San Jose Orientation

I can't believe it's already September! This past weekend, I had an orientation with AFS. We took the 6:30 bus from Perez Zeledon to San Jose, a three-hour bus ride, and we live the farthest away out of the people at this orientation, so we ended up being the last ones there. We had about 5 hours to talk with all of the exchange students which was really nice, but it made we wonder why we couldn't have slept longer and gotten there later. We started having the boring orientation stuff after lunch. First we went over all of the rules of AFS for literally at least the 5th time. We then started talking about things like risks and risk management. We played charades with topics of sexual misconduct. I don't know who thought it was a good idea to have teenagers act out sexual scenes, but we all got a good laugh out of it. 

We went to the hostel around 6 that night. We stayed at Hostel Toruma, and it was great! It had a really nice pool and outdoor seating area. Also, I got lucky. I got placed in a room with friends, and we didn't have a shared bathroom. We had our own shower with hot water! This was the first time I have taken a hot shower in 6 weeks, so I definitely enjoyed it. We all hung out, and I had a great time talking with everyone. We played a ridiculous game that night that the Italians taught us. All of us stood in a circle. Each boy was given a number, and each girl was given a letter. Someone stood in the middle and called out a number and a letter. If your number/letter was called, you ran to try to kiss the other on a cheek. For example, if there is a boy standing in the middle, the girl who was called runs and tries to kiss the guy in the middle on the cheek before the guy who was called can kiss the girl on the cheek. This was absolutely hilarious to watch and play, but I don't know if this is a game I will be teaching to people in the US. 

On Saturday, we went to Inbio Parque. We had a bunch more boring orientation stuff, but then we were sent on a scavenger hunt. Ryan, Abby, and I decided to split from the group and take the hour and a half to explore. I am definitely glad we did, because we had a great time exploring and taking funny pictures. They ended up not naming a winner for the scavenger hunt because everyone did so badly. After even more boring stuff, we finally went back to the hostel around 5:30. There was a talent show at 8:30, so my friends and I took the whole time to prepare. We ended up doing a medley of Mother Lover, Sorry 4 the Wait, Baby Got Back, and Super Bass. I'm not going to lie. I was absolutely terrified to do Sorry 4 the Wait by myself because I really didn't want to get in trouble with the volunteers, but luckily, it was all extremely well received! The volunteers couldn't stop laughing, and all the other exchange students were cheering us on. We ended up winning, and they wanted an encore, so we did it again. I felt reassured that I wouldn't get in trouble, because the volunteers recorded it. It felt really good to do it so well and to win. We were rewarded with pride, cookies, and lollipops.

This morning, the last thing I wanted to do was leave, but knowing I will be back in San Jose on Thursday made it a lot easier to leave.