To Ellie, From Lauren

Dear Lauren,

YOU GOT A TATOO?! Hahaha, I'm somehow not surprised. Your summer sounds amazing, mine was great as well. Summer O definitely formed a similar family and had lots of fun.

Well I arrived in Costa Rica last Friday night and have been here almost a week. I am staying with a mother (I call her Nena) and her older daughter Karen, who lives here but is gone a lot at work etc. There is another daughter who is 30 who comes home on

the weekends, but mainly lives in San José. I have been eating Costa Rican food prepared by Nena and so far I've liked just about everything. Rice with black beans (called Gallo Pinto) is the staple. Also they make delicious drinks of blended fruit juice called Frescas, which are super yummy and I have one almost twice a day with meals. The only thing I'm not too keen on is the amount of fried food. I am craving a fresh salad!

There are 14 students in the program here, one from Australia and the rest from the US. Three

of us are from Chico! And there are a few others from CA as well. The group has been going out almost every night and enjoying the cheap Costa Rican beer, neither of which I'm particularly fond of. But I still hang out with them all most nights and have fun.

My classes are really cool, and definitely not as tough as some of the classes I've had at Chico. Most of them only meet once a week. I wasn't planning to take Spanish (and I had 15 units

without it) but when I got here, my host mom speaks no english so I decided I needed to audit Spanish as well. The spanish class is 8 units, so hopefully I won't get overwhelmed. I'm also just showing up to the latin american dance class which is super fun! (And I think I'm the best US dancer in there, not to toot my own horn [actually, being the leader is much more difficult, so I don't envy the guys]).

I have my bird book and binoculars and have been notating when and where I see each species. I talked to the professor who is really into birds and she said campus is an excellent place to birdwatch (there is supposedly over 100 species on campus). This is a blue-crowned motmot I saw.

Oh yeah, did I mention that I live ACROSS THE STREET from campus? Its pretty cool. The USAC staff is super nice and helpful and we always stop by the office to chat or have coffee, tea or water. I tried the coffee here and I actually like it! It doesn't need any milk and tastes much different from the coffee in the states. The one I've tried is made in San Ramón, but I'm going to a coffee factory tomorrow, so I'll probably try some more. Thats one of the field trips that is included in my program.

On a personal level, I've managed to keep up with my journal here, and I noticed yesterday that I stopped bitting my nails, and have no desire to do so. Also, I realized that this experience is absolutely perfect for me and I love it.

With much love always,

Pura Vida

Ellie

PS: I have two huge dogs outside my window. Here, dogs are more like animals and less like members of the family, so I think the attention I give them each morning is much appreciated. I snuck them a tortilla that I couldn't finish the other day. :)