A Second Week in Santa Marta

 

 The kitten that was at the hostel!  I say at the hostel because the housekeeper took her home while I was away last weekend.  =(

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This past weekend I went to Playa Costeño with a few of the other volunteers from the Mariposas and another NGO that works in Santa Marta.  It was wonderful.  One had to walk for around twenty minutes to get to any kind of store and even then it was only the smallest of markets.  If you walked twenty minutes either way on the beach the only people you ran into were fishermen.  I am really dissappointed in myself for not getting pictures of the beach and the hostel.  Here is the link to their website if you want to see more of what it was like: Costeño Surf Camp.  Sadly I did not surf as I need to save my money for the Lost City trip I am leaving for today.  The above is an artsy photo I did manage to take of my friends while were hanging out by the bonfire.  At night there was basically no electricity except for a few twinkle lights in the bathroom.  It was so tranquil and beautiful, and there were crabs, frogs, geckos, and animal life everywhere.  There were monkeys and caymans, and while I heard them, I sadly did not see any in my time there. I also encountered plenty of insects who thought I was breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Bug spray is just really ineffective in this country.

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This is the Dreamer Hostel, where I have been living for the past week and a half and plan on continuing to live at during my stay in Santa Marta.  I am sure you can figure out the appeal from this picture.  It is wonderful coming back from teaching the kids on a hot day (every day here) and jump in the pool and cool off and then take a siesta in one of the many hammocks surrounding the pool area.  I might be getting a little spoiled here.  It does however get tiring living in a 10 person dorm room (the cheapest room available) particularly since get up every morning around 6:20 to be at the school by 7:30.  We used to take the bus to the school but it is very slow.  All the buses here go into the center of town and then to wherever the destination is.  This means what should take 10 to fifteen minutes can take 30 minutes to an hour.  Lauren and I have started taking the motorbike taxis to work.  They cost about a dollar, take ten minutes, are a little scary but quite a lot of fun.  The drivers are very good about slowing down when they come up to puddles so as to not splash water on us.  The other day we took two to get back the hostel after school and they briefly drove down the wrong side of the street so they could cross earlier.  Always in a rush.  Don´t worry though, our drivers like living too so I trust them about as much as I trust a taxi driver.  Another great thing about taking them instead of the bus is I am learning the route to school better and the price is always the same.  Instead of being late I have time for breakfast!

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 These are the kids we are working with.  Yesterday we had a police officer come in as a guest speaker.  The kids loved it.  He got them all to participate and worked on teaching them about being safe and being respectful.  The kids too often just demand things and do not use phrases like please and thank you.  We are working on them though.  This is my first experience working with 4 through 7 year olds.  Let me say it is difficult and exhausting.  Their spanish is almost impossible for me to understand because they mumble like crazy and they have the attention span of a pea.  They are great kids though and face a lot of issues in their home and the area they live in.  One of our boys´ shoe was falling apart and I said to another volunteer who had been there much longer that I felt bad for him.  She looked back at me and said at least he has shoes.  Despite this the kids are pretty happy the majority of the time, particularly if they are running circles around us.  Maybe that is why teaching little ones is so tiring, I constantly have to chase them down!

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 Feliz Dia de la Madre!

Happy Mother´s day Mom!  I love you and miss you.  We spent the rest of yesterday making Mother´s day cards with the kids.  They got really into it.  It was so pleasant having a full day of the kids being productive.  If any of my readers have worked with this age group and have suggestions of activities, songs or games please pass them along to me.  I would love to hear them!!  Since I could not make a Mother´s day card and send it to my lovely Mother I took a picture of the kids with their cards.  <3

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Tyler, this story next story is for you.  There are extremely large frogs here.  Probably technically toads, but for this story it is a frog.  Lauren and I were walking along the main avenue by our hostel and saw a frog larger than my two fists put together.  It jumped into the road and we both let out small screams ¨FROGGY!¨ We thought for sure he would be hit by one of the cares, motorbikes, or buses that flies down that street.  One car missed the frog by mear inches, in fact from our angle we thought he was a goner.  But he was still alive, dodged a few motorbikes and made it the otherside.  A real life Frogger story.  Sorry if no one else gets this Playstation reference.  Tyler I thought of you and I playing that game the rest of the way home.  

As much as I would like to continue telling stories about my adventures here I have to go pack my things and run to the ATM before I get picked up by my tour group for the Lost City.  You can only trek to the Lost city with a tour and while it is a little expensive we are supposed to get fed extremely well and have mini-hostels in the jungle to sleep in on the way.  The ruins should be beautiful with barely anyone there except the army, our tour group and maybe one other group or researchers.  I do not think I can even explain how excited I am.  So more soon!  I will write next week when I return.  (Sorry, I am going to the land of no wifi.  It should be blissful)

Pura vida!!!

