Fish Camp, and I do not know what I would do without it.

There was my sentimental moment... but now I'm going to go take more pictures and enjoy this nice evening! Sorry, I don't really have any pictures today to upload since we were at the Center all day. But more will come soon!

Another hard day at work

Ah today was such a long day. It was so hard to get out of bed this morning after our busy and exciting day yesterday. Everyone was dragging this morning, especially when we had class at 8:30. We got our first taste of field work today though when we had to divide into 2 groups and each build weather stations to collect data. One station was going in a completely covered place under the canopy of the rainforest, and the other was going in a place where some of the trees in the forest had blown over so there was no cover over them. After building the stations in the classroom, we had to carry them while hiking through the forest which wasn't the funnest thing that we have done while we have been here. It was fun to actually get out in the forest and take a few readings... but we weren't there for too long. We came back around lunch time, and from then until now (11:15) I have been working on my assignment that was due today. They SUCK. Even though we are allowed to work in groups, they are very long and tedious and everyone kept messing up which caused us to have to start over numerous times. These days where we have to do school work all day long are not very fun at all... but I guess the reward comes when we get to go on excursions and explore new things every couple days.

Luckily Dr. Quiring is with us while we are here at the Soltis Center. He is one of the coolest professors that I have ever had, and he is an all around awesome guy. He is always around to help us if we have any questions, but he also hangs out with us when we aren't working and plays card games with us or just sits and talks with all of us. It's almost as if he is one of us (a student) studying abroad and enjoying himself. He ALWAYS has a smile on his face and has definitely made the trip so much better. These few days have convinced me to change my class schedule for next semester so that I can sign up for his Intro to Hydrology class!

Not too much else happened today. Actually nothing else happened other than our adventure to the forest with our weather-meters and working on our assignments all day... but I did get to talk to Kristen Diou today on skype!!! It was so much fun being able to talk to someone else and tell her all about the adventures that I have had.

Here are a couple random pictures from yesterday and some of the other days. Other than that, I have nothing else to really say. I am wiped out so hopefully I can sleep through the birds/bugs that are waiting to start screeching around 5 every morning.

Pura vida!