old friends and new friends

Sarah: The last week with Matt was spent both here at QERC and in San Jose. We did some hiking, collecting plants for QERC’s native plant demonstration, and plenty of games and hanging out time. Matt’s friends from Taiwan, 2 of whom are Costa Rican and another who is Bolivian, were here in CR and came out to visit us at QERC. We took them out on the trails a little bit, looked for quetzals, and stayed up late playing games. It was a fun combination of Spanish and English being spoken over the course of a few days.

Unfortunately, our time with Matt was coming to an end, so we wrapped it up by spending a couple last days in the city doing some souvenir shopping and going to watch the Dark Knight. That was a fun evening, because we went to the fancy theater on Wednesday, when the tickets were half price. So for a mere $4.00, we sat in a huge theater in our own personal recliner seats and enjoyed a very good movie. On Thursday evening we got together with Alex Grant, a former LASP staff member who was around when David and I went through the program, as well as when Matt was here. It was fun to catch up on each others’ lives.

And sadly, we said our goodbyes to Matt early Friday morning. Also sadly, we had to take our car into the mechanics during our time in the city to get some more problems fixed on it. When it was finally ready to go again, we were able to make it back out to QERC on Saturday. It was fun for us to be in the city on Friday and Saturday, because Saturday, August 2^nd, was El Dia de La Virgen de Los Angeles. Thousands of people from all over Costa Rica come to Cartago (just outside of San Jose) for concerts on Friday and mass on Saturday, to remember the miraculous appearance of a small statue of the Virgen Mary, which is supposedly responsible for several miraculous events. Many come by car, bus, bikes, horses…..and many walk! People from all over the country start their journey many days in advance in order to walk all the way to Cartago. When we were coming into the city on Wednesday, we saw hundreds of people up on the highway on their journey. Those closer to Cartago actually make the journey completely on their knees. It was quite a sight to see thousands of people on foot headed toward Cartago, and traffic backed up for miles.