Mi Tiempo en Costa Rica

Orientation month is almost ocer and I will be beginning my classes at the Universidad de Costa Rica soon. My classes are not what I exactly wanted (and I am not sure if I am offically in them until after the first few weeks of class).
Well I will re-cap my event packed month. I had a great time on the 10th at the family picnic. All the students and their families just hung out that Saturday. I decided that morning that I am definitely at home here--it took my mother an hour after we should have been there to get ready (she has got me beat with her ¨Tico-tiempo¨).
After the picnic, the students of the grupo (yes all 17 of us) went on our way to spend the weekend at the highly spoken about national park/beach in Manuel Antonio. There was just one slight problem. Once we went onto the bus, we realized that the gentleman at the ticket counter gave us the wrong tickets on this bus that only departs twice each day to our destination (we were on the last bus for the day). It would have been fine except we took taxis from the subrurb where we had the picnic to the center of the croweded city of San Jose and we were determined to get to Manuel Antonio. The driver was nice enough to let us stay on the bus, but, of course, the ticket holders had priority over the seats. Luckily, there were a few seats available in the back for us and we took turns sitting in them through our hot and humid four hour bus ride. And that was just the beginning of our adventures.
When we finally arrived to our destination at seven (which was actually Quepos, a little town with cheaper hotels about an hour away from Manuel Antonio), hot, sweaty, hungry, and a little tired, we went on a hunt for the cheapest hotel room (we hadn´t made any reservations, I´m not sure why). After consulting various places around the bus station and checking our tourist books, we found a humble hotel worth only $7 per person. Granted this place did not have the greatest accomodations, but it was a cheap and clean place to sleep.
In the hotel room some of us took our cold showers and tried finding some place to get some dinner and snacks for the next day (we were told the food would be expensive since Manuel Antonio is so touristy). We had a nice good grupo bonding time for a while in one of the rooms and then went to bed to wake up the next day and catch the early bus to Manuel Antonio.
At six am we awoke and prepared for a day of hiking and fun in the sun. When we finally entered into Manuel Antonio National Park, we realized just how beautiful it was. This place certainly lived up to its name. Eleanor, Andres, Nicho (my cousin), and myself decided to hike up the various trails in hopes to see some wildlife before emmersing ourselves in the heavenly-looking water. I thought it was a great idea, until I noticed I had made a mistake in my packing. While everyone else had a backpack with their belongings, I packed a duffel bag, apparenly in an effort to be ready for anything. After dragging through the hike, sweating and panting, Andres found pity in me and offered to carry my bag for a bit. Thank goodness for nice people.
There are some good pictures from the hike, but my favorite was from the shore. We didn´t see any animals until we walked onto the beach. We spotted the Costa Rican Racoon, Pizote, and a bunch of mischievious white-faced capuchin monkeys. There were strict warnings as you entered the park against feeding the monkeys, but noone warned us that they would actually unzip someone´s bag and STEAL food from us (which was precisely what happened to Mateo´s loaf of bread. As some of us played in the water, we observed some monkeys stealing a napping tourist´s bottle of water. We made every effort to shout from the water in order to awake him, but he awoke only to see the monkey climb into a tall tree with his refreshment.
For lack of space, I will end the story here and post later. I am visiting a volcano and hot springs, so I will probably have more stories and pictures (they are now on yahoo: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/chandlover_21/my_photos).
Well all, it´s been fun, I promise I will complete the story at a later date. Miss you all!

On Saturday, the Grupo went through the city of San Jose in a tourist bus (It was hilarious to see how the bus was branded with ¨Turistas¨, what looked to be more of a warning than a informative sign to the natives). It was a day full of Costa Rican history, which I enjoyed immensely. The anthropologist in me was delighted to see our first stop, el Museo Nacional. A museum dedicated to precolonized Costa Rica and all the rich heritage therein. I was sure to take many pictures of which will be posted as soon as I find a way to post them (for those of you who have facebook, there are a couple of albums already assembled.). Since there was so much we saw, I took pictures of memorable items, so each should have an explination attached to it. Well all, it is still great here and, as you all know, I miss you so much! Hope all is well with you!

Hello again. I am in my second morning in Costa Rica and I am loving it. I was a little upset the night I arrived (the thoughts of leaving you all for so long and the fact that my luggage was misplaced until the next day was a little much for me), but my host mother and brother were nothing short of amazing! My host mother could tell I was upset and kept hugging me and assuring me that I will be well taken care of. I could tell that she was right.
Yesterday I woke up feeling better about things. I began the day with an interesting hamòn y queso sandwich and took the autobus for the first time. My grupo (all the exchange students from the US are in a group called the Grupo de Kansas) got a tour of the Universidad de Costa Rica (UCR) where we will be attending classes this semester. It is a beautiful, but fairly large, campus with a Koi pond and beautiful vegetation and birds everywhere. At the risk of looking too much like a tourist, I decided I would take pictures a little later (especially since I will be on that campus often).
San Jose is hot and a bit humid, which does not help my hair one bit. You will see what I am talking about when I attach pictures. I still feel quite lost, but everyone assures me it will pass. Well, that is enough blabbering for now. I will be going to figure out how to apply for a student visa today with el Grupo. I am sure there will be a story attached to that. I miss you all!
Ciao,
Marlise

Suitcases are packed and I am in the airport. Thank goodness for wireless! I miss everyone already. I can't help but feel a sense of excitement as I wait here paitenly...I don't get on my flight until almost two, so I am trying to find ways to entertain myself...