Santa Marta, My First Week

So I left Medellin about a week ago now, and leaving was quite the mess.  About an hour before I had to leave the hostel to get to the airport I went to the ATM that had worked earlier in the week to take money out to pay my bill and have some money when I arrived in Santa Marta.  Of course, the ATM decided that my bank was temporarily unavailable.  I tried three times.  None of the other ATM's near my hostel worked, and at this point, I was stressing... a lot.  I ran back to the hostel and immediately tried researching what other ATM options I had in the area.  The other travellers kept suggested ATM's that were in the center of the city but there was no way I had time to go to the center, find an ATM that worked, come back to the hostel, pay my bill, and then make it to the airport in time for my flight.  Finally one of the girls that worked at the Wandering Paisa Hostel told me there was a Citibank ATM a few blocks away (which for some reason did not show up on the Google search).  I ran there, hoping I would find it and make it back in time.  I found it, and it did not work on my first try, but thankfully worked on my second try.  I was then on my way to Santa Marta.

Not too bad right?  Oh but I made a grand mistake.  I forgot to write down the address of my hostel in Santa Marta.  My connecting flight was delayed so I arrived in Santa Marta a little bit before 9 o'clock.  I took the shuttle into the center of town, and while on the shuttle started using my (still poor) spanish to ask if anyone new where the hostel was.  The Colombians on my bus tried to help me as much as possible, but to be honest, they had no clue.  I ended up getting poor directions to another major hostel that was in the center of town.  I got off the bus, and tried following their directions.  I probably wandered for about a mile around the center of town, asking directions along the way, and having no luck.  I could not find an internet cafe, and at this point, I was once again feeling stressed.  Note, that at this time, I had my full pack and a backpack I used as carry-on, with all my cards, camera, ipod, and everything with me.  Luckily it was a Saturday night and there were plenty of people on the street so I felt fairly safe, but was not particularly enjoying the situation.  I went back to the main park, Parque de los Novios, where there were a fair amount of restaurants and bars.  Finally, someone knew the hostel I was asking about.

His response?  The Dreamer Hostel was no where close, but was actually on the outside of town.  Oh dear.  He did not know the address but was able to direct me to the closer hostel, La Brisa Loca.  I knew they would have internet and/or know the address of the hostel, so I made my way there.  It was only 4 blocks away.  I was able to get the address, and at this point I just hopped in a cab.  Of course the cab driver had to hit on me, and try to ask me out for the next day, and not wanting to make my cab driver angry when I was in a strange city by myself I just kept pretending I did not understand him.  It's a fairly good fall back option to avoid unwanted attention.  Thankfully I arrived safe and sound, and immediately ordered a beer with a sigh of relief.

The Dreamer Hostel is wonderful.  I will have to take pictures, as it is had been my home for the last 3 weeks, and will continue to be for the next 3 to 4 weeks.  There is a pool table, an in-ground pool, hookah, a bar, a restaurant, hookah, a cat and a kitten!  The owner is incredibly kind, and is giving me a discount because I am volunteering with the Mariposas Amarillos. 

As I was to begin volunteering on Monday, I went to the beach on Sunday.  The transportation was provided by the Dreamer Hostel, and there were 5 other girls also going.  I made friends with 2 Colombian girls, Sandra on the left and Maria on the right.  Sandra spoke pretty good English pretty well, but I used my spanish a lot as Maria only knew a few words in English.  We call it Spanglish. 

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 This is me having a great time on the beach.  Both sides of the bay were surrounded by tall hills, or small mountains.  The vegetation was sparser than I expected but I am here at the end of the dry season, so it should only get more green from here.

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 I just really like this picture.  Playa Media.  The beach itself was called Playa Concha Bay.  It is more of a Colombian hotspot than a gringo hotspot.  This means there were not tons of people walking up and down the beach trying to sell souvenirs.  We were given a cooler full of beer that we could pay for however many we drank at the end of the day.  That was sweet.  American beaches need to adopt this feature for sure.

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 The lunch prices were a little outrageous, but I had not packed a lunch so I went for it.  It was a whole fish with plantains, rice, soup, and Colombian style coleslaw.  (No mayo, much better!)  Que rico! In translation, how rich!  (delicious!)

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There are lots of street cats and dogs and Colombian.  We fed our leftovers to a little pregnant cat.  Kitties deserve some nice fish too.

