First 3 months in Costa Rica

Our first three months in Costa Rica…..We departed from our little spec of a town called Ontario long ago on February 28th. It really does seem very long ago that I was a substitute teacher at Kinglsey Elementary and Patty was an after school program coordinator at Sultana Elementary. Paving our way through and helping create our so called “destiny”, here we are in what is a spec of village called Barra de Tortuguero. What happened in the months of March, April, and May were the transformation of two typical Americans from southern California to trainees in the San Jose, Costa Rica area to eventually a full blown volunteer in Barra de Tortuguero, Costa Rica. My training was held in the rural community of San Juan Norte while Patty’s training took place in the urban community of San Antonio de Desamparados. We were approximately an hour and 15 minutes away from each other via bus. A basic week in training for both of us consisted of the following; Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays were Spanish classes. Tuesdays were our technical training focusing on our specific projects. For Patty’s project (Child, Youth and Families) it was training on the Costa Rican educational system, being exposed to family resources, organizations and learning about the “Patronato Nacional de la Infancia” which is the equivalent of the U.S.’s Child Protective Services. My project is “Rural Community Development” therefore my technical training consisted of community development, building relationships, sustainability, Non-formal education, and service learning to name a few. Thursdays were the days that all 52 Tico 20 volunteers got together to learn about Costa Rican ways and Laws, gender roles, safety and security, medical information (common illnesses). Early on in the training Patty and I were sent to visit a volunteer in action. It was really a great experience to see such an awesome volunteer doing so much for her community. Some time later Patty and I split off and I spent a week down south in a little community less than an hour away from the Panamanian border. The learning experience was great, but the fact that I was able to go to the cleanest and most natural river that I’ve ever been to was breathtaking. The fact that right next to this river there are natural hot springs was icing on the cake. During my warm bath in the hot springs Patty was enjoying herself about 10 hours away from me further north in Puerto Viejo de Sarapiqui. There she was able to see in action one of the finest Peace Corps volunteers integrated into her community and found the volunteer that she would like to model after. Throughout the rest of training on the weekends, I went over Patty’s community or she came over to mine. We both had exceptional host families, therefore establishing lifelong friendships. On the same note we have met some great volunteers also establishing lifelong friendships. Towards the end of training Patty and I came to Tortuguero for a four day trip simply to get to know the community that we would be working in. Just this past Friday we swore in as Peace Corps Volunteers and I had the great honor of speaking on behalf of my RCD group. Among the people present were; host parents, Peace Corps staff, U.S. Ambassador, Costa Rican counterpart organizations and of course the volunteers. It was truly a great experience for both of us and now here we are in Tortuguero at the very beginning of our two years of service……We have included some pics of our training, Swearing In Ceremony and our future home Tortuguero!! Enjoy!!