Happy July! :)

I cannot believe it is July! :O July 1st is a big milestone in my Brueggeman project: OFFICIALLY one month down and exactly one month until I am flying back home to the US! So I celebrated by going to Starbucks (this is a no-judgment zone, BTW), where I purchased a nice cookie & a chai tea latte. My only regret being that I don't regret this purchase at all... >:D

This week has gone pretty well! I've been in a really good mood, which has helped with the less not-so-good stuff. For instance, on Monday I had a bad salad and suffered some rather unfortunate consequences for about 48 hours. Manageable, but unfortunate nonetheless. :p However, I am happy to report that today I have been able to eat without feeling too horribly queasy! Another reason to celebrate with a cookie and super unhealthy beverage.

On the subject of food, I really impressed myself last night by making little mini pizzas with eggplant! Super basic (stove-top made with sliced eggplant, some marinara sauce, and mozzarella cheese), but the beautiful thing about eggplant is that it doesn't take much to make it really good. In my humble opinion, anyways. My little eggplant pizzas were REALLY good! I will definitely do it again soon.

Eggplant pizza!

Tonight for dinner I think I will make green beans--I got some fresh (?) ones from the store on Monday. And something else, but I can't think of anything right now that I have at the hostel that will go well with green beans. So, I might just eat green beans and eggs for dinner. This illustrates quite well the food struggles of this summer. I never have needed to consistently cook for myself before. Also, we don't have a working oven at the hostel I am staying at, so that eliminates A LOT of options. I have a stovetop, a microwave, and fridge at the hostel. And a blender. It's been working out fine the past month, but I've definitely had to adjust! And adjusting on the fly means a lot of over-easy eggs and grilled cheese; based upon that, I really think I went above and beyond last night with my mini eggplant pizzas. Again, as I've said before--it's the little things in life. :P I have discovered that I enjoy cooking for myself, though. So come fall when I have the beautiful conveniences of an oven and an unnecessarily bountiful American grocery store, I think I will really enjoy making new, more adventurous things. :)

Nothing really abnormally crazy to report about work this week. I have mostly been working on further updates to the Malawi literature review. Thankfully, it has been pretty easy. The president wanted us to reformat the appendices, so I have been working on that the past 2 days. Unfortunately, that required looking up every reference in the appendix, but it was only about 30-40 references--manageable. I have to do one more bit of research and then HOPEFULLY the literature review will finally be done!

We are working on the China capital investment project--well, kind of working on it. Amidst all the other assignments, I haven't had time to do research for it, but luckily we have until July 10th or so before it needs to be completed.

Also, today during my lunch break I played ping-pong with some of the IT guys! I won one game and lost another. Apparently, ping-pong is still called ping-pong in Costa Rica. It was fun! :) Tomorrow everyone is going out to celebrate one of the consultant's last day at Sanigest. He is leaving to go to graduate school in the UK. Yay, workplace bonding!

As for this weekend, I will be with my family again! However, some different living arrangements have been made. I will be staying with a host family for two nights! :D I am VERY excited about this. For one, less money (always a good thing), but mostly because I really want to experience some Costa Rican culture. You might say, "now, Haley, you've been in Costa Rica a month! You have definitely experienced the culture by now!" Yes, of course, but there is something important you need to realize about Costa Rica: it really thrives from tourism. And an unfortunate side-effect of tourism is the catering towards the needs and wants of tourists. So, every weekend I have been traveling to touristy destinations, experiencing the "culture," but in a way that is undoubtedly tainted by tourism. And as I am living in a hostel, I don't get to experience much during the week. Therefore, I am VERY excited to go live with a Costa Rican family this weekend! It might only be for a one day and two nights, but I think that should be enough to give me a taste.

Besides that, I am going with my mom's students (yay, high school kids--just kidding, I'm sure they are all lovely) on a boat tour of Isla Tortuga! Again, thankfully paid for by my loving parents. <3

Here is a map-- Isla Tortuga is basically in the center of the triangle made by Puntarenas, Jaco, and Montezuma

If you've been paying attention to my travels, you've probably noticed that all of my trips have been concentrated on the Pacific coast. This is because there have been HORRENDOUS flooding problems on the Caribbean coast. Over a thousand people have been evacuated from their homes, the Panama government has sent helicopters to help with search-and-rescue missions, 25 communities have become completely isolated, and the president of Costa Rica has (I think) declared a state of emergency. 

So, that is why I haven't traveled to the Caribbean coast. No worries, I am perfectly safe in San Jose. For as small as a country as it is, Costa Rica is INCREDIBLY diverse. It's truly amazing. The Caribbean coast is under a state of emergency, San Jose experiences mild weather akin to late-spring of Ohio, and the Pacific coast is blistering hot with extreme humidity. Quite interesting!

Anyways, off to make my green beans and "something else." ¡Hasta luego!

amdg.