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The rest of my week has been pretty pleasant.  I started volunteering with the Mariposas.  It has been a bit of a crazy week for them, with holiday on Tuesday (no school), and then Wednesday was a little bit of mess, as we got the kids too riled up with games early in the morning to accomplish much teaching wise afterwards.  Its difficult, because if we teach first and then play games, it is really too hot to run around.  The kids are super cute, but very difficult to teach, as they have very little sense of discipline.  I am more of a teachers assistant in the classroom, as my spanish is too poor to properly teach.  I plan on devoting an entire blogpost at the end of next week to my volunteering experience.  I want some more time with the kids, to do it justice.

On Wednesday nights, the Mariposas run a trivia night at my hostel to raise some money.  The hostel got quite riled up over the trivia competition as the winners are given free breakfast by the hostel.  We then ask for donations and basically everyone obliged.  It was all around a good night, although it felt like teaching again, just this time with adults from all over the world.

Tomorrow after teaching in the morning, myself and some of the other volunteers are going to spend the week at what sounds like a perfect beach.  There will be no internet, and we will sleep in hammocks and hang out around bonfires at night.  It should be spectacular.  I promise more pictures of Santa Marta, my hostel, and adventures this weekend.  I have just been so busy doing things this week, I forgot to play tourist and bring my camera with me a lot of the time.  Until then....

Pura vida!!!

Medellin

I do apologize for my tardiness and giving this blog update.  I was unable to upload my pictures on the computer at my last hostel, and at this one, well I have just been busy having fun.  But I do have some great photos and small stories to share.
First of all, Medellin is beautiful.  The city of eternal spring nestled in the mountains.  It is breathtaking and the people are so incredibly kind and helpful.  I have never been anywhere quite like Medellin.

 Raphael Uribe Palace of Culture.  Across the street and around it are about 22 fat statues donated to the city by Fernando Botero.  It is an absolutely amazing place to stumble on when wandering without a map.

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 Fernando Botero´s el gato.  Mreow!  One of many of his works.

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The cable car is part of the metro system.  So it only costs about a dollar to go up and get some really spectular views of the city.

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Me in the cable car.  =)

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 My friend Martin from Austria.  There was a second cable car that you had to pay extra to go on, and we just assumed it was to get to an even better viewpoint.  So we went up it, and went up and over the mountain into a national park.  The cable car ride was our entrance into the park. We were only planning on going up to the top of the mountain to see the view, but we ended up hiking around the park for the day, going to a lake, meeting this little fellow, and eventually getting to a view of the city that my camera just could not do justice, but I will never forget.

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 The first part of the metro cable is part of the metro because it does take you to parts of the city.  The food was cheap and delicious, and there was some amazing local artwork to be seen on the walls of many of the buildings.

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 Much of the artwork came with deep meaning.  The pieces above are protesting violence and sexual violence.

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 There were many massive photographs of different people, various cultures, and some with writing like this posted like billboards on the walls of buildings, so that you could see them when you are going up or down the cable car.  This is one of my favorites.

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While up at the top of the mountain in Medellin, we walked passed a school yard of kids playing soccer.  Everyone was wearing really traditional uniforms except for the girls that were actually playing.  The kids were chanting, cheering and screaming.  You can see how their love for footbul starts at such a young age, and is such a large part of the culture.  

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 This was a pretty intense Colombian PETA protest we came across in a park.  The girl is washing herself in blood (fake I believe... or at least hope) and is protesting testing products on animals.  Really quite visual.

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 At the botanical gardens in Medellin.  I liked the workers shirts so much I had to get a picture.

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 La casa de los mariposas.  There was a butterfly house in the Botanical Gardens.  It was only fitting that I get a picture with one, as I was going to be, and now am, a Mariposa Amarillo.  (Thats the organization I am currently volunteering with.  I will tell more in my next blog post, but right now I am focusing on Medellin.)
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 Everyone drives motorbikes.  Alright maybe not everyone, but a lot of people.  Particularly the young ones.  This is a picture of the university.  You can see the double line doing all the way down the street.  Everyone is always warning me to be careful in Colombia, particularly all of you back home, well if you are going to worry about me, I would worry about me getting hit by a car of motorbike.  They drive crazy here, and it is absolutely not condusive to Boton style walking.  It is by far the thing that makes me the most nervous.

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 This is a man I started talking to.  He could not actually speak, he had pieces of paper with a few sentences written on it.  I did not even mean to start talking to him, but I thought the oragami made out of leaves next to him was a really animal... and of course I wanted a picture.  I gave me Gri Gri, the bug looking thing next to him, and made me a hummingbird out of leaves.  I left them with my hostel the Wandering Paisa as I did not think I could bring them with without destroying them.  I took them into the Botanical Gardens with me when I went back to sit and study my spanish, and all sorts of Colombians get stopping to ask me about them.  It was really quite funny.

