Anticipating

We know one thing....where we will live for the next two years.  The Hubs and I will live in Santa Cruz, Guanacaste.  Okay, we know a few more things, such as our jobs (I will get to in a little bit), where we will be living, and where other Tico 23ers will be living.

Our jobs-The Hubs will be working with up to 9 English teachers in a bilingual cologio (high school).  He will do things like co-plan, co-teach, conduct English conversation clubs, and other neat things to help the teachers and students improve their English.  That his is primary job being a TEFL PCV.  For his secondary projects he says he wants to work with young kids and/or teens.

I will be working with our regional English assessor creating uniform observation forms, observing teachers in our region, and facilitating workshops for English teachers in the escuelas (primary school) and cologios.  I will be doing a more administrative role (I think), which is what I want to do after the Peace Corps.  Regional assessors are equivalent to district managers in the retail world.  This is a new job in the Peace Corps Costa Rica world.  For my secondary projects, I would like to do something with teen moms/young women about parenting and taking care of themselves and maybe an exercise group for women.  However, our secondary projects will be based on the needs of our community more than what we want.

Speaking of our community, we will be living in a larger community than most Peace Corps volunteers because it needed to support two people.  We are about an hour from the beach and half an hour from an international airport.  And has just about everything we need and want to live.

We will be living with a couple possibly close to our parents age who have grown kids.  We have been told we will stay in their upstairs with our OWN BATHROOM!  I am a little excited because our two room apartment has felt extremely small the past 2 1/2 months.

We will know more of what our community looks like, our jobs, counterparts, (Tico co-workers) and host family soon.  We leave today for a 2 day workshop with our counterparts.  Then on Saturday, our counterparts will take us to our communities.  This is for everyone in our group.  We will no longer be living in walking distance from our friends.
Once we get back from our site visit we will only have 1 1/2 weeks left together before we swear and do what we came here to do, make a difference.  While our group is diverse and unique we have become pretty close knit.  It will be hard saying good bye to more people, but it will only be for a short while and we have some cool places to visit.

So friends and family in the States and in Costa Rica, be thinking of when you want to come visit us.  The Hubs and I would LOVE visitors.

PS Sorry for the lack of pictures again, still having problems with posting pictures.

Informing

This past week was Tech week here in the training world of a future TEFL Peace Corps Volunteer.  We each visited a current Volunteer at their site and work along side them.  (Each program has a tech week during training and they trainees visit a current Volunteers in their project field.)

The Hubs and I visited an awesome couple who basically dominates the TEFL world.  :)  We were able to observe and teach with them at their night school, primary school, high school, and community class.  

We lived with a host family to continue working on our Spanish.  Our host family was the most adorably sweet family.  They have 3 kids and the cutest pets.  They were so patient with my Spanish and welcomed us into their home for the short week.  The host mom and her sisters were the teachers and director of the primary school we worked at.  

We are now back home and getting ready for the last stretch.  We only have a month left in trainee.  Can you believe the Hubs and I have been in Costa Rica for 2 months!  

Here is a quick run down of what our basic week in training looks like, what we have done up until this point, and what were are doing here on out.  

Our typical week:

Mon.- Spanish class*  (8-3:30)

Tues.- Tech (TEFL) training (8-5)

Wed.- Spanish class*

Thurs.- (PC) Core training 

Fri.- Spanish 

*We also teach in a local school for a couple hours during class 

What we have done in training: 

Visited the Peace Corps office in San Jose 

Visited Volunteers in Costa Rica for PCV Visit**

Visited Volunteers (in the same project) for Tech Week** 

Attended VAC dinner in San Jose 

What we have left to do in training:

Find out our permanent site 

Visit our site during Site Visit**

Project Partner workshop-where we meet our counterparts we will work with at our permanent site

Family Party-throw a party for ALL the host families from the training communities

Swear-in

Move to our permanent site

**As a married couple in the same project we were able to go on visits together.  However, if you are a couple in different projects you will do the first two visits separate.  

We also have been to visit family of our host family, stay in a hostel after VAC dinner, experience Holy Week, and just see the country.  

Sorry, for the lack of pictures.  I am having trouble uploading them on blogger so just check out my facebook for pictures.  

***Congrats to two of our best friends on the birth of their first child!  We love and miss you JKJ!  

Settling

We have now been in Costa Rica for 6 weeks.  I had a moment yesterday where I realized I was living in another country.  It was surreal.  In about 3 weeks we will find out where we will be living for our 2 years of service.  Because they have to place 2 people in the same site we have a better idea of where we could be living than the single volunteers.  It will most likely be one of two places since there are only 2 married couples in our group.

Yesterday, we had a TEFL project fair.  The project fair was wonderful because we got to meet actual TEFL volunteers and learn about some of the main projects they have headed up at their sites.  The TEFL objectives are to improve teachers' English and teaching methods and students' English but we are encouraged to embark on other projects outside of that as well.  Some of the projects I enjoyed learning about are community English classes, book clubs, and facilitating workshops for local teachers.  We also got to have cafecito and dinner with most of the volunteers in Costa Rica yesterday.  It was nice to get out of training site and meet others in similar situations to us.  I am now extremely excited to find out our site and get there.

I will leave you with this little fact from Costa Rica:  They call James Hardin (from OKC Thunder) Mr. T.  That made me smile.

Challenge:  What is something that has made you smile or excited for something else this week?