I like my job!

I do!

Why? Well.-. It's just more interesting stuff to do! Like this week for example. Had meetings with one of the gringos I did the presentation for and now we are trying to get money for a container to put outside the COFERENE building that would make it easier for people to drop things off, pluss it would be kind of a sign as well because it will have our logo on it. And I'm also trying to make a "shopper's guide" kind of a list of brands/products that are env. friendly/has recycable packaging.
AND friday I'm doing my first presentation in SPANISH! Not a whole one, but one part of it. Scary.

And there's more:) Tomorrow I'm going to San Jose with my boss to visit one of the factories that we cooperate with! Will see the whole recycling process, great for a recycling nerd like me8)

ANother thing I would like to share, actually two more things but this first..I am very facinated at how creative some people are! Came over som products during my research:

A mirror made from fashion magazines!

A Lamp made from snack bags and candy wrappers !

This ring is made from an old spoon!

And I loove this clutch bag, it's made from old ties!!
(All the products were found at thedailygreen.com)

The last thing I feel a need to share is a wonderful book I read here. It's very girly but oh so good, called "The Chocolate Run" by Dorothy Koomson. Which is a must read for anyone that likes chic-lit and chocolate:D

Helg! Weekend! Fin the semana!

Hellu,

It's been a while, and that's not good because that means I have A LOT to write about! And I can't really be bothered always..

Right now it's raining like crazy..it doesnt rain often, this is actually the second time while I've been here but it's sooo much rain when it first begins and soo noisy. But I was lucky, been outside the whole day and five minutes after I get inside the house it began:)

So yes, where to begin. The presentation on wednesday went really well. According to one of the guys I rocked, jajaj:D (jaja, is like haha in spanish by the way)

On friday I was going to my second dance class, but the electricity dissapeared for like 2 hours and since it difficult to dance without music and light I couldn't go:( Buuut I was kind of happy..I was sooo tired. My family is amazing tho..they lit up a bunch of candles and we sat together and had red wine, crackers with cheese, tzatziki, and olives. And they were telling me stories from when they lived in Lima, Peru. It was during the civil war (the period of Sendero Luminoso) and the car of Daniel, the father here, exploded one day he was at work because someone had put a bomb under it!! Apparantly they were both targets because they worked for a public university..crazy to think about.

Saturday we went early in the morning to pick up the daughter that lives in San Jose and went on a trip together to a nice place almost in the middle of many coffee plantations by a lake.

My hostparents:)

It's Close to Cartago. Had a very nice lunch there and the BEST coffee I have ever had in my entire life. Oh my god it was sooo good I find myself craving it all the time now. I think I even had sweet dreams about it last night. Unforgettable.
This is how they serve the coffee. Very fresh coffee, the plantation is like 10 meters from the restaurant and then they put fresh grouded coffee in the little bag and pour boiling water over. mmm:)
The flower that looks like a shower is La Reina de la Noche. It's apparently like a drug, kind of like marihuana..

Fountain by the restaurant we went to!

Stopped in Orotí, a village that has one of the last churches still standing from the colonial times.

And here it is:)

Sunday I worked from 8-4 with Abby. It was a fair with micro companies, kind of a marked with small local companies here in San Ramon.

Our stand

Most of them had things to sell like food, jewleries and clothes but we were just there to inform people about Coferene.

We had the nicest jewelery makers right next to us and Im soooo proud of myself because I managed to not buy ANYTHING! :) And because the whole day I spoke a lot of spanish. i speak spanish everyday at work and stuff but it's not really that many to talk to there but today me and Abbi have been speaking a lot the whole day, and I finally feel like my spanish is improving, or at least my confidence to speak! Happiness:D I'm sure I still sound like a retared person at times, but who cares;)

Some local entartainment!!

Ate some typical Tico food as well. Rice, beans and tortilla cooked in banana leaves.

Muy Rico!

And for desserts, Trés leches which is a kind of cake made with 3 types of milk. Normal milk, condensed milk and anotherone I can remeber..but it was very good! And of course some more amazing coffee. I will seriously buy a suitcafe full of coffee before I go back to Europe. And fruits.

That was the weekend! Next weekend, big party in San Jose! It's the birthdays of two other volunteers so should be good fun. And in a week and a half my parents arrive!:) Will be a great chance for me to see more of the country, very excited about that. Love this country, I really do. Pura Vida!

I am wearing 10 plastic bottles!!

