07/22/2013 First Visit to San Jose and Interviews for Project Placement

So unbelievably happy and grateful to be here in Costa Rica bonding with TICO 26! We've only been in country a week and already I feel like I've known some of these people for months. Yesterday we went San Jose for the first time and saw all the some of downtown. Some of the more beautiful buildings include the Teatro National, Museo National, Cathedral National among others.

                                                          The National Theater

The "Clinica Biblica" is the main hospital where we as volunteers get health care. I'm told it's as good as anything we have in the states and from what I've seen I can believe it. Costa Rica is one of the places that US expatriates go for "health tourism" (i.e. things we cannot afford in the US medical system.)

My wife and I are staying to Dona Flora (Dona is a way of expressing Mrs. in a professional setting) She reminds me a lot of my grandmother in the Philippines. She and Don Franklin have a beautiful family. This is her with two of her many grandchildren.

Today we are receiving interviews for site placement. It will be the first time we get to sit down and express what type of place we want to work in here in Costa Rica. Since my area is business development I'm hoping to get a place that has a lot of tourists and entrepreneurs who want to sell to those tourists. I hope to also get an opportunity to do micro-finance as it would be a good way to establish a career in small enterprise development.

Wish me luck!

07/11/2013 Costa Rica Peace Corps Training Retreat

Holy cow the 7th was NUTS! It takes a while to get 32 people to a new country but we managed to do it without losing anyone or any luggage! WOO HOO! There was a huge cheer that erupted from our group when we finally touched down in San Jose. The staff here is great and super organized. They would have to be to squeeze all the training we have to do into the next 13 weeks.

You should see the view from this camp! It's in the mountains with a clear view of San Jose. We unpacked, did a little training and background on the program here and had dinner. I got to try my first cup of Costa Rican coffee. MMMMM... Ticos (Costa Ricans) are proud of their coffee and it's no wonder. They supply Starbucks. It's rich and immediately made me plot of ways to leave clothes behind in order to pack bags of coffee in my luggage.We're going to be here for 4 days of orientation and training in language and culture, safety and security, and our area of expertise. After that we continue training in another location but we will be living with a family. Traditionally married couples like us will live with two families and come together to live with a single family once training is complete. For those of us who are newly weds that can be a long lonely time. For those that have been married for 10 years or more that can be... nice.

07/08/2013 Washington D.C.

Surprise everyone! My wife and I are on our way to COSTA RICA! After spending almost all of our lives in the American Midwest and always wishing we could do something adventurous we took it upon ourselves to join the Peace Corps. I think that may be the trick to doing anything you want. Do it with someone who is also motivated so that one, you can share it with someone your whole life long, and two, you can't chicken out.

Peace Corps was kind enough to set us up with mentors who are Peace Corps Volunteers (PCV's) in country from the last class. We consulted with them about all sorts of things including what to pack. They advised us to pack lite as anything we want we could purchase there. I tried to pack as lite as possible but I think paranoia got the best of us. What do you think?

I mean I might as well have done this:

For those of you who have never been to Costa Rica it's pretty highly technologically developed. By that I mean they have things like clean water running out of the taps, they produce microchips for Intel and they have a WAL-MART. We probably could have gone with a few pairs of shoes and bought everything we need down there.

Today we are did a staging event with Peace Corps in Washington DC. This is where they tell us what they expect of us and we sign all our paperwork.We had a bunch of team building exercises during which I met Mark who just came back from the Philippines where he is doing microfinance work. Exactly what I want to do when done here. I also met a girl who graduated from the small liberal arts college I went to in Michigan. Kalamazoo college. Small world.

Tomorrow we get up at 2:30 for a 6am flight to Miami then ON to COSTA RICA! More on this as soon as I am able.

PURA VIDA