Weather: 60-80 degrees Fahrenheit, minimal wind, blue skies, and infrequent rain.
People: Ridiculously friendly.
Food: Flavored to the max.
Women: Dark hair with a choice of hazel or brown eyes.
So that's where I live now. The downsides to the town are few. The nightlife seems to be restricted to before 11 p.m. and consists of getting ice cream from the center plaza. Sunscreen costs about one leg per 500mL bottle. Dehydration kicks in pretty quickly if you don't pay attention. Other than those things it's pretty nice. I'm sort of used to the small town scene from having lived in Pohnpei for them two years, so the tears that that situation brings are few and far between. The lack of friends situation is always a killer when you move to a new place, but I've made some good connections with my coworkers which will hopefully open the door to a more active social life.
As far as my job goes, it goes splendidly well. Being a mentor consists of making sure the boys have an expert ultimate frisbee partner, a two-legged Spanish dictionary, and someone to help with general daily duties. Last weekend we went on an adventure to Manuel Antonio which is an interesting mixture between national park and tourist bonanza; not that those two are incompatible, but I find their coexistence intriguing. At the park I saw just about every animal you see in those National Geographic documentaries that you put on between football games. Two kinds of sloths, capuchin monkeys, deer, crocodiles, howler monkeys, and spider monkeys all made my jaw drop. Hell... Even Toucan Sam dropped on in to say follow your nose! Magical. On top of that I got to connect with some of the NSA students by playing board games, communally oogleing over women in bikinis, and fighting off a scorpion that we found in the sleeping room. Ya, that's right. There was a scorpion in someone's bed! If that doesn't scare you, google Gary Busey. That's about how scary that scorpion was. In all, I like my job. It's nice. Berry Nice. Jerry Rice? Posh Spice. No dice.
Graduate schools will be getting back to me soon. I have some pretty good prospects that I believe will offer me some graduate assistantships and internships to help me get through with some money and experience. It's going to be a tough decision if I get accepted at all my schools, but I'm favoring programs with the better internships for out of class experience.
My barrio (neighborhood) is pretty amistoso. The gente is siempre saying hola when yo pass por their casas. La only cosa that me bothers es that muchos dogs ladran when yo pass en this calle. Are tu confused ahora by mis switches entre both languages? Me too. So I'll stop. Stop that right now young man! Okay, back on track. The neighbors are nice. I've been trying to get my name out there by being annoyingly friendly. You know... Those neighbors that walk by your house and say hi every time and try to engage you in a conversation longer than, "Hey." "Hey." "Beautiful day." "Sure is." "Well, I'll see you around." "See ya!" And it's working, I think. There's still too many people to meet and be annoyingly extroverted towards in the neighboorhood. Which makes me think of only one thing. WWMRD. What would Mr. Rogers do? He'd probably get on the train and meet whatever strange folk lived beyond that tunnel. Metaphorically speaking, that's the goal.
For now I think this is enough to quench your outsourced thirst for adventure. Until next time! :)
Un saludo.
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