Oh, Leo

Samantha, 18

Today we went to La Carpio and our job was to dig out a sewage drain. I used a pick-axe for the first time and it was intense! I took a break for water and there were two young girls playing with their dolls near our break spot. I tried talking to them the best I could, but my Spanish level is dreadful. One of their mother´s told us she had pet pigs and our whole group went running through her house and into her back yard. She kept the pigs in pens and once we were all in the yard she let them out to roam free with the dogs. They were so cool and I remember thinking how bizzare of a situation I was in when I was leaving the yard full or roaming pigs to dig in a sewage pit as a rooster walked by crowing.

We went to visit our Tico pen pals after digging and that was fun. Mat and I were left sitting at our table when everyone´s pen pals came pouring in. Ours had not showed up and we felt stood up and sad, but before we started to shed tears Leo and Pepe (Our penpals) came in all sweaty and said that they were playing a game of soccer. Pepe knew some English and Mat knew some Spanish and then there was Leo and I. We were both obviously the people who slack off in foreign language class because we couldn´t understand eachother at all. I got paper and tried drawing things and that kind of worked. He showed me pictures on his phone of his motorcycle and I pointed out his eyebrow piercing which I thought was cool. We talked about that kind of and then we just went on about our pets. Apparently he has a cow, a dog, a beaver and a tucan. One day his dog bit his beaver, but the beaver is okay. Just typing that sentence made me reevaluate whether or not I really translated what he was saying correctly..

We played this game that was basically Monkey in the Middle only with soccor incorporated and it was really fun. Leo betrayed me by putting me in the middle, but it was all good. We explained that in the USA their game would be called ¨Monkey in the Middle¨ and Pepe laughed and started making monkey noises and acting like a monkey in the middle which made me laugh because I had never thought of the game title so literally.

Before we left everyone was taking pictures with their pen-pals so I got a picture with Leo and I was smiling and he made this really tough scowl. I then began (very patiently and kindly) yelling at him to smile and not be such a macho jerk. I´m not sure if he understood, but needless to say I have a picture of us both fully smiling and looking like two peas in a pod! Nate was taking these pictures and he got one of me yelling at Leo and it makes me laugh every time I see it.

That was basically my day. We stopped at the bank and exchanged our money so now I´m rollin in the colones.

Food Update: I´m doing better than I thought for being such a picky eater. All I need is their salsa/hot sauce and I´m good to go. I have become an official vegetarian as well. Some aren´t feeling as well as I. I know of one person who has been literally living off her secret stash of Teddy Grahms and there is talk of another girl who is planning to make a jail-break tonight for the grocery store down the street that sells junk food. If you were to walk into someone´s room right now and mention food you would think you were at a fat camp; it´s so funny!

Pura Vida!