El Oso llega

Well, I did not go out into the forest today. All night long, I woke up every hour on the hour, alternately thinking either: “Yes, my eye is better; I can do this” or “No, my eye is no better; I have to stay in.” At 6:00 I finally got up, determined to go out in the forest. I started getting ready but quickly realized that my eye still did not feel good and finally made the executive decision that I was not going to the forest today. Immediately after I made this decision, it began thundering and pouring down rain. It continued pouring all morning—Rob and I got soaked when we ran up to the kitchen for breakfast.

I’d intended to spent the day doing something useful—entering data. But instead, I started reading a book that a tourist had left behind (The History of Love by Nicole Krauss—so far, one of the best books I’ve ever read) and before I knew it, it was 2pm. At that point I hurried up and tried to get some of my data entered.

Late this afternoon a little girl showed up for English lessons. She is the grand-daughter of one of the cooks who works here, and Rob not quite sure how this happened, but he thinks he may have somehow agreed to teach her to speak English. Rob was just getting ready to go on a bike ride, but he stopped everything and we both began to teach her some words in English. She's really sweet and really bright. After Rob left for his bike ride, she and I kept talking a while, and she was picking up the English words really fast. I really don't know the first thing about teaching someone to speak English, but I thought we'd just start with the basics, "Hello, What is your name, How are you, Please, Thank you" etc...

About that same time, Bernardo showed up. Yes, Bernardo, El Oso. My sometimes friend, sometimes “almost” friend—Bernardo. He’s doing his dissertation research on capuchin monkeys in Costa Rica, and he popped up here for a surprise visit. We celebrated his arrival with good Nicaraguan beer—the first drink I’ve had since leaving the US. I’ve included a photo below—Bernardo’s getting skinny!



My eye feels better, so tomorrow I plan to be back out into the forest. Simeon is going to come with me on Friday instead—he got a gig leading tourists up the volcano tomorrow, and the pay for that is pretty good. Since I didn’t get to collect data today, this new plan actually works out better for me. That's all for now; thanks for reading.