Hello all,

I made it to Costa Rica! My host family seems incredibly nice. I will give you an account of what has transpired so far:

I...

got through customs here in Costa Rica even though apparently they frown upon filling out the immigration papers in pencil (so I got plenty of practice with filling those out). Then I met up with my host family who drove me from the airport back to their house in a rather roundabout way so that I could see what San Pedro is all about. Then we settled in the house, and I unpacked in my new room. The room itself is very nice. I have plenty of space and I have a bathroom all to myself. After a few minute of unpacking I watched bullfighting with my host father for a little bit and he tried to explain to me what I should be looking for in a good bullfighter.

After that, I played video games with Sebastian (11) and Nicolas (9). They are into the exact same things as little boys in the U.S. (monster trucks, japanese cartoons, sports, video games, and toys). We then ate dinner and watched a bit more TV. Then we tried to get the wireless internet to work on my computer but that proved to be difficult without the correct password so my host mom called a computer-savvy neighbor to help out. Then I decided to head to my room for the night (I had to be up at 3:30 am to catch my flight to Houston that morning).

I slept from 10 to 8 am and this morning I watched soccer with my host dad, played video games with the boys, and played with the dogs for a while. Then the boys decided that they wanted to go meet my "novia" so we took about a 10 minute walk over to her house. When we got there, it did not appear that anyone was home so we turned back and the boys spent the rest of the walk home throwing rocks at each other. As a third person, I came in handy as a human shield.

When we got back to the house, we went to the mall for an afternoon of pleasure. First we had lunch in the food court and then I went to play mini golf with the two boys and one friend named Jose (11). The youngsters weren't overly concerned with the mini golf rules and usually resorted to using their hands after not finding the hole after a few strokes. We only made it to the 16th hole of mini golf before we went to the movie theatre to watch the Spanish-dubbed version of the new Disney movie Bedtime Stories (Cuentos que no son Cuento). It was entertaining and funny to see Adam Sandler's lips move to the sound of the Spanish language.

After the movie we picked up some cups of Mr. Mango, a stand that specializes in shaved mangoes with sweet/salty toppings. I had plain old mangoes with lime and salt. It wasn't bad. After we got back, we watched Costa Rica lose to Panama in penalty kicks in a World Cup qualifier (Sebastian seemed quite displeased with the result). During the game, we also played Jenga. Let me tell you, 9 year olds don't have the motor skills for Jenga, but it was fun anyways.

Now I am in my room getting ready to hit the hay for the night as I have to be up at 6:30 tomorrow to catch the bus to the ACM building because classes start a bit earlier than usual on the first day.

This is all for now,

Scott