Hey guys here is another story from paradise so of course you have to read it. One thing which really surprised me of Puerto Jimenez was that there was actually something happening in this small village. The whole town celebrated an event around a decorated tree. It kind of surprised me because the decorated tree and some singing children were the only things present. Though, it was quite fun and interesting to see how these people make fun. In addition, I experienced two earth quakes already and I really felt a strong vibration on the walls but nevertheless not that scary as I thought for now!
A few days later I went to the primary school to assist the English teacher. I have to say it can be really fun to educate children. The teacher explained me what the assignment was for the children, which mainly consisted of learning them new words and how to count. Eventually in the break we all played tag or football which was very amusing because these children were all very active. The only difficulty I encountered were children who did not listen what I was explaining and then I didn’t know how to handle as a teacher. However, the overall experience was really nice and very interesting to see it from a different perspective.
Additionally, my supervisor asked me to join her to a fund raising market just half an hour from Puerto Jimenez on Friday. Everybody had their own stand and were trying to sell a variety of jewelry products. We were promoting the Cat & Dog Rescue project and people could donate money or participate in a bingo whereas the participant could win a brand new surf board. After the market was finished, the place was turned into a dancing area and everybody had a good time.
In my free time I usually go walking with a local guy and just check what’s going on downtown. Local people tend to watch a lot of television and in most cases football and also the local church was very impressing where people were singing together and it seemed like some kind of exorcism was going on but yeah that was my impression 😛 Our supervisor also arranged two bikes for us, I already went to the beach which was pretty nice to bike on a road surrounded with a lot of nature, the sun shining and quality music.
Of course also some work has to be done, so the basic tasks this week was working on processing the data of email respondents from student volunteers, contacting tour operators for a possible cooperation with Green Life Volunteers, working on a clear financial oversight of incoming volunteers and reading the terms and conditions and reflect on it. All this work is an ongoing process so this has to be updated during the whole internship.
We also went to the Panama border to extend the visa of Guanhao. The boat left at 6:00 in the morning but our supervisor was too late because she had to wait for a friend who wanted to join. This was a real adventure because our boat had some technical problems during this trip. Eventually, Janina her friend came with a private boat and we continued the way to Golfito. We took a taxi and arrived on the border with Panama. Though, it seemed they invented a new rule that Chinese citizens cannot travel by land to Panama but they are allowed travelling by air. That was not very logical but we had to accept it, so we had to come with a new plan to go to the immigration office in San José and after that we will participate in a turtle conservation project. We also saw some dolphins which was pretty cool. That was my story again, thank you for reading haha and enjoy your day!
