Happy December from Costa Rica....

I wrot this blog about a week ago but better late than never, expect a new one next week about my family´s trip here, it was awesome!

It’s been a while since I have updated my blog so I thought I would say hi to everybody and wish all a happy December and holidays. Hope everybody had a stomach fulfilling Thanksgiving ate turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, and fruit salad for me! I ate rice and beans, lol.... a bunch of other volunteers went to people houses from the US embassy and had traditional meal and stayed in a hotel afterwards, I unfortunately wasn’t able to make it, but was told by a couple of friends that the atmosphere wasn’t the same without me; which made me feel good. I hear the mountain has snow, Hill, Alison, and all other snowboarders/skiers, I’m super jealous; ride double time and enjoy a Widmier Seasonal Birrr for me, what I would do for a good beer... My dad’s been sending me the sports sections so I feel somewhat up to date with Beavs and Blazers. The last I read, it was all up to the Civil War to decide the fate of the Beavs or Ducks, do I smell Roses? Who knows but it will be the first thing I check when I get to the Internet to post this blog. I even talked about flying to Pasadena if that happens, but in reality, that’s a little bit of a rush. Who knows, maybe next year I’ll make a trip to home for the Civil War at Grant’s tailgate. Reading up about the Beaver’s improvement this year has been awesome, I hope they can finish strong. But whatever happens, its good for Oregon in general to have both teams fighting for the Rose Bowl. Hopefully it will be a more interesting game than last year’s Civil War.

On a more sobering note, I received the news that Dennis Moore (Ryan Moore’s dad) passed away.... Ryan, you’ve been my best friend since junior high school, I remember growing up with both your parents. And have great memories of them both whether it’s from freshman year when Shelley walked in on us putting eye drops in our glazed over eyes and you having to explain our misdeeds. Or watching countless football games with Dennis. They are memories I will cherish forever. It seems like just a couple months ago I heard the news of your mom, now I can’t believe your father’s goon too. Sorry man, like I said a year ago; death is the shittiest part of life. Keep your head up dude, sorry I couldn’t be there for you! Love you like a brother...

Ok, now let’s change the subject to Costa Rica!

It’s Tuesday December 8th and I’m sitting in my house writing this blog that I will post when I go to the city to greet my family and friends at the airport. Something that I am super pumped to do. Hopefully my mother and sister do not read this before they board the plane because they are under the impression that I can’t make it to the City to greet them. But, if all goes as planned it should be a good surprise. I’ll be spending just over a week with my parents, sister, our friends Ed and Rosie, John and his sister Austin, Steve and Ash, Deiter and Steph.... They all rented what looks to be a sweet house about an 1.5 hours on a bad dirt road from my house, unfortunately unless we have a 4x4, to get to my community we’ll have to loop around to San Isidro on the highway about an 2 hour detour. I can’t wait to spend time with all of them, and on Sunday they will be able to see one of the communities I work with, who’s hosting a soccer tournament. They’ll be able to meet some of my friends that a have made here and even a girlfriend who doesn’t speak English. Yes, I said it; I have a girlfriend... I really planned on not having a relationship, but shit happens, lol. Her name is Jeannette and she was one of the first friends I made in my town, she’s actually a younger sister of the guy I live with, one of 13 kids, a good Catholic family, lol. She’s almost a year younger than me and collects coffee and makes cheese for a living. Needless to say we have extremely different backgrounds. I remember meeting her in my community and thinking to myself, “careful Leif, she’s a cute one, you could get yourself in trouble here, lol”. And for almost 6 months I behaved myself, but as we became better friends my feelings got the best of me. I have no idea where we’re going with this and can’t tell the future but for now I’m happy living in the moment. She’s going to spend a night or two at the house with my family which is amazing that her family is allowing that, the really trust me, little do they know, lol, no in all seriousness it should be fun for her, she’s never been to a house with a pool or visited any of the 3 national parks that are within 50 miles of where she’s lived all her life. So it’s an opportunity that she doesn’t get very often or ever, the language barrier should be interesting, she just started to learn English so hopefully she tries to speak a little, lol.

On the business side of things, I have good news to report. I wrote a proposal a few months back to fix up the cemetery; last week I was informed that I got about $10 thousand dollars to build a fence around it, and a building where they have their funerals, I don’t know what its called in English they call it a “Capilla”. Its important to them and the community is stoked. The same week I was also was informed that we are going to receive a bunch of materials to fix up the school and its kitchen, a truck delivered the material this week. Including 53 bags of cement, paint, wood, tin roofs, toilets, sinks, and bars for the windows, which is a requirement for a program that could bring a satellite for internet and telephones to my community. So it’s a start to something I really want to see in here.... Two agencies of the Costa Rican government are funding these projects. There is money here for projects the problem is the majority of the public doesn’t know how to get the funds, especially in the rural communities so my job is to show them that they can develop their community if they know where and how to look for help. It does help that I write in the proposals that I am a Peace Corps volunteer, but the goal is that in a year and a half when I leave they can continue their development of the community. I’m also in the process of trying to figure out what happen to a lot of money that was signed to repair the roads of my area more than 2 years ago. None of the reparations were ever done, so with any luck, we can fix up the roads, because some of them are not passable unless you have a moto or quad.

Ok well, I believe I have rambled on for enough, miss ya’ll that I won’t be seeing this week! And, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all! To leave you all with a quote,

“You’ll never regret the chances you take, you’ll regret the ideas you don’t pursue.” A quote by Andy Mercier before I left Oregon. It has a lot of truth to it, thanks.

Pura Vida,
-Leif