day 6 Friday

---

Friday,
Last day of class with these teachers. We get new ones Monday. Our morning teacher had graduation today so we had a girl teacher. She was young. We went over the hw, did a word search puzzle. I hate word searches, so not educational. Took half an hour. But she did tell us that the double L is pronounced like a G not Y, I don’t thinks its necessarily a CR thing but just a thing some spanish speakers do. Had our break and we had these tacos with veggies in them, like cut up in little pieces, mostly green beans, then on a tortilla. It was good, I don’t think too many other people liked it though. The area was all set up for a play with chairs all facing one way and painted sheets/ curtains hanging from wires under the covered area. went back to class. Then we were gonna play a game to learn nouns that are derived from verbs but we didn’t have time because of the cultural activity this week we got out of class at 11:30, so she said lets just pretend to play this game. (I was like, why is she promoting slacking, we all are here because we WANT to learn Spanish, this isn’t high school where we don’t want to be in school). So I had her go over all the definitions and pronunciations of the words. Then we went down to the eating area and they had it set up for a play. It was a homemade kind of play about how Costa Rica grows and exports their bananas. They had a girl dressed up as the Chiquita banana girl do a dance. She didn’t smile at all. It was all in Spanish. The 2 main characters were ladies dressed up like men with fat stomachs and fake beards painted on and a hairy chest. The main guy was a worked growing the banana plants and his helper Jose, who was lazy and didn’t like to work. It was really funny because the main guy kept raising his eyebrows at girls in the audience and saying hola mi amor and saying I’m single to random girls. Then three girls (probably from high school or 13-16 yrs old) came out in big dresses and did a dance where they basically just waved around their dresses. Then they came out later dressed up like banana trees, reminded me of a kindergarten play when we had to dress up like trees and flowers. They said how the banana tree needs lots of water and lots of sun and heat. And they dig up plants that are close to each other and move them so each plant has lots of room and wont grow dwarfed and they cut some banana bunches so they get a set of good big ones and they put foam sheets between the layers of bananas and cover the bushels with plastic to protect against the insects. Their bananas are shipped all over the world. After the play we had about 40 minutes for lunch so I went and go what they serve at the school for 3 dollars. It was good, rice and beans and a piece of chicken. Kyle got the same and came and sat with me and Eve was sitting there too smoking. She is from France. A lot of more people find it normal to smoke in France. This will be here third language cuz she learned English already. After lunch went to afternoon class. I was glad it was the last one. All we do is talk in class and I don’t like it much. She was telling me the difference between conocer and saber which was a little more clarifying. Then told me a little about pronunciation. After class I went and struggled to pay for the white water rafting trip for tomorrow. It’s so hard to pay for stuff with credit card at the school! Then Kyle, Thomas, and I went to the Super Mercado! Costa Rica’s version of Wal-Mart. I’m glad they were down to go with me. I prob would have been fine going alone in the day time. But it was better this way. They didn’t have an alarm clock but I asked a clerk and he said I could go to a place down the street farther called Gallo for one. So I got some snacks and the guys got some stuff to and we went on our way. We finally found Gallo but they only had big plug in the wall $20 alarm clocks. So we walked around more exploring. Checked out the restaurants, and saw the church. Saw Pollo su amigo, looked like a nice restaurant. Then we decided to head home. The guys planned to meet at pollo su amigo at 6 for dinner, I didn’t know what mama tica had planned for dinner yet. I went home for a bit then asked mama tica what we were gonna do for dinner because it was “noche de teatro” with the school so we had to meet at the school at 6:45 so I had to leave at 6:20 and we usually have dinner at 6:30. Kyle and Thomas were going out to eat at 6 so I had the option to meet up with them at “pollo su amigo”. She said Friday they get express and she doesn’t cook and they actually get express from pollo so amigo but it takes 30-40 mins and it was like 10 mins before 6, so I told her I was going to go out for dinner. I got ready quick and headed out to meet the guys. It was better this way because by the time I got to the restaurant at 6 it was approaching dark so after dinner I would have two people to walk to the school with in the dark for noche teatro. I had chicken strips and the Costa Ricans fav soda, Pepsi. It was like a surfer shack and had candles stuck in the walls between the rock bricks and the wax just dripped down it was cool looking. Then we headed for the school to meet everyone else. The school provided transportation to the theatre for the play. The play was called “la otra cara del matrimonio” at the Teatro La Mascara. “El y su receta imperfecta para tener dos amores” is the description; it means “him and his imperfect recipe for having two lovers”. It was a “romantic comedy” it was about this guy who had an apartment where he saw his mistress and he let her live there, then his wife found out they had this apartment so she gave the key to her friend so he could live there but didn’t tell the husband. So the guy friend got to the apartment and the mistress was there and they had a squabble then the wife got there and automatically assumed the mistress was the guys wife, so the mistress had to play it off like she was married to this guy that she had been trying to kick out and who she was repulsed by. Then the husband got there and had to grin and bear seeing his mistress pretend to be the other guy’s wife because his wife was there. Then the wife told them to kiss so they had to kiss as part of the act.Then the wife found out it was the mistress’s birthday so she suggested they go out dancing to celebrate, the two couples. So they all went and did that and in the end the mistress and the guy-friend fall in love. But it was all in Spanish so we didn’t understand the majority of it. Half the theater was cpi students and the other half was locals. So since it was a comedy a lot of it was funny but only half the theater laughed. It prob would have been better to see at the end of this trip. It’s because they talked so fast. I can’t understand “fast-Spanish” only “slow-Spanish”. After that we were each dropped off at our homestay. It was around 10:30 almost 11. I made it through the first two gates then I was trying to unlock the front door but it wouldn’t turn. Mama tica heard me and came and opened it from the inside. I told her hi from Mayi (works at the school, came with us to the theatre). Then went to bed. Had to wake up early for white water rafting in the morning (meeting at 5:50am!).

---