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Volunteers At Last

We really lived it up during our last week as Peace Corps Trainees! On Wednesday, we met with all of the other TEFL trainees in Frailes, the biggest of the TEFL training communities, for a final Spanish class celebration. We played games involving astonishing amounts of teamwork and balance, ate delicious “gallos,” taco-like creations with sausage, beans and salad, played bingo and learned the Costa Rican national anthem. It’s actually a lovely song. We had a great time and enjoyed unwinding with our friends and fantastic language facilitators.

On Wednesday night, we La Filers and our friend Ken from El Rosario caught the Christmas bug and decided that we needed to go caroling… immediately. (For those of you that know me well, this should be no surprise!) So we borrowed some Santa hats and went from host family to host family singing our hearts out. We didn’t have any music and most of our members didn’t know the words to the songs, but what we lacked in preparation we made up for in spirit. Along the way, we were invited in for soup, soda, and cider, oh my!

Then came Friday and the event we’ve all been waiting for: the SWEAR-IN CEREMONY! The ceremony took place at the U.S. Ambassador’s house near San José, most definitely one of the most luxurious houses we’ve ever visited. What a treat! We were all dressed up (I wore the beautiful green dress Grandma Joanie recently made for me) and our host families were there to support us as well. We listened to uplifting and inspiring speeches by the director of Peace Corps Costa Rica, our training director, the ambassador herself, and our talented friends Maurice and Barton. I was even asked to interview on two separate Costa Rican television channels! Then we swore in and accepted our certificates, took a bunch of pictures in the beautiful yard, and celebrated with our friends and family.

Later that afternoon, our La Fila group found a fantastic Lebanse restaurant and for once really splurged. It’s bittersweet ending this stage of our Peace Corps adventure and leaving the friends and families we’ve grown so close to during training. We’ve got lots of work and cultural integration to look forward to though!

Our youngest host brother José was the man of the day today as he graduated from kindergarten. We were invited to his graduation ceremony and really got a kick out of all of the funny kids and the lack of separation of church and state. José did a great job performing his class’ Christmas song: an all-Spanish version of “Feliz Navidad.” We’re all very proud of him.

Tomorrow we’ll finish the week off right with an early Christmas celebration with our wonderful host family. We bought the boys a baseball bat and ball (go figure) and a game of UNO. Our stockings are looking awfully heavy too!

On Monday morning we’ll be on our way to La Rambla, our new home. Here’s to 24 great months of service ahead!

Comments

Karey said…
Congratulations you guys!!!! Your pictures are so great! Good luck on the next chapter of your awesome adventure! Hopefully we'll connect on Christmas. Love you both!!!
Karey
December 18, 2010 at 8:26 PM
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