Thursday, 27 December
A lot of people left this morning – about 7-10 people. Our van was supposed to arrive at 8am but did not show up until 8:30. I was getting worried that there was another communication problem and we were going to miss the ride. Unfortunately, this was a very packed van. When we got in, there were already 4 people so we made 6. Then we went to another place and picked up 3 guys. Then we went to another place and picked up a couple. 11 people plus the driver – very packed. One couple was from Prescott and seemed to be traveling a lot through Costa Rica. The lady that sat next to me was a school counselor from NY with two years of teaching english in Turkey. I talked to her a bit about it and she said that Blondie songs were very good learning devices due to her clear voice and use of words like watcha. She and her husband also traveled a lot and one of the places they liked the most was Thailand. Apparently, they were very close to not coming back. They stayed in little out of the way towns instead of the big touristy places and loved it. We dropped them and the Prescott people off in Peurtavita (or something like that) so they could catch a ferry and get to Montezuma.
Maria has a thing that you are to obtain something from everyone you meet. After we dropped of the lady from NY, Maria immediately asked me what I got from her. I was already thinking of this so I had my answers ready. I was just surprised that she asked for she was staring out the window most of the time and I was not sure she was even paying attention. Shortly after, we made another stop and dropped off two ladies to catch another ride to San Jose. Finally, the van was more spacious with only 5 left.
The ride back was going fine until we hit the line for the bridge. Our direction was not moving at all. Luckily we had a driver that did not like this and he kept taking back roads and cutting people off to keep moving up the line. Overall, I think we waited about 20 minutes. If he did not take all of these shortcuts and such, we could have been there for at least an hour. I was the first to be dropped off around 2 and told Maria I would meet up with her at the beach around 6.
I went home and Sharon gave me a nice bear hug when she heard me come in. I am staying in a different room for the one that I was in is being saved for something else, but I could not understand what it was. I pulled some stuff out of my bag (the wet stuff) and then went to the internet cafe to call home. Unfortunately, all the damn tourists were in the cafe, so I went to a different one and just did email. I also did a little bit of job searching and found a volunteer gig in Thailand that would have me teaching english to novice monks and stay in the temple with them. Maybe. I also got an email from Katie that said she found a job posting for teaching english on a cruise line to the staff. Maybe.
I then came home and changed into my swimsuit and headed up to the beach and holy crap was there a lot of people there. I walked down the beach a ways and found a nice spot to sit and watch the sunset. I zoned out while watching the waves and thought about what I should do next. At one point, a student that I taught walked by and said hello. After seeing him and feeling the energy like I used to feel while teaching at Dobson, I knew I had to go back to teaching. Now it is just a matter of figuring what and where.
When I got back to the main part of the beach, I could not find Maria, so I went to a bar where I could look out on the beach and I had a beer. While I was in the bar, the power to the whole area went out 3 times, the longest was the last one which lasted for about 5 minutes. At 6, I went down and found Maria coming out of an internet cafe. We then went back to where I was drinking and had dinner. I told her that I looked at her facebook photos and thought it was strange not to see her in a poncho or wrapped in a blanket to keep warm. Mike, one of the new observers at TEFL, ran into us and we talked for a little bit. He was trying to get Maria and I to go out but we were too tired and declined. On the way out, we scheduled a sailing trip for tomorrow. This is the same trip the Carsten and Judy took and that I was bummed that I missed. We then took the bus home and I took a shower and went to bed.