Yup, it´s the day of my first solo presentation today! The americans are coming around 2pm and I am going to present information about COFERENE, how to recycle and what the recycled products are used for. I have really enjoyed working with this presentation. We have been doing a lot of research about the companies we sell things to, which products they make etc. And today I found out it takes about 10 plastic bottles to make a polyester t-shirt. Hadn´t really thought about how polyester is made but I must say it´s a bit disturbing that I´m basically wearing plastic! Well, hopefully at least it´s recycled..

Other products that are made from out recyclable material includes:

• Plastic rubbish bins (made from plastic caps!)
• walls for housing (Gypson Fiber Boards made from newspapers and telephone guides!!)
• toilet paper
• new glass bottles
• new plastic bags
• clothes (polyester)
• and if I understood correctly some of it is made to make car oil..

I find this super facinating which is scary. I´m turning into a real recycling nerd already 8)

I´m not really nervious for this presentation tho. It feels different because for once I don´t have to worry about getting marked on it, so it´s less pressure. I´m only doing this to informe people and I like it:) AND it´s in english:)

Found out I will have a looooong holliday as well!! When my parents are here it´s easter break so I will be off work from the 31st of March until the 11th of April!! And the only goal of that holliday is to see more of the country and work on my tan. I´m sure it´s going to be horrible ;)

Went to aerobics and spinning yesterday. HATE spinning still, but then again I´m doing a lot of things I don´t really like here (for example going to dance classes alone without knowing anyone) but my hope is that I will hate it a bit less in a while...Don´t hate the spinning it self so much anymore it´s more the sweating part. I was SOAKED. Really. But I´m sure it´s good for me.

PURA VIDA! :D

Bailando, Bailando!

Yo,

Yesterday was first day of dance classes at Merrecumbé. Interesting experience!
First of all I couldn´t find the place. I had been there before to sign up and thought I knew where it was but nooooo..my sense of direction is very very bad. But after some asking around I found it and thanks to Tico time I was not late!
Secondly, I thought it was going to be mostly tourists and foreigners in genereal as it is a very basic course. But again noooooo. I guess my steriotyping is bad..I thought all latinos knew how to dance already, but they don´t because at least 30 of them is in my beginners class. And mostly couples. But I did found 2 foreigners I could feel weird with. We didn´t really do much dancing the first class, started by laying down on the floor! At lot of talking, some rythm exersices and some getting to know each other exersices. Nice poeple tho. After that we began with Merrengue. When the dancing began I was in for a bit of a shock. The instructer brought ME to the middle of the circle of people to show them how to do the steps when it was time to couple up. Sweatted a bit in that moment I must admit. But it was fun. Next class is friday.

Today I´m actually bussy at work. Realized I haven´t really done that much work with the presentation which I have to do tomorrow, but have been working hard the whole day and it´s looking pretty good now if I may say so myself!

Also done a bit of research for when my parents come in just 2 weeks. Yay for holliday:) I have to leave the country when they are here because I´m only here on a tourist visa so I have to leave the country every 3 months to get a new valid stamp in my passport! SO the plan is to go to Granada, Nicaragua, an old colonial city close to a lake called Laguna de Apoyo, and I´ve found a place to stay that just seems like heaven on earth.
http://www.sansimian.com/



Just hope they have available rooms! During easter a lot of people will be travelling around so it might be difficult! Fingers crossed.

Anywho, think that might be it for today. Need to finish the presentation. Work-out meny today will consist of aerobics and perhaps a spinning class if I feel ambitious!

Kos og Klem sendes hjem:) xxxx

Guapiles!!

Hola a todos :)

First some pictures of my house and the view from my house, it sooo nice at least when it's not cloudy!



Had a lovely long-weekend in Guapiles with Therese. My boss gave me friday off so I could go visit Therese´s project :)
A little summary of the weekend:

Thursday: Arrived around 8-9 and was picked up by Therese and her family. Ate fruit, relaxed and went to be early.

Friday: Got up early, went to the hogarcito and met the kids. There are 11 kids there between the ages of 4 months and 4 years and they are all soooo cute I might have to take a few of them with me before I go back to Norway;)

We had breakfast there, bread and beans, and then we played with the kids all day. It was soooo warm tho, not very pleasant when you have to run after 11 kids!