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 I actually ending up picking up these Colombians with Gri Gri.  They were quite lovely.  Another example of the amazing kindness I was greeted with when travelling around Medellin.  I hung out with them the rest of the day, and part of the night, having a blast practicing my spanish, and working through the language barrier.  Thus far, it has been one of my best days.

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 Torry, one of my Colombian friends, in the Casa de los Mariposas, with one sitting on his rosta hat.  

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A few other notes.

• My hostel was perfect. Its called the Wandering Paisa Hostel.  I left a review on Hostelword.com.  Its friendly, fun, and a great please to meet people and go out, without being a crazy party hostel. 
• I am sorry I have not been on top of my skype account.  The hostel I am currently at has free internet, but no headphone or microphone.  I will be finding an internet cafe tomorrow to remedy that.
• I will be updating again very soon, because I have a lot to tell about the beginnings of Santa Marta, but I figure this is enough with just Medellin.
• I will write soon, with less time in between this time, I promise.  Once again, my apologies.

Pura Vida!

Goodbye Puerto Rico and Hello Colombia

The past few days have been a whirlwind.  I said my last goodbyes to my family and my brothers friends and spent my final night in a hostel in San Juan, expecting to keep it pretty tame due to my flight the next day.  Well, there happened to be a really good crowd of people at the Juan International Hostel, and post pizza party, thrown by the owner himself, they convinced me to go and shake my groove thing, and forgoe sleep.  Around 4am my cab driver almost slept through picking me up, but I was still able to get to the airport an hour and half ahead of time. Thank goodness cause I ran into a few issues, and almost was not allowed on my flight.  The people at the airport were very kind and helpful, and bent a few rules for me.  If you want to know me, ask me in person, I would rather not publish it on the internet and get anyone in trouble. =)

I make it to Colombia, and towards the end of my flight I started conversing with my nieghbor.  She is a wonderful woman, vice president of a major healthcare union in the United States, and is trying to helping poor workers in Colombia have a type of union support group without getting in trouble with government.  A bit of a sticky situation, but its wonderful that she keeps trying.  She was giving me advice, and trying to hook me up with a friend she has in Medellin when I tried to use the ATM and could not get my card to work.  She lent me 10,000 mil pesos, enough to take the shuttle into the city and then the metro to get to my hostel.  I just want to emphasize how kind people have been to me thus far.  The instant I left her and was looking around for the shuttle, a man notices my confused face, and immediately offers me help.  He explained my public transportation options, and left me off at the shuttle.  The shuttle driver made sure I some of the passengers that were walking to the metro went with me, and helped me find it.  Those two American men were extremely kind, taking me under the wing for 30 minutes, giving me advice, and helping me find my way.  We had to go seperate ways on the metro, because I had to switch lines.  As I was trying to figure out where to go, I almost accidently exited, and a Colombian lady, who overheard our questions to other Colombians about where I need to go, prevented me from going in the wrong direction and showed me the way.  She was getting off at the same stop to meet a friend.  The two Colombian ladies then wandered for about 10 blocks with me, trying to figure out exactly where the hostel was and would not leave me until I was safely in my hostel.  It has been wonderful.  The people are so kind here.  Everyone gives me their contact information in case I get in trouble and need help.  It is kind of crazy.  There simply is not this kind of kindness in the United States to complete strangers.  I have been told the people are either the most kind you will meet, or complete scammers.   I will have to keep my wits about me.

I cannot seem to figure out how to get my pictures on this computer, but I do have some pretty ones of the view from the hotel in Puerto Rico, and of me and my Dad just before he left.  I will try posting them next time.  It has been such an amazing week, getting to spend time with my friends and family prior to starting this trip.  I have hit a few snags in this trip, like my debit card, and issues in the airport, but everyone is so helpful that I am (thus far anyways) easily overcoming these obstacles.  Hopefully that will continue.  Life is good.  =)  I will write again soon.  (PS apologies if my grammar or spelling is terrible.  Everything is underlined in red because I am typing in English and not Spanish.  lol)

Pura Vida

Puerto Rico

Well hello my darlings.  I hope you are all doing well.  I had some rather tearful goodbyes a few days ago with many of my close friends and especially, my handsome man and adorable kitty.  Goodbyes are the worst part of going away on a trip.  At least, on the sad day that my trip has to end, I will get to look forward to the Hellos!
Puerto Rico has been a whirlwind.  My favorite thing at the hotel is definitely the bed I get to sleep in.  It is probably the most comfortable amazing bed I have ever slept in.  Yet this country/state/territory whatever you want to call it, is to beautiful to spend the whole time in bed.  Instead we have been partying and celebrating my brother Dustin's marriage to Andrea (a great addition to our family... she is just as feisty as the rest of us), enjoying the sun, and getting to know their friends.  I see more parties in our future. =)  We rage well together.
A picture is worth a thousand words so here are a few of my favorite pictures I took this weekend.  Everyone is sooooo happy and I love it! 

