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I will be home, in California this Saturday, around 8pm after over 15 hours of traveling, so I thought I would make one last entry to fill you all in. Haven't written in about 3 weeks, so I'll try and make this short: Went to a bread museum with my class instead of having an exam, left on a bus to go visit my friend Ariel from highschool who is living in Puntarenas, rode around on beach cruisers, went surfing, sliced my foot open, laid around on the beach, went to a carnival where we were going to watch a mini running of the bulls inside some arena, which ended up being cancelled because of rain. Was entertained on the bus ride by a drunk Spanish clown though, who in between pulling oversized shoes and wigs out of his bag, would pull a liter of alcohol t and then laugh histerically for about 20 minutes. Went to a huge soccer game between Puntarenas and the team from San Jose, Saprisa, which during halftime we left and went and jumped in a pool because it was so rediculously hot, was taught some new spanish slang that you just don't learn in class, and took the bus back to San Jose after Puntarenas won with the drunkest group of people on a public bus I've ever seen. Went out to Saltan's, performed a really embarrasing lip sync to Jaunis' "fotografias" with my Spanish class for a talent show, baked Christmas cookies which surprisingly turned out pretty good despite the difficulties of translating, went to our school's goodbye party for all us international students, then went out to Terra U, had a Christmas party with my class, went shopping, then left for Nicaragua the next day... After a 9 hour bus ride from San Jose, Melanie and I arrived in Granada, Nicaragua. The border crossing was a little confusing, but once we actually got across we were greeted by two huge volcanoes on the edge of a lake to our right, and a beautiful sunset to our left. So the last part of the bus ride wasn't all too bad. We found a hostel called Oasis, booked our bus tickets back and exchanged money all with very little difficulty, and then went out to explore the town. Granada is a gorgeous city, to say the least. Our hostel, for $6 a night, had a pool, hammocks all along the garden, and a spiral staircase leading up to the roof with a view of the whole city. We met up with a couple other students from another program when we were there, and the next day we all went to spend the day at a lake that was formed in the middle of a volcanoe crater. Spent the day kayaking, swimming, laying on the floating dock, playing frisbee, eating lunch off banana leaves, and reading. It was pretty perfect. When we got back into the city we headed to the town square to go check out the local artesanias, but the power went out and left us stranded in an unfamiliar city in complete darkness. Aparently all of Nicaragua is having huge power issues, and our hostel actually only had electricity from burning oil. So, we migrated toward the few restaurants that still had lights, and had a fabulous dinner to the beautiful sound of rediculously loud generators. We ended up going to bed pretty early that night, since the whole town pretty much shut down after that, but at least this way we were able to get up early and have a nice morning exploring the city before taking the bus back to San Jose. It was a perfect last weekend in Costa Rica, even though technically I spent it in Nicaragua... This week has been more than a little crazy: class, packing, tests, presentations, etc. Our family had a goodbye party for us Tuesday night, and invited all of our friends, after which we went out to Saltan's. I came home with the intention of working on my presentation for the next morning, but instead was kidnapped by Catalina, Leo and Christine to go check out some random house they claim is haunted. Christine left yesterday to go back to Guatemala. Our whole ISA group had a dinner last night at a really pretty restaurant with a view of the whole city. Marcina left this afternoon. I finally am done with all of my classes, and now it's just down to Catalina and me at our house... Tonight we are going out to Castro's, and tomorrow are spending the whole day lounging in Parque de la Paz before going to Cafe Mundo for a class of wine and one last night in Latin America... See you all soon!! Love.
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