Had lunch there as well, rice and beans of course and salad..mm:) I loved it! My family in San Ramon is not vert typical Costa Rican and they NEVER eat rice and beans!! After lunch we watched TV with the kids, changed some more diapers, played some more, had coffee and at 4 we went to town for some shopping! Bough some stuff and some beers and then we went home. Chilled out, had dinner (rice and beans) , met some more family/neighbours and hung out in the very nice terrace area drinking beer and talking.

Saturday: Had breakfast and them were invited to go to the country club that the family is a member of. It was sooo nice! The weather was not too good, warm and cloudy but no rain so we had almost the entire place to ourselves. We chilled out by the pool, played some tennis, had a really good salad and mango juice (the fruit juices in this country are AMAZING:)

Went home, chilled, changed and then went to town for a bit more shopping! I finally found some sandals:) Bought rum and coke of course and got ready to go out!




We went to a very typical costa rican "night club" which was more like a bar..or something with LOADS of people. All locals of course. So it was rather funny when me and Therese arrived. We both felt so weird because when we got out of the taxi and went into the place EVERYONE stared. Like really stared..we felt like 2 monkeys. Anyways, bought some more rum and coke, talked, met a very strange guatemalan guy who showed us very bad magic tricks, but he gave us nice bracelets..and then we met some other nice people so when the place closed we went with them to another place that was more like a nightclub but they played sooo good music so the rest of the night was spent dancing the night away salsa style. Loved it!

Sunday: Such a lovely lazy day. Slept a lot, ate more rice and beans and watched a lot of tv in bed with fruit and chocolate:) Around 3 I went back to San Ramon which turned out to be a looong journey because of a traffic accident. But I got home safe around 9 and it was nice to be home again:) Briefly met one of the daughters of my family as well.

Now I´m at work, preparing my presentation for wednesday when all the gringos are coming. And tonight is my first dance class, which I´m so ready for after saturday night:) Really want to learn salsa properly!


Take care! Hasta Luego:)

Nuestro Futuro!

That means our future! Came over this picture while working on my presentations today, brilliant! But scary also..

Nothing much to update about here. The sun is shining and I saw no dogs on my way to work today :D

Hopefully will take friday off and go visit Therese´s project In Guapiles! Would be so nice, she works with small cute children. We´ll see if I can..

Lunch time! Hasta Luego ;)

Noen ganger er det alright :)

Noen ganger skal det ikke så mye til for å gjøre meg glad! Gi meg en hard treningsøkt og noen salte nøtter etterpå, og det er gjort:) Det var i går..en dag som ble ganske så begivenhetsrik etterhvert!

But first, had a lovely weekend with my swidish friend Therese. She came saturday and we had lunch with my hostparents, homemade pizza, and we had an effective shopping session..with a lot of money flying. Buut we bought pretty things. Just look at this:)

At night we went out for a beer and a meal with my parentals and the me and T went out to check out the night life of san ramon. It was not bad at all, some cool bars and good drinks. We even found a place with free drinks for girls between 8 and 10 but the line went on for miles so we couldnt be bothered. Good night tho with laughter and good conversations, but I should really have avoided the last shot of Tequila...

Woke up sunday morning feeling everything but good. AND my camera was gone. Great way to wake up. Went to have breakfast and the camera was in the kitchen! My host father came up to me and asked me if I knew where he had found it. Outside. Right next to the gate. Ups. But again, lucky!

Walked around in town a bit, had a very healthy lunch:


And then it was time for my BFF to leave.. :(

In the evening I took a 2h nap and then watched the WHOLE Oscar program with my host mum. And ate candy worms (Thanks for forgetting them Therese :)I enjoyed it.

Then monday.
A guy from ACI came to check that everything was ok. Pretty standard stuff. How are you. good. see you later, that kind of thing. Then this guy calls to arrange a presentation to a group of 15 people. Americans. In english. So more work for me which is thumbs up!!

On my way home from work I almost cried. Two new dogs wanted to attck me and even when I got off my bike they started barking and run after me:( I was not bitten this tiem but I'm now oficially scared of dogs.

Went to the gym in the evening. First Yoga class and it was sooooo weird because after a short conversation like what are you doing here etc. it turns out the yoga instructer is the same american guy that called my work earlier that day asking for the presentation!!! How weird is that.

Did Yoga and aerobics:) Also found out my personal instructer is also a nurse. How cute is that!? This big, big (og ganske kjekke) guy is working as a nurse. (Ble bitte litt forelsket da han sa det, men det har gått over nå;)


Picture from one of the presentations. We did 11 presentations last week!

