I've got jungle fever, she's got dengue fever...or so we suspect - July 3rd - July 5th

July 3rd

- Took our first lab practical exam - a test on a Saturday?! You've got to be kidding me. A lot of work went into preparing for this exam and I'm hoping my grade will reap the rewards - I'm thinking a B probably, depending on how hard they grade the short answers.

- Finally got to go in the garden at the station! Didn't realize it was right across the driveway because it blends in so well with the rest of the area - native plants tend to do that. It is a very cool and very pretty garden though! Part of our lab exam was in it.

A new take on hanging baskets

The plant that the first Costa Rica group all got pictures next to at Volcano Poas in 2008! I now know this plant as Gunnera insignis. It is endemic to Costa Rica and biologists believe it is insect pollinated and bird dispersed. Its leaves are very thick and produce an alkaline chemical to ward off herbivores, but there is a species of beetles capable of digesting this chemical and therefore attack the plant. Can't say I haven't learned anything!

This whole section of the garden is epiphytic plants growing on old logs and tree branches! Very cool and something I wish could be easily done in the U.S! Unfortunately, most of the plants are bromeliads or orchids and do not do well in cool climates.

- Saw a cool "chrome-plated" beetle at the station while we waited to take part of the exam

- Prepped for diversity indices day by hiking to a stream with a waterfall and sampling macroinvertebrates using nets. We put the macroinverts in alcohol to kill them and then we will identify them on Tuesday and calculate a diversity index for the stream. Forgot my camera on this little outing, sorry!

- Mid-day, Alex went to the clinic. She's been running a fever for a few days and is only getting worse. The doctor suspects that it is Dengue Fever. There has been an outbreak (8500 cases) in the Guanacaste region (in which Santa Rosa is located). Dengue is transmitted by mosquitoes; so don't worry! I can't catch it from Alex and I would already be showing symptoms if I did have it. Ellie and I have been doing our best to help her out with stuff.

- Played some Scrabble in the afternoon. Then Ellie, Alex and I played Clue while most of the gang pregamed to go to the bar - let's just say their evening sounded like it got a little out of control. Glad I stayed in and fell asleep on the couch while watching Ferngully with Ellie and Bridget. Our first attempt was to watch Good Will Hunting, but the burned disc wouldn't play on my computer. Then we moved on to Boondock Saints which is in my itunes. However, computer speakers are very quiet and this is a confusing movie to watch when you can't hear much of what they're saying. We finally decided that you didn't need much sound to understand Ferngully, but I guess a movie with no sound puts you to sleep really fast. It was fun because we got to borrow the projector and set up our own little movie theater, but next time we need to remember to borrow speakers too. Also, it's amazing how many species we could identify in Ferngully! The animation is worse than I remembered, but they must have done some research when they made it!

July 4th

- HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY! FELIZ CUATRO DE JULIO!

- I miss fireworks. They are one of my favorite things. Thank you Brandon for setting off a few little ones before I left!

- Did homework in the morning and attempted to upload pictures to facebook, but it's only letting me upload 5 at a time...I have like 400 pictures.

- Went horseback riding in the afternoon - James' horse tripped leaving the stable and James flipped over the horse's neck. At one point he was completely vertical with his feet in the air. Luckily, he didn't land very hard and wasn't hurt at all. He took it like a champ, but apparently this is a pretty regular occurrence every time he gets on a horse! I had a nice grayish horse. She reminded me of an old lady driving - she went very slow, but did not like when others tried to pass her and would therefore start to speed up. We rode down a road and then into some pastures. The pastures led into the forest. There was a very beautiful, misty atmosphere that is typical of the Monteverde region, but something that we hadn't fully experienced yet. Ellie has most of the pictures of me, but I'll put up some that I took.

James before the horse tripped.

Ellie in the pasture.

- We stopped at this old strangler fig tree. It was hollow on the inside and our guide told us we could climb up part of the way. It was very very cool! Almost like a natural jungle gym!

- After horseback riding, Ellie and I walked to the store in the rain to get some Powerade for Alex. She wants everyone to know what good roommates we are! It's not short walk to a convenience store around here!

- Went to a 4th of July cookout at Alan and Karen's - they have an absolutely beautiful house! It just fits right in with the surrounding cloud forest! It's very cool. I gorged myself on delicious American food (yum!) and cuddled with they're precious kitty! I miss my Charles Kitten!

- Alex woke us up at about 2:30 am. She felt really sick and so we went to get Moncho (our TA). She had been drinking water, but there were no salts or nutrients in her body to absorb it so it was flowing right through her - really not a good thing! Basically she could keep drinking water and still get dehydrated so now she has to only drink Powerade.

July 5th

- We had three lectures today! This is getting more intense than real school... The lectures were on biodiversity in the tropics, bird diversity, and how to calculate diversity indices.

- We walked to Spanish in the pouring down rain, but then Alex and Moncho's pick-up truck taxi (they were on the way to the doctors again) pulled over and took us the second half of the way to Spanish. Moncho said we deserved it for taking care of Alex. We still had to ride in the bed of the truck though, I guess it's because we were soaking wet - thank goodness for rain gear though! I was completely dry when I got to Spanish!

- Like I said, Alex went to the clinic again today to have more blood work done. We won't know the results until tomorrow. The doctor called this morning with the results from her first blood test - apparently her white blood cell count is below 2,000 and normal is between 4,500 and 10,000. We're doing our best to keep her in good spirits though! She still manages to laugh and smile when we make jokes about stuff even though she isn't feeling well at all.

- Read some articles for the midterm on Wednesday - I have so much work coming up! Besides this exam, I have a quiz and an essay for Humans in the Tropics due by Thursday, Spanish homework due on Wednesday, and my independent research project to be thinking about! Then on Friday, we leave for the second camping trip!

- I talked to Karen about my independent research project again today. I told her I wanted to do something with water quality and macroinvertebrates. I want to start doing more with this at home, so I thought I might was well start learning about it here! She suggested doing a project at Guillermo's farm (the coffee grower from the other day). There's a stream that passes through his farm and some sort of mechanical shop or something has a discharge point along the stream. They're interested in knowing if this discharge point has any effect on the macroinvertebrates or water quality. To do this project (or really most water quality ones), it would be best for me to live at a homestay in Canitas, which is a more rural town (I might get to live on a farm!) outside of the Santa Elena/Monteverde/Cerro Plano region. This is going to mean that I'm about an hour away from the station walking. There are cabs in the town that will take you from place to place for a reasonable price so that's good at least. I won't have internet at my homestay most likely so I'll have to come to the station or where our Spanish classes are for free internet, or pay for it at a local internet cafe. Internet here is pretty cheap to use though, so I'll make something work! The internet availability and usage here is so different from being in the U.S. though! It'll definitely be something to get used to.