life in a typical week here in Colon!
i'm at school monday thru friday, in class from 9-12. i'm taking a course now called "facilitation and drama methods for conflict transformation" which has been pretty entertaining (if you need a ever need a good icebreaker/group game, i have a couple pretty hilarious ones now!)
but at first, frustratingly nothing at all to do with real conflict transformation, which was much of my frustration with my classes before Christmas, but in the last couple days it's gotten a bit better and maybe i will be able to take away some things that i can apply later.
but anyways, it's been pretty nice being back up on campus - it really is beautiful, and that makes me happy!
actually one of my favourite parts of week is running up to campus on tuesday and thursday mornings with two of my friends here, francine and andrew, who - crazy as they are! - are both training for half marathons. there's a half marathon in Panama (next door to Costa Rica) at the end of march that andrew's been trying to talk me into joining, but i'm not sure im quite that motivated... but it's still been lots of fun running in the mornings. we've gotten down to about 40 minutes (i think its 6.5ish km, but quite uphill!) but anyways the best part is just being able to enjoy the gorgeous road up free on my feet rather than on the bus!
nice start to the day, eh? :) i printed some pictures when i was at home in vancouver and put up a bunch of pictures in my room from some of the beautiful places i've been - around BC, all over norway, quebec, tanzania & uganda... and i just said, "wow, God.. this is really amazing, and even more, you've given me the privilege to see it... t h a n k y o u!"
anyways, the days im not running, there's a couple students that are awesome yoga teachers and i join them M/W/F's in the morning - also a really nice start to the day. which reminds me, not so much for a typical week!, but for halloween, i found an impromptu costume by (sadly) massacreing a giant teddy bear (which i almost gave to the next door neighbour kids on the way home after they came to give him a big hug)
and lululemons as yogi bear! :)
along with Marilyn Monroe & Volcan Arenal (the volcano debbie & i visited!)
anyways, my morning usually starts at 5:45 and i have some time with God with my Bible & journal at home before heading out the door an hour later for one of those two things. and it's been good to be active in the morning when i sit on my bum in class, in front of my books and in front of my computer for the rest of the day. i used to get SO restless by mid evening and julianne and i and our other apartment mates would frantically jump up and down, kick and wave our arms and do jumping jacks ("porch aerobics") when we couldn't sit still anymore! :)
i usually stay on campus to do some reading...
...wishing i could do it here all the time! :) this is actually at a gorgeous hostel in Malpais on the west coast on weekend surf trip i took with some other girls back in september, but studying up at school really isn't so bad - its beautiful and quiet, and actually julianne and i will be moving up near the school in March, which i'm really looking forward to! we'll be renting a super cute little house with forests around and butterflies and sometimes even monkeys and toucans, so i've been told!, in my backyard. (and there IS a hammock!). i can't wait!
i've just started taking Spanish classes now twice a week, which i'm quite excited about... taking classes in English with English speaking classmates and living with all north americans hasn't been so conducive to picking up the language, but i've found myself a really great teacher who's really sweet and also teaches English to the less-advantaged kids in the community.
otherwise i'm squeezing in time to work on my thesis about peace education through literacy learning in Africa (or somewhere more specific...), which i really am enjoying, and sometimes wish i were working on instead of writing my other papers. but i've gotten some positive response on my thesis proposal from my program advisor. i'm looking for a thesis advisor now - i was hoping to have a professor from Sierre Leone that has done a lot of work with Peace Ed & community development to advise my thesis, but unfortunately, he isn't the best with email communication. i met with a visiting professor from the UPeace Africa programme in Ethiopia, but he will be traveling and teaching until the end of May so he's not able to advise my thesis, but he is going to try to put me in touch with another professor who's working with the Peace Education project there, so fingers crossed, that will work out! :)
julianne and i usually have a nice break in the evenings together making dinner together & we've started a recipe book for some of our random creations - i'm glad she's back! although me and Francine did get together last night to experiment with "yucca" (yoo-kah), which i wish i took a picture of before we cooked it, but i'll do that next time im at the store... it's kind of a thick barky piece-of-a-branch-looking local root vegetable like a potato, and we decided to make yucca burgers with them! we cut off the 'bark' outside, and boiled it up, mashed it up, cut in some red pepper and onion, sour cream and spices and then fried it in a pan... they were pretty good - kind of like hashbrowns but since we decided to have them with tortillas instead of buns, we called them 'yucca falafels' instead - not bad! :)
okay, again, there's still more pictures and stories i'd like to share, but it's much past my usual 10:30ish bedtime... hopefully i'll get the chance to share more soon! thanks for reading! :) buenas noches for now!
love & hugs!
rainbow =)
