¡Buenos dias!
For many of us, when we are back in our respective homelands, Sunday is a day of rest. Not so here, or at least not today. With the end of our stay in Biolley now sadly within sight, we are scrambling to get everything done. We awoke to the dulcet tones of Sophia’s voice calling each of us to rise and shine. Gretel prepared us a scrumptious breakfast of eggs, toast, and avocado, and we eagerly began our work. Our two remaining group projects are to decorate the accessibility ramp with a painting of a coffee plant and to finish the interior of the technology training room. While some mixed paints to create the perfect shades that the painting required, others traced out the design in chalk. We got about two-thirds of the painting done before fears of rain held up our work. It already looks fantastic and it will only look better when we finish it up tomorrow!
Ally and Mila sketch out our coffee plant’s structure.
At noon, like we do every day, we took our break for lunch. Gretel prepared us tortas de carne molida (a type of meat patty), with rice, beans, and green papaya picadillo. After lunch, we stopped our group projects for the day and started to work on our independent projects instead. These projects are coming along and the group is really starting to grasp the community that makes up Biolley, the stories that the people of Biolley have to tell, and why this town now holds such a special place in our hearts. Everyone seems to be really thrilled by their independent project work and excited by our days ahead.
After having the time to work on our independent projects from 1-4 PM, many of the associates of ASOMOBI and their families came together to give us a very special tarde cultural. With the associates came a number of little kids who brought an extra liveliness to the party as they ran about underfoot. During this time, the associates taught us how to make typical Tico dishes such as tortillas, gallo pinto, and patacones, which we then all ate together for dinner. It was delicious, and we all learned a huge amount about what it takes to cook in a truly Tico fashion.
Dinner was MYOT: Make Your Own Tortilla.
After dinner, we finished off the meal with a carrot cake made by our lovely Laura, with the help of Maya and Charlie, to celebrate Alex’s 16th birthday! We ate ice cream with our amazing cake while singing the man of the hour “Happy Birthday.” We tried to sing in German for Alex, but once Sophia told us it was too complicated, we settled on the English version instead.
The Birthday Boy (Geburtstagskind)!
To further celebrate Alex’s birthday, we set up our own movie theater and watched Alex’s movie pick, “Dodgeball,” before we all went off to bed. An amazing day indeed, but definitely not the restful and rejuvenating Sunday that we are accustomed to. More of the same tomorrow!
Missing you all terribly,
Alia y Cody