Presidents and Nicaraguans

Sarah: This week has been full. Last weekend we had a Super Bowl party where I was thrilled to watch the Indianapolis Colts win. We also had some visitors last weekend. A group of students from the LASP program came to spend a couple nights away from the city. We were encouraged to see the two groups interacting and forming friendships.

This week the students have been diving hard into their research projects, actually getting to a point where some of them are even collecting data. It is fun to see their enthusiasm for their projects as they are really starting to take shape. We also went into the city for a couple days. As part of their cultural class with the LASP program, they needed to go in to hear a speaker from Nicaragua and be a part of the Nicaragua orientation. A Nicaraguan woman named Amita gave her story to the entire group. She grew up during the Sandanista revolution and lived through many rough times of change in Nicaragua. Amita was barely able to make it through her talk without crying, and it was emotional for us all to hear. After Amita spoke the students learned more about their upcoming trip to Nicaragua—expectations, purpose, and what to bring and not to bring on the two-week trip. The rest of the day they had free in the city to hang out and make any needed purchases for the trip.

The following day was a real treat. The LASP program had scheduled Otton Solis to speak to their group and invited us to sit in on it as well. Otton Solis is the head of a political party called the PAC, and has twice run for president here in Costa Rica. The first time was when David and I were students, and he caused a run-off between the two top candidates by securing a high enough percentage of the votes that there was no clear winner. The second time he ran was about a year ago, and he lost by a very tiny margin. So, Otton Solis is one of the top political figures in Costa Rica, and he allowed us all to come to his party headquarters to hear him speak. It was awesome. He definitely would have had my vote! It was inspiring to hear his views and political stances on many controversial subjects, and my hope is that in 3 years he becomes the next president of Costa Rica.

And finally, today the students left for San Jose. They leave really early for Nicaragua tomorrow morning. And the professor who is with us now, Sharon Young, leaves tomorrow to go back to the states. And then it will be David and me.