Hope all is well with everyone around the world! Love from Pura Vida Costa Rica :D xxx

I was bitten by a dog today:(

Ok. Gonna start with the dramatic insidence. I was going home from a rather shitty day at work. The newspapers hadnt been touched since thursday and the pile had grown several meters!! And I had to climb over small mountains of shit to get to my little table. Anyways. Went back on my bicycle and was first chased by one fat small dog who gave up the chase after 5 meters. 2 min later 2 other dogs started chasing me. A bit more fit and aggressive dogs. I panicked and started going faster and I tried to kick them. Bad idea. The smallest one jumped up and bit my leg! Not hard or anything by he bit me. And now Im scared of dogs. Good things do not come in small packages anymore. The small ones just bites you:(

Yesterday on the other hand was a good day! I met up with 3 nice girls from the University and we went to a school. Then we had 3 presentations for three different 6th grade classes, it was great! The activities are really good! We have a fairlytale that deals with environmental problems, and one of the girls made some amazing illustrations. We do some other stuff as well, talk about recycling why and how to do it, and then the kids have to come up with ideas how they can help the env. and so on. Its simple but its sooooo much better than packing newspapers! Im doing more with them tomorrow which is good:)

This evening I went to the gym again. Did aerobics first and it was fun but SO warm! It was like doing aerobics in a sauna. I lost 2 liters of sweat I think. I also met some nice german girls and they "forced" me to come with them to spinning after the aerobics class. It was a bad idea. I hate spinning and even more when its 30 degrees inside the room!! So I sweated another 2 liters. Seriously, I looked like a drowned cat afterwards. But now it feels good:)

On my way back from the gym I saw something funny. A old truck couldnt start in 1st geer so there were 2 people running next to the car pushing it and when it got some speed the engine started and the people jumped in the car. It was exactly like a scene from little miss sunshine:)

Would really like to know how you guys are doing as well!!!! Comments are appreciated ALOT ;)

Take care and Pura Vida!!
Besos xx

Back from weekend in Heaven :D

Greeting folks!

Had a lovely weekend, but it started out BAD. The weather in Limon has been crazy and really wet and the morning before I left I was told there was a bridge that had fallen apart on the way to Puerto Viejo, and also that the weather was HORRIBLE. We are talking big floads. BUT I wanted to go no matter what. Have been missing my hostal family too much!

I went to San Jose at 7am from San Ramon, took the bus from SJ to Puerto Viejo at 10am and arrived safe and sound in PV at 3pm. Looong and HOT journey, but met up with Sabine, had a beer and life was good again:) The others came by car from SJ and arrived in the evening. It was SOOO nice to see everyone agian! And the place is soooo different! It was like being in a different country. Its on the carrabean coast and many of the people living there are rastafaris, and old european hippies. So the atmosphere was great, really chilled and laidback, but alot of gringos! We stayed at rocking Js, a really cool hostel where you can rent hammocs (hengekoyer), tents and also cabinas. The hammocs you can also use anytime you want and its right by the beach. Heaven. And they have the best strawberry juice ever. Its called a juice but its like a smoothie, me liky alot:)
Friday night we hung out at the hostel, had some drinks and alot of fun. We went out to a club right on the beach which played loads off reagge music so you could dance if you wanted to or sit on the beach by the candles and hang out..I loved it, and damn those rastafaris can dance!!!

Saturday was also great despite a little headache...we drove to Manzanilla, a beach 20min from our hostel. It was Heaven.

The ocean was a bit crazy, but we found a hole in the coral reefs and had our own little private swimming pool:)

I really want to come back here:)

Saturday night we went to a nice, cozy reastaurant and had RICEandBEANS. They eat it all the time all over the country but in Limon they prepare it with coconut milk, it was really nice. AND I had the best Mojito I have ever had!! :D

We had some drinks and went back to the beach club, but we were all so tired and didnt stay out that long. Sunday we had breakfast, chilled in our hammocs and went back to SJ around 1pm. Luckily I didnt have to take the bus by myself again, we drove:)

SO this is us right before going back.

Rocking Js has very stickt rules when it comes to smoking marihuana: PLEASE go to the beach and do it..
On the way back..so strange the difference between the climates. When we got over the mountain to SJ the air changed immediatly from humid and warm to a typical nowegian summer evening..and San Ramon was rainy and foggy:( But it was kind of nice to be back and sleep in a bed and not in a tent. I had a really good day back at work today, will write about this tomorrow!

Hasta Luego:)