The beautiful bride post 'I do'!

Dustin and Dad.  Just a little happy =)

Dad, Andy and Tyler feeding the fish off the dock

 

Dustin and his boys (this does not capture their raging properly, trust me)

 

Cheese and Mini... brother and sister for life! (obviously)

I should post more but I want to upload some photos to facebook and make sure I am all set and organized for the next few days.  And I promise I will post a view from the room and of the hotel grounds.  

Pura Vida

Time to Blog

My last post began with me talking about how long it had been since I had blogged, and how I was going to start again.  Clearly I did not stick to it, as that last post was back in 2010.  But here I am.  Back again.  And this time, I promise I will blog on the reg.  I am about to embark on another great adventure into the wonders of the world outside of the United States.  Since you last heard from me I graduated Magma Cum Laude from Northeastern University in 2011 with a degree in Environmental Studies and International Affairs.  It has been almost a year since I graduated, and you may ask (as everyone else in my life has been) what am I doing with my degree?  Uhhhh... thus far, not a whole lot.  But that is about to change.

On April 19th I will be hopping on a plane to Puerto Rico for my brother Dustin's and his fiancé Andrea's wedding.  I will be spending four days and three nights in a high-class resort with my family and their friends before hopping on another plane to Medellin Colombia.  This will likely be a shock to my system, going from high class to backpacker style travelling, but I am hoping to take it in stride.  I plan on doing some volunteer work in Colombia, travelling around the country, and then making my way to Ecuador and Peru, where I will be meeting up with my close friend Cassie to more volunteer work as well as more exploring.  Along the way we will be joined for two weeks by our friend Micala who we will see again in Lima.  Some other friends have stated they would like to join me, but at this point, who knows?  More details of the trip will follow in future posts.

At this very moment I am at home helping take care of my Mom, post shoulder surgery.  Tomorrow I have to leave her (too soon!).  My Dad will be picking me, taking me to visit my grandparents, visit my godparents (my fairy godmother taught me all about being a thrifty shopper - comes in hand when trying to save for a big trip) visit my brothers and then hop on an overnight bus up to Boston.  And this is where the countdown begins.  I have exactly 50 days before my flight out of the United States, and I must finish planning the important details of my trip, pack up my life in Providence and move it all home for storage purposes, work as many days as possible in order to fun this trip, and try to complete as many things as possible on my bucket list for the New England area.

This includes but not limited to:

• Using that rock climbing deal I bought months ago through living social
• Salsa dancing lessons with James
• Visit the Harpoon Brewery
• Visit the Sam Adams Brewery
• Go to the top of the Hub aka the Prudential Center (yes I have lived in the Boston area for almost five years and have yet to do it)
• Go to the beach with Levy and Nicole
• Go for a hike with Rob (and other friends I am sure!)
• Play with Ollie as much as possible
• Have the most extravagant potluck yet!
• Spend as much time as possible with my friends who will be missed dearly!

For now this is all, but I promise (really this time, I will) more posts will be coming your way soon!

<3 Pura Vida =)

its been a while

So I suppose it has been a while since I have created a new post. The original intention of this blog was for friends and family to be able to follow my doings while I travel, but I realize for many of my friends and family I am still quite far away. Plus, it would be good for me to be in the habit of updating a blog, I always intend to be transient, and discovering new places and things. I am pretty busy lately, with school and work all the time. Penny Lane caught her first mouse the other day (for anyone who doesnt know, that is my purring little cat). She is such a killer.
I am very excited for this coming weekend. I am leaving Boston and exploring someplace new! The environmental and geology club at Northeastern is running a free trip up to Freeport Maine (ironic i know) and various other locations in Maine, mostly along the coast I believe. The group is pretty awesome, and I am just so stoked to get away for a weekend to do something new. I need to crack down on doing school work this week so I dont have to worry about anything on the weekend, which could be a little tougher, but we shall see. I just need to find motivation... I know its hiding around here somewhere....
hmmm well thats it from now... more after maine probably... unless something epic happens this week.