Yipy Girls

Friday
We had our drive to Turrialba... 7 hours!  That feels like forever when you are driving through these mountains.  If you could just drive straight there it would be soo much faster!  Also the streets are not all that developed so it's a pretty rocky drive to start out with but then the streets get softer but then they are windier.  On our way we dropped off the middle schoolers and Elizabeth (teacher).  I'm actually really glad we got to meet all of them.  They're so sweet and I think this whole experience really changed some of their views.. especially with school and how its not all about writing and reading but experiences can impact your education as well.  But on the way we stopped for lunch and had this "refresco" which had milk and blackberries and it's soo good!  It's like a smoothie but when I drink it I feel like I'm being more healthy. :)

This was actually taken on Saturday but
that's the fountain :)

The hotel we were at is called Turrialba Bed & Breakfast.  It was soo cute!  It really only had like 8 rooms maybe?  But it's like a house that was turned into a hotel but it was really nice.  We had a jacuzzi that was out on the back porch (for everyone).  There were hammocks and a kitchen we could use and then a living room with a huge tv and couches and everything which we didn't use but it was nice to have.  Right when you walk in the hotel there is a fountain too and it's gorgeous!  Then on the front of every door they had the names of rivers instead of room numbers. But what's really interesting is that on the ceiling of the room, there are almost like windows so that natural light will come through but that means that our room is SUPER bright at 5 in the morning.  Other than that it's nice to have in the afternoon. 

Once we were settled in we went out for dinner to this place called Maracuya which means Passion Fruit.  They have REALLY good food!  And I finally found a cold coffee drink so that was pretty exciting.  For dinner I had Crepa which was amazing!  I've never had a crape before.  But that restaurant has definitely been one of my favorites. 

After dinner we chilled at the hotel for a little and then went out to Nazca which is this nice adult restaurant and just had a drink and talked.  It was really nice cause we could just get to know each other.  But it was hilarious because Lauren ordered a glass of wine and it came out as a dessert wine so it was tiny!! While Kara had a "normal" sized glass.  It was soo funny watching Lauren just stare like ummm what?  And try to explain to the server that she wanted something different and ask why it was so small.  And then we got really hot in the restaurant, so Kara decided to ask them to turn on the fan... not knowing any Spanish.  She goes up to the server and starts talking and throwing her hands above her head and moving them in circles and making a shhhh sound so that he'd realize she was talking about a fan... funniest thing to watch for sure.

Saturday
We had an assignment today but it wasn't like a writing assignment.  We had to go into the market and find 3 vegetables, 3 fruits, and 3 utensils we'd never seen before and ask how they were prepared or used.  It was actually really fun.  But the vendors weren't expecting someone to come up to them and say "Ummm what is this? How do you make it? How much for just one?"  So we got laughed at a lot but we just laughed with them.  There was one fruit that had like a pokey fruit called Tacaco.  And so while we're talking to the vendor about what it is all of a sudden we hear Kara squeal because some guy with a really sketchy smile had poked her in the arm.  It was hilarious but then the vendor caught on and started to poke us too.  And there were so many people around just watching the Americans get poked by some fruit we'd never heard of before.  It was hilarious.  But we ended up leaving with a bunch of free fruit because we never bought a kilo of them.  We just wanted one.

After the market we went to lunch and then had some shopping time.  I finally found some jeans!  I'd been stressing out about that because we were going to have "coffee" with Paula and Aurora's family but I only had nike shorts.. don't think that's exactly the best first impression outfit.  But I found them for $8 and that pretty much made my day.  I've never found jeans that fit that well for so cheap.  For the "coffee" we actually kind of had this as an assignment/adventure thing.  We had to get there by bus without our professor or her daughter.  So we had to walk to the bus station and make sure we were on the right bus - which Paula had told us what it was called so we weren't just guessing.  But we paid the bus fair and had to look for the signs for her house and everything.  But we made it!  That was pretty fun because I don't think I've ever even been on the Marta bus. 

But the reason why I call it "coffee" with quotations is because we got there expecting a cup of coffee, but when they invite you for coffee it's like inviting someone over for tea in England - it's a full meal.  We sat at the table.. just the three of us with all of these Spanish conversations going on around us which was extremely loud and overwhelming and then all of these plates of food were set on the table.  And we were like ummmm I hope other people are going to sit with us because 1) I already ate lunch and was expecting just coffee and 2) I have no idea what half of this stuff is!!  But the majority of it was really good and her aunt had a star fruit tree in the backyard so we got to eat some of that too. 

But for the coffee we got to meet a lot of her family and there are like 3 different Carlos's.  There's Juan Carlos, Jose Carlos, and then there's just Carlos.  And only half of her family was there but we heard about a whole bunch so all of these names were getting jumbled up in my head and it just was like umm WHAT.  It was also Edgardo's birthday the next day so we got to sing to him the Spanish and English version of Happy Birthday.  Then we took a whole bunch of pictures with him and by ourselves.  One of our favorites is our "yipy girls" photo.  We went to take the picture but for some reason he held up the bag of yipy's - which is a chocolate candy here.  So it looks like we're in a commercial and that once you eat yipy's you'll be a chick magnet.  But overall the "coffee" was really fun and I got to speak a lot of Spanish so that was cool. I'd have to say it was definitely a cultural experience.

Okay well that's all I'm typing for now!  I really need to work on my homework but don't worry